Transcript
Speaker: Good, good, so good
Speaker: Welcome to the Good GM's Podcast. I'm E.A. Morris, and today's episode is Beyond the Neen Valley of the Dolls. And now, here's Chuck and James.
Speaker: Hello and welcome to another episode of Good GM's podcast. Today we have a very special guest. Today's guest has been rolling dice and telling stories since the mid 80s, so nearly four decades.
Speaker: D&D, Call Cthulhu, Vampire the Masquerade, Savage Worlds, etc, etc, etc. He's also, so not just a good GM, but he is also a retired US Air Force major.
Speaker: with 35 year career in intelligence and reconnaissance. Thank you for service. Yes. Thank you. Thank you. um So those two worlds obviously have impacted your your style and your philosophy of GMing.
Speaker: um So again, again i think I think I'll just, i'll ah so he's he's the host of the Neen Valley Role Playing Association. You can find them on YouTube. You can find them on Patreon. I'll let you do your own plugs um at at some point. But I'm really, I'm excited. We've been talking for a while to get you on the show. This is, ladies and gentlemen, and Anthony Langley. Hello and welcome.
Speaker: Hey, very nice to finally be here. I've been watching your podcast. so I loved ah love your stuff and was very, very pleased to be able to to get on here as well and and chat.
Speaker: Yeah, absolutely. And i've i've been watching I've been watching your stuff too and I love like i find it i find it i find it very very enjoyable. i like I like hearing the different accents. I love you know Some of my favorite stuff has been like the the weird war stuff because like I can tell when I'm watching that, like, oh, this is a guy who understands what's going on.
Speaker: like if i was sit If I was to do a story set in World War II, it would do like i would would be like, okay, while the war is going on, you guys are researching in the library. like you know i don't I don't have a lot of context. so i' tell you what.
Speaker: yeah Thank you for joining me. Good stuff. Now I haven't got to watch any of your actual play yet. I've been taking notes on that. So that's, that's next on my to-do list. There you go. The one that's on the Patreon. they ah We've only got one out as at the time of recording this, but starting tomorrow night, if, if ah you know, and obviously every Friday night on twitch.tv forward slash good GM's podcast next day or two on, on YouTube you can check out, you can check out my monster hunters club all that yeah starting tomorrow. I'm very excited. But you did Chuck, you've done it to you I've done it to you Yeah.
Speaker: Why do we love ETU so much? Let's start with that easy question. I'll start with ah with a slow pitch. Well, very interestingly, i was just the name itself turned me off when I was originally looking through the Savage World settings.
Speaker: um i You had the same experience, Chuck. I remember you saying, like, I'm like, I like i don't know college. And I sort of felt like, you know, if I'm a... 50 plus year old dude do is this just sort of weird like am I trying to relive my youth or something like that and I will say that some of that does happen but but but at the same time and and i i was just like it seems like a such a compact setting that that you really couldn't take anywhere. And man, have has was I completely wrong? Oh, yeah. Wow. how I love that. I love that style of setting where it's like you're just normal people and suddenly monsters. yeah It's phenomenal. And of course, we really leaned into our multicultural setting here. So all of our guys are foreign exchange students. Yeah, I like their British accents. And we get to play a little bit with with things that they don't wouldn't normally see. I love bringing something up.
Speaker: And they're just like, what? Because there's some genuine surprise. So we had a state fair where they got... conned into lining up for the cow chip throwing contest. Oh, no.
Speaker: Phenomenal. Because they had no concept what was about to happen. And for our for our listeners, this is this is dried cow poo. if a Exactly. like Such an American thing to do. What are you doing today? I'm going to go throw some poo. Yeah. Oh, my I don't know if there's a Canadian example. I'm sure there is. I'm sure if you go to like northern Saskatchewan, there's some moose turd tossing. con No doubt. but There we go. Yeah. um Yeah. and and and and And it's funny because we both we both had Ed on our show, which is fantastic. He's such a great dude. Yeah. um
Speaker: So, so yeah, you've also, so you've done ETU. What's your, but I mean, here's a question out right out of Chuck's, ah Chuck's wife's question book. What, oh what, what, what, what genres do you, do you particularly, what are your favorite genres other than ETU?
Speaker: So I really, really enjoy the d political intrigue setting. That is my, I love it. why um And I've recently gone back to all the all the players and said, what was you guys' absolutely favorite campaign we've done so far?
Speaker: And they popped off with with several different things. Of course, right now, their favorite thing is ETU because they're doing ETU. Yeah. but You guys are like 50, 55 episodes into that. And we're only halfway through our sophomore year. That's amazing. Plus, to be honest, it's bad news. If it means anything, I've never made it halfway through sophomore year. The first time I ran it, we did. We got just got to sophomore year. The second time I tried running it, we... We fell apart at the end of a freshman year. Like I couldn't get it. It's just like my mask and our lethotep campaign. We finally made it to England. This is my third try. Oh, let's talk about masks.
Speaker: We'll go into the details of the yeah online off your Turn off your headphones. We're going to have some conversation. Yes. I can't be associated with this. I got to go. he's He's one of my players, so I can't i can't spoil anything for him. No, I think we're in this one for the long haul just because of the yeah the the passion of the players. and are you following Are you following the Plot Point campaign? and you We are. story okay cool And I find I've had to riff off the Plot Point campaign a bit. Because we're going so slow and there's so much that if I didn't somehow reinforce the plot points with other things, you have to, ah you know, we know the Sweetheart Foundation is a thing. Well, what if they had been plowing money into some biotech companies that are out at the edge of town?
Speaker: And those guys can become big bads for some of the early years and things like that, that i'm I'm trying to do. So the plot campaign keeps going. so well that's thing like I've heard of people running these campaigns and like, like, like what there's 10 points over four of over four school years. if and Is that right? Or 12 points over four. Something Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker: And it's like, how could, like, how could you run that in 20 sessions? You couldn't. Right. Yeah. Like you'd have to do that one. Like I was looking at the monster hunters club one in the back of the book. And again, another 10 point plot point campaign. I was like, for my monster hunters club campaign, I was just like, well I'll just use that. And I started reading it. and it's like the first chapter, the first story takes place at the, at the last day of of grade six.
Speaker: The second story takes place in the summer. And the third story takes place at the beginning of grade seven. I'm like, no, no, no, no. no no I want my story to be contained in between, you know, end of school, grade six and and the end of summer. So I had to rewrite my own story because of that. But like, I could see if I was running a campaign that went on forever, I could easily do that.
Speaker: Yeah. and And people are like, when you look at ETU, I mean, I will, cause I was, i was same way it won't one. I never went to college. I went right into the workforce. Yeah. So for me, it was like, you went to audio engineering school. So, so it's like, I, that's why I stayed away from it. And I've said it before.
Speaker: ah So I'm not going to regurgitate all that. But ah when I got the book. Check out episode four of Good GM. Oh, I've heard it. I've heard it. Right. And so when I got the book and I'm like, OK, and I'm flipping through it and I was like, OK, what is it? Because I heard people say, oh, it's like, well, do you like Supernatural? you like Buffy? And the guys flat out said that's what inspired us.
Speaker: I'm like, okay, cool. I'll check it out. And then I started reading it and I'm like, holy crap. This is this is amazing. I love this. I'm looking forward i'm so looking forward to to Fresh Blood. I really am. I really am. Absolutely. I've got my PDF volume. and I'm trying to decide now.
Speaker: it Would it be possible to wrap up the original plot point in their first two years and then run, but the second two years, that by I don't know. I have to have to think about that. It would be pretty hard, but no, I had, ah my college career was different. I had five good years and still crashed out with, uh, six hours, six credit hours short, uh, selling myself to the military. and, uh,
Speaker: You know, not not looking back. You don't get to go into intelligence without a little bit of intelligence, though. yeah as far as Please, thank you. No, yeah, it was a great career. But yeah, so I had eight years enlisted before I finally went over to the officer side of the house. But yeah, and I actually would have wound up in the army.
Speaker: But my color vision deficiency wouldn't let me be a linguist. Hmm, you're little colorblind. And I walked next door to the Air Force and they're like, oh, we can waver that.
Speaker: You know, and it's funny, even listening to yeah you, I can hear like can hear like your style, your your your sort of GM philosophy is very detail oriented. yeah And so even when I watched the first episode of ETU and you're like, OK, so you get off the highway and you get onto this road and you drive past the Walmart and then you head up this road and I'm like.
Speaker: This guy's painting it like this guy' is painting a picture like in in ah you ah in ah in a detail that I don't, you know, and ah and a detail that i I'm just like, so here's the map and you're going to, this is where the ETU is in relation to everything else. And it's like, you can, you know, but I'm not saying...
Speaker: one so One philosophy is better than another, but I i love the detail-oriented philosophy of your of your style. And you can see, to me, I'm like, this guy, obviously, like you you have to have that level of detail if you're in 35 years of intelligence and reconnaissance. yeah You can't just like, I don't know, the the bad guy, the bad country guy, the spy, was I don't know, he was wearing like a shirt. I don't know. Yeah. It was blue. Wasn't it blue? Oh, wait, I'm going to know. Basically, I saw him go by the Walmart. i don't remember what part of town it was. but Some of that is driven by the players. So I've got a group, you know, they're not your ah theater kids. These guys are software engineers. I've got a doctor. I've got, um you know, ah these are grownups that have life experience behind them. And they are all quite detail oriented. In fact, that's the kind of gaming you obsessively so.
Speaker: yeah to To the point where the other night we had a car chase and then they ran into this club. And I know that we've described the club. And i know that one of the players actually built the map for the club. oh but i hadn But I hadn't got it downloaded onto Roll20 yet. But don't worry.
Speaker: She had it pulled up in the background so that when they came running in and and one of them wanted to go up on the balcony, she goes, well, you're standing right next to where the stairs would be. And I'm like, son of a... Yeah, but that's pretty awesome. not That's Nice! I feel like we skipped back to ETU from the first question, but like you're saying most of your players are into that, and you you really like the... like I know you know you've done the Weird War stuff, which is really cool. Have you done any like sort of Delta Green stuff? Because I can feel like that. have not. In fact, ah the...
Speaker: I've got a couple of ah ah little Call of Cthulhu modules out there on DriveThruRPG. Oh, congratulations. I've got, thanks. what do they called? Tell us. ah know The Retreat and Shadow Tag. so Okay. and The Retreat is a great name. I feel like I've played, the like i because it's like because it's the double the double meaning of the word retreat, right? Yes, exactly. relaxing holiday or the get the hell out. which is absolutely yeah but i ran it with a i've got a set of australian friends i met through the service and so as you guys are coming in at a weird time to do this uh for me i was playing at a weird time for them but uh ran through and they're like this should have been delta green and and at the time i wasn't familiar with delta green i'm like well that sounds cool um
Speaker: I better start going and looking and and reading it. But no, I have not played any Delta Green. So that's ah my own lack there. That's for sure. yeah it's It's a good system.
Speaker: well it's very And especially with your background, exactly ah you you would excel. You could retell it from like like, is there a British version? Is there like a British version of Delta Green? yeah Right? Where it like it's like, you know, M16 or whatever. um you know and then and then like with your guys ah think they totally get into that too um oh yeah they are it's very much the the men in black meets like covert ops meets like don't ask don't tell you know if you you know if anyone finds out that what you've been doing we have to kill you your family and all of their families like like yeah yeah
Speaker: Yeah, yeah that very cool. Sounds cool. I mean, all the Call of Cthulhu stuff I've i've enjoyed. um i think the players are leaning more into Savage Worlds now because I think they're just enjoying the yeah the squash buckling capabilities that they've got. Swinginess, right? like But Octune Cthulhu is another great example. Octune Cthulhu is, they had a system, but they also did it through, there's ah like a, like, think when you Octune Cthulhu, it comes with, the rules are set to both.
Speaker: I tried to buy it on purpose, instead of the, the Weird Wars thing I got, and I couldn't find it because they'd gone through the change of companies or something like that. It's really, really hard to find right now. i think they've, they've gone away from the,
Speaker: 2d 20 or whatever this that system is and they've gone to another one so i'll i'll still have to find it yeah i think i have it somewhere with like the savage worlds like well let's be honest yeah you just you can buy because that i i do it all the time in fact i'm going to be doing it uh sometime soon here um i i could take a story from whatever setting and i can adapt it to savage worlds fast buddy buddy of mine A buddy of mine and I, there's like sort of a thought experiment. I have somewhere in one of my Google drives, he and i worked on on Savage Worlds of Darkness, where we created the vampire rules using Savage Worlds, where it was like blood points were like Benny's. And like, you know, we had created this sort of like, and like and like your your edges where your...
Speaker: your your're um discipline Disciplines. Yeah. Interesting. Mm hmm. Like like PowerPoints. Yeah. Blood blood. The PowerPoint system in Savage Worlds work like blood points and like your power was your Betty or something like that. It was. it But you can do that. You can do that. So like you can be burned down your bennies and you're getting towards frenzy or something like that. So, you know, that kind of thing. Right. Like it would be. it yeah wonder i mean i'll have to re-dig up that file to even speak to this topic but yeah it was it's funny how you can do that but yeah yeah that's fascinating yeah that's fascinating i said it on the show before i would love to take a campaign like a massive campaign like mass and our lithotep or horror on the orientexpress and try running it in savage worlds yes yeah that's a must that's that because it can easily be done and yeah yes so uh
Speaker: yes The ETUs I've watched that you've done, um good shows. I've enjoyed them a lot. And one of the things I do enjoy is ah you have a structure, but you also do a very good job of blending like railroad or like structure and then sandbox.
Speaker: So you're giving your players a very decent amount of freedom. um What are some of the pros and cons that you've experienced and how do you mitigate them? Yeah.
Speaker: Well, hey as a early GM, i i i had a sort of the story is prime philosophy. And the whole thing was about providing this wonderful story that they could all live through.
Speaker: And I grew up after, after railroading folks for a long enough time. it's It's now, I truly believe the character is prime.
Speaker: yeah Right. And, and they are the protagonists of the story. It's our story is a shared story. And if they want to write a chapter that's entirely different or morph the, you know, the basic premise of the story that that, You know, I got to sort of roll with it.
Speaker: um And the other thing I really used to do was a lot of Matt Mercering, telling the player what they do. Oh, yeah. And at this point in my career, I find that grating just because i really sort of feel like I'm your sensory organs person.
Speaker: but the rest the rest of it is you're the muscles is you So and with that, i I'll catch myself once in a long time trying to say something like, oh, you feel no, no, you don't know. I don't say that, you know, oh, back up. OK, interesting. Yeah, I mean, I think giving them the sense that like, OK, you know, and you so I'm 100 percent like I'm with you. There's certain points where I catch I will do it because it's like, OK, so you you know, I'll describe the scene and there'll be a thing. It's like.
Speaker: So you guys go in like, like if I don't say like, it's like, I feel like obviously you're going to go in so I can describe the next scene. I'm not going to say, okay, this is what the door looks like. And then just,
Speaker: Yeah, moving in the plot Move the plot along. move the on But again, on the topic of the... ETU is a great example. We've all done it. So let's let's use this as our philosophy. The first time I ran ETU, I ran it episodic. Every episode, every every every section of the story. So like bugs. So like... um um I'm trying to think of some of the the good ones. Too ghoul for school or whatever. Like any of these. I ran pretty much in one session.
Speaker: You know, I'd run it like on a Saturday for for a three or four hour, four hour session or whatever. okay So I would run it and then I'd move on to the next one and run it and move on to the next one. And I would have to railroad it very hard. I still leave room. Personally, I still think one of the best parts of ETU is the taking the time to say, OK, so you guys are like, you know, you are in class. Give me a test give me a roll for your test. Like I loved playing that up. yeah's You know, not every every everyone. Yeah.
Speaker: Not everyone has that has that that, like, well, that's the boring parts. I don't want to do that. But like yeah for me, I found it. And then the second time I ran it, it was it was here's a hook, here's a hook, here's a hook, here's a hook, go.
Speaker: And it took a long time to get through the plot points that way. But I felt better about it. And I think the players enjoyed it more. So it really is a trade-off. Like, do you run it episodic? Do you run it Monster of the Week, X-Files, Seasons 1 through whatever?
Speaker: Absolutely. Absolutely. Or do you run it like, again, like, like, I mean, I'm watching, um, criminal minds and the first several seasons of that show were monster of the week, one off, one off, one off. And the last few seasons of that show were one bad guy and they're following him the whole time.
Speaker: And which is better. I don't know. I like them both. Yeah. I don't know. Chuck, Chuck, how's your, where's your, I know where you're at. I, I've played in game. Um, uh, I, I,
Speaker: I try to blend the two because yes, I have. Okay. Cause again, when I'm on Savage Sessions, I have X amount of weeks to tell, to get through this story.
Speaker: Yeah. Yeah. And you, you'll take a story and run it over a four week. I can. Yes. yeah Easy. Well, because, well, again, our Sabbath sessions are only two hours. Yeah.
Speaker: So that's why it's like, well, of course it takes me three sessions to get done because I only have x amount of time. Um, but they still have the opening. Like if you, if you like, especially this it's going to be coming up soon.
Speaker: Um, the, uh, the two ghoul for school, I combined a bite to eat and two ghoul for school. I combined those two stories together. ah Because it's ah the the vampire one in. ah Yes. yeah we Yeah. Well, the one student thinks he's man. Spoilers. Yeah. yeah Don't watch this players.
Speaker: but But yeah. So i so I combined them and the show should be called good GMs, bad players. But, you know,
Speaker: but you know I still still, for me, they're still sandbox because, and because, trust me, that spiraled out of control very fast because it was like, yeah, we're doing this, we're doing this, and then somebody went and did this, and then that took a life of its own.
Speaker: And then it's like, okay, indulged, indulged, okay, I got get... get you back on the track. Okay. We got, we got other, we got, this has to get completed. Otherwise gets back. Cause you have an imposed deadline on your own storytelling.
Speaker: Yes. I have to. Yeah. And it happens. Like I said, my mask and I left the depth game is a great example. Like how long did it take us to get out of Peru? Like, which is the prelude to chapter, you know, like, like six months. like ah So I could, I could have pushed you guys through it, but I really enjoyed it.
Speaker: Yeah. Well, when when you mentioned the, um, I don't tell the players what they're feeling. And now for a good GM's special announcement.
Speaker: Hello, good GMs and hello, Chuck. How you doing? Hey bud, what's going on? Well, I had this idea. You know how we do this show, right? It's for good GMs. It's called good GMs. Right, right. The whole idea behind it is, you know, we offer ideas and tips and stuff to help good GMs be good der GMs.
Speaker: Right. So how do we acknowledge our amazing good GMs that are out there listening to our show? People who are watching our show, who are playing in a game and have a good GM. How can we do that?
Speaker: So here's my idea. What about the Goody Awards? I love it. Love it. Tell me more. So what i was thinking was if, if We get our listeners, whether if you're if you're a good GM and you want to tell your, you know if you think you deserve an award, tell your guys to make a video for us. We don't we don't have to know that part. But if you're if you're a player and you want to nominate your good GM, what we're going to do is make us a video. So one to three minutes, you know, we're not going to be picky about it. Just don't, we don't want to sit through ah an epic, well, maybe if it's really good, we'll sit through Make us a quick video about what makes your GM the goodest GM and why they deserve one of our monthly goodie awards. Every month, starting in December, we will play the video on our show. We'll announce the winner that we've chosen for that month.
Speaker: and And we don't have to submit every month. So the way I think we'll do it is that if you submit and let's say we get 10 really good ones right off the bat, we'll pick one each month from that batch. And then each month we'll look through what we've already got and decide you know who deserves a goodie award each month.
Speaker: then at the end of the year so december 2027 we'll have the goodie awards maybe we'll rent some tuxedos who knows depends on how good our our our patreon is um but the idea being that we will announce we'll we'll have everybody vote on the top 12 of the 12 that we have for every month we'll put a poll together in our discord or in our in our patreon and we'll let people vote on who they thought was the goodest gm of all we'll bring them on our show and we'll talk to them about what makes them good gm that's absolutely i I love that idea. We'll try to figure out some prizes as well. you know We'll figure out some stuff, maybe some merch if we have some merch by then. And then maybe we'll even get them to host a show on our our Twitch channel. which we kind of well i bet I love that idea. If they're such a good GM, share your share your goodness the world. the world, yes.
Speaker: How you nominate your GM is you're going make the video, you're going to save it as either a YouTube or you know, save it in your Google Drive. Send us the link. So join our Patreon and send us a link there.
Speaker: And you just have to join for free. But if you want to also, you know, become a good GM or a gooder GM level supporter or goodest GM or even help launder money, you can join us at one of those levels. But for just for the sake of it, you can join us on our Discord, which is another Discord, our Patreon, which patreon.com.
Speaker: forward slash goodgmspodcast and actually also send us your link there. And then, like i said, once we have all the videos submitted, starting in December of this year, we're going announce the very first Good GM's Goody Award, which I think is going to be a lot of fun.
Speaker: I do too. I like this idea. Fantastic. Awesome. Awesome. Well, thank you so much. And join us, GM's, every Tuesday. That's right. Be good. Be good-er. I could have pushed you guys through it, but I really enjoyed it.
Speaker: yeah well when When you mentioned the um I don't tell the players what they're feeling completely agree with that unless yep yeah especially when we're about Call Cthulhu we're talking about sadness the fear and the sanity as soon as they fail that role yeah and I tell the players i tell just ahead of time you still have some agency but I'm putting you in a box now Yeah. And this is, this is a, you fail that role.
Speaker: um If they are going against an NPC and they they, they want to do intimidation and they fail that intimidation or worse, they crit fail that intimidation.
Speaker: And it's like, okay, you were trying to scare him. You fumbled that. And now he has intimidated you. Yeah. And like, oh, okay. You realize you realize that he is and unflappable and that's scary as hell. Yes. and and And I've had players where they've been like, still like, oh, well, you know, no, no, no, no. You failed.
Speaker: Your character is frightened. You looked into the void. Please continue. And I've had players to shut down. They're like, wait, what? You failed. you characters frightened. Now you will not talk snarky to this person. You will not be a bravado. Your bravo is gone. The bravado is gone.
Speaker: Yes. So that that's the only times where I, I, I, to an extent, I take it away, but I still try to hand it back to them as okay. This is the box. You're not in this box for the rest of this scene. No, I definitely agree with you on that. And when they,
Speaker: they're suddenly terrified by the werewolf that pops out from behind the tombstone, then involuntary reactions, especially if there's a failed role involved, oh, you've got all the license in the world to be able to tell them exactly how the rush of adrenaline feels that they have suddenly gone to. But I definitely think that that's an important thing.
Speaker: if If you've got players who are are feeding you back what what they're feeling all the time, then great. yeah But sometimes you're like, okay, so you enter this room and you get this shiver up the back of your spine.
Speaker: Yep. Like I'm telling them how they're feeling, how they relate. How do they relate to that? How do how do they respond to that is entirely up to them. Yes. I would classify that almost as involuntary responses. Yes. And that's absolutely, that's completely in our wheelhouse as a GM. I like the philosophy that you said, we are the sensory organs. I like that too.
Speaker: and And it's true. We are the eyes, the ears, the nose. We are the tongue. We are the the nervous system. Yep. Yeah. Absolutely. i Cheers. I love that. Yeah. but but when it when it comes to, yeah, we can relay that information to them.
Speaker: Like I said, the only time that I'm. You're also the instinct, I think as well, it's fair to say. Yeah. When instinct kicks in and they are in a fear situation, we can tell them you you're you either going to freeze or you're going to fly. Yeah. If, if, it has yes, but for me, it's, I only reinforce that if, if they fail a role, m like if they come in and there's a gruesome scene,
Speaker: ah And for whatever reason, as GM, if I forget to have that fear role and then they're just going about it like, oh, OK, this and then I can't get mad at myself for saying, um bull crap. You wouldn't. um OK, nope. I I didn't do that part. So carry on.
Speaker: Yeah. You know, i I can't get mad at myself. But if I call for that Sandy. Yes. If I call for that Sandy check, I call for that fear check. If I call for that, hell, even if you're doing D&D and I call, I call for that wisdom check and you know you fail it.
Speaker: It's like, OK, no, guess what? your Your barbarian is upset now. but What? Why do you guys think the scene has upset him? How has that scene upset him? yeah And so that gives them a spotlight back and they can now take that moment.
Speaker: To be vulnerable and to explain that. and carry it on. It gives them a chance to role play, which is what this is all about. just ah love it. i Absolutely. And you do it well. and You and your players, you guys do it well. yeah we We are so blessed. I mean...
Speaker: We get to play three hours of ETU a week. And we're really freaking religious about it. I'll be off at some location and I'll be on the crappy hotel Wi-Fi running this stuff. Or if they're off on vacation, we've had a guy, he took his um his camper van and he was over in Eastern Europe.
Speaker: tootling around, but hey man, he had his Starlink going to run the games. That is awesome! It's religious. In our last game that we played, Francis is somewhere in in Eastern Europe and and he he's logging in from his hostile Wi-Fi. like Absolutely. 1 o'clock, 2 o'clock in the morning because it was... at 9 o'clock our time. like That's crazy. i like and I gave him kudos. I was like, dude, you're more dedicated than I That's pretty dang good. so yeah We also get oh three hours of D&D.
Speaker: three hours of d and d And I get to play. So we've got two DMs and honestly, a third that can rotate in when we've got different things that are that are going on. And so we're producing just massive amounts of yeah YouTube stuff just because we're religiously playing the game. We're doing ah we're doing a oh ah what's the ah flying through space.
Speaker: Spell jammer. There. yeahre so We're still jamming away in ah in our D&D. But yeah. Okay. okay So you bop back and forth between DM yeah and player. i For me, I feel that's incredibly important to do that. I do. What are some things that that you you take away from that when when you sit down behind as a player behind the sheet?
Speaker: And what are you looking for? Mm-hmm. and Well, I think I'm more sympathetic to the GM than I would have been just as a player. right there's There's a lot going on in the guy's head, a lot going on and in ah as we're doing our typical buffoonery, you know completely derailing everything that he's planned for the for the evening by just randomly doing something. And so I think as a player, I take my GM stuff – and try to be a and a helpful player. There you go. and be that Be the type of player that knows, ah I think the GM really wants us to go through that door. We should probably go through that door. you know There you go i have you go. I have just, I just saw this again. I can't quote who who said it right now, but I saw this reel or TikTok or whatever. This guy was talking about giving your GM brushes.
Speaker: and he and And the joke was not gentle caresses on the side of his face. It's it's like the knife theory we've talked about is you give your GM, you know, in your backstory, giving brushes is the example he used. I loved was um you don't just say you you he walk you walk in the room and he describes the the bar scene that he describes the big ogre that you're trying to get information from sitting at a table. And and you say, OK, I'd like to roll intimidation.
Speaker: versus I walk over to him. i I pick up his flag in a beer and I slam it on the table in front of him and I'm looking dead in the eyes and I say, you want to see where I can put this flag in? You got 30 seconds.
Speaker: Now I'd like to roll intimidation. And that's brilliant. Yeah, that's how you give your GM because your GM is painting this picture for you Give him brushes. Don't just make Jackson Pollock all over the place. Like I, I, I roll, I roll intimidation. What, ah what, what are you, what what are you doing?
Speaker: Like, how is that? If you roll intimidation. Okay, cool. What are you like giving him a dirty look from across the room? Give me story. Tell me story. brilliant yeah Yeah. Oh, i like it on speaking of which are, you guys need to do an episode on the flashback function and blades in the dark.
Speaker: I'd love to hear you guys talk about that. i got I got to read it. I just bought it. I just bought the dark. I have that book. I have not read that. in the dark It's a great book. all issues It's a phenomenal. set So basically, he plays good friend i should bring you don't usually die, right? okay you You wind up stressing out. So you take take stress to add some extra dice to try and succeed. and Or you can take some stress for a flashback.
Speaker: Phenomenal. you know they They round the corner. There's a guard. One of the guys goes, you know what? i' been I stake this place out, and I it's and i mean you you know i put some i put some stuff in their their soup, and they're probably about to fall asleep.
Speaker: Okay, that'll cost you. That's a three stressor right there because that was really complicated. And on we go. It's phenomenal. And you can even turn that into part of the story. You can even turn that into part of the story. Oh, absolutely. Because you're walking through the hallway and it's like, okay, I'd like to do a flashback where I put poison in this thing. Okay.
Speaker: Two days later, or two days earlier, yeah here's the scene. you know And you can you can. You can do that. it' It's phenomenal. Okay. Okay. So you have, ah because you're you're like James and I. We're a little long in the tooth, I guess they'd say. oh Yeah.
Speaker: I'm a kid. Yeah, whatever. Anyway, moving on. just shaved, so I feel you like a kid. Right? Oh, Chucky did that recently. He got he got remarried. Yeah. Same woman, same woman. just i mean like so um So, because James I have talked about this, so I'm i'm curious. um So you've played a lot of different systems.
Speaker: Yeah. Give us two things from another system that you like to import into your games. Do you do that? Yep. And I'd say both both would be my examples of Blades in the Dark and the really, and I would i would invest in this one as well, the Court of Blades, which is a spinoff of it.
Speaker: Okay. so What are you taking? So what I take out of that, I love their sandbox and how tight it is. And then the other piece I would love to take, but I haven't found it.
Speaker: a real way to do it is, is much of the other games is, is that wonderful flashback system that, that I can see, I can see the flashbacks just being like, okay, that's going to cost you a penny.
Speaker: Spend a penny. And yes, something like that. Okay. And I think that would make sense. Right. go ahead go Go back to the sandbox. Cause that's interesting. You said the sandbox, but it's too tight, tight, it's usually that's not it's it's a you're understanding like ah you can pick it up anytime and just continue it it is a pressure cooker right so you've got the they got the characters in and there's so much pressure on them of what the things they need to do how they're surviving that it just drives the story where they're it never says never sits still on to the things that are happening absolutely and in fact our our uh
Speaker: Court of Blades, because we we ran a full full campaign of Blades of the Dark also won a Court of Blades, I thought was our maybe our seminal work because it was really good gaming. And, but it's, it's your basically noble houses, like in a Venice situation, and and all of the houses are competing and you're basically the troubleshooters for one of these houses. Gotcha.
Speaker: And you're constantly just given players so many problems and there's no way they can take care of all of them, but they get some points for their house each season that moves the house either forward or drops them back. depending on how they do. And so they're desperately trying to get the things done. It's a, it was, it was a lot of fun. i didn't realize how stressful it was on the players until they told me later. They're like, that was stressful.
Speaker: They're like, interesting. Okay. Interesting. i like that. You like, you like a political intrigue and things like that. Yeah. um We recently had our, our friend James on, he was running us through the 2d 20 system, right? Have you looked at the Dune? have not.
Speaker: I would like to. Yes. I'm telling you right now. Yes. Yeah. Dune as an intellectual property is all about those house first. That is. Yes. Yeah. i'm i've at Vampire the Masquerade is set up perfectly for political intrigue. yeah If you're not playing political intrigue, why are you playing vampire? You're doing it wrong. you I'm sorry. You are. Or you're not getting everything you can out of it.
Speaker: Fair enough. I got to ask this one question. I just want to make sure because I don't want to I don't want to. So we were talking about. no, no. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So Rainy, ranney our producer um from Reggie Studios, she she she purposely sent me this message saying, please ask this question, because I think the question is,
Speaker: What are the cultural differences you played in? You're you're an American living in in in in England. What are some of the cultural cultural differences between playing there and playing here? So things like like what like different cow pie, not just not just not just the specifics that they don't know about. I'm talking about like the the culture of gaming. We we we went through mostly the Americans, but but but here in Canada, to some degree, we had satanic panic.
Speaker: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. You guys, you guys were more into the D&D is big in the US and you guys had, was it Warhammer or something similar. i can't remember what it was called, but it was not you guys. Cause you're not England, but like, so there's, did they have a similar satanic panic? Like what are the, what are the, how did it play out in England versus how, how did it like, what, what, ah how does it manifest in your play? Well, I was living through that in the States at the state time, but at the, here, what I, what I would say is, and there's a great book called watching the English. I can't remember the the author's name, but her last name is Fox. And she writes she writes um
Speaker: a sort of pop anthropology. if you know it's It's really a good study of the British mind and how things work. And um they they do things differently.
Speaker: I think one of the main problems that Americans have with British people is they look and sound so much like us that that we think they're they're us. And they're not. They are absolutely different in so many ways. I think What I find is there there is a more relaxed... Kate Fox.
Speaker: Kate Fox. Well done. Thank you, Google. yes theha Thank you, Google. Yeah, she's great. And ah it's actually a really good read if you're just the type of voracious reader like I am that just reads all sorts of crap. But the um they are a lot more laid back about the whole thing.
Speaker: And many times a bit less expressive. So sometimes my ha-has, if I get them to open their mouth like, I, that's, that's a freaking, exactly. And it was like, I know I've won when they go, Ooh, yeah. And that's about it. That's awesome. Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah. No. And that's the thing. It's like, there's a little more repression in some ways and a little less repression in other ways. yes Yeah. It's funny how it's, yeah, we, we have, we have ah ah actually the opposite of you in a way is we have an American, ah a brit a Brit living in America right now in one of our, in my ah yes game, Claire. And she's like university professor, like genius, you know, she's an avid Call of Cthulhu Delta green player. Oh, wow. It's really, it's really amazing. I love playing with her because again, it's like seeing how like her take on things. And she's also, yeah ah it it really is helpful when we're're I'm describing things that are happening in London that I've never, I've never been to. And she's like, Oh yes, that it's just down the road from there. I used to work in that building. and Yeah, absolutely. Now, if you don't love the frisian of running up against different people and different cultures, I, I, I think you, you lack something that's this, that's really wonderful in life. And, uh, I obviously love it and I'm living over here and I enjoy working with the Brits and I do all the time. And, uh, I,
Speaker: And I think it it sort of goes over into the gaming as well. It's you sort of want to like your you like people. You like ah you like your players. You like the people. And and ah you're you're enjoying making a game together. And that perspective is necessary.
Speaker: It really is. the you you know You need that perspective. You need to have that that difference of opinion. You have to have the Canadian. There you go. Yeah. Well, that's just a rule of thumb.
Speaker: You know, I love i love looking to my brother up north here in Michigan. um That's right. yeah yeah Close enough. When I was in Toronto, especially. like yeah yeah Yeah. But yeah. So it's funny. Yeah.
Speaker: speaking of of time um i think we we probably should i'd love to keep going just for the sake of it like it's no we'll have you back we got to have you back awesome it's love to have you back gotta to be nearing nearing nearly bedtime for you guys no i'm not quite almost seven is that right yeah yeah yeah well it's funny when we were interviewing uh we were interviewing mike mason and and watching the watching how dark it got through the the 40 minute or whatever interview that yeah like it was like He didn't have any lights on his camera. He just opened the window. But I wanted to say, first of all, thanks so much for joining us. Love it. And let's do more of this. This is fun. Absolutely. We'll pop over for a pint or something. I think you should. Come over to the Chaosium Con over here. Oh, I bet. Oh, I want That's really nice. It's a smaller one, but it's really got a great family feel to the whole thing. Where is Chaosium? I know that there's a lot of Brits involved in Chaosium. Yeah, I don't know exactly where the location is. I know that... I know they're Michigan. The Ann Arbor is their...
Speaker: but I don't remember if they started there or their headquarters are there or how they did their thing. It would be interesting to look up, but um yeah, we would love to join you over there and, or just, just join you. Absolutely. Someday you can come, come absolutely and and talk. um Come talk to our players at some point, get their perspective. I'm sure they'll tell you wonderful things about their GMs and their foibles, but yeah, and i would yeah I would say that's one of my favorite, favorite things about watching you guys is, is the little, a little bit of ah ah British bickering that happens sometimes during scenes. Oh, yeah. Yeah, that's no joke. You should see us in our D&D game. Once in a while, it gets hot. so tell It'll be in our show notes anyway, but tell tell our our viewers where we can where we can find you. Yes, sir. Where can we find you? Absolutely. So you can find us as Neen Valley Roleplaying Association on Patreon. That's N-E-N-E. Just so you know how it's spelled. N-E-N-E. N-E-N-E. Yes,
Speaker: And ah we're just starting to build that out. Honestly, ah Christine, one of our players, writes out every one of our ETU sessions in almost storybook format. Wow.
Speaker: And they they still need some polish and stuff like that because she is using some AI assist to pull the stuff out and then clean it up. But then she adds like character thoughts and things that that it makes it phenomenal. But we're putting them in there, and those are neat.
Speaker: And then i'll we'll be building and putting more and more stuff into there as we go. Most of what we're doing right now is on Facebook and not Facebook. What am i talking about? YouTube. We tend not to do Twitch.
Speaker: Just because our players are just more comfortable not in the live format. They prefer to feel that afterwards they can, if they said something really stupid, they can. Yeah. well like Actually, let me let me ask this one question. I know we've got to move on in and I'm trying to bring it to a wrap, but I just wanted to ask this one question. Is is Christina the is the cat.
Speaker: Yes. And is that, is that. That's a she doesn't like seeing herself on video. Yeah. No, that's what I was wondering. I was like, is that. Cause I mean, we live in an age where maybe that's how she identifies. I don't know. Like, you know, but it's, it's more just that she's, she's self-conscious or she's got social anxiety and doesn't. It's more of a, it's more of a, she didn't like seeing her own video up there. And, and so when we play around the table and we set the cameras all up,
Speaker: She didn't mind that. guys are the table. Once in a while. Oh, okay. not Not a lot. So when we are at the table, then the cat's out the window because she doesn't care because she's not seeing her video staring her back in the face.
Speaker: So, yeah, and that's, hey, if that's the least of the the foibles that I've got to deal with, that's it that's nothing. It's it's yeah it's interesting. i just It was a question I had. I just was like, because again, it may be that that's how they identify. I don't know, like, I have no idea. You know, I really should have run with that so I could have had fun with it later on. know but no i mean I told the world. yeah yeah Yeah, absolutely. But so so YouTube, you guys have a Patreon as well.
Speaker: Yeah, that's how actually how we find found you is ah um Rainy from Red Juice was like, you need to get in touch with these guys. That's cool. So, yeah. um So, and you guys, you guys do have quite a you know, but quite a following on YouTube now and it's, it's great. And I'm hoping, hoping that. Oh, heck yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So thank you for joining us. And again, you can find us as well. If you want to check out our Patreon, we're, we're up there with them. We're friends. That's great. Patreon.com forward slash good GM's podcast.
Speaker: ah Join us. ah ah Hopefully, hopefully we'll see Anthony. If you, if you want, I'll send you a link later. A link later. You know, that guy that made the the movies slacker and whatnot. um I'll, I'll,
Speaker: Sorry. I'll send you link later. ah So you can join our our Discord if you want. and and Brilliant. And you can join join us in ah in in there and talk about, you know. you know but one Sounds good. Help us grow. Maybe you can, you know, this is one of the book club things we've been talking about is I'd love to do a Blades of the Dark one because me for me, reading not a voracious. it's it's It's a lot of work. And as a GM, it's a lot out of work. Like I still got to get through all the masks in our lithotap and I've been running it for years. You know, so yeah so, you know, but I'd love to get into Blades in the Dark. I want to get into all these games. So join us there. We're going to start a book club very soon. If it's not already started, I know Cam Rogers is going to Mothership and then we're going to do i I want to do Blades in the Dark. So having somebody an avid fan like you would be great. Absolutely.
Speaker: Awesome. Love it. Thank you guys for having me on. It's been great. hi Anytime. Thanks for joining us. And top of the morning to you, sir. That's right. And if your GM says do you want to Benny that. You probably should.
Speaker: You probably should. You probably should. Those words to live by. You could. You could.
Speaker: Thank you for watching. If you like or dislike what you heard, let us know. 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.
Speaker: For now, I'm E.E. Morris, and you're all good GMs.
Speaker: We are so grateful to all of our Patreon supporters. At the gooder level, Weird Candy. At the good level, Carl Kiesler, Preston DuBose.
Speaker: Morris. I put my own money to back our projects because we're all good GMs.
