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Good GMs Podcast - 4 - The Best Little University in East Texas
49 Plays16 days ago
Welcome to a very special episode of the Good GMs Podcast! Today, we PIVOT TO VIDEO~ And are joined by the legendary founders of 12 to Midnight, Ed Wetterman and Preston DuBose, to talk all things Savage Worlds: East Texas University (ETU).
*Youtube listeners have heard this episode, and can skip ahead to the eleven minute mark to hear an EXCITING ANNOUCEMENT! Good GM's will be hosting our first ever actual play on Patreon, FOR FREE, of Fresh Blood - join now and get notified when it drops! The show is available to all member tiers of the Patreon, but you must join as a member to see it! It's live as of 5/24/2026, go check it out!
Whether you’re a long-time fan of the Pinebox, Texas setting or a new GM looking for the perfect "gateway drug" into modern horror, this episode is packed with insights. We dive deep into the upcoming ETU: Fresh Blood Kickstarter, exploring how this new edition for Savage Worlds Adventure Edition (SWADE) revamps the college horror experience with graduate school options, refined ritual magic, and brand-new plot point campaigns.
In this episode, we discuss:
- The Origins of 12 to Midnight: Revisit the 2003 release of Last Rites of the Black Guard and how it all began.
- Fresh Blood Details: Why this is a "new game" with all-new plot points, Savage Tales, and monsters.
- Rituals & High Strangeness: How the magic system has been refined and why technology and magic definitely don't mix.
- GM Wisdom: Ed and Preston share their top tips for building a shared, communal storytelling world and keeping the "hook" alive between adventures.
- Chickens in the Mist: The notorious TPK adventure returns as a graphic novel.
Support the Show & Our Guests!
🎓 Back the Kickstarter! Don't miss out on East Texas University: Fresh Blood! Enroll at your own risk and grab those early bird rewards. https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/545820095/east-texas-university-fresh-blood-savage-worlds
🌐 Visit 12 to Midnight: Explore the cosmology of Pinebox, check out the latest blog posts, and find classic adventures like The Beast Within and the Last Rites of the Black Guard. https://12toMidnight.com
- Support Good GMs on Patreon: Free! Or let us help you launder money on our $99 tier https://www.patreon.com/GoodGMsPodcast
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- Subscribe on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3XSYh258bxrIjYuZpmdw2R
- Subscribe on Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/good-gms-podcast/id1851312721
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Transcript
00:00:06
Speaker
Good. Good. So good. Good. So very good.
00:00:28
Speaker
Welcome to the Good GM's Podcast. I'm E.E. Morris, and today's episode is The Best Little University in East Texas.
00:00:40
Speaker
And now here's Chuck and James.
00:00:47
Speaker
Hello everyone out there and welcome to another or possibly leaked first episode of good GM's podcast. My name is James and I'm joined by my excited and and humbled colleague,
00:01:03
Speaker
Chuckity. Hi, everyone. Glad you're here. not night i'm not excited at all. Not at all. I'm and collected. Today is a very special episode. we have ah We have some really awesome people here. We're going to tell you all about it. um We're talking about Savage Worlds. We're talking about East Texas University. um Why don't you tell us what's going on here today, Chuck?
00:01:24
Speaker
Oh, yeah. So today we have ah the esteemed Mr. Ed Weatherman and his ah sidekick or superior, we're not sure yet, Preston Deboe. ah And they are going to be going over some yeah GM tips, tricks, and things to look forward to with their new Kickstarter, ETU Fresh Blood.
00:01:46
Speaker
they they're the the owner founders of uh 12 to midnight games um which to me is kind of a full circle thing i'll explain this real quick which is the first um one of the first games i ran as a halloween story i looked online i googled like good ghost story to run then i downloaded it and i ran it um using like i bought it and i downloaded and i ran it using um uh white wolf which was the only system i knew how to run and uh it was cool it was about a nazi living next door and uh And some really cool audio clips that I got when I bought it. And it was called The Last Rites of the Black Guard. And it turns out years later, overheard, I was listening to Wild Cards playing an East Texas University game.
00:02:32
Speaker
And they were playing. And I'm like, how do I know this story? Like, how do I know this story? And I realized, shoot, it was a Savage Worlds game. And and this was after I had discovered and fell in love with Savage Worlds. So I'm excited to have you guys here. um yeah So tell us, ah tell us who you are and what you do. straight floor Well, I'm Ed Wetterman.
00:02:52
Speaker
I helped write East Texas University with my partner, Preston. um We had done a lot of games before that, but 12 to midnight going back to 2003 with the original release of last rights of the black guard. Um,
00:03:09
Speaker
And we got a whole bunch of stories that we can tell on that. But it takes us a while to write things because we do this as a side gig and for fun as much as for anything else. And so I think the first ETU took us about 10 years. And it looks like the second one took us about 12. So don't expect us to... And that's why you're here. That's what brought you here is this new edition of the story.
00:03:33
Speaker
And we're really excited about Fresh Blood. no So tell us, tell us about that. What is that? tell What's what's happening and why, why would this, what, what, what are we doing? You guys have a Kickstarter coming.
00:03:45
Speaker
What's. Yeah, we have a Kickstarter coming. We also just had more tales to tell, right? We, at our heart, we are storytellers as much as we are game designers, right? And we just had more stories to tell in the ETU universe.
00:04:04
Speaker
ah For those who aren't familiar with it, there's the core game about college students fighting the supernatural in rural East Texas. It's kind of Scooby-Doo meets Buffy the Vampire Slayer in East Texas college environment, right?
00:04:20
Speaker
So we did that. We did Pine Box Perils, where we introduced more bad guys because we just... couldn't cram enough in the main book. And then after that, we had this cool idea about, well what if they, what if they wanted to ce submit, spend a semester abroad?
00:04:38
Speaker
And so what are some cool places around the world that are similar to little old pine box, Texas, where they could also have supernatural adventures. And so we put out study abroad and, and that was a lot of fun. And we still had more stories to tell. And we thought it was just ah a good time to um To revisit the core setting because there were things we wanted to do like add graduate school so that you don't have to finish the game as as college seniors. You can continue right on into grad school with legendary rank ah characters if you want. That's amazing. We had more adventures to tell. And so we just decided it was time to come back and and um revisit the the core setting with Fresh Blood.
00:05:26
Speaker
That's awesome. Chuck, I think you're drooling on your microphone, dude. I'm trying not to. I'm so sorry. I'm not professional. I promise. um So, ah well, I mean, umm do you have anything else you would like to pop in on that?
00:05:41
Speaker
i mean, Preston hit it on the on the nail there, the nail on the head or whatever. Like he he's a he he's he's he's got a good concept of what we're about. And that's exactly When we came up with this, we decided we wanted to do a horror setting. And it led to Pine Box and the ETU. And you know ah and we've we're just blessed that this has gone on now for 20, 23 years, 22 years, of years.
00:06:08
Speaker
a lot of years you know you you you You two have created something incredibly special. It truly is. I was telling e earlier that um I have two 20-year-old twins, and I weaned them on Savage Worlds. I started recording not to put stuff out, but just because I'm lazy and it's for my note-taking. well mean football players, baseball players do it. And how can we, how can you do better? Um, so that was for me. And one of the first ones I recorded was with my daughter, my son, and then my daughter's eventual wife was for East Texas university. so That's awesome. That's just special all the way around. That's awesome. That's going to be great memories for you later. you can go back and revisit and it's ETU. So that just makes it awesome.
00:06:57
Speaker
ja And I'm a big fan of... go Go ahead. I'm sorry. No, please, please. you My oldest son is 30 now. But when he was 12 years old, he was playing the original ETU as ah as a child prodigy. And he was shooting people with shotguns at my brain.
00:07:18
Speaker
So I got you on the memories there. There you go. Yeah, no, I actually, when I discovered, again, it was the wild cards. And again, thanks to those those folks for doing that. um Oh, yeah. But it was it was, I fell in love with it. Like, to me, it was the, and I and i didn't go to university, so I was a little bit intimidated.
00:07:34
Speaker
But, like, for somebody who's a GM, what what, like, if they're looking for a new setting or a new story to tell, what, What do you think is like, like what makes ETU so special as far as like, where where where how how big can it get? how how how like How would you run it as far as a campaign? Because you guys use plot point campaigns, right?
00:07:58
Speaker
um what what would you say is a good like thing for somebody who's maybe run Dungeons Dragons before or run you know Call Cthulhu or something why would why would they really get excited about this because I know I am, I know Chuck is what what do you guys think is the biggest thing with the new the new Kickstarter that's coming Tuesday right, you said it's going to launch the Tuesday yeah tuesday the so for those of you listening to this beforehand you've got some insider information, we're looking at the 21st 21st of April twenty first yeah yeah of april I know. Ed, do you want to take that or do you want me to?
00:08:29
Speaker
ah Go ahead and get started and I'll follow up. ah Well, advice for GMs is, i mean, if you're coming from fantasy, it's dramatically different.
00:08:40
Speaker
setting Right. right so you have you have to have buy in not only from yourself but also your players about switching genres entirely but if you're going to switch genres entirely i would argue that etu is a rate gateway drug to other genres Because it is, it's our world. It's the modern world. It's very relatable. You don't have to explain um idiosyncrasies of other settings like you would, if it's a sci-fi setting or even the weird West or some of of other settings. You learn the lore as you go, right? You don't need to have a, yeah. Exactly. You learn things as you go. You have an inherent understanding of, the world around you, it just happens that the world around you also has zombies and ghosts and cults and things of that nature.
00:09:36
Speaker
Yeah. And I think that makes it a really great game for newbies as well, because it's like, you don't have to get into the hard fantasy right away. You're, you know, it's, this is the real world. This is your college kid going to college. And it's better. It's better that they come into it with this understanding that there isn't monsters because then when they discover monsters, it's like, It's like, oh, yeah. And, and you know, when when we came up with it, one of the things I've always, I loved back in the day, and I still love it, but I'm getting, it's getting dated now, unfortunately, but Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
00:10:07
Speaker
I love Buffy. I'm a huge Buffy fan, huge Angel fan. um And when they went to the fourth season of Buffy, where she went to college, they had so much potential and the writers blew it.
00:10:18
Speaker
In my opinion, the fourth. Oh, yeah. I think the writers absolutely blew it. And when they blew it, it made me say this could be done so much better. like College is such a great setting for this. And I think of all the great movies that that you've seen about colleges, even if you've never gone to college, you know, you put on any college movie that's ever been made, every comedy, every whatever.
00:10:41
Speaker
And you get ETU and then you add a little bit of horror mix to that little Scooby Doo to that, depending on how you want eat your flavor. We don't tell people how to play. You play your game. If y'all want to have a Scooby Doo fun time or if you want to have a horrific time, we can do both with ETU. In fact, you can go do both in the same campaign.
00:11:00
Speaker
ah Sorry to interrupt this episode of Good GM's podcast. I'm sorry, Chuck. I'm sorry, James. James, what's going on? We're really excited. As you know, we've been promoting this ETU Fresh Blood Kickstarter that's underway right now. That ends on May 29th. If you haven't already signed up, if you haven't already supported the Kickstarter, go join them now. Absolutely. But we got lucky. What are we doing on Monday, the 25th? We have been given the opportunity to do an actual play surrounding Fresh Blood podcast. We got a little glimpse into some of the mechanics of the game and we got a little glimpse into some of the bad guys that you're going to find out in, in my first rodeo is the name of the episode. It's going to be airing on our Patreon. Very nice. So you've got to be a member of our Patreon. So go over to patreon.com and sign up as a member. Then find us there. It's free. It's free to join. You don't have to subscribe. You you have to subscribe, but you don't have to be a paid subscriber to get this episode.
00:11:50
Speaker
But it's only on this episode. So make sure you check it out. Patreon.com forward slash good GM's podcast. You know, again, let's get back to that episode that we just interrupted. What do you say? Exactly. All right. Have fun. Be good. Back we go. And now we return you to our regular scheduled program in progress.
00:12:06
Speaker
Right. Right. Because for me, that that was one of the things why I i avoided ETU, sadly, for such a long time is because i i I went from high school to the workforce and family.
00:12:20
Speaker
you know So i I didn't get to do that. And so for me, I looked at it like i I don't have the first idea on how to. And I can tell you right now for everyone listening.
00:12:31
Speaker
just what these two men have put together. Like it takes that pressure right off the GM. Oh yeah. there's Right now. Like bing, bing, bing. Here you go.
00:12:42
Speaker
They made mechanics for how to be college. Everything else is storytelling and fun. Right. Yes. And I love that. I love that. And they break it down and you guys did a good job on that. It helped me understand. Oh, okay. And then like you said, you what what's that? You want zombies and animal house?
00:12:58
Speaker
Let's rock and roll. Yeah. new yeah yeah yeah so my favorite Some of our favorite things were like Red Necromancer. We're about this guy that's like, you know, keeping old people alive with magic so he can take their social security checks, right? Yes. You can do anything with this. Certainly, I love it.
00:13:16
Speaker
I love it. Yeah. I, I holler in Katie. I wrote the song for the, you know, I played it with like on guitar for everybody. And like, yeah, no, there's so many good stories and so many good little, and then, so I guess, I guess, okay. So the, the purpose of a plot point campaign, you guys have a, there's a, plot is there a new plot point campaign with, with, with the, Oh, cool. Yeah.
00:13:37
Speaker
So ha as, as, as somebody who, I don't know if other systems use plot point campaigns in the same way, like, I i think only Savage was truly does it this way. So explain if you want, if you would, what's a plot point campaign and how, how would you run it different? Like in terms would you, would you cast a hundred hooks into the water or would you run it episodic?
00:13:58
Speaker
Like, i don't know about a hundred, but I would cast extra hooks every, every time we played, see where the characters want to go. Yeah. Um, Shane Hensley, as far as I know, came up with plot points. And it's it's like mini adventures that that have an arc that go over ah a long term. So if you think of a, the best best way to describe it, honestly, is like a TV series. yeah You've got, if you're watching Supernatural, the first season, you've got a big arc on the first season, but not every episode is arc related.
00:14:26
Speaker
yeah And you do the same thing with your plot point campaign. Yeah, your big bad show up every four episodes or so to remind you you're still there. Exactly. And so you'll fill in the blanks with Savage Tales, with your own creative stuff, or maybe some of the previous adventures that we put out. You make it your own, but the arc goes all the way through to the very end. And so you have this this huge moment at the end where it's like, this is what we have to do to win. and it's it's Everything built up to this.
00:14:52
Speaker
Everything built up to this. And it's it's a brilliant way to do it. I've seen all sorts of other ways done. i mean, other people have done it with you know threads and things like this where this is a plot idea or a plot seed, go to here. But it's a little bit more detailed than that, but it's not as detailed as a as a solid campaign book that you might get from another company. right right But it but it but it's it's literally, this is what you need as a GM to sit down and play right now.
00:15:17
Speaker
Yeah, and it can go as long or as short as you want it to. That's the thing I like about the plot point campaigns is you could quite literally, if you had a 10-point plot point campaign, you could run that in 10 episodes. You could run it. you could or You could. Or you could do what I do, which is i'm I'm a sandbox guy myself where I will run it, and it'll take like three years to get through one year of college. But still. It's a lot of fun. And I really do like the mechanics of like, yeah, we just, we just, so we were out all night, you know, tracking down the vampire lair, but we have a test in the morning and how are we going to get this done?
00:15:50
Speaker
Right? Like I love that a project or something that you have to get done on the side or, or you're a football player and you got a game coming up, you know, are you gonna be back in time for the game? Are going be in trouble with you're get trouble with the ghost and it makes for great npcs it makes for great you know story storylines that that aren't necessarily about killing the monster it's it's it can be scarier to face your english teacher and tell them that you didn't get your essay done and you know some of the things that are fun about etu too is it's college these are kids trying to find their way into adulthood and They are trying to find love. They're dating. They're doing all the other things that you do, but you're also doing it on a budget, right? If you remember, if if you went to college, you know, you don't have, ah I didn't have a lot of money in college. I think I lived on $30 a week, literally. um And I stretched that to get but beer. So and i say it wasn't i priority real well, but you have to have priorities in college. And one of the very first games we played of ETU, we were doing a play test.
00:16:52
Speaker
And I'll never forget one of the guys that was playing was out of money because he had went bought stuff. And it was still had like half the semester to go. And he needed to date this girl to find this information out for the party. So he had to borrow money from another player to go take this girl on a date.
00:17:07
Speaker
And it was hilarious. It was so much fun. Like you can do so much with ETU. That's great. Oh, God. Yeah. Because, yeah, because i've I've always enjoyed that aspect of it is if the characters come in, especially the characters that took like poverty or something. So like they're there.
00:17:24
Speaker
You got your stuff. But what do you know? What are you doing for cash? how What are you doing? And then just the absolute bizarre stuff. That they will do. And the horrible situations I get to put them in.
00:17:36
Speaker
Because what's that? you youre're ah You just made friends with the grandson to the local Bruja? Congratulations. The pizza bar on Friday night is an adventure every time.
00:17:49
Speaker
Yes. Every time. yeah um And you guys have, you guys have have done a lot of work. The one thing I really loved about, you know, and still continue to love about ETU is like the way the magic system is. It's not your wizard. You cast a spell. yeah You have to find the pieces. you You have to find the, the, the, the spell in the first place. And I like, like, using the example i made one for like miss mildred's uh uh tea ceremony for protection or whatever and i actually went and wrote this poem for the players and they had to go get river water and a stone and they had to get yeah this feather from ah you know and i had to run out and find all these things and then they put it together and then they do their brit so what's what's is there any new exciting things for magic and stuff that you could talk about if you want that you i mean
00:18:35
Speaker
If you can talk about it. Yeah. Yeah. Well, Preston's a guru on that one. ah So, I mean, in short, yes, there, ah there were changes this time around for sure. um We did refine the list of ritual components. They didn't go away. That's for sure. You still do ritual components. If you saw Pinebox middle school, which is the stranger things version of ETU,
00:19:03
Speaker
Yes. um We played that's like ETU 1.5. So it's somewhere in between the first edition and fresh blood. Yes. So we we played with it there and then further refined it for flesh for fresh blood.
00:19:20
Speaker
Um, we, um, we pulled out, um, black magic for pine box middle school because it wasn't appropriate for kids, but it's, it's back in there for, uh, for fresh blood. And we did it in a way that I think makes more sense.
00:19:38
Speaker
Well, okay it didn't, it didn't, that it didn't make sense before, but, uh, we explained that, why in the world anyone would try black magic is because it makes magic easier.
00:19:51
Speaker
And so if you, your party is faced with a really, really difficult ritual that they need to pull off in order to defeat some bad guy, well, guess what? There's a shortcut.
00:20:03
Speaker
You can do black magic, but then you have to pay the cost, right? So that there's some additional ah room for conflict there. The other thing is that I ah clarified something that that I had wanted to do first time around and just didn't get around to doing, which is the intersection of technology and magic.
00:20:27
Speaker
okay And the idea that you could just use your cell phone and have a ritual on the phone or take pictures of something or video of something. And so this time we explained that it doesn't that technology and magic doesn't mix.
00:20:44
Speaker
There's always going to be entropy. And if you try to use your phone or whatever, Bigfoot pictures are blurry, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. It just degrades it. And it's possible that maybe you pull it off, but the ritual that results isn't the one that you meant to cast. Or maybe it bounces back on you. love that. Or you go back to the random demon table, you know, things like that. Oh, heck yeah.
00:21:08
Speaker
Heck yeah. Guys. Nice. Nice. So yeah let's say, let's say I'm new to Savage Worlds. Let's say I'm listening to this podcast and I'm thinking to myself, this sounds like a lot of fun. So I, I got to get the Savage Worlds core book, which is available, right? Like I can get that. And then I get your Kickstarter. I get this game. Do, do I need the, the horror companion? Is that a piece that I have to have to run ecu You don't. We do mention it in a couple places. We did ah borrow a few edges from the Horror Companion. So they're just copied wholesale out of the Horror Companion. So they're already in there. There are other places where we do reference and say, hey, if you want to use these optional rules, you can find them in the Horror Companion. But they're not necessary to play the the core Fresh Blood game.
00:21:56
Speaker
Because I know when and when the Horror Companion came out, I was reading through it, and a lot of what I was looking at was like, how do I incorporate this into my ETU game? Oh, absolutely. So, like, you were talking about Black Magic, and I thought of the corruption. Like, there's, there's like, ah ah ah in the in the in the Horror Companion, it's like you can have a... So I and incorporated that. I had a character who started to go down that dark path.
00:22:17
Speaker
yeah um And so that's... that absolutely fits ETU. I mean, it really does. Oh, every almost everything in that book. yeah I mean, god that was one of the first things that I did. I looked at that I'm like, oh, yeah oh, look at that chart. Oh, yeah. Oh, that fear chart. Well, the fear table. Oh, yeah. I did. And I've worn them all the time. I said, okay, guys, look, there there's fear and there there's terror.
00:22:42
Speaker
And when you fail this terror check or if you botch um the fear check, yeah, I get to roll my favorite chart. And yeah and I love, I love to look at their face where i get, I pull up that book and they're like, no, no, come on, man. so yeah. Oh, yeah, absolutely.
00:22:59
Speaker
Yeah, it's great. It makes for great storytelling, right? That's what the rules are are for. It's, yeah ah they they don't exist just for their own sake. They, ah they elevate the storytelling. There are tools in your toolbox to make for a great game.
00:23:14
Speaker
That's awesome. We also revised the way you use High Strangeness to make it more applicable to so tell us what tell us Tell our listeners what what High Strangeness is and then give us the play any little bits of what you can get right. So when it comes to paranormal ghostly stuff or aliens or whatever, there's a thing called High Strangeness. And this is what but people really believe. So I'm not making this up. But ah like strange things happen when aliens appear or ghosts appear whatever so that are unexplainable. So we we wanted to put that in the original ATU, and we did. The problem was it was very cool, but what we found is many players would would go off on a red herring trying to change down this high strangeness. And it was just weird thing where crows were gathering. It's that happened because of the haunting. So we actually came up with some rules and things on how high strangeness works to help the the Dean not have those problems. Nice. ice Awesome. Wow. Yeah. Good. Wow. Yeah.
00:24:15
Speaker
It's much more cause effect. That makes sense. And i yeah, that that's true. Cause I'll be honest. and and And that was one thing I always did too, is I would, I would have the, I would look at the high strangeness and then I'd roll something and I'd look at it and go, Nope, that's going to confuse them. um know they're goingnna be like oh if That's the truth. I mean, it's a cool table, but it's great. was a great idea. yeah purpose yeah The other thing that we've, we, Preston and i both agreed on early on when we were doing fresh blood is we did not want to just do ETU.
00:24:43
Speaker
Right. So what you've got now are is a new book. Okay. And even if you see things that are familiar, it's a lot of it has been changed and revised. It's for for Suede as well as for what we think is makes it a better edition. All the plot points are new.
00:25:03
Speaker
All the Savage Tales are new. We've got new monsters. Like it's, it's a new game. So you're not, you're not spending your money buying the same game over you which always irritated me. This is a new game. And suede is a Savage Worlds adventure edition for those new to. Yeah. yeah that's ah So that's the latest edition of Savage Worlds. That's awesome. um Go ahead.
00:25:22
Speaker
Oh yeah. ah So oh you guys had mentioned earlier that there was that like ETU wasn't the starting, you know, there was the 12 to midnight ah production stuff, which I love by the way, I did really seriously ah beast within, you know, all, all, all of that was yes Yeah. I mean, yeah. Right there. it's good Good horror. Good horror. i love It really is. And it was very, cause in, in, In the degrees of horror you guys mentioned, which was incredibly helpful to me, by the way. Thank you.
00:25:53
Speaker
ah Say, hey, by the way, you know this is a good idea to place like if if you want. here's Take this story. It could pop it in during this year or something like that. have a similar sidebar in Fresh Blood.
00:26:07
Speaker
how to old adventures, old ETU, all that stuff. That's awesome. That is absolutely awesome. and So would, would fresh blood be like, it would be something like, let's say you had a team at a party and you've been running ETU. Would you say that fresh blood would be a a whole new group of ah characters? Yeah.
00:26:28
Speaker
I would say yes. yeah but We have what we call old era and new era because people might be playing the very next year after they finish their ETU, right? Or they may be playing 10 years later or 12 years or whatever. so Or maybe they never played the original ETU.
00:26:43
Speaker
So the new era, you don't have to have played that to play this. There are still there are still links there. You can still see the continuity if you have. But if you haven't, you're not missing out on anything.
00:26:54
Speaker
Nice. yeah um Well, and you said the original book is, is you'd have to get a PDF or get lucky to find one, right? Like they're they're' they're not in print anymore. And so I think there's just a very few of them still left, but the PDF will still be available.
00:27:07
Speaker
Yeah, of course. Yeah. Nice. But again, you can use anything we've ever done. You can upgrade and put it into your own campaign. That's nice. Yeah. So even though we say for Canon purposes,
00:27:20
Speaker
first edition, and anything we all eventually we did before then, our first era, you know, and this is new era, which is later. That doesn't mean the DM can't take and pick and choose and do what he wants. and but But the point, the point is you don't need to have the old stuff to enjoy the new stuff. And if you do have the old stuff, you can still enjoy the new stuff without feeling like you wasted your, yeah, that's amazing guys. That's amazing. I'm so excited. So and we also have rules about bringing your pine box middle school character from new era into EGU.
00:27:49
Speaker
Oh, wow. They've grown up. They've gone to high school. how going to you So we we actually have rules for that as well. That's awesome. Oh my God. Oh So if you played the Pine Box middle school campaign, you want to roll in into each of you with the same characters, more adult.
00:28:02
Speaker
There you go. There going to go. that's i agree I have two burning questions. I'm sorry. We're on it. I got to ask. The first one is, um, because i again, I got you guys here. So I've, and I've been, I've been dying to know when is the original Pine Box?
00:28:19
Speaker
Like in your heads, when, when years that taking place? Degrees water. In your head, what do you think? 2009, 2002. 2009, okay. okay all right so now We didn't have rules for cell phones and things. We just talked about it. So now we actually have rules for cell phones and things. Because a lot of folks were confused. We didn't realize that. In our head, it was the 2000s. And other people were like, well, this is the nineteen eighty s No, it would be really cool, but no.
00:28:45
Speaker
I feel like you could run it. and and like That's the one thing I always thought was. In the era. I know when I was playing, so Chuck ran one. 2014. Well, and it well i I remember it was 2000, it was like 2000 and, ah you know, for a few years there. It was like, well, don't need to explain what year it is. doesn't matter. no we don't talk and i think wild cards ran last rights in the eighty s eighty s right yeah yeah they said it in the 80s so which is ruby that was yeah well i like i like the idea i think if i was to do something i think be neat to run last rights as and the player one of the like some of the player characters could be like sonya alvarez and and uh and and uh glenn yes glenn mcclanahan you know
00:29:31
Speaker
So it's funny you say that. We wrote an adventure and and and eventually, hopefully it'll get published. We turned it a long time ago. But Preston and I wrote a a three-part adventure that we ran at ChupacabraCon a couple years back. One of them was Pine Box 1880.
00:29:46
Speaker
And then you play the grandchildren of those kids in the 1930s. And then you play the grandchildren of those kids in 1980. And Glenn Mack is actually one of the characters as a young man in 1980. That's awesome.
00:30:00
Speaker
um It's like the Giovanni Chronicles, but with the... It's called Legacies because you you you learn things over this long arc. oh my God. and So hopefully that'll be out eventually. ah that is Oh.
00:30:17
Speaker
I'm so excited. I'm so happy. I'm so happy. I really am. It was a cool thing, but it's not really ETU per se, right? It does it doesn't fit in with either degrees horror or fresh blood. You're not releasing it, but it was a cool story is what you're saying. yeah We may release it. you may oh no we Hopefully it will. i be get going You can just go ahead send that to me. I'm i'm on okay with that, boys. It's good.
00:30:39
Speaker
You know, we'll we'll we'll run that. way We had a lot of fun with that one because I'm playing a little bit of Deadlands, a little bit of Deadlands Noir. And then, you know, the you know, with the the disco. Oh, damn it. it all the the main part of the third one. Press, want to tell them what the main part of the third one was?
00:30:58
Speaker
So the third one is set at a roller derby. Oh, skating rink and pine box. ah so there's a So we extensively used the chase rules yeah as a roller derby team. So you're one team and you have an opposing team and you're in this extended chase. And it it was a ton of fun.
00:31:22
Speaker
And that's great. That's great con. Yeah. No, that's great. I got my roller derbies in. Damn it. Yeah.
00:31:30
Speaker
that and that's something let's like Another fun thing about that is the first the first one, you're all it was when it was a Texas Women's College, East Texas Women's College, so every character is a female. And then when you get to the last one, most the characters are female because they're on the roller derby team. that's so It was a lot of fun.
00:31:47
Speaker
that is so ah You said you had two questions. Was there another one you want to ask My second one is, um ah because I completely agree with everything you guys said. like When I'm bringing new players in,
00:31:59
Speaker
In fact, my my wife, um you know, but a so a couple that she used to work with, they wanted to get into tabletop. And I said, okay, yeah, I'll run in through something. And my immediate go-to is ETU because it's just like you said, you can understand it right away. Yeah. And you know it. yeah And it's the buy-in is so easy for this. Yeah.
00:32:23
Speaker
So when it's fun to play 20 somethings, it's fun to, you know, like let yourself be stupid for a while. It's fun to remember what it might've been like in my brain. Right. so Even if you haven't been to college, like Ed said, like we've, we've seen the movies, we've consumed the media. It isn't like you really in college anyway. You're it exactly, you know what, you know what you want the college to be.
00:32:47
Speaker
Right. Whether it's real or not. Like I, I made a mistake cause I, again, I didn't know. um But the, ah the RAs in my head, it was like, oh, there's one RA for the building.
00:32:58
Speaker
And both um um especially my son's ah ah girlfriend. ah came back and I was still talking to her about it you know, just picking her brain. And she's like, wait, what are you talking about? No, that would be insane. There's no way. One person, no. Right, per floor or per wing, yeah. Exactly. And I was like, oh, okay, well, that's cool. That's something more I could put in. The other thing I really like is you guys, through when, especially for the study abroad, you had the archetypes.
00:33:28
Speaker
And I can't tell you how immensely useful that was for me because it's right now. Boom. Here you go. What do you want to do? What's that? You want to do the cowgirl? Hell yeah. Let's play. And the jock. Yeah. And you know, immediately, you know, because I could take those characters. I could take the horror companion archetypes and put them together. The only thing. Okay. Hold on. Here we go. Okay.
00:33:55
Speaker
The only thing that has been clawing at me for years now, gentlemen, because my daughter wanted to play the ROTC and you did not make an archetype.
00:34:07
Speaker
So this is my request. The ROTC. And then you have another beautiful picture of it's the lady, I think it's like the pink dress. The sorority girl.
00:34:24
Speaker
ah No, no, no, no. It was in the book. The floor link skirt. Yeah. Right. Yes. Her. Because you see her in multiple pictures. And you didn't make her either.
00:34:35
Speaker
Yeah. So this is my humble request. if you're going to archetypes. Honestly, that last, the the first one you talked about, the ROTC girl, yes came almost at the very end of the original ETU, so it was too late to get the archetype added in. oh Because that was actually my wife's character when she played this. Oh, nice. so that was my wife's character, yes. Nice. Yeah, my my my kid, that was immediate when she saw that because she's, she's sadly, she when she was younger, she got sick and she's so she's deaf in one ear. wow Wow. And so that was something, even as a little child, she said she wanted to go into the military and she can't. And so when we started playing, she was like, oh, I want that. and I'm like, okay, here we go. I'm sorry we didn't have that for her. Yeah.
00:35:22
Speaker
It's okay. You can make amends. Well, I'm excited for this. im excited I will warn you, we have different archetypes this time around. I mean, we have, so we have a long list of archetypes, right?
00:35:36
Speaker
But only a handful of them have art associated with them because art's expensive, right? and Exactly. ah My drawing would be stick figures. right so um So, yeah, we chose for for the ones that are pictured, We chose some, like they're they're all new characters, even if they're the same archetype.
00:35:59
Speaker
So we have an athlete, but it's not the same athlete as before. We have a cheerleader, but it's not the same cheerleader as before. So you're going to see some differences and some similarities.
00:36:11
Speaker
No, that's, that's beautiful. Hey, more. I'm okay with that. Yeah. That just, that just gives me more, more tools in my toolbox. Heck yeah. So that's awesome. Yeah. Um, we'll, we'll, I think, I think we should, we should, I mean, I'm having a great time, but let's, let's get to, let's get to the close, which is, so the, the Kickstarter starts on the 21st of April.
00:36:29
Speaker
Um, we'll, like I said, we're going to try to push this episode out. If not, it happened and hopefully you guys all bought it, but, um, But let's... let's what's say um Which should. Which they should, and I'm excited, too. I'm definitely going to be on on board for that. Thank you, guys. What... I mean, can you give us a tease on any of the any of the goals or any of the fun stuff that comes along with the Kickstarter, or...
00:36:54
Speaker
i mean it was a too early I thought you meant personal goals. I was going to be like, my personal goal is to make enough to buy an island. Right. that That's my goal. But not Island. Not Dale Island.
00:37:06
Speaker
No. that's we play now No, let's not be hasty. you know, you know. If you know, you know. Let's not hasty. That could be cool. So I will say to begin with that we have, of course, ETU, Fresh Blood, the rules and the plot point and all in one book. We didn't want to do separate books. as Oh, that's neat. Okay, cool. Yes. But we do have, and i I cannot wait for you to see it, Chickens in the Mist, the graphic novel. Oh, wow.
00:37:34
Speaker
I got a page of it. I got a page of it. it was And Suede, and it is Suede. We have the adventure for Suede in the back that has been updated for Suede. And with ah with the with actually characters and everything you can play right off the bat from from the comic book. In fact, I use those characters every time i go to a con now. Those are the characters that I'm using to to play with. yeah so And and chickens Chickens in the Mist is a notorious story in the Savage Worlds community of ah yes if you don't like your characters anymore, run Chickens in the Mist and get a whole new character. right it has It does have a reputation to kill everyone. But honestly, players are getting better because I used to kill everybody in TPKs and there's some that are... It seems like now I can't kill them all. i try think I think the only time I've ever run it or played it and I can't remember, but I think it ended up being a dream sequence because that way it didn't matter if we all died.
00:38:21
Speaker
If you put it in, if you put it in your campaign, put it early. So no one's really attached to the characters. Yeah. Yeah. Cause like, no, cause that, that story really is like you have what, um, dead lands, the night train.
00:38:36
Speaker
is synonymous with that and that is like that and then Chickens in the Mist and it it really is if you know you know it's like oh yeah oh and i am and I've read it and going that's another thing that i really want don' as I know we're wrapping but i gotta say guys it's okay we can keep going it's a It really is like your stories. It's not just fun to run. It's also just fun to read.
00:39:01
Speaker
they They really are. It's true. So for the that you're making this a graphic novel, yes, do more. Thank you. yeah do do man Do one of the um the the Savage Tale Beautiful Smile.
00:39:13
Speaker
I'll say this. don't know if we're going to do another graphic novel. That depends on Pinnacle. yeah But I will say that Preston and I have both written several short stories and Preston's going to be putting out a book of these very soon. let go run i lead to you this So i want to have you guys I want to have you guys on the show again because I think there's a lot of questions we didn't ask. A lot of gaming questions. um and know what one One thing I'd like to do when we have when we have guests on like this is if if you guys don't mind, what's one good GM tip? Not necessarily connected to etu or what's one what's the best what's your best tip to give our listeners uh so they can become good gms like you and i not me okay well well you and i did my tip is start the hook for the next adventure before the current adventure is over
00:40:11
Speaker
So that it feels like one continuous experience rather than individual TV episodes. Love it. Right. Good thought. Good, good, good. And one of the things I like to do, um well, one GM trick is definitely listen after every session, listen to your players talk.
00:40:30
Speaker
and steal their best ideas. Yes. Yes. and don't let them know you're doing it. But the other thing I would say is no matter how many people you have at your table, make sure you have a moment in every adventure or even maybe an adventure that focuses on everyone's individual character. Let them be the star for a while. i agree Let them at you know see where they want to go with it. If they play the love interest card, then by gosh, let's have a love interest. Let's have some fun with this. And, you know, you can just make sure the players, a lot of times I think early young GMs, like young deans will will say, well, this is my world and this I want to have happen.
00:41:08
Speaker
But the truth is it's a shared world and you want your players to have fun with it. Where do they want to go? What kind adventures do they want to have? and And, you know, let them have some control of that. And one thing about Savage Worlds, you can play those bennies as players and say, oh you know what? I think I see ah a friend of mine in this club and i I'm going to them. Yeah. love it. ever That's right. That's right. so those Those are real good things that I do. And and I think with Savage Worlds, one of the neat things I really like is is the the hindrances and like, you know, you've got your you've got your edges and your hindrances and your hindrances your hindrances are most certainly things that you're youre your players are telling you they want to play out. Because why would you have a character who's, I don't know, afraid of the dark if you're not going to put them in situations like that? So that's that's what you're saying is listen to your players. Thank you so much, guys.
00:41:57
Speaker
Yes, seriously. but Thank you guys so much. it was yeah it's been It's been a ton of fun. think Anytime you want us on, just ask. him Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. And I will, yeah, take my money, please. yeah Just right there. My wife is going to be so mad.
00:42:13
Speaker
She's going to be so mad. She's like, what what what is this? Baby, it's necessary. It's important. Don't you worry. All right. You'll get three years worth of use out of it. It it costs out. It amortizes out.
00:42:27
Speaker
Thank you so much. Thank you so much for joining us. Thank you for listening. Thank you for everyone out there. And if this is your first time joining us, join us at our Patreon, which I think Everett's going to tell you about as the credits roll.
00:42:38
Speaker
So either way, have a great night, everybody. Bye. Thank you. Good night. Thank you for listening. If you like or dislike what you heard, let us know.
00:42:51
Speaker
If you want to suggest an idea for an episode, ask the host a question, or just tell Chuck and James what you really think of them, join our communities at patreon.com forward slash good GM's podcast, or find us on the usual social media platforms.
00:43:13
Speaker
For now, I'm E.E. Morris, and you're all good GMs.
00:43:29
Speaker
We are so grateful to all of our Patreon supporters at the good level.
00:43:43
Speaker
Yes, E.E. Morris. I put my own money to back our projects because we're all good GMs.