June 5, 2025 • 34 mins
Bonus Episode - Solo Podsters Roundtable 3: Tale of the Manticore is a hybrid solo-actualplay D&D game and full production audiodrama. I use Dungeons & Dragons B/X (OSR). This is a dark fantasy tale made for a mature audience.
Want to listen without the ads while helping the show? Join the Supporters' Club: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/tale-of-the-manticore-a-dark-fantasy-dungeons-dragons-audiodrama--6276878/support
Featured in this Roundtable:
Simon from Legend of the Bones:
https://legendofthebones.podbean.com/
Maddy Serl from A Game of One's Own:
https://snazzytapir.com/581-2/podcasts/a-game-of-ones-own/
Dan of Legends from the Fireside:
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/legends-from-the-fireside/id1660343914
Coop the GM of Echoes of Eshaton and cohost of Myth & Moon:
https://echoesofeshaton.com/
https://podcastaddict.com/podcast/myth-moon/5848304
Also Mentioned on the show...
Justin Pfeil: Keep on Borderlands:
https://thekeepontheborderlands.justinpfeil.com/
and
Alexy Gorboot:
https://www.instagram.com/alexeygorboot/
**And please check out our new network website: https://soloroleplayersnetwork.com/
Want to listen without the ads while helping the show? Join the Supporters' Club: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/tale-of-the-manticore-a-dark-fantasy-dungeons-dragons-audiodrama--6276878/support
Featured in this Roundtable:
Simon from Legend of the Bones:
https://legendofthebones.podbean.com/
Maddy Serl from A Game of One's Own:
https://snazzytapir.com/581-2/podcasts/a-game-of-ones-own/
Dan of Legends from the Fireside:
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/legends-from-the-fireside/id1660343914
Coop the GM of Echoes of Eshaton and cohost of Myth & Moon:
https://echoesofeshaton.com/
https://podcastaddict.com/podcast/myth-moon/5848304
Also Mentioned on the show...
Justin Pfeil: Keep on Borderlands:
https://thekeepontheborderlands.justinpfeil.com/
and
Alexy Gorboot:
https://www.instagram.com/alexeygorboot/
**And please check out our new network website: https://soloroleplayersnetwork.com/
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:18):
We are back for a third and final installment in
this series of roundtable discussions with some of the most
exciting players in the world of solo RPG pods. I've
got four more of my fellow creators with me here today,
all of whom have a different approach in style. I'm
excited to get started, So let's meet our guests. Simon,
why don't you introduce yourself? Hi?
Speaker 2 (00:39):
I'm Simon. I produce a podcast called Legend of the Bones,
which is a dark fantasy audio drama driven by old
school solo D and D fantastic.
Speaker 1 (00:50):
And sitting next to Simon at the round table, we've
got Maddie. Maddie wants to introduce yourself.
Speaker 3 (00:55):
Hello.
Speaker 4 (00:56):
Yes, I'm Maddie Searl My pronouns are they them? And
I am the host of a Game of One's Own,
which is a solo and duet TTRPG podcast.
Speaker 1 (01:04):
Good stuff.
Speaker 5 (01:04):
Dan, Hi, I'm Dan from Legends from the Fireside, a
solo hybrid storytelling RPG show just like.
Speaker 1 (01:12):
We all do. Thanks Dan. And finally, Coop, why don't
you tell us about yourself and your show?
Speaker 3 (01:18):
Hello? There, I'm Coop, the GM host of The Echoes
of Eshington Podcast, a post apocalyptic primal punk adventure and
co host of the Myth and Moon Podcast, a dueling
narrative where fates collide and dice decide.
Speaker 1 (01:33):
Okay, thank you very much. We have got a great
group and I am excited to get started. So our
first question is going to be how do we start
a new game from scratch, especially if you were giving
advice to somebody who had never tried a solo game before,
or you can just talk about how you start a
game from scratch yourself. Why don't we have Maddie start
(01:54):
us off?
Speaker 4 (01:55):
I think for me it's about picking the right game,
and because I tend to go to the weird Thelendi
games that usually are very like heavily full of prompts,
that I think would be a good place to start
if you're new to solo games, so like solo journaling games,
because yeah they're usually heavily structured, but they leave enough
(02:16):
room for you to be creative within the constraints of
the game.
Speaker 1 (02:20):
Great advice. Let's go on to Dan, same question, how
would you start a game from scratch or what advice
would you give to someone who was just getting started.
Speaker 5 (02:29):
So for me, I've only ever used old school essentials
for this, and I've thought in the past if I
wanted to do something like three point five or something
like that, somethe really clunky, that it would be difficult
to manage that in an audio format like we do
for our podcast. But in my mind, I think, really
what pulls me back to doing the show is having
something that's really evocative, something with a cool vibe to it.
(02:51):
So in my mind, I'm like, if you want to
get started in this, you just got to pick out,
like what your favorite slice of fantasy or sci fi is,
and just really chase that high of that of that
game style. And when you can find what makes you
want to keep coming back and keep rolling dice and
keep going down that avenue, you know it'll all fall
in place.
Speaker 1 (03:10):
That's a great answer. Okay, thanks very much, And next
up we're going to ask Coop the same question, Coop,
how would we get started in solo gaming?
Speaker 3 (03:19):
When I think of a story I want to tell,
if there's something real that I can grab onto, that's
when I find the easiest place to start for solo games. So,
for instance, I would say like a location I think
castles just in general, all types of castles from all
over the world are the coolest thing. They're the last strongholds,
the last fortresses. But what goes on behind closed doors?
(03:42):
You know, castles were very sprawling in some instances. They
had their own you know, surfdom or fifetom or however
you want to describe it within the castle walls. So
it was all this closed economy type stuff as well
as the political sphere in there as well. So yeah,
I'd say finding a slice of life that is entertaining
to you, or at least there has a nugget of
your own truth in it, that's what's going to help
(04:03):
you make a good solo game, good stuff coop.
Speaker 1 (04:06):
Last job we've got simon any advice for a new
solo gamer or any procedures that you would use to
start fresh.
Speaker 2 (04:14):
Okay, So, assuming you're playing fully fledged RPG like D
and D, GERPS, BRP or something like that, then first
and foremost, I think it's really important that you choose
a system that you're comfortable with, that you know and
that you like. Then for the game itself, I would
suggest starting small in a small location where you don't
(04:35):
need to know much about the law or the wider
geography and you build out from there, and that's pretty
common advice nowadays. But I do think that if you
want to achieve a level of emotion in your game
and very similitude, and I think solo play is really
good at this, then I would advise having a strong
concept for your game, and what I mean by that
(04:57):
is grounding it in something which is consistent. So it
might be a kind of Greco Roman feel or a
Western or in my case, I went for a Viking
ehe Briton concept with kind of Anglo Saxon and Celtic
themes in it. And I think if you do that,
then the world feels a bit more real and it
comes together much more nicely. And that means that as
(05:18):
you build law going forward, then you can have more
consistency with it. So yeah, that would be my top tip.
Speaker 1 (05:24):
It really is like such a common question, and of
course that makes sense even if you listen to shows
like Hours. I think it could be a daunting thing
to try and do it for the first time on
your own. I think there could be a paralysis there.
So great advice and thanks very much. Our next question
is going to be how much do you randomize in
your solo play and how much do you use DM
(05:48):
fiat or just make things up. So we're talking about
NPC's random encounters, layouts for locations and things like that,
And for this question, I'm going to ask Dan to
start us off.
Speaker 5 (06:01):
Okay, So for me, I think that this is almost
like the most center point of solo play is this
question of am I writing a novel or am I
doing a completely random I don't touch it like style play,
And I think what's interesting is the level of balance
implies like how much in I don't know, I don't
(06:21):
want to say, like how much you are tailoring the
story to your tastes. But if you let this be
completely and utterly random everywhere around it, you might lose
a little bit of the flavor and the vibe that
you're looking for in a game. And thus, I mean
within the constraints of the system. Obviously, I don't think
spaceships are going to show up in your Arthurian Fantasy,
but I do think that there's something to be said
about how you find that balance when you're playing that
(06:44):
sometimes you feel like I want to introduce a new
character and I'm not going to try to balance the party.
I'm not going to try to introduce these things. I
want to have it be as random as possible. But
then there's other times when you're like, no, the story
calls for this to be here at this point in time.
It'll really pull things together. And so I guess you
know how much to randomize. I don't want to say
(07:04):
according to taste, but the story will tell you how
random it should be. You know, if you're going to
a particular dungeon where you know there's a magic sword
somewhere in a well held sanctum, I can't hope that
the dice will just have that appear, let alone have
that appear potentially as the first room they walk into.
Kind of a little anti climactic. So you know, there's
times where you really have to hold hands with the
(07:25):
dice and really guide the story to the right place
with it. But you'll find the balance.
Speaker 1 (07:30):
I think, Yeah, your story is talking to you. You
have to listen to your story, don't you. I say
it facetiously, but actually sometimes I actually believe that some
magic is going on. Anyway, let's turn that question over
to Coop. Coop, same question, how much do you randomize
and how much is dm fiat.
Speaker 3 (07:48):
The slider has grown to be more fluid owing to
you know, the sort of sliding scale that you were
talking about. I owe a lot to the mythic GME
authored by Tana Pigeon, who we cannot say enough good
things about. It's so complete, it's so comprehensive, it's easy
to read, it's easy to understand. There's theming in there.
(08:10):
There's great tools for writers in there. I mean, I
would love to meet her in person. But yeah, so
sliding scale aside, the tool sets help me determine how
much I want to do at any given time. Now,
if I come in with a certain idea, that's probably
going to be all me and I won't roll for anything.
It will be fully fleshed out from my own head.
(08:31):
But the biggest problem I have when I'm doing my
solo games is finding good obstacles for characters to encounter,
physical or otherwise, but mainly physical, because that's going to
give a challenge that I can roll against that I
can actually gamify. So trying to find a good way
to keep the gamification while also finding a little bit
(08:54):
of wiggle room in there for something randomized as good.
Now in terms of store, I think story is probably
about sixty percent me forty percent chance fait randomization, because
I don't I don't want it to end. I don't
want to I don't want to encounter a writer's block
in a way that's gonna make me want to backtrack
(09:16):
and change decisions that I've already made. I always want
to be pressing forward. So with that in mind, i'd
say about a sixty to forty split is good for me.
And then location wise, locations are good where I can
just drop a handful of dice right out a location.
But if I have a central point, like I mentioned
the Slice of Life earlier of just like the King's
throne room in the Castle, I know exactly what that's
(09:37):
going to look like, whether it's borrowed from Cone or wherever.
And then the last thing I'd say is probably dungeons,
which is, you know, falls in line with obstacles. I
think dungeons are usually fully randomized. Dungeons need to be
challenging enough for the players to progress and also not
be you know, stymied immediately, So finding a good balance
there as it's still what I would consider a novice
game player, I don't quite have the tac for that yet,
(10:00):
but doing it from a table seems usually easy enough
and well balanced.
Speaker 1 (10:04):
Thanks so much for that. We're going to now move
on to Simon. Same question for you as well. How
much do your randomize? How much is DM.
Speaker 2 (10:10):
Fear much like Dan? Really it depends. I do have
set pieces which I've predesigned, where I've created the location
and the embcs or monsters which might be encountered beforehand,
and other times it will be completely random. I recently
had a situation on my show where a wandering encounter
(10:32):
which sporned four or five episodes of story and action.
I then had to fit some bits in by DM
fiat in order to make things work to be more
coherent to make sense. Where things become tricky is when
you put your characters into say a dungeon, and there
are multiple choices available for the party to take multiple
exits or multiple ways of overcoming something. The difficulty then
(10:57):
is how do you not mitigate it? So what I
would normally do is think about what the characters know,
their personalities, the information available to them, and make a
logical choice based on that. If that still doesn't lead
to a clear answer, then I might just roll randomly
or even ask my oilcle what the pieces might do
in that situation. But in terms of the places and
(11:18):
the NPCs, it depends. If they're a major NPC, I
probably predetermined them, or in those cases, I might randomly
generate some of their personality to give it some interest
and flavor. But in terms of how much I lead
into that audio drama versus game dynamic, I'm probably about
fifty to fifty, but it's a matter of taste, and
(11:40):
others will be at various degrees of that scale.
Speaker 1 (11:42):
Yeah, there really is a kind of a slider, isn't it,
And you can move that slider around depending on what
well to use Dan's idea, what your story's asking for. Okay,
let's move on to Maddie. Same question for you. How
much do you randomize or how much do you just
make things up as you go?
Speaker 4 (12:01):
I think for me, because I tend to play a
lot of journaling games or prompt driven games, use the
games that use a deck of cards or a taro
set to kind of offer prompts, I think this question
still can apply because sometimes you get a prompt that
just doesn't really fit with where your story is going,
(12:22):
and so even though it's not strictly in the rules,
I will redraw sometimes in the in the rules, especially
for kind of safety tools reasons, they will say, if
you're not comfortable with this prompt, just draw another one.
And I think that, yeah, it's if it's ruining your
enjoyment of the game and a prompt comes up that's
just not working for you, I think it's completely fine
to reroll or redraw, and yeah, just do what as
(12:47):
people are saying, feels right for the story.
Speaker 1 (12:49):
Yeah. Actually, I'm so glad that we've got you involved
in this roundtable because the rest of us are playing,
you know, these traditional role playing games the same system
kind of for a long time, but you really sample
a lot of different systems, so I think you've probably
got a real breadth of knowledge that the rest of
us don't have and experience too. Anyway, great answer. Let's
(13:10):
move on to our third question, and we're gonna start
out with coop for this one. Do you have a
favorite moment ever in a solo game?
Speaker 3 (13:19):
This one was able to be pulled right out of
my back pocket. This is actually what I'm beginning to
call the Deborah Anne Wool effect. I don't know if
you've seen that clip of her talking to the actor
he plays the Punisher, John Burnenthal. Deboraham Wolf's talking to
John Burnhal and John Burnenthal has a podcast. He's kind
of a man about Hollywood. He has a lot of
interesting connections, and he seems like a good host, a
(13:41):
decent host. And he's talking with her, and she just
naturally brings up Nungeons and Dragons. John asked, well, how
do you play? And Deborah and her infinite wisdom, says well,
would you like to play? Right now? He's like, yeah, okay.
Speaker 5 (13:53):
Lovely D and D. I mean I'll try. I mean,
what do you think literally right now? Sure?
Speaker 3 (13:59):
And she just launches into it. She sets a scene,
she gives an optional challenge, She describes his character in
brief and just probably from some of his acting instincts,
he immediately picks up on something so to give it
the Deborah Anne Wohl effect, This is the story I
normally tell people who are looking to start D and
D or some type of tabletop RPG game, because it
(14:19):
exhibits several things. It exhibits critical thinking, it exhibits lex
and storytelling, and it exhibits a good relationship with your
GM or DM, which I think is probably I said
it last, but I think it's one of the most critical.
So here's my moment. It was a curse abstrade campaign
in D and D and we were in the Amber Temple.
Those familiar with the Amber Temple, it's a huge, sprawling,
(14:42):
you know, temple of Macab's secrets and lots of cool
magical artifacts and things like that. And our DM, who
is my co writer on Myth and Moon, he had
set up the dungeon really really well. He was expecting
one of the party members to die because we were
a little under level. So owing to what you mentioned
earlier about finding the right balance, he was striking it
(15:02):
for several sessions in a row, but then he threw
us a real curveball. There was an enemy and a
spire with a shrouded darkness around the top of the
little spire inside the temple, so we couldn't see what
was firing at us, and it was a magic user,
So we were really having trouble trying to assault the
base of the spire to either you know, try to
get him out of there, or just trying to figure
out how to even attack it. So as a dwarf.
(15:24):
For my first character ever in D and D. I
was a fighter and I had a magic helm of
stone shape. I put the helmet on. I ran underneath
the base of the tower and I asked my DM.
I said, is this temple made of stone? And he's like, yes,
it is. I put my hand underneath the spire. I
raised a three foot cube underneath it, just at the
edge to make the spire topple over. And then the
(15:47):
magic user fell out of the shroud of darkness and
we all ganged him and he was just had his
head in his hands buried. He thought he'd had us,
that we were licked. But little did he know that
he had a super inventive novice at the base of
the spire. So that's the story I normally tell everyone.
They're like, oh, helmet of stone shape, where'd you find it?
And I was like, well, it actually has an ancient
(16:07):
dwarf and wizard trapped inside the helmets. Every time I
put it on, the DM would put on this wizard.
I'll just rink fire for it's good to see you again,
you know, good to be in your head. So there
was lots of great moments like that, but that's the
one that always stands out.
Speaker 1 (16:21):
That is a great story coop. All right, Simon, do
you have a favorite moment ever from a solo game
that you could share?
Speaker 2 (16:27):
Yes, So around episode twenty eight something like that, my
coacters were in a dungeon and they were facing off
against a big bad and things were going pretty badly
for the party. I think I overpowered the monster a
little bit and suddenly one of the characters that critical
moment rolled it at twenty and without that I probably
(16:48):
would have had a TPK on my hands. It was
one of those moments where you just go, yes, yep,
that's why we play and yeah, it was amazing.
Speaker 1 (16:56):
Did you stand up and cheer like a like at
a table game? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (17:00):
Oh yeah. It was one of those fispumpanenty moments where
you go yeah, yeah, So that was probably my favorite
moments so far.
Speaker 1 (17:07):
Fantastic, Thanks Maddie. How about you.
Speaker 4 (17:10):
I played a game for my show called Forgery by
Banana Chan, and it's really interesting in that it kind
of combines a sort of choose your own adventure style
book with solo journaling role playing. So you're playing as
this struggling artist who is forging this sort of demonic painting,
(17:32):
and there's a twist in it that just really took
me by surprise, and like I really felt what the
character was feeling in that situation. And yeah, it gets
into some really dark themes, but in a way that
is very sensitively done and really makes you think about
like what are you willing to sacrifice or what sort
of terrible things are you willing to do to be
(17:54):
successful in a creative field. So yeah, I won't tell
you exactly what happens because it is massive spoiler, but yeah,
fair enough, that game is amazing.
Speaker 1 (18:04):
Now, Maddie, would you say that sort of the highs
and the lows can be or even just often are
like more intense with solo games than with group games.
Speaker 4 (18:13):
I think it depends. Yeah, I think it can be
if you are going for a more introspective kind of tone,
it can really feel like you are at the center
of the story. You are sort of both in control
and out of control because you've got the randomized elements.
So yeah, I think that it can be very intense,
especially for a game that maybe has some kind of
(18:36):
supernatural elements. Maybe if you are doing it in a
dark room with candles or something like that. There's a
game that I haven't played yet called Wreck This Deck
where you sort of draw on and destroy a deck
of cards in a sort of demonic ritual. So you
can really get very experiential with this kind of stuff.
Speaker 1 (18:53):
I want to play that game. I want to get
scared playing a solo game. It hasn't happened yet.
Speaker 5 (18:57):
I want to do it.
Speaker 1 (18:59):
Dan, same question for you, favorite moment ever in a
solo game.
Speaker 5 (19:04):
So it might sound a little morbid to say this
is my favorite moment, but I think that this is
what made me really feel the most I've ever felt
in a solo game. One of the longest standing characters
that I had in the first season of the show
is Marris, and he sort of was like the de
facto sort of main character, just the way the dice
rolled him up in the way story worked. But he
died in a random encounter with a hag and it
(19:28):
was one of those like it takes your breath away
moments where they get hit all three times in the
three split attacks and every one of them just drops them.
You start looking through the rules and like begging the
rule book, like it, well, is there a way I
could maybe you know, fiot that there was actually a
light problem so it was a minus two for this
or something. And accepting that this character who propped so
much of the story up on their shoulders was just
(19:49):
gone because the dice say so. Having to accept that
and work with that and say like, well, where is
the story now? Like I had a grieving process. The
characters had a grieving process. And it's weird to think
piggybacking or what we were saying just a second ago that, like,
I don't know, you feel it almost stronger because it's
all in your head. I'm granted, we get the luxury
of putting this out for people to listen to it,
(20:09):
but like, these characters really just exist in this weird
ethereal space, and yet I feel something when this poor
hapless character is torn to shreds out in the wilderness,
and it, you know, you feel something, and that to
me is like a really powerful moment.
Speaker 1 (20:23):
Yeah, one hundred percent. There's that grieving process if you
lose a character. I mean that's true with a table game,
like a social game as well, but I don't know,
I do feel like it's stronger with solo games. Okay,
we're moving on to the next question, Simon, This one's
for you. What can solo games do or give you
the group games cannot.
Speaker 2 (20:42):
Yes, So for me, what solo can enable is a
really deep sense of immersion in the other world that
you're creating. And whilst table games can do that to
a degree, often it's a little bit more social. We
have people are munching pretzels and yeah, having fun and
is more humor in it, whereas I think with a
(21:04):
solo game you could really get that immersion and believe
in the fantasy a lot more. And the wonderful thing
about it is the world you create, the environment, the geography,
the places, the characters. You learn about those things and
in a very deep way, and with the characters, particularly
as personalities emerge through the play, and it's like getting
(21:27):
to know someone. It's a really strange but wonderful experience
to have that, and I think that's something that you
could only really achieve in solo. And I maintain that
that solo play is great for everyone and for me
it certainly made me a better GM as well. And
the techniques and tools that I've used in solo I
(21:48):
now bring to my life table. So yeah, it's something
for everyone. So if you really want to feel something
very very deeply and get completely immersed, then that's where
the how if.
Speaker 1 (22:00):
Solo is fantastic. I agree with all of that for sure, Maddie.
Same question for you, What can solo games do or
give you that group games cannot.
Speaker 4 (22:10):
I think I'm going to give two answers to this.
One is deeply mercenary and practical, is that usually even
your friends who are super into tabletop games and love
playing games together are busy adults with hugely busy lives,
and it can be really really hard to get a
table together, and a solo game is a great way
(22:30):
if you're really looking forward to playing a game together
and it has to be canceled at the last minute
or something, you can still get your TTRPG fix even
though your friends aren't available. And it's great to have
a balance of deeply social, deeply kind of camaraderie filled
games and then ones that are a bit more personal
and introspective. And that kind of leads into my second answer,
(22:50):
which is for the kind of games that I play,
there are a lot of games that really focus on
loneliness and isolation, especially games that use the in the
loan system, and it can be a really good way
of both getting into the mind of a character and
also reflecting on your own feelings about isolation and loneliness.
(23:12):
So well, that's kind of a depressing answer. I think
it can still be valuable to look at these more
difficult emotions in a safe way.
Speaker 1 (23:19):
Very true, Very true, Dan, same question for you. What
can solo games do or give you that a group
game cannot.
Speaker 5 (23:26):
Well, something that's kind of funny that I've noticed in
your games, John, is that there's those moments where you say,
I'll be right back, but with the power of editing,
like we don't have to put that in there. You know.
I don't mean to fool anybody into thinking you write
the table in the three seconds that you're away, But
it's the feeling that we get in solo games where
you can just take an hour, take a day, take
(23:46):
a week, and come back to it with like fresh
eyes of how will I move forward to the story.
Whereas I get a game with the table, if you
tell everybody, like, you know, maybe I need to think
about this for a little bit, can we come back
in an hour? I don't know that that would really
like work well with a group flow. So it's interesting
that there's such like a self pace to this whole
thing and you have this freedom. It's so like like
(24:07):
Maddie was saying before that you know, it's it's such
like an individual solitaire experience. You get to, you know,
do it at your own pace whenever you want to.
And it's really true that you can just do it
as you please and just take it as you'd like.
And that's such a weirdly freeing feeling.
Speaker 1 (24:21):
So yeah, you never laid to a solo game.
Speaker 4 (24:24):
You're right precisely when you mean to you.
Speaker 1 (24:27):
That's right, exactly exactly. No. I love that idea because
it's so true. When you're at a table game, you're
doing a lot of improvisation as a player or as
a GM, right, But as a solo gamer you really
have time to chew it over. And as I'm sure
all of us have experienced, your second and third idea
are very often better than your first idea. Certainly it's
(24:50):
true for me, I'm not My strength is not improv
Being able to like think things over over time makes
all the difference. Coop, same question for you, what can
solo game to do or give you that a group
game cannot.
Speaker 3 (25:02):
Well, I think in solo gaming, I know the story
that I want to tell, and I know the type
of world that I want to continue to live in
with no big breaks or deus ex macuna in the action.
And I view that as kind of this OSR, like,
if if I trust myself enough to buy into the world,
I don't have to do anything untoward or what might
(25:23):
some might consider juvenile or silly, you know, to quote
another podcaster John, I would even say that, you know,
if you want something more serious, more like Game of
Thrones and less like Monty Python, that's really what solo
gaming offers me is just this complete package of world building, theming,
and you know, if I choose you know, violence or
(25:45):
political intrigue, and it doesn't have to have any you know,
magical reber duckies in there to find humor, the humor
can kind of be a little bit more organic. I'd
also like to add a disclaimer, because I know it's
not I didn't harp on it too much. I would
never diminish anybody's fun at the table. Ever, whatever you
play with, you should have fun doing it. But if
you're going to go solo you can customize the crap
(26:05):
out of it and it's your game, nobody else's. So
that's what solo gaming gives me is basically complete control
over the type of narrative and story that I want
to tell. And so it's like, well, you know, how
do you get out of your own head about that
mythic GM dice rolls talking with other people, seeing what
they like. It's it's great, Yeah, good stuff. Coop.
Speaker 1 (26:26):
This question is our last question. It's a choice player's
choice either what genre is underrepresented in the solo podcast
world or would you like to hype another creator that
you feel deserves more attention in the solo podcast world. Coop,
what do you think.
Speaker 3 (26:46):
A genre that's underrepresented and the solo podcasting realm would
probably have to be cyberpunk. It's a genre that I
really really like. Ar Taal story in games that is
in charge of the Cyberpunk franchise in league with Mike Pondsmith,
the original creator had come out with the Cyberpunk Red
variant not too long ago pre pandemic. As a matter
(27:07):
of fact, it was from twenty nineteen when that version
came out, And I think the really interesting part of
that is if there was a solo RPG podcast that
could really hone in on how to explain mechanics in
a really fun or interesting way. Cyberpunk is a good
realm for that because it's a meat grinder every session.
(27:29):
You know, you're not gonna hang on to your heroes
for any sort of major arc, or at least that's
not the intent, because they're going to turn into red
and mist soon enough.
Speaker 5 (27:38):
You know.
Speaker 3 (27:38):
Part of the best part about playing the game is
going down in a blaze of glory. So if every
night is a Friday night firefight, then you might as
well really hone in on what makes the game fun.
Exploding dice, you know, ticking down your enemy's armor, you know,
and speaking of sound design, sound design for that genre
would be the sky's the limit. Your brain would just
(28:00):
explode it possibility.
Speaker 1 (28:02):
It does sound fun. Thanks Cube, Simon, you're up next.
You've got a choice either which genre is underrepresented or
promote another creator that you really enjoy.
Speaker 2 (28:12):
So I'd like to give a shout out to another creator.
And I'm going to ask forgiveness farther than permission, John,
because this isn't a podcaster. So the person I'd like
to give a shout out to is just In File,
Fireless Belt, PFI e L. And Justin creates webcomics and
his web comics are about his solo games, so he
(28:34):
plays BXD and D and he's just an amazing artist.
He has this ability to capture the human form in
motion in the most extraordinary way, and his comics are
visceral and fun, and I just love his work.
Speaker 1 (28:46):
Oh my god, it's so good. And whenever I read
his webcomic, I think this looks like so much work.
People think that podcasting is a lot of work. Could
you imagine doing what we do? But in comic form?
Is it keep on the Borderlands?
Speaker 2 (28:59):
Yeah, he's up to hundreds of pages now, Yeah.
Speaker 5 (29:03):
It's huge.
Speaker 1 (29:04):
I'm going to try and find the link and add
that to the show notes. Great recommendation, Maddie. Same choice
of questions for you, either what genre is underrepresented? Or
would you like to hype up another creator?
Speaker 4 (29:17):
I think I'm going to sneakily do multiple things in
one extended answer, And I just sneakily did a little
Google after Coop was talking, because there's a cyberpunk game
that I really love, which is Cyborg from pre League.
It is part of this sort of OSR style of games,
and because it has a very generous third party license,
(29:40):
there are lots of indie creators who make stuff for it,
and on Itch there's a creator called m eight Ui
I'm not sure how you pronounce it, who did solo
work for Cyborg, which is solo rules for the game.
So now that I know that that exists, I'm very
excited to try it at some point. But also, I
think that a show that's underrepresented is kind of slice
(30:02):
of Life. But there is one game that I know
of that does represent this genre, which is Jude's World
by Buttonkin Games, and it's about teenager trying to kind
of parent trap their parents back together because they're going
through a divorce. And while I absolutely love big, bombastic
sci fi, fantasy, western and all that kind of stuff,
(30:24):
I think going to smaller kind of everyday stories every
once in a while can also be really really interesting.
Speaker 1 (30:31):
Sounds good, all right, Thanks Maddy Dan Over to you
a choice of which genre is underrepresented or hype another
creator that deserves more attention.
Speaker 5 (30:42):
You know, it's one of those things where I feel
like representation is interesting because I think we're so saturated
with fantasy stuff that a lot of us do that
everything by comparison seems like it's underrepresented. So I make
the music for my own show. And one thing I
did is sort of like a little passion project was
I released like a video game soundtrack for a game
(31:03):
that doesn't exist, and it's like this Duke nukeom Doom
style ninety shooter thing. And I thought to myself, I'm like,
that would be so fun to do like a post
apocalyptic wasteland game and use that for soundtrack. But then
obviously there's a few people who are doing that in
the in the space. But if you're in the slice
of a stuff too, I think like a modern game
like D twenty had the you know, with all the
(31:23):
D twenty things. D twenty Modern was pretty interesting with
what they try to pull off with that, but like
something like that would be a lot of fun too,
doing maybe something that leans into like maybe Vigilantes or something,
because it really modern is something I don't think we
do a whole bunch of in this space, and that
would be kind of fun to do as well as
well as you know, westerns and space opera would be
(31:44):
a lot of fun to do too. I find that
the longer I do my show, the more I dream
of all the other shows I could be doing at
the same time, and then I think about how limited
my time is, and I think, you know, maybe someday,
but I think that, yeah, I definitely yearned for running
my own space opera, solo play and some sort of
a knockoff Star Wars kind of deal and come up
with my own version of everything. That's very much you know,
(32:06):
leaning into it without touching it. But I'd also really
love to before I, you know, end my time on
the mic here, I'd like to promote an artist as well,
somebody who I've actually had to do some work for
me for a project I was going to release sometime
in the near future, and that's Alexi gore Boot. I
don't know how to properly pronounce his name, so I'm
sorry for that. But on Instagram it's a l e
(32:27):
x E Y g O R boo T. He does
sword and sorcery like comic book style, real like you know, flashy, bright,
colorful artwork, and it just is so evocative for what
the kind of game that I like to try to
put on. So I just feel like he's just such
a nice guy. He's great for illustrating, so I'll contact
him for whatever, but I cannot recommend his stuff enough.
Speaker 1 (32:49):
I'll try and put his link for him in the
show notes as well. All Right, folks, I just want
to say thank you so much for coming together and
doing this third round table. It's been really fun and interesting.
Got a great diverse group of people here with a
bunch of different experiences and perspectives. So thank you so
much for coming. I enjoy all of your shows on
the regular. Please keep making them and maybe we'll do
(33:10):
this again in the future sometime.
Speaker 4 (33:12):
Thank you so much.
Speaker 3 (33:13):
Thank you for your time, John.
Speaker 1 (33:16):
And thank you for listening. So I've just finished my
first past at editing this episode, and I realized that
I said the word fantastic enough times to warrant a
drinking game. So my apologies for my lack of imagination there,
but I'm confident that my fan that my wonderful guests
more than make up for my shortcomings in that regard.
Were they a great bunch. Today we spoke with Simon
(33:38):
from Legend of the Bones, Mattie Seerl from A Game
of One's Own, Dan of Legends from the Fireside, and
finally Coop the gm of Echoes of Eshington and co
host of Myth and Moon. If you'd like to find
out more about these great podcasts and podcasters, check out
the show notes or my blog for links. And for
even more great solo podcast variety, try our new website,
(34:01):
Solo Roleplayers network dot com. The next real episode of
Tale of the Manticor is just around the corner, so
I'll see you soon. Until then, the chaos roll
We are back for a third and final installment in
this series of roundtable discussions with some of the most
exciting players in the world of solo RPG pods. I've
got four more of my fellow creators with me here today,
all of whom have a different approach in style. I'm
excited to get started, So let's meet our guests. Simon,
why don't you introduce yourself? Hi?
Speaker 2 (00:39):
I'm Simon. I produce a podcast called Legend of the Bones,
which is a dark fantasy audio drama driven by old
school solo D and D fantastic.
Speaker 1 (00:50):
And sitting next to Simon at the round table, we've
got Maddie. Maddie wants to introduce yourself.
Speaker 3 (00:55):
Hello.
Speaker 4 (00:56):
Yes, I'm Maddie Searl My pronouns are they them? And
I am the host of a Game of One's Own,
which is a solo and duet TTRPG podcast.
Speaker 1 (01:04):
Good stuff.
Speaker 5 (01:04):
Dan, Hi, I'm Dan from Legends from the Fireside, a
solo hybrid storytelling RPG show just like.
Speaker 1 (01:12):
We all do. Thanks Dan. And finally, Coop, why don't
you tell us about yourself and your show?
Speaker 3 (01:18):
Hello? There, I'm Coop, the GM host of The Echoes
of Eshington Podcast, a post apocalyptic primal punk adventure and
co host of the Myth and Moon Podcast, a dueling
narrative where fates collide and dice decide.
Speaker 1 (01:33):
Okay, thank you very much. We have got a great
group and I am excited to get started. So our
first question is going to be how do we start
a new game from scratch, especially if you were giving
advice to somebody who had never tried a solo game before,
or you can just talk about how you start a
game from scratch yourself. Why don't we have Maddie start
(01:54):
us off?
Speaker 4 (01:55):
I think for me it's about picking the right game,
and because I tend to go to the weird Thelendi
games that usually are very like heavily full of prompts,
that I think would be a good place to start
if you're new to solo games, so like solo journaling games,
because yeah they're usually heavily structured, but they leave enough
(02:16):
room for you to be creative within the constraints of
the game.
Speaker 1 (02:20):
Great advice. Let's go on to Dan, same question, how
would you start a game from scratch or what advice
would you give to someone who was just getting started.
Speaker 5 (02:29):
So for me, I've only ever used old school essentials
for this, and I've thought in the past if I
wanted to do something like three point five or something
like that, somethe really clunky, that it would be difficult
to manage that in an audio format like we do
for our podcast. But in my mind, I think, really
what pulls me back to doing the show is having
something that's really evocative, something with a cool vibe to it.
(02:51):
So in my mind, I'm like, if you want to
get started in this, you just got to pick out,
like what your favorite slice of fantasy or sci fi is,
and just really chase that high of that of that
game style. And when you can find what makes you
want to keep coming back and keep rolling dice and
keep going down that avenue, you know it'll all fall
in place.
Speaker 1 (03:10):
That's a great answer. Okay, thanks very much, And next
up we're going to ask Coop the same question, Coop,
how would we get started in solo gaming?
Speaker 3 (03:19):
When I think of a story I want to tell,
if there's something real that I can grab onto, that's
when I find the easiest place to start for solo games. So,
for instance, I would say like a location I think
castles just in general, all types of castles from all
over the world are the coolest thing. They're the last strongholds,
the last fortresses. But what goes on behind closed doors?
(03:42):
You know, castles were very sprawling in some instances. They
had their own you know, surfdom or fifetom or however
you want to describe it within the castle walls. So
it was all this closed economy type stuff as well
as the political sphere in there as well. So yeah,
I'd say finding a slice of life that is entertaining
to you, or at least there has a nugget of
your own truth in it, that's what's going to help
(04:03):
you make a good solo game, good stuff coop.
Speaker 1 (04:06):
Last job we've got simon any advice for a new
solo gamer or any procedures that you would use to
start fresh.
Speaker 2 (04:14):
Okay, So, assuming you're playing fully fledged RPG like D
and D, GERPS, BRP or something like that, then first
and foremost, I think it's really important that you choose
a system that you're comfortable with, that you know and
that you like. Then for the game itself, I would
suggest starting small in a small location where you don't
(04:35):
need to know much about the law or the wider
geography and you build out from there, and that's pretty
common advice nowadays. But I do think that if you
want to achieve a level of emotion in your game
and very similitude, and I think solo play is really
good at this, then I would advise having a strong
concept for your game, and what I mean by that
(04:57):
is grounding it in something which is consistent. So it
might be a kind of Greco Roman feel or a
Western or in my case, I went for a Viking
ehe Briton concept with kind of Anglo Saxon and Celtic
themes in it. And I think if you do that,
then the world feels a bit more real and it
comes together much more nicely. And that means that as
(05:18):
you build law going forward, then you can have more
consistency with it. So yeah, that would be my top tip.
Speaker 1 (05:24):
It really is like such a common question, and of
course that makes sense even if you listen to shows
like Hours. I think it could be a daunting thing
to try and do it for the first time on
your own. I think there could be a paralysis there.
So great advice and thanks very much. Our next question
is going to be how much do you randomize in
your solo play and how much do you use DM
(05:48):
fiat or just make things up. So we're talking about
NPC's random encounters, layouts for locations and things like that,
And for this question, I'm going to ask Dan to
start us off.
Speaker 5 (06:01):
Okay, So for me, I think that this is almost
like the most center point of solo play is this
question of am I writing a novel or am I
doing a completely random I don't touch it like style play,
And I think what's interesting is the level of balance
implies like how much in I don't know, I don't
(06:21):
want to say, like how much you are tailoring the
story to your tastes. But if you let this be
completely and utterly random everywhere around it, you might lose
a little bit of the flavor and the vibe that
you're looking for in a game. And thus, I mean
within the constraints of the system. Obviously, I don't think
spaceships are going to show up in your Arthurian Fantasy,
but I do think that there's something to be said
about how you find that balance when you're playing that
(06:44):
sometimes you feel like I want to introduce a new
character and I'm not going to try to balance the party.
I'm not going to try to introduce these things. I
want to have it be as random as possible. But
then there's other times when you're like, no, the story
calls for this to be here at this point in time.
It'll really pull things together. And so I guess you
know how much to randomize. I don't want to say
(07:04):
according to taste, but the story will tell you how
random it should be. You know, if you're going to
a particular dungeon where you know there's a magic sword
somewhere in a well held sanctum, I can't hope that
the dice will just have that appear, let alone have
that appear potentially as the first room they walk into.
Kind of a little anti climactic. So you know, there's
times where you really have to hold hands with the
(07:25):
dice and really guide the story to the right place
with it. But you'll find the balance.
Speaker 1 (07:30):
I think, Yeah, your story is talking to you. You
have to listen to your story, don't you. I say
it facetiously, but actually sometimes I actually believe that some
magic is going on. Anyway, let's turn that question over
to Coop. Coop, same question, how much do you randomize
and how much is dm fiat.
Speaker 3 (07:48):
The slider has grown to be more fluid owing to
you know, the sort of sliding scale that you were
talking about. I owe a lot to the mythic GME
authored by Tana Pigeon, who we cannot say enough good
things about. It's so complete, it's so comprehensive, it's easy
to read, it's easy to understand. There's theming in there.
(08:10):
There's great tools for writers in there. I mean, I
would love to meet her in person. But yeah, so
sliding scale aside, the tool sets help me determine how
much I want to do at any given time. Now,
if I come in with a certain idea, that's probably
going to be all me and I won't roll for anything.
It will be fully fleshed out from my own head.
(08:31):
But the biggest problem I have when I'm doing my
solo games is finding good obstacles for characters to encounter,
physical or otherwise, but mainly physical, because that's going to
give a challenge that I can roll against that I
can actually gamify. So trying to find a good way
to keep the gamification while also finding a little bit
(08:54):
of wiggle room in there for something randomized as good.
Now in terms of store, I think story is probably
about sixty percent me forty percent chance fait randomization, because
I don't I don't want it to end. I don't
want to I don't want to encounter a writer's block
in a way that's gonna make me want to backtrack
(09:16):
and change decisions that I've already made. I always want
to be pressing forward. So with that in mind, i'd
say about a sixty to forty split is good for me.
And then location wise, locations are good where I can
just drop a handful of dice right out a location.
But if I have a central point, like I mentioned
the Slice of Life earlier of just like the King's
throne room in the Castle, I know exactly what that's
(09:37):
going to look like, whether it's borrowed from Cone or wherever.
And then the last thing I'd say is probably dungeons,
which is, you know, falls in line with obstacles. I
think dungeons are usually fully randomized. Dungeons need to be
challenging enough for the players to progress and also not
be you know, stymied immediately, So finding a good balance
there as it's still what I would consider a novice
game player, I don't quite have the tac for that yet,
(10:00):
but doing it from a table seems usually easy enough
and well balanced.
Speaker 1 (10:04):
Thanks so much for that. We're going to now move
on to Simon. Same question for you as well. How
much do your randomize? How much is DM.
Speaker 2 (10:10):
Fear much like Dan? Really it depends. I do have
set pieces which I've predesigned, where I've created the location
and the embcs or monsters which might be encountered beforehand,
and other times it will be completely random. I recently
had a situation on my show where a wandering encounter
(10:32):
which sporned four or five episodes of story and action.
I then had to fit some bits in by DM
fiat in order to make things work to be more
coherent to make sense. Where things become tricky is when
you put your characters into say a dungeon, and there
are multiple choices available for the party to take multiple
exits or multiple ways of overcoming something. The difficulty then
(10:57):
is how do you not mitigate it? So what I
would normally do is think about what the characters know,
their personalities, the information available to them, and make a
logical choice based on that. If that still doesn't lead
to a clear answer, then I might just roll randomly
or even ask my oilcle what the pieces might do
in that situation. But in terms of the places and
(11:18):
the NPCs, it depends. If they're a major NPC, I
probably predetermined them, or in those cases, I might randomly
generate some of their personality to give it some interest
and flavor. But in terms of how much I lead
into that audio drama versus game dynamic, I'm probably about
fifty to fifty, but it's a matter of taste, and
(11:40):
others will be at various degrees of that scale.
Speaker 1 (11:42):
Yeah, there really is a kind of a slider, isn't it,
And you can move that slider around depending on what
well to use Dan's idea, what your story's asking for. Okay,
let's move on to Maddie. Same question for you. How
much do you randomize or how much do you just
make things up as you go?
Speaker 4 (12:01):
I think for me, because I tend to play a
lot of journaling games or prompt driven games, use the
games that use a deck of cards or a taro
set to kind of offer prompts, I think this question
still can apply because sometimes you get a prompt that
just doesn't really fit with where your story is going,
(12:22):
and so even though it's not strictly in the rules,
I will redraw sometimes in the in the rules, especially
for kind of safety tools reasons, they will say, if
you're not comfortable with this prompt, just draw another one.
And I think that, yeah, it's if it's ruining your
enjoyment of the game and a prompt comes up that's
just not working for you, I think it's completely fine
to reroll or redraw, and yeah, just do what as
(12:47):
people are saying, feels right for the story.
Speaker 1 (12:49):
Yeah. Actually, I'm so glad that we've got you involved
in this roundtable because the rest of us are playing,
you know, these traditional role playing games the same system
kind of for a long time, but you really sample
a lot of different systems, so I think you've probably
got a real breadth of knowledge that the rest of
us don't have and experience too. Anyway, great answer. Let's
(13:10):
move on to our third question, and we're gonna start
out with coop for this one. Do you have a
favorite moment ever in a solo game?
Speaker 3 (13:19):
This one was able to be pulled right out of
my back pocket. This is actually what I'm beginning to
call the Deborah Anne Wool effect. I don't know if
you've seen that clip of her talking to the actor
he plays the Punisher, John Burnenthal. Deboraham Wolf's talking to
John Burnhal and John Burnenthal has a podcast. He's kind
of a man about Hollywood. He has a lot of
interesting connections, and he seems like a good host, a
(13:41):
decent host. And he's talking with her, and she just
naturally brings up Nungeons and Dragons. John asked, well, how
do you play? And Deborah and her infinite wisdom, says well,
would you like to play? Right now? He's like, yeah, okay.
Speaker 5 (13:53):
Lovely D and D. I mean I'll try. I mean,
what do you think literally right now? Sure?
Speaker 3 (13:59):
And she just launches into it. She sets a scene,
she gives an optional challenge, She describes his character in
brief and just probably from some of his acting instincts,
he immediately picks up on something so to give it
the Deborah Anne Wohl effect, This is the story I
normally tell people who are looking to start D and
D or some type of tabletop RPG game, because it
(14:19):
exhibits several things. It exhibits critical thinking, it exhibits lex
and storytelling, and it exhibits a good relationship with your
GM or DM, which I think is probably I said
it last, but I think it's one of the most critical.
So here's my moment. It was a curse abstrade campaign
in D and D and we were in the Amber Temple.
Those familiar with the Amber Temple, it's a huge, sprawling,
(14:42):
you know, temple of Macab's secrets and lots of cool
magical artifacts and things like that. And our DM, who
is my co writer on Myth and Moon, he had
set up the dungeon really really well. He was expecting
one of the party members to die because we were
a little under level. So owing to what you mentioned
earlier about finding the right balance, he was striking it
(15:02):
for several sessions in a row, but then he threw
us a real curveball. There was an enemy and a
spire with a shrouded darkness around the top of the
little spire inside the temple, so we couldn't see what
was firing at us, and it was a magic user,
So we were really having trouble trying to assault the
base of the spire to either you know, try to
get him out of there, or just trying to figure
out how to even attack it. So as a dwarf.
(15:24):
For my first character ever in D and D. I
was a fighter and I had a magic helm of
stone shape. I put the helmet on. I ran underneath
the base of the tower and I asked my DM.
I said, is this temple made of stone? And he's like, yes,
it is. I put my hand underneath the spire. I
raised a three foot cube underneath it, just at the
edge to make the spire topple over. And then the
(15:47):
magic user fell out of the shroud of darkness and
we all ganged him and he was just had his
head in his hands buried. He thought he'd had us,
that we were licked. But little did he know that
he had a super inventive novice at the base of
the spire. So that's the story I normally tell everyone.
They're like, oh, helmet of stone shape, where'd you find it?
And I was like, well, it actually has an ancient
(16:07):
dwarf and wizard trapped inside the helmets. Every time I
put it on, the DM would put on this wizard.
I'll just rink fire for it's good to see you again,
you know, good to be in your head. So there
was lots of great moments like that, but that's the
one that always stands out.
Speaker 1 (16:21):
That is a great story coop. All right, Simon, do
you have a favorite moment ever from a solo game
that you could share?
Speaker 2 (16:27):
Yes, So around episode twenty eight something like that, my
coacters were in a dungeon and they were facing off
against a big bad and things were going pretty badly
for the party. I think I overpowered the monster a
little bit and suddenly one of the characters that critical
moment rolled it at twenty and without that I probably
(16:48):
would have had a TPK on my hands. It was
one of those moments where you just go, yes, yep,
that's why we play and yeah, it was amazing.
Speaker 1 (16:56):
Did you stand up and cheer like a like at
a table game? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (17:00):
Oh yeah. It was one of those fispumpanenty moments where
you go yeah, yeah, So that was probably my favorite
moments so far.
Speaker 1 (17:07):
Fantastic, Thanks Maddie. How about you.
Speaker 4 (17:10):
I played a game for my show called Forgery by
Banana Chan, and it's really interesting in that it kind
of combines a sort of choose your own adventure style
book with solo journaling role playing. So you're playing as
this struggling artist who is forging this sort of demonic painting,
(17:32):
and there's a twist in it that just really took
me by surprise, and like I really felt what the
character was feeling in that situation. And yeah, it gets
into some really dark themes, but in a way that
is very sensitively done and really makes you think about
like what are you willing to sacrifice or what sort
of terrible things are you willing to do to be
(17:54):
successful in a creative field. So yeah, I won't tell
you exactly what happens because it is massive spoiler, but yeah,
fair enough, that game is amazing.
Speaker 1 (18:04):
Now, Maddie, would you say that sort of the highs
and the lows can be or even just often are
like more intense with solo games than with group games.
Speaker 4 (18:13):
I think it depends. Yeah, I think it can be
if you are going for a more introspective kind of tone,
it can really feel like you are at the center
of the story. You are sort of both in control
and out of control because you've got the randomized elements.
So yeah, I think that it can be very intense,
especially for a game that maybe has some kind of
(18:36):
supernatural elements. Maybe if you are doing it in a
dark room with candles or something like that. There's a
game that I haven't played yet called Wreck This Deck
where you sort of draw on and destroy a deck
of cards in a sort of demonic ritual. So you
can really get very experiential with this kind of stuff.
Speaker 1 (18:53):
I want to play that game. I want to get
scared playing a solo game. It hasn't happened yet.
Speaker 5 (18:57):
I want to do it.
Speaker 1 (18:59):
Dan, same question for you, favorite moment ever in a
solo game.
Speaker 5 (19:04):
So it might sound a little morbid to say this
is my favorite moment, but I think that this is
what made me really feel the most I've ever felt
in a solo game. One of the longest standing characters
that I had in the first season of the show
is Marris, and he sort of was like the de
facto sort of main character, just the way the dice
rolled him up in the way story worked. But he
died in a random encounter with a hag and it
(19:28):
was one of those like it takes your breath away
moments where they get hit all three times in the
three split attacks and every one of them just drops them.
You start looking through the rules and like begging the
rule book, like it, well, is there a way I
could maybe you know, fiot that there was actually a
light problem so it was a minus two for this
or something. And accepting that this character who propped so
much of the story up on their shoulders was just
(19:49):
gone because the dice say so. Having to accept that
and work with that and say like, well, where is
the story now? Like I had a grieving process. The
characters had a grieving process. And it's weird to think
piggybacking or what we were saying just a second ago that, like,
I don't know, you feel it almost stronger because it's
all in your head. I'm granted, we get the luxury
of putting this out for people to listen to it,
(20:09):
but like, these characters really just exist in this weird
ethereal space, and yet I feel something when this poor
hapless character is torn to shreds out in the wilderness,
and it, you know, you feel something, and that to
me is like a really powerful moment.
Speaker 1 (20:23):
Yeah, one hundred percent. There's that grieving process if you
lose a character. I mean that's true with a table game,
like a social game as well, but I don't know,
I do feel like it's stronger with solo games. Okay,
we're moving on to the next question, Simon, This one's
for you. What can solo games do or give you
the group games cannot.
Speaker 2 (20:42):
Yes, So for me, what solo can enable is a
really deep sense of immersion in the other world that
you're creating. And whilst table games can do that to
a degree, often it's a little bit more social. We
have people are munching pretzels and yeah, having fun and
is more humor in it, whereas I think with a
(21:04):
solo game you could really get that immersion and believe
in the fantasy a lot more. And the wonderful thing
about it is the world you create, the environment, the geography,
the places, the characters. You learn about those things and
in a very deep way, and with the characters, particularly
as personalities emerge through the play, and it's like getting
(21:27):
to know someone. It's a really strange but wonderful experience
to have that, and I think that's something that you
could only really achieve in solo. And I maintain that
that solo play is great for everyone and for me
it certainly made me a better GM as well. And
the techniques and tools that I've used in solo I
(21:48):
now bring to my life table. So yeah, it's something
for everyone. So if you really want to feel something
very very deeply and get completely immersed, then that's where
the how if.
Speaker 1 (22:00):
Solo is fantastic. I agree with all of that for sure, Maddie.
Same question for you, What can solo games do or
give you that group games cannot.
Speaker 4 (22:10):
I think I'm going to give two answers to this.
One is deeply mercenary and practical, is that usually even
your friends who are super into tabletop games and love
playing games together are busy adults with hugely busy lives,
and it can be really really hard to get a
table together, and a solo game is a great way
(22:30):
if you're really looking forward to playing a game together
and it has to be canceled at the last minute
or something, you can still get your TTRPG fix even
though your friends aren't available. And it's great to have
a balance of deeply social, deeply kind of camaraderie filled
games and then ones that are a bit more personal
and introspective. And that kind of leads into my second answer,
(22:50):
which is for the kind of games that I play,
there are a lot of games that really focus on
loneliness and isolation, especially games that use the in the
loan system, and it can be a really good way
of both getting into the mind of a character and
also reflecting on your own feelings about isolation and loneliness.
(23:12):
So well, that's kind of a depressing answer. I think
it can still be valuable to look at these more
difficult emotions in a safe way.
Speaker 1 (23:19):
Very true, Very true, Dan, same question for you. What
can solo games do or give you that a group
game cannot.
Speaker 5 (23:26):
Well, something that's kind of funny that I've noticed in
your games, John, is that there's those moments where you say,
I'll be right back, but with the power of editing,
like we don't have to put that in there. You know.
I don't mean to fool anybody into thinking you write
the table in the three seconds that you're away, But
it's the feeling that we get in solo games where
you can just take an hour, take a day, take
(23:46):
a week, and come back to it with like fresh
eyes of how will I move forward to the story.
Whereas I get a game with the table, if you
tell everybody, like, you know, maybe I need to think
about this for a little bit, can we come back
in an hour? I don't know that that would really
like work well with a group flow. So it's interesting
that there's such like a self pace to this whole
thing and you have this freedom. It's so like like
(24:07):
Maddie was saying before that you know, it's it's such
like an individual solitaire experience. You get to, you know,
do it at your own pace whenever you want to.
And it's really true that you can just do it
as you please and just take it as you'd like.
And that's such a weirdly freeing feeling.
Speaker 1 (24:21):
So yeah, you never laid to a solo game.
Speaker 4 (24:24):
You're right precisely when you mean to you.
Speaker 1 (24:27):
That's right, exactly exactly. No. I love that idea because
it's so true. When you're at a table game, you're
doing a lot of improvisation as a player or as
a GM, right, But as a solo gamer you really
have time to chew it over. And as I'm sure
all of us have experienced, your second and third idea
are very often better than your first idea. Certainly it's
(24:50):
true for me, I'm not My strength is not improv
Being able to like think things over over time makes
all the difference. Coop, same question for you, what can
solo game to do or give you that a group
game cannot.
Speaker 3 (25:02):
Well, I think in solo gaming, I know the story
that I want to tell, and I know the type
of world that I want to continue to live in
with no big breaks or deus ex macuna in the action.
And I view that as kind of this OSR, like,
if if I trust myself enough to buy into the world,
I don't have to do anything untoward or what might
(25:23):
some might consider juvenile or silly, you know, to quote
another podcaster John, I would even say that, you know,
if you want something more serious, more like Game of
Thrones and less like Monty Python, that's really what solo
gaming offers me is just this complete package of world building, theming,
and you know, if I choose you know, violence or
(25:45):
political intrigue, and it doesn't have to have any you know,
magical reber duckies in there to find humor, the humor
can kind of be a little bit more organic. I'd
also like to add a disclaimer, because I know it's
not I didn't harp on it too much. I would
never diminish anybody's fun at the table. Ever, whatever you
play with, you should have fun doing it. But if
you're going to go solo you can customize the crap
(26:05):
out of it and it's your game, nobody else's. So
that's what solo gaming gives me is basically complete control
over the type of narrative and story that I want
to tell. And so it's like, well, you know, how
do you get out of your own head about that
mythic GM dice rolls talking with other people, seeing what
they like. It's it's great, Yeah, good stuff. Coop.
Speaker 1 (26:26):
This question is our last question. It's a choice player's
choice either what genre is underrepresented in the solo podcast
world or would you like to hype another creator that
you feel deserves more attention in the solo podcast world. Coop,
what do you think.
Speaker 3 (26:46):
A genre that's underrepresented and the solo podcasting realm would
probably have to be cyberpunk. It's a genre that I
really really like. Ar Taal story in games that is
in charge of the Cyberpunk franchise in league with Mike Pondsmith,
the original creator had come out with the Cyberpunk Red
variant not too long ago pre pandemic. As a matter
(27:07):
of fact, it was from twenty nineteen when that version
came out, And I think the really interesting part of
that is if there was a solo RPG podcast that
could really hone in on how to explain mechanics in
a really fun or interesting way. Cyberpunk is a good
realm for that because it's a meat grinder every session.
(27:29):
You know, you're not gonna hang on to your heroes
for any sort of major arc, or at least that's
not the intent, because they're going to turn into red
and mist soon enough.
Speaker 5 (27:38):
You know.
Speaker 3 (27:38):
Part of the best part about playing the game is
going down in a blaze of glory. So if every
night is a Friday night firefight, then you might as
well really hone in on what makes the game fun.
Exploding dice, you know, ticking down your enemy's armor, you know,
and speaking of sound design, sound design for that genre
would be the sky's the limit. Your brain would just
(28:00):
explode it possibility.
Speaker 1 (28:02):
It does sound fun. Thanks Cube, Simon, you're up next.
You've got a choice either which genre is underrepresented or
promote another creator that you really enjoy.
Speaker 2 (28:12):
So I'd like to give a shout out to another creator.
And I'm going to ask forgiveness farther than permission, John,
because this isn't a podcaster. So the person I'd like
to give a shout out to is just In File,
Fireless Belt, PFI e L. And Justin creates webcomics and
his web comics are about his solo games, so he
(28:34):
plays BXD and D and he's just an amazing artist.
He has this ability to capture the human form in
motion in the most extraordinary way, and his comics are
visceral and fun, and I just love his work.
Speaker 1 (28:46):
Oh my god, it's so good. And whenever I read
his webcomic, I think this looks like so much work.
People think that podcasting is a lot of work. Could
you imagine doing what we do? But in comic form?
Is it keep on the Borderlands?
Speaker 2 (28:59):
Yeah, he's up to hundreds of pages now, Yeah.
Speaker 5 (29:03):
It's huge.
Speaker 1 (29:04):
I'm going to try and find the link and add
that to the show notes. Great recommendation, Maddie. Same choice
of questions for you, either what genre is underrepresented? Or
would you like to hype up another creator?
Speaker 4 (29:17):
I think I'm going to sneakily do multiple things in
one extended answer, And I just sneakily did a little
Google after Coop was talking, because there's a cyberpunk game
that I really love, which is Cyborg from pre League.
It is part of this sort of OSR style of games,
and because it has a very generous third party license,
(29:40):
there are lots of indie creators who make stuff for it,
and on Itch there's a creator called m eight Ui
I'm not sure how you pronounce it, who did solo
work for Cyborg, which is solo rules for the game.
So now that I know that that exists, I'm very
excited to try it at some point. But also, I
think that a show that's underrepresented is kind of slice
(30:02):
of Life. But there is one game that I know
of that does represent this genre, which is Jude's World
by Buttonkin Games, and it's about teenager trying to kind
of parent trap their parents back together because they're going
through a divorce. And while I absolutely love big, bombastic
sci fi, fantasy, western and all that kind of stuff,
(30:24):
I think going to smaller kind of everyday stories every
once in a while can also be really really interesting.
Speaker 1 (30:31):
Sounds good, all right, Thanks Maddy Dan Over to you
a choice of which genre is underrepresented or hype another
creator that deserves more attention.
Speaker 5 (30:42):
You know, it's one of those things where I feel
like representation is interesting because I think we're so saturated
with fantasy stuff that a lot of us do that
everything by comparison seems like it's underrepresented. So I make
the music for my own show. And one thing I
did is sort of like a little passion project was
I released like a video game soundtrack for a game
(31:03):
that doesn't exist, and it's like this Duke nukeom Doom
style ninety shooter thing. And I thought to myself, I'm like,
that would be so fun to do like a post
apocalyptic wasteland game and use that for soundtrack. But then
obviously there's a few people who are doing that in
the in the space. But if you're in the slice
of a stuff too, I think like a modern game
like D twenty had the you know, with all the
(31:23):
D twenty things. D twenty Modern was pretty interesting with
what they try to pull off with that, but like
something like that would be a lot of fun too,
doing maybe something that leans into like maybe Vigilantes or something,
because it really modern is something I don't think we
do a whole bunch of in this space, and that
would be kind of fun to do as well as
well as you know, westerns and space opera would be
(31:44):
a lot of fun to do too. I find that
the longer I do my show, the more I dream
of all the other shows I could be doing at
the same time, and then I think about how limited
my time is, and I think, you know, maybe someday,
but I think that, yeah, I definitely yearned for running
my own space opera, solo play and some sort of
a knockoff Star Wars kind of deal and come up
with my own version of everything. That's very much you know,
(32:06):
leaning into it without touching it. But I'd also really
love to before I, you know, end my time on
the mic here, I'd like to promote an artist as well,
somebody who I've actually had to do some work for
me for a project I was going to release sometime
in the near future, and that's Alexi gore Boot. I
don't know how to properly pronounce his name, so I'm
sorry for that. But on Instagram it's a l e
(32:27):
x E Y g O R boo T. He does
sword and sorcery like comic book style, real like you know, flashy, bright,
colorful artwork, and it just is so evocative for what
the kind of game that I like to try to
put on. So I just feel like he's just such
a nice guy. He's great for illustrating, so I'll contact
him for whatever, but I cannot recommend his stuff enough.
Speaker 1 (32:49):
I'll try and put his link for him in the
show notes as well. All Right, folks, I just want
to say thank you so much for coming together and
doing this third round table. It's been really fun and interesting.
Got a great diverse group of people here with a
bunch of different experiences and perspectives. So thank you so
much for coming. I enjoy all of your shows on
the regular. Please keep making them and maybe we'll do
(33:10):
this again in the future sometime.
Speaker 4 (33:12):
Thank you so much.
Speaker 3 (33:13):
Thank you for your time, John.
Speaker 1 (33:16):
And thank you for listening. So I've just finished my
first past at editing this episode, and I realized that
I said the word fantastic enough times to warrant a
drinking game. So my apologies for my lack of imagination there,
but I'm confident that my fan that my wonderful guests
more than make up for my shortcomings in that regard.
Were they a great bunch. Today we spoke with Simon
(33:38):
from Legend of the Bones, Mattie Seerl from A Game
of One's Own, Dan of Legends from the Fireside, and
finally Coop the gm of Echoes of Eshington and co
host of Myth and Moon. If you'd like to find
out more about these great podcasts and podcasters, check out
the show notes or my blog for links. And for
even more great solo podcast variety, try our new website,
(34:01):
Solo Roleplayers network dot com. The next real episode of
Tale of the Manticor is just around the corner, so
I'll see you soon. Until then, the chaos roll
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