March 17, 2025 • 33 mins
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What if the characters we play in games reveal more about who we truly are? 🎭🎲 Tabletop Role-Playing Games (TTRPGs) offer more than just entertainment—they create powerful opportunities for self-discovery, personal growth, and deeper engagement. This conversation dives into how the roles we play in games often reflect real-life struggles, aspirations, and identities—sometimes without us even realizing it. Through immersive storytelling and emergent gameplay, TTRPGs become tools for building emotional intelligence, confidence, and connection. Whether you're designing learning experiences, digital communities, or gamified products, this episode uncovers how role-play can drive transformation and long-term engagement.
Ryan Alan Jones is a transformational coach, mindfulness practitioner, and advocate for the power of storytelling in personal development. Currently pursuing a doctorate in leadership and coaching, Ryan’s academic work complements his unique approach, which integrates tabletop role-playing games (TTRPGs) to help individuals uncover new facets of themselves, build social and emotional intelligence, and foster beautiful and satisfying lives. His work bridges the creative and the practical, drawing on his experiences as a certified personal trainer, yoga instructor, actor, and director. Through his innovative approach, Ryan bridges the worlds of imagination and reality, helping others discover their potential and redefine their personal narratives.
Rob is a host and consultant at Professor Game as well as an expert, international speaker and advocate for the use of gamification and games-based solutions, especially in education and learning. He's also a professor and workshop facilitator for the topics of the podcast and LEGO SERIOUS PLAY (LSP) for top higher education institutions that include EFMD, IE Business School and EBS among others in Europe, America and Asia.
Guest Links and Info
- Website: raj.coach
- LinkedIn: Ryan Alan Jones
- Instagram: @drjones.coach
- TikTok: @drjones.coach
Links to episode mentions:
- Proposed guest: Anthony Kurza
- Recommended book: Transformative Role-Playing Game Design (free PDF!)
- Favorite game: Venture Society
Lets's do stuff together!
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Hey, this is Professor Game where we interview successful practitioners of games,gamification and game thinking to help us multiply engagement and loyalty.
I'm Rob Alvarez.
I'm a consultant, I'm a coach, and I'm the founder here at Professor Game.
And I'm also a professor of gamification and game inspired solutions at IE University, IEBusiness School, EFMD, EBS University, and other places around the world.
(00:24):
And before we dive into the interview, you're struggling.
with engagement in your business and are looking to find out how to make your users staywith you, you will find a free community full of resources, quite useful.
You can find it for free in the links below in the description.
So, Engagers, welcome back to another episode of the Professor Game Podcast.
(00:45):
And we have a special guest as always today.
We have Ryan with us, but Ryan, we need to know, are you prepared to engage?
Ready.
Let's do this.
Let's go.
have Ryan Allen Jones, a transformational coach, mindfulness practitioner, and advocatefor the power of storytelling in personal development.
(01:07):
He's currently pursuing a doctorate in leadership and coaching and his academic workcomplements his unique approach, which integrates tabletop role-playing games to help
individuals uncover new facets of themselves, build social, emotional intelligence, andfoster beautiful and satisfying
lives and his work bridges the creative and the practical, drawing on his experience as acertified personal trainer, yoga instructor, actor, and director.
(01:30):
And through his innovative approach, he bridges the worlds of imagination and reality,helping others discover their potential and redefine their personal narratives.
Ryan, don't know if there's anything you want to add to that, anything we're missing,anything we should know before we get into the questions.
I would say that it's pretty comprehensive.
(01:51):
I have a 19-month-old daughter, so she's out on a playdate right now.
yeah, excited to be here.
Happy to be in the conversation.
we're ever in the same city, probably our daughters can play together.
Mine is from November.
you can make the math.
It's just a few months away.
amazing.
So Ryan, if we were to follow you around shadow or whatever, you know, whatever withinlegal and ethical boundaries follow you around, try to feel what you feel in a regular day
(02:22):
week or what, whatever that looks like.
What would that feel?
What would that look like?
What would be the activities or things you're doing nowadays?
Yeah.
So I'm a practitioner of the art of living beautifully.
I have a really big life.
(02:43):
have a family that I have a sweet little daughter that I take care of and I do bedtimewith her.
have a group of really gorgeous clients that I get to work with who are really
like developing themselves and moving forward in their lives.
So the satisfaction of watching them kind of learn and grow.
(03:05):
I take a lot of class.
I'm in a doctorate right now.
So I'm studying and reading and writing and reflecting.
And I run a small business.
So I'm on the computer and I'm having networking meetings and talking to people and thenplaying games here and there when I can.
(03:27):
Sounds familiar to me, you know, academic, not on the doctorate side I'm teaching, smallbusiness, young daughter.
It sounds very, very familiar in my case, the engagers know these things already.
I'm not going to dive deep.
Ryan, we like, it seems like as you were saying, you're leading a beautiful life and welike to sort of bring our guests to the real world as well.
(03:49):
Because sometimes when people hear that it's like, this person has it all figured out.
And they've always been that way.
They were sort of born into this fantastic world and
Usually that is not the case and we've had rough times as well.
So we'd like to hear of one of those times.
One of those times when, especially using these CT RPGs or tabletop role playing games,they use that things where, you know, you're expecting them to work some way.
(04:10):
They just didn't flopped or whatever that looks like, especially we want to be there inthat story.
You know, see that first attempt at learning or that fail, how you came out of it.
What did you learn?
I don't know.
Guide us through that moment and that story.
Yeah, so this is maybe a little lower stakes, but I've been developing a bespoke RPG tofunction as a coaching intervention for my dissertation.
(04:38):
So this is a game that I'm designing for the purpose of learning and growing and personaldevelopment.
And I ran a play test with a group of friends, with a group of of like close people whoare all either
like coaches themselves and really well versed in the kind of personal development work orour long time game masters and game designers.
(05:01):
And, and it was just a mess.
was so messy.
And I realized one of the things I was trying to do too much.
And one of the challenges as a facilitator of this kind of work is there are kind of liketwo really big hats you're wearing.
There's the game master, which anyone who's ever
(05:21):
run a game before it knows, that's a lot of technical skill, it's a lot of payingattention and preparation and responding in the moment to people.
So it's a big lift in terms of attention.
And then as a facilitator, where I'm focused on the personal development of the people atthe table, that's another big lift as well.
(05:43):
So there's this learning curve that's very steep in terms of learning how to
facilitate the style of game that my first couple of times out, I bombed.
It was really not good.
I already had a fine time.
I got positive feedback, but on the back end, behind the DM screen, I was just like, oh mygod, how can I possibly do this?
(06:12):
And so the things I'm learning from that are that
the potential for partnerships between a game master who's running the game and then acoach facilitator who's kind of outside the game, maybe playing NPCs here and there to
make interventions in the group.
But sort of a partnership where two people can share that load is one possibility.
(06:37):
The other possibility is increased kind of story structure for, to help me stay grounded.
One of my ideals is that the story is emergent, that the game and the story is this thingthat just happens between the players at the table, and that it can come from the
(07:04):
creativity.
We don't need to decide a bunch of things in advance and have a bunch of story beats thatwe've already decided.
But I think that for better or for worse, that ideal is a high skill.
There's a high skill ceiling there.
so starting out having a more structured approach, I think will serve me, especially in mydissertation and kind of, especially with newer players too, who have less experience role
(07:32):
playing, getting people to kind of show up and be comfortable making something up in themoment that's connected to everything around them is another, it's a skill.
So.
Absolutely.
That makes sense.
I'm going to make a quick pause here.
Sorry about that.
There, when you were talking, there was some sort of clicking sound.
(07:54):
I'm not sure.
Like maybe you were doing something with your hands or something.
Is there, is there something that the, like your microphone, I'm guessing is the one thatis incorporated on there.
Is there.
No.
Was it?
There, I just heard it.
Did you hear it?
Is this yeah, it might be my my
Then again, sorry again.
(08:16):
I don't know, maybe it sounds every few seconds.
I didn't really account for that.
Because usually you're not moving your head.
was like you had your hands here.
Like you did something and then all of a sudden, like you did here.
I don't know.
Yeah, it might be my jacket if I take off my jacket right now is that
Yes, it could be.
It's opening and closing maybe.
(08:37):
Click, click, click.
Yes.
That's it.
You never imagined the impact of a small sound like that.
People like, I mean, in the video, maybe you have your attention elsewhere, but you'relistening.
You're just walking like, what was that?
What was that?
then, sorry about that.
That interruption.
That's just.
No.
(08:57):
Push Thanks for catching it.
No worries.
So Ryan, that was an amazing example of how you think about things in a certain way.
You plan things out and then, you know, of course, don't get me wrong, and I'm operationsprofessor as well.
So there's no way you can, you can find me in a situation where I don't have a plan whenit's, you know, business or teaching, right?
(09:19):
But every plan, when it hits the real life, there's always things that you need to be ableto adjust.
And so there's a mix there between what you were saying of
You know, the emer, emergence storyline and all of that, which is fantastic.
And you have to be prepared for that.
Then also a structure that supports you so that that emerging story can actually happensuccessfully, which is the, a very important aim that I'm sure you have as well.
(09:43):
So Ryan, how about we take a spin on that and actually go for something in the oppositedirection, something that went great.
You were using these TTRPGs, whether you created one specifically for this client, or youwere just using it for a certain purpose.
No need to disclose any names or any private information if it's not necessary for you.
But we want to be there.
(10:04):
We want to see some of success factors.
What led you in that direction?
How did you get there essentially?
Yeah.
one of the core, and here I'll nerd out a little bit about the coaching model because I'mgoing to tie it in with kind of the how this works, how it functions, how this works
(10:25):
essentially.
So each of us has this set of beliefs that we formed between the age of zero and five thatform the structure of our perceptual matrix.
So it's like what I believe about myself, what I believe about other people, what Ibelieve the world can expect from me and what I believe I can expect from the world.
(10:49):
this becomes this.
Yeah.
So we make up this, this operating system essentially of, of beliefs and behaviors thatform in that first five years of life when we're, when we're children.
And then we run that operating system 90 % of the time.
just because it's the most efficient thing to do and the brain is very expensive to runenergetically.
(11:12):
So the transformation gain is bringing when we experience upset, when we get blocked inour life, when things aren't working, when we get these repetitive patterns, especially
dynamics and relationships that are dissatisfying consistently with my wife, with mydaughter at work, with my friends that, sorry.
(11:37):
I realized the baby monitor was on.
these are the things, our beliefs are the things that are limiting our ability to expressourselves in a satisfying way and generate satisfying dynamics with others.
So when we encounter upset, we can bring that into the consciousness in a conversation orthrough gameplay, through reflection.
(12:02):
then...
transform that, essentially choose a new belief to start to empower, to start to buildevidence for.
So how that relates to identity is we think of ourselves often in this kind of fixed way,where it's like, this is how I am.
that identity is formed and it's not necessarily accurate.
(12:24):
We don't necessarily see ourselves accurately.
And so with games like Dungeons and Dragons, as I'm creating an avatar to play in thegame, as I'm creating a character, I'm unconsciously projecting stuff into that character.
And often it's stuff that
I want to work that I want that that I that is uncomfortable or that is aspirational orthere's unconscious stuff in there that I'm still working to process and understand about
(12:53):
myself.
An example of this is I was working with a guy and he had created this character and itwas he was like this he was like this scrappy pirate and he was like
He was like, I'm not a very successful pirate.
keep trying, but like my dad is this really famous pirate and he and I'm just like, alwaystrying to live up to his expectations of me essentially.
(13:19):
And in a coaching session, I said, you do you mind if I ask about, do you mind if I askabout your relationship with your dad?
And he was like, I didn't realize I'd done that.
I didn't realize I'd made that.
I totally like, like
I have this relationship with my dad where I just think he's disappointed in me.
(13:41):
so this became an opportunity for him to work that dynamic more consciously.
And we were able to use dad, the famous pirate as an NPC in the game and help him kind ofredeem that part of himself and kind of like come to a more satisfied conclusion about who
(14:01):
he was.
And that's just one example.
People like
People often work like I had a client who like two characters were two like characters arehaving a romantic relationship in the party.
the two of the players who decide to have a romance and one of the players had kind of areaction to it.
(14:23):
And he shared with me, it was like, I think my character is asexual.
Like I think my character is not, doesn't have any kind of sexual urge.
And I was like, oh.
Like, interesting, very cool.
Like, keep playing with that and see what happens.
And then five or six sessions later, that player came out as asexual.
(14:44):
And so this is something that he kind of discovered about himself through the character.
It wasn't something that he was necessarily aware of in himself or hadn't named inhimself.
But as he was playing the character, he was making those conclusions.
as he saw how he felt as he role played that.
(15:08):
So those are some examples of like how this can work.
going deep and it's like coaching, but also psychotherapy in many ways, right?
Like there's, there's some covering of many, many deep stuff in there.
So brilliant.
mean, amazing cases of using these, these TTRPGs for, you know, brilliant and hugepurposes as well.
Love it.
(15:29):
Ryan, if you were, you know, and I know you're working on a TTRPG, so this might be timelyin a way.
If you were to build.
TTRPG or a rebuild some sort of coaching session specifically for somebody using thesegames that you already have or are out there.
How would you approach it?
Like, do you have a thought process for this?
Do you have some system?
Like how does that work when a new client comes in and asks for something that you haven'tnecessarily done exactly that way before?
(15:56):
How does your, where, does your thinking go?
Yeah.
So, I mean, just to talk a little bit about the game I'm making now, I want to designsystems that help players take agency over the story.
they're the, the players are driving the story.
It's not the DM has decided here's the plot and here are the, it's like the players areco-creating the setting from this, from the jump.
(16:21):
They're, they're the ones deciding what kind of world we want to play in.
What kind of issues do we want to be dealing with?
What kind of characters?
are competent and going to be engaging with these issues.
And then obviously the character creation process, like what's emerging in me that I wantto bring into this game to work on?
(16:42):
What's my personal growing edge as a person that I can then as a player bring into thegame and work that into the story of the game with all the other players?
And then the actual
Gameplay the moment to moment gameplay.
I have a dice system.
I'm working on I've actually I'm really inspired by a dude named Anthony curza who's agamer and a coach out of Florida State and he he created some a system called Sam and
(17:14):
things like simple action narrative or like simple it's like a simple narrative system,but he does a and I've adapted it into a 2d6 dice system where
the middle values, the kind of 60 % of the values are player described success andfailure.
(17:34):
And then the outliers on either end are like GM describes the worst or best possibleoutcome.
But essentially that there are no difficulty classes.
all, it's random.
When you go to the dice, it's success and failure.
the dice are weighted towards success, you're gonna succeed more than you fail, but you'regonna fail an awful lot.
(17:57):
And so learning how to engage with failure and engage with success in a way that continuesto drive your story forward helps you keep going where you wanna be going as a character
and kind of embracing mistake, embracing that kind of thing.
So that's one example.
(18:17):
Another example is I'm strongly influenced also by fate.
I don't know how familiar you are with that game.
Nope.
But so one of the core mechanical engines in the game is a relationship between you getthese fake points, you get these these tokens you can spend on activating a character
(18:40):
aspect, which is like a brief description of something that's essential about yourcharacter.
So your character has three to five of these descriptors and they can help you in asituation.
And they can also draw you into danger.
So you can spend a fate point to activate them, to help you, help you be bad-ass in asituation and succeed.
(19:00):
But they can also draw you into danger.
And when they do, you get a fate point.
So there's this economy of spending, spending fate points to be bad-ass and then, and thengetting myself drawn into danger because of my aspects and then getting fate points to
spend to be bad-ass.
there's that's, that's kind of the gameplay loop.
(19:20):
I'm interested in using that with a transformative angle.
any character is always going from one state to another state.
So they have some kind of aspect that says, you know, this character is going from streeturchin to like competent burglar, you know?
(19:46):
So maybe this player is working with scarcity and
trust and competence and that sort of thing.
That there's this narrative of growing and changing over time and the extent to which theplayer engages with that part of their character, they have more storytelling power
(20:07):
essentially.
So the more they engage with that essential thing that they're working on, the more theycontribute to the narrative, the more fun they have at the table.
those are some of the systems I'm thinking about as I'm designing.
Sounds great.
You're working on many interesting things.
I'm guessing that's also part of your PhD.
So, you know, keep at it.
I'm sure the engagers will be excited to see where that ends and even potentially ifthere's anything that you can share, we'd love to hear about it too.
(20:34):
And, you know, Ryan, some people always like to talk about, you know, the silver bulletsand so on.
I don't want to go so far, but is there something that is like a best practice?
Something that you say, well, when you're using these TTRPGs,
or you're introducing these elements for something that is not just, you know, playing thegame for coaching or anything, would be a best practice that you have observed in your
(20:55):
experience?
I think even outside of game design, totally, like totally outside of game design, anyplayer, any player coming to the table can engage in this way by reflecting on like, who
am I?
Like, what do I really want in my life?
(21:16):
What's not working in my life?
And how can I bring some of these elements into the character I'm making for this game?
So intention setting as I'm creating the character.
intention setting as I come into a game session, like, okay, today, you know, I had thisfight with somebody at work and it's really upsetting me and, you know, and it's really
(21:38):
about, I'm feeling disrespected and, and so I'm really, I'm okay, respect.
So I'm yearning for respect.
I'm, I'm, and so, so in this game today, I'm going to work out some of that stuff.
I'm going to work on, I'm going to work on like getting respect or what it means to bedisrespected or, that sort of thing.
So I get some additional play time in this lighter environment.
(22:00):
then after the session, I can ask myself like, okay, how did that go?
When did I feel, you know, did I learn anything new?
And then how can I grow?
what, how does, how does what I learned influence how I want to behave, how I, what I wantto choose in my life.
And then that can be a positive feedback loop.
(22:20):
So that's something that, and that's something you could do.
Obviously it's easier if you get the buy-in of everybody else at the table, but it'ssomething that you can do just for yourself.
It's something you don't even need to share necessarily with anyone.
It can be really beneficial to share that journey with people so that other people arelooking out for you.
They're like, Rob's working on being effective or being seen or being heard.
(22:47):
And so I'm looking for opportunities to pass him the ball.
So it can be something I can do by myself.
It can also be something that I can share with other people.
But I don't even need, I could do it, we could play D &D, we could play, you know,mothership, we could play anything and still be using these tools.
(23:11):
Well, so it's a way of bringing, you know, it's a two-sided blade in a way, right?
So it's bringing to your zone of entertainment and of comfort in it for many people.
You're also bringing some of the quote unquote heavier stuff to work on it, but in a waywhere you're also still enjoying the game.
So it has that, you know, I'm bringing something heavy, but initially I think people mighthave a small, some people might have some reactions.
(23:36):
this is my game space.
Like leave it.
alone, but then it's like, yes, still your game space.
can still play in and by playing you're, you're working on some stuff and discovering newthings about yourself.
So I really like that, that good practice of as a player, which is something that no needto be a game designer.
As you were saying, you know, anybody can just engage in this by playing TTRPGs orwhatever games they are playing on as well.
(24:00):
So Ryan, after hearing these questions, you know, with all the things that we've beendiscussing, is there somebody that comes to your mind that you say, I
really like to listen to this person answering these kinds of questions on this setting.
So essentially a future guest for Professor Game.
Actually, I would recommend Anthony Curza.
think he'd be a good fit for, and I can send his information your way.
(24:25):
He's a college life coach out of, I think it's Florida State University, and he'sdesigning a narrative game very much in this vein where he and I are very much kind of on
the same path.
And he works with a lot of college students.
So he works with a lot of young people.
(24:46):
kind of helping them move forward in their lives.
So he's a cool dude.
Sounds definitely like a cool person to talk to as well.
And Ryan, in that same vein, is there a, perhaps a book that you recommend people to readif they haven't yet?
my goodness.
Uppsala University out of, gosh, it Finland or Sweden?
(25:16):
One of the OGs, the academic OGs who's done a lot of the early work on kind of like theuse of games for transformation.
Her name is Sarah, dang it, I'm gonna need to just bring this up.
She runs the Transformative Play Lab, the Transformative Play Initiative out of UppsalaUniversity.
(25:41):
And they just released a book that's free on their website.
And it's essentially best practices for this kind of like, how do you design a game thatcan help people change and grow?
And...
And they go deep into the theory and the research that they've done.
(26:02):
And they really focus on the Nordic LARP scene.
kind of like realistic live action role play is kind of where a lot of their research isbased.
But the principles are cross-disciplinary.
And it's really generous of them to have made that available for free.
And it's a really cool resource if anyone's interested in this kind of design.
(26:29):
Sounds like there's plenty to look into there and being a free resource, you know, it'seasy, easier to recommend it even further.
And talking about this world of TTRPGs and using them with a greater purpose as you do, isthere something that you would call your, or actually not is there, what is what you would
say is your superpower?
(26:49):
That thing that you do at least better than most other people.
And remember they don't have to be exclusive.
Doesn't mean you're the only one in the world who has it, but it's that thing that maybedistinguishes you from the crowd.
Yeah, I think that like, I'm really good at just being with people.
like, the one thing I've really learned about the coaching and leadership is that likepeople are people and groups are self organizing so that that individuals and groups will
(27:19):
orient toward the highest good for themselves.
if you give them the space to do so.
so like being simply being with people is a skill that, that
I think is really difficult for a lot of facilitators and a lot of people who want to liketeach or lead because they feel like they need to do something or do the group.
And so a skill that I've really, I think I have a natural ability in and have worked quitea bit on is, just like letting people be and seeing them accurately and, and, and
(27:50):
empathizing with them and that sort of thing.
Sounds like very meaningful, especially for your work, the work that you're doingnowadays.
And that's fantastic.
And now we reach an actually difficult question and it has to do with what is yourfavorite game?
Gosh, that's tough.
(28:12):
I've really been enjoying Mothership.
I've been enjoying this kind of dark, kind of apocalyptic sci-fi future kind of horrorgenre has been fun.
A game that I would lift up as being really cool.
I really like ninth level games, their polymorph system.
(28:32):
And particularly there's a game for young people called Venture Society, which is a gameabout talking animals.
There was a war recently and, and now you're in a time of peace and, the player charactersare a part of a peacekeeping force that are, they're going around and essentially like
(28:53):
solving problems nonviolently.
And so it's just like, they've got a really high value box set.
And if you
want a game to play with kids that's really about social emotional learning and that sortof thing.
I think it's hard to beat that game.
So that's something I would definitely plug as a really kind of innovative and good game.
(29:16):
Venture Society is the name of the company or of the game?
I'm not sure I called that one right.
Ventra Society is the name of the game and the game company is called Ninth Level Gamesand they've got a polymorph system.
the system essentially is each character class gets one die.
So you get a D4 or a D12 or a D8 and so success and failure is about rolling for certainkinds of outcomes.
(29:43):
So it's a really simple system.
It's really easy to pick up.
It's highly narrative and I like those kinds of games.
Sounds absolutely brilliant.
Thank you for that recommendation.
Sounds very meaningful as well.
Is there anything that, you know, of course we're super excited to have had you here inthe podcast to listen to all of the experience and knowledge that you bring in.
(30:03):
Is there anything else you'd like to say to the audience before, of course, letting usknow where we can find out more about you and your work and so on.
Any final words or advice or we can just move on and say, you know, we can find out moreabout me here and there.
Yeah, I mean, I'll say that.
(30:27):
One of the functions, a lot of people use games to escape.
And you kind of alluded to that earlier and that I think the potential for games to beused in a way that expands and enriches and deepens the meaning and the satisfaction that
(30:47):
you have in your life is worth the discomfort of some of the dark.
difficult things that we need to kind of go through in order to get to that deeper meaningand that games can provide a really safe place to do that.
And so even though this work can be uncomfortable, it's deeply and profoundly satisfyingin terms of both what I get for myself as well as the connections that I create with other
(31:14):
people through it.
So if you're concerned about losing your fun, I can assure you
It's still fun, it's just also something else.
So the style play is additive to your fun as opposed to kind of contracting around thefun.
(31:36):
Amazing, deep and amazing for sure.
So Ryan, where can we find out more about all that amazing work that you're doing aboutyou, know, I don't know, social media, webpage or many of these as well.
Yeah, I post pretty consistently on Instagram.
have a website.
I'm still in the process of once in the next couple of years, I'll be moving toward doingmore workshops.
(32:02):
Although I am going to be at Gen Con this year.
If anybody's going to be at Gen Con, I'll be doing some games facilitation and workshopsthere.
But keep a look out for my dissertation and follow me on Instagram.
Amazing!
Again, Ryan, thank you very much for sharing your insights, your knowledge, yourexperience.
(32:22):
However, Ryan and Engagers, as you know, at least for now and for today, it is time to saythat it's game over.
Hey, Engagers, and thank you for listening to the Professor Game Podcast.
And since you're interested in this world of creating motivation, engagement, loyalty,using game-inspired solutions,
How about you join us on our free online community at Professor Game on school.
(32:48):
You can find the link right below in the description, but the main thing is to clickthere, join us.
It's a platform called School is for Free and you will find plenty of resources there.
We'll be up to date with everything that we're doing, any opportunities that we might havefor you.
And of course, before you go into your next mission, before you click continue, pleaseremember to subscribe using your favorite podcast app.
(33:09):
and listen to the next episode of Professor Gay.
See you there!
Hey, this is Professor Game where we interview successful practitioners of games,gamification and game thinking to help us multiply engagement and loyalty.
I'm Rob Alvarez.
I'm a consultant, I'm a coach, and I'm the founder here at Professor Game.
And I'm also a professor of gamification and game inspired solutions at IE University, IEBusiness School, EFMD, EBS University, and other places around the world.
(00:24):
And before we dive into the interview, you're struggling.
with engagement in your business and are looking to find out how to make your users staywith you, you will find a free community full of resources, quite useful.
You can find it for free in the links below in the description.
So, Engagers, welcome back to another episode of the Professor Game Podcast.
(00:45):
And we have a special guest as always today.
We have Ryan with us, but Ryan, we need to know, are you prepared to engage?
Ready.
Let's do this.
Let's go.
have Ryan Allen Jones, a transformational coach, mindfulness practitioner, and advocatefor the power of storytelling in personal development.
(01:07):
He's currently pursuing a doctorate in leadership and coaching and his academic workcomplements his unique approach, which integrates tabletop role-playing games to help
individuals uncover new facets of themselves, build social, emotional intelligence, andfoster beautiful and satisfying
lives and his work bridges the creative and the practical, drawing on his experience as acertified personal trainer, yoga instructor, actor, and director.
(01:30):
And through his innovative approach, he bridges the worlds of imagination and reality,helping others discover their potential and redefine their personal narratives.
Ryan, don't know if there's anything you want to add to that, anything we're missing,anything we should know before we get into the questions.
I would say that it's pretty comprehensive.
(01:51):
I have a 19-month-old daughter, so she's out on a playdate right now.
yeah, excited to be here.
Happy to be in the conversation.
we're ever in the same city, probably our daughters can play together.
Mine is from November.
you can make the math.
It's just a few months away.
amazing.
So Ryan, if we were to follow you around shadow or whatever, you know, whatever withinlegal and ethical boundaries follow you around, try to feel what you feel in a regular day
(02:22):
week or what, whatever that looks like.
What would that feel?
What would that look like?
What would be the activities or things you're doing nowadays?
Yeah.
So I'm a practitioner of the art of living beautifully.
I have a really big life.
(02:43):
have a family that I have a sweet little daughter that I take care of and I do bedtimewith her.
have a group of really gorgeous clients that I get to work with who are really
like developing themselves and moving forward in their lives.
So the satisfaction of watching them kind of learn and grow.
(03:05):
I take a lot of class.
I'm in a doctorate right now.
So I'm studying and reading and writing and reflecting.
And I run a small business.
So I'm on the computer and I'm having networking meetings and talking to people and thenplaying games here and there when I can.
(03:27):
Sounds familiar to me, you know, academic, not on the doctorate side I'm teaching, smallbusiness, young daughter.
It sounds very, very familiar in my case, the engagers know these things already.
I'm not going to dive deep.
Ryan, we like, it seems like as you were saying, you're leading a beautiful life and welike to sort of bring our guests to the real world as well.
(03:49):
Because sometimes when people hear that it's like, this person has it all figured out.
And they've always been that way.
They were sort of born into this fantastic world and
Usually that is not the case and we've had rough times as well.
So we'd like to hear of one of those times.
One of those times when, especially using these CT RPGs or tabletop role playing games,they use that things where, you know, you're expecting them to work some way.
(04:10):
They just didn't flopped or whatever that looks like, especially we want to be there inthat story.
You know, see that first attempt at learning or that fail, how you came out of it.
What did you learn?
I don't know.
Guide us through that moment and that story.
Yeah, so this is maybe a little lower stakes, but I've been developing a bespoke RPG tofunction as a coaching intervention for my dissertation.
(04:38):
So this is a game that I'm designing for the purpose of learning and growing and personaldevelopment.
And I ran a play test with a group of friends, with a group of of like close people whoare all either
like coaches themselves and really well versed in the kind of personal development work orour long time game masters and game designers.
(05:01):
And, and it was just a mess.
was so messy.
And I realized one of the things I was trying to do too much.
And one of the challenges as a facilitator of this kind of work is there are kind of liketwo really big hats you're wearing.
There's the game master, which anyone who's ever
(05:21):
run a game before it knows, that's a lot of technical skill, it's a lot of payingattention and preparation and responding in the moment to people.
So it's a big lift in terms of attention.
And then as a facilitator, where I'm focused on the personal development of the people atthe table, that's another big lift as well.
(05:43):
So there's this learning curve that's very steep in terms of learning how to
facilitate the style of game that my first couple of times out, I bombed.
It was really not good.
I already had a fine time.
I got positive feedback, but on the back end, behind the DM screen, I was just like, oh mygod, how can I possibly do this?
(06:12):
And so the things I'm learning from that are that
the potential for partnerships between a game master who's running the game and then acoach facilitator who's kind of outside the game, maybe playing NPCs here and there to
make interventions in the group.
But sort of a partnership where two people can share that load is one possibility.
(06:37):
The other possibility is increased kind of story structure for, to help me stay grounded.
One of my ideals is that the story is emergent, that the game and the story is this thingthat just happens between the players at the table, and that it can come from the
(07:04):
creativity.
We don't need to decide a bunch of things in advance and have a bunch of story beats thatwe've already decided.
But I think that for better or for worse, that ideal is a high skill.
There's a high skill ceiling there.
so starting out having a more structured approach, I think will serve me, especially in mydissertation and kind of, especially with newer players too, who have less experience role
(07:32):
playing, getting people to kind of show up and be comfortable making something up in themoment that's connected to everything around them is another, it's a skill.
So.
Absolutely.
That makes sense.
I'm going to make a quick pause here.
Sorry about that.
There, when you were talking, there was some sort of clicking sound.
(07:54):
I'm not sure.
Like maybe you were doing something with your hands or something.
Is there, is there something that the, like your microphone, I'm guessing is the one thatis incorporated on there.
Is there.
No.
Was it?
There, I just heard it.
Did you hear it?
Is this yeah, it might be my my
Then again, sorry again.
(08:16):
I don't know, maybe it sounds every few seconds.
I didn't really account for that.
Because usually you're not moving your head.
was like you had your hands here.
Like you did something and then all of a sudden, like you did here.
I don't know.
Yeah, it might be my jacket if I take off my jacket right now is that
Yes, it could be.
It's opening and closing maybe.
(08:37):
Click, click, click.
Yes.
That's it.
You never imagined the impact of a small sound like that.
People like, I mean, in the video, maybe you have your attention elsewhere, but you'relistening.
You're just walking like, what was that?
What was that?
then, sorry about that.
That interruption.
That's just.
No.
(08:57):
Push Thanks for catching it.
No worries.
So Ryan, that was an amazing example of how you think about things in a certain way.
You plan things out and then, you know, of course, don't get me wrong, and I'm operationsprofessor as well.
So there's no way you can, you can find me in a situation where I don't have a plan whenit's, you know, business or teaching, right?
(09:19):
But every plan, when it hits the real life, there's always things that you need to be ableto adjust.
And so there's a mix there between what you were saying of
You know, the emer, emergence storyline and all of that, which is fantastic.
And you have to be prepared for that.
Then also a structure that supports you so that that emerging story can actually happensuccessfully, which is the, a very important aim that I'm sure you have as well.
(09:43):
So Ryan, how about we take a spin on that and actually go for something in the oppositedirection, something that went great.
You were using these TTRPGs, whether you created one specifically for this client, or youwere just using it for a certain purpose.
No need to disclose any names or any private information if it's not necessary for you.
But we want to be there.
(10:04):
We want to see some of success factors.
What led you in that direction?
How did you get there essentially?
Yeah.
one of the core, and here I'll nerd out a little bit about the coaching model because I'mgoing to tie it in with kind of the how this works, how it functions, how this works
(10:25):
essentially.
So each of us has this set of beliefs that we formed between the age of zero and five thatform the structure of our perceptual matrix.
So it's like what I believe about myself, what I believe about other people, what Ibelieve the world can expect from me and what I believe I can expect from the world.
(10:49):
this becomes this.
Yeah.
So we make up this, this operating system essentially of, of beliefs and behaviors thatform in that first five years of life when we're, when we're children.
And then we run that operating system 90 % of the time.
just because it's the most efficient thing to do and the brain is very expensive to runenergetically.
(11:12):
So the transformation gain is bringing when we experience upset, when we get blocked inour life, when things aren't working, when we get these repetitive patterns, especially
dynamics and relationships that are dissatisfying consistently with my wife, with mydaughter at work, with my friends that, sorry.
(11:37):
I realized the baby monitor was on.
these are the things, our beliefs are the things that are limiting our ability to expressourselves in a satisfying way and generate satisfying dynamics with others.
So when we encounter upset, we can bring that into the consciousness in a conversation orthrough gameplay, through reflection.
(12:02):
then...
transform that, essentially choose a new belief to start to empower, to start to buildevidence for.
So how that relates to identity is we think of ourselves often in this kind of fixed way,where it's like, this is how I am.
that identity is formed and it's not necessarily accurate.
(12:24):
We don't necessarily see ourselves accurately.
And so with games like Dungeons and Dragons, as I'm creating an avatar to play in thegame, as I'm creating a character, I'm unconsciously projecting stuff into that character.
And often it's stuff that
I want to work that I want that that I that is uncomfortable or that is aspirational orthere's unconscious stuff in there that I'm still working to process and understand about
(12:53):
myself.
An example of this is I was working with a guy and he had created this character and itwas he was like this he was like this scrappy pirate and he was like
He was like, I'm not a very successful pirate.
keep trying, but like my dad is this really famous pirate and he and I'm just like, alwaystrying to live up to his expectations of me essentially.
(13:19):
And in a coaching session, I said, you do you mind if I ask about, do you mind if I askabout your relationship with your dad?
And he was like, I didn't realize I'd done that.
I didn't realize I'd made that.
I totally like, like
I have this relationship with my dad where I just think he's disappointed in me.
(13:41):
so this became an opportunity for him to work that dynamic more consciously.
And we were able to use dad, the famous pirate as an NPC in the game and help him kind ofredeem that part of himself and kind of like come to a more satisfied conclusion about who
(14:01):
he was.
And that's just one example.
People like
People often work like I had a client who like two characters were two like characters arehaving a romantic relationship in the party.
the two of the players who decide to have a romance and one of the players had kind of areaction to it.
(14:23):
And he shared with me, it was like, I think my character is asexual.
Like I think my character is not, doesn't have any kind of sexual urge.
And I was like, oh.
Like, interesting, very cool.
Like, keep playing with that and see what happens.
And then five or six sessions later, that player came out as asexual.
(14:44):
And so this is something that he kind of discovered about himself through the character.
It wasn't something that he was necessarily aware of in himself or hadn't named inhimself.
But as he was playing the character, he was making those conclusions.
as he saw how he felt as he role played that.
(15:08):
So those are some examples of like how this can work.
going deep and it's like coaching, but also psychotherapy in many ways, right?
Like there's, there's some covering of many, many deep stuff in there.
So brilliant.
mean, amazing cases of using these, these TTRPGs for, you know, brilliant and hugepurposes as well.
Love it.
(15:29):
Ryan, if you were, you know, and I know you're working on a TTRPG, so this might be timelyin a way.
If you were to build.
TTRPG or a rebuild some sort of coaching session specifically for somebody using thesegames that you already have or are out there.
How would you approach it?
Like, do you have a thought process for this?
Do you have some system?
Like how does that work when a new client comes in and asks for something that you haven'tnecessarily done exactly that way before?
(15:56):
How does your, where, does your thinking go?
Yeah.
So, I mean, just to talk a little bit about the game I'm making now, I want to designsystems that help players take agency over the story.
they're the, the players are driving the story.
It's not the DM has decided here's the plot and here are the, it's like the players areco-creating the setting from this, from the jump.
(16:21):
They're, they're the ones deciding what kind of world we want to play in.
What kind of issues do we want to be dealing with?
What kind of characters?
are competent and going to be engaging with these issues.
And then obviously the character creation process, like what's emerging in me that I wantto bring into this game to work on?
(16:42):
What's my personal growing edge as a person that I can then as a player bring into thegame and work that into the story of the game with all the other players?
And then the actual
Gameplay the moment to moment gameplay.
I have a dice system.
I'm working on I've actually I'm really inspired by a dude named Anthony curza who's agamer and a coach out of Florida State and he he created some a system called Sam and
(17:14):
things like simple action narrative or like simple it's like a simple narrative system,but he does a and I've adapted it into a 2d6 dice system where
the middle values, the kind of 60 % of the values are player described success andfailure.
(17:34):
And then the outliers on either end are like GM describes the worst or best possibleoutcome.
But essentially that there are no difficulty classes.
all, it's random.
When you go to the dice, it's success and failure.
the dice are weighted towards success, you're gonna succeed more than you fail, but you'regonna fail an awful lot.
(17:57):
And so learning how to engage with failure and engage with success in a way that continuesto drive your story forward helps you keep going where you wanna be going as a character
and kind of embracing mistake, embracing that kind of thing.
So that's one example.
(18:17):
Another example is I'm strongly influenced also by fate.
I don't know how familiar you are with that game.
Nope.
But so one of the core mechanical engines in the game is a relationship between you getthese fake points, you get these these tokens you can spend on activating a character
(18:40):
aspect, which is like a brief description of something that's essential about yourcharacter.
So your character has three to five of these descriptors and they can help you in asituation.
And they can also draw you into danger.
So you can spend a fate point to activate them, to help you, help you be bad-ass in asituation and succeed.
(19:00):
But they can also draw you into danger.
And when they do, you get a fate point.
So there's this economy of spending, spending fate points to be bad-ass and then, and thengetting myself drawn into danger because of my aspects and then getting fate points to
spend to be bad-ass.
there's that's, that's kind of the gameplay loop.
(19:20):
I'm interested in using that with a transformative angle.
any character is always going from one state to another state.
So they have some kind of aspect that says, you know, this character is going from streeturchin to like competent burglar, you know?
(19:46):
So maybe this player is working with scarcity and
trust and competence and that sort of thing.
That there's this narrative of growing and changing over time and the extent to which theplayer engages with that part of their character, they have more storytelling power
(20:07):
essentially.
So the more they engage with that essential thing that they're working on, the more theycontribute to the narrative, the more fun they have at the table.
those are some of the systems I'm thinking about as I'm designing.
Sounds great.
You're working on many interesting things.
I'm guessing that's also part of your PhD.
So, you know, keep at it.
I'm sure the engagers will be excited to see where that ends and even potentially ifthere's anything that you can share, we'd love to hear about it too.
(20:34):
And, you know, Ryan, some people always like to talk about, you know, the silver bulletsand so on.
I don't want to go so far, but is there something that is like a best practice?
Something that you say, well, when you're using these TTRPGs,
or you're introducing these elements for something that is not just, you know, playing thegame for coaching or anything, would be a best practice that you have observed in your
(20:55):
experience?
I think even outside of game design, totally, like totally outside of game design, anyplayer, any player coming to the table can engage in this way by reflecting on like, who
am I?
Like, what do I really want in my life?
(21:16):
What's not working in my life?
And how can I bring some of these elements into the character I'm making for this game?
So intention setting as I'm creating the character.
intention setting as I come into a game session, like, okay, today, you know, I had thisfight with somebody at work and it's really upsetting me and, you know, and it's really
(21:38):
about, I'm feeling disrespected and, and so I'm really, I'm okay, respect.
So I'm yearning for respect.
I'm, I'm, and so, so in this game today, I'm going to work out some of that stuff.
I'm going to work on, I'm going to work on like getting respect or what it means to bedisrespected or, that sort of thing.
So I get some additional play time in this lighter environment.
(22:00):
then after the session, I can ask myself like, okay, how did that go?
When did I feel, you know, did I learn anything new?
And then how can I grow?
what, how does, how does what I learned influence how I want to behave, how I, what I wantto choose in my life.
And then that can be a positive feedback loop.
(22:20):
So that's something that, and that's something you could do.
Obviously it's easier if you get the buy-in of everybody else at the table, but it'ssomething that you can do just for yourself.
It's something you don't even need to share necessarily with anyone.
It can be really beneficial to share that journey with people so that other people arelooking out for you.
They're like, Rob's working on being effective or being seen or being heard.
(22:47):
And so I'm looking for opportunities to pass him the ball.
So it can be something I can do by myself.
It can also be something that I can share with other people.
But I don't even need, I could do it, we could play D &D, we could play, you know,mothership, we could play anything and still be using these tools.
(23:11):
Well, so it's a way of bringing, you know, it's a two-sided blade in a way, right?
So it's bringing to your zone of entertainment and of comfort in it for many people.
You're also bringing some of the quote unquote heavier stuff to work on it, but in a waywhere you're also still enjoying the game.
So it has that, you know, I'm bringing something heavy, but initially I think people mighthave a small, some people might have some reactions.
(23:36):
this is my game space.
Like leave it.
alone, but then it's like, yes, still your game space.
can still play in and by playing you're, you're working on some stuff and discovering newthings about yourself.
So I really like that, that good practice of as a player, which is something that no needto be a game designer.
As you were saying, you know, anybody can just engage in this by playing TTRPGs orwhatever games they are playing on as well.
(24:00):
So Ryan, after hearing these questions, you know, with all the things that we've beendiscussing, is there somebody that comes to your mind that you say, I
really like to listen to this person answering these kinds of questions on this setting.
So essentially a future guest for Professor Game.
Actually, I would recommend Anthony Curza.
think he'd be a good fit for, and I can send his information your way.
(24:25):
He's a college life coach out of, I think it's Florida State University, and he'sdesigning a narrative game very much in this vein where he and I are very much kind of on
the same path.
And he works with a lot of college students.
So he works with a lot of young people.
(24:46):
kind of helping them move forward in their lives.
So he's a cool dude.
Sounds definitely like a cool person to talk to as well.
And Ryan, in that same vein, is there a, perhaps a book that you recommend people to readif they haven't yet?
my goodness.
Uppsala University out of, gosh, it Finland or Sweden?
(25:16):
One of the OGs, the academic OGs who's done a lot of the early work on kind of like theuse of games for transformation.
Her name is Sarah, dang it, I'm gonna need to just bring this up.
She runs the Transformative Play Lab, the Transformative Play Initiative out of UppsalaUniversity.
(25:41):
And they just released a book that's free on their website.
And it's essentially best practices for this kind of like, how do you design a game thatcan help people change and grow?
And...
And they go deep into the theory and the research that they've done.
(26:02):
And they really focus on the Nordic LARP scene.
kind of like realistic live action role play is kind of where a lot of their research isbased.
But the principles are cross-disciplinary.
And it's really generous of them to have made that available for free.
And it's a really cool resource if anyone's interested in this kind of design.
(26:29):
Sounds like there's plenty to look into there and being a free resource, you know, it'seasy, easier to recommend it even further.
And talking about this world of TTRPGs and using them with a greater purpose as you do, isthere something that you would call your, or actually not is there, what is what you would
say is your superpower?
(26:49):
That thing that you do at least better than most other people.
And remember they don't have to be exclusive.
Doesn't mean you're the only one in the world who has it, but it's that thing that maybedistinguishes you from the crowd.
Yeah, I think that like, I'm really good at just being with people.
like, the one thing I've really learned about the coaching and leadership is that likepeople are people and groups are self organizing so that that individuals and groups will
(27:19):
orient toward the highest good for themselves.
if you give them the space to do so.
so like being simply being with people is a skill that, that
I think is really difficult for a lot of facilitators and a lot of people who want to liketeach or lead because they feel like they need to do something or do the group.
And so a skill that I've really, I think I have a natural ability in and have worked quitea bit on is, just like letting people be and seeing them accurately and, and, and
(27:50):
empathizing with them and that sort of thing.
Sounds like very meaningful, especially for your work, the work that you're doingnowadays.
And that's fantastic.
And now we reach an actually difficult question and it has to do with what is yourfavorite game?
Gosh, that's tough.
(28:12):
I've really been enjoying Mothership.
I've been enjoying this kind of dark, kind of apocalyptic sci-fi future kind of horrorgenre has been fun.
A game that I would lift up as being really cool.
I really like ninth level games, their polymorph system.
(28:32):
And particularly there's a game for young people called Venture Society, which is a gameabout talking animals.
There was a war recently and, and now you're in a time of peace and, the player charactersare a part of a peacekeeping force that are, they're going around and essentially like
(28:53):
solving problems nonviolently.
And so it's just like, they've got a really high value box set.
And if you
want a game to play with kids that's really about social emotional learning and that sortof thing.
I think it's hard to beat that game.
So that's something I would definitely plug as a really kind of innovative and good game.
(29:16):
Venture Society is the name of the company or of the game?
I'm not sure I called that one right.
Ventra Society is the name of the game and the game company is called Ninth Level Gamesand they've got a polymorph system.
the system essentially is each character class gets one die.
So you get a D4 or a D12 or a D8 and so success and failure is about rolling for certainkinds of outcomes.
(29:43):
So it's a really simple system.
It's really easy to pick up.
It's highly narrative and I like those kinds of games.
Sounds absolutely brilliant.
Thank you for that recommendation.
Sounds very meaningful as well.
Is there anything that, you know, of course we're super excited to have had you here inthe podcast to listen to all of the experience and knowledge that you bring in.
(30:03):
Is there anything else you'd like to say to the audience before, of course, letting usknow where we can find out more about you and your work and so on.
Any final words or advice or we can just move on and say, you know, we can find out moreabout me here and there.
Yeah, I mean, I'll say that.
(30:27):
One of the functions, a lot of people use games to escape.
And you kind of alluded to that earlier and that I think the potential for games to beused in a way that expands and enriches and deepens the meaning and the satisfaction that
(30:47):
you have in your life is worth the discomfort of some of the dark.
difficult things that we need to kind of go through in order to get to that deeper meaningand that games can provide a really safe place to do that.
And so even though this work can be uncomfortable, it's deeply and profoundly satisfyingin terms of both what I get for myself as well as the connections that I create with other
(31:14):
people through it.
So if you're concerned about losing your fun, I can assure you
It's still fun, it's just also something else.
So the style play is additive to your fun as opposed to kind of contracting around thefun.
(31:36):
Amazing, deep and amazing for sure.
So Ryan, where can we find out more about all that amazing work that you're doing aboutyou, know, I don't know, social media, webpage or many of these as well.
Yeah, I post pretty consistently on Instagram.
have a website.
I'm still in the process of once in the next couple of years, I'll be moving toward doingmore workshops.
(32:02):
Although I am going to be at Gen Con this year.
If anybody's going to be at Gen Con, I'll be doing some games facilitation and workshopsthere.
But keep a look out for my dissertation and follow me on Instagram.
Amazing!
Again, Ryan, thank you very much for sharing your insights, your knowledge, yourexperience.
(32:22):
However, Ryan and Engagers, as you know, at least for now and for today, it is time to saythat it's game over.
Hey, Engagers, and thank you for listening to the Professor Game Podcast.
And since you're interested in this world of creating motivation, engagement, loyalty,using game-inspired solutions,
How about you join us on our free online community at Professor Game on school.
(32:48):
You can find the link right below in the description, but the main thing is to clickthere, join us.
It's a platform called School is for Free and you will find plenty of resources there.
We'll be up to date with everything that we're doing, any opportunities that we might havefor you.
And of course, before you go into your next mission, before you click continue, pleaseremember to subscribe using your favorite podcast app.
(33:09):
and listen to the next episode of Professor Gay.
See you there!
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