System Mastery

System Mastery

Jef and Jon review old roleplaying games

Episodes

January 9, 2026 85 mins
Two games in one box? What a bargain! MM&M here comes with basic and advanced rulesets for its historical fantasy Earth setting, though the differences are so odd that it's almost like two (bad) games! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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Hell yeah we got something for under your tree! It's a System Mastery review of Fabula Ultima! For future readers that joke is because I put this episode up Christmas Eve. It was hilarious at the time. Ask an old person, they'll remember. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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December 11, 2025 78 mins
Well hello there, superhero game from 2005. We saw you from across the room, and we dug your weird mix between classic and modern game design vibe. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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November 30, 2025 69 mins
A dive into the world of mapmaking games, which we've briefly touched on in the past but are definitely a growing area of game design, but also, combat free! Hooray for Sweater Weather! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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November 13, 2025 70 mins
Welcome back to our Sweater Weather season! But wait, how can this be charming and cozy if these kittens have LASERS? Listen and discover! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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October 29, 2025 68 mins
Ween closes out with a bang, as we discuss a game designed to cover *cough* a wide variety of different Slasher movies that may or may not have specifically launched the genre in 1978 or so. Check it out, it's 1978 (The Night They Came Home)! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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October 16, 2025 80 mins
Oh man, I don't know if I should just put a bunch of movie quotes here (nah, the book already made me sick of them) or a bunch of Ween stuff. Let's go with that one. It's Army of Darkness as we start a look at horror movie RPG entries in a little sequence we're weenly calling WEENS ON FILM. Weenjoy. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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Sorry it's been a while friends! This episode is special and it took some work to get it working. We're interviewing Sean Ellis and Kira Woodmansee, two of the major names involved in getting Tales from the Floating Vagabond off the ground. Because we wanted to! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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September 4, 2025 75 mins
Part of this job is getting to hold extremely weird things in our hands, things we never expected to be real, and this is certainly one of those times. Three hundred and seven episodes ago we discussed Tales from the Floating Vagabond. Between then and now the author, Lee Garvin, passed away years ago. Now we have the second edition ANYWAY, and it's neat to hold. Let's talk about it! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit mega...
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August 20, 2025 113 mins
Yeah yeah, we did the thing. God knows there was plenty more content. James is still here to help us process all this stuff. Thanks James! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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August 6, 2025 103 mins
This is almost certainly the largest product we've ever attempted to review! As a result there are some gaps in coverage here. We may yet revisit this game just to do a deep dive on the setting, if there's interest. Otherwise, welcome to the whimsical world of not quite wizards that is Invisible Sun, recorded twice for various reasons, and featuring our network president James D'Amato, because we like that guy. Learn more about ...
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July 24, 2025 76 mins
Let's lay out what we're discussing here this week. It's three games (in four books) comprising Clever Girl, #Flirt Squad, and Anyone Can Wear The Mask. We love checking in on micro games from time to time, they're a refreshing change from the elderly tomes we normally peruse. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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July 10, 2025 79 mins
More TV sci-fi! More TV sci-fi! Actually wait, hold on, this one is based on the books. No TV in here, which is probably for the best, because you guessed it, neither of us watched the show. Is this relatively modern relatively hard sci-fi space game fun? Well let's find out. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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June 26, 2025 86 mins
Who loves Doctor Who? Specifically and exclusively any Doctor Who made before 1991? Not us it turns out, though this game is pretty fun! It's got some neat design ideas and good advice and writing, and also a lot of information about old Doctors. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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June 11, 2025 74 mins
This is one of the venerable old giants of the fantasy gaming industry. Avalon Hill producing Chaosium's Runequest. Couldn't be more classic. But how does it read 40 years later? Let's all find out together. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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May 28, 2025 72 mins
By all account, this is the first ever superhero RPG, but don't let that fool you, it contains virtually nothing you'd recognize as a superhero game. In fact, it's wild what it contains. You'll see. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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May 14, 2025 76 mins
Okay the rumors that we like every supers game are scurrilous, devious, and increasingly accurate. This is Capers, and it's a supers game set in a slightly less socially shitty 1920s, which is a neat thing. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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May 1, 2025 66 mins
Hi folks, let's start up another 300 of these, what do you say? This one is about The Arcanum, an early 80s game that sure seems similar for some reasons (the same reasons they always do? Probably!) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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April 16, 2025 99 mins
Well that certainly was 300 times we did a thing, I tell you what! Let's take a little victory lap by cracking open a cask we've been saving for a special occasion, a feisty little 1983 vintage called Palladium Fantasy that definitely isn't just dust and vinegar by this point, right? Right? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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April 1, 2025 61 mins
We're hard at work on our giant pile of weird old box sets, and that means it's time for Bleeding Heart, a game that Jon assures me is loosely based on something called the Corman Poe film era of the mid-sixties, and he's a total horror nerd so I gotta go with him on this one. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
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