RPG Design Panelcast

Episode 187 - Face your Fears

Recorded at Metatopia 2018

Presented by Kiva Fecteau, David Beever, Jim Dagg , Kate Beaman-Martinez, Beth Rimmels.

Congratulations. You screwed up the courage and got yourself to METATOPIA! Prepare to panic... or not. Talk with fellow participants in small groups to identify your fears and where they come from. You'll probably discover a lot of commonalities. Our workshop leaders have begun to overcome their own fears, and have seen success at METATOPIA. They'll share tips and techniques to help you stay afloat during the weekend.

Episode 183 - Failing Forward

Recorded at Metatopia 2017

Presented by Joshua Yearsley, Hannah Shaffer and Mark Richardson.

Being competent at something just means you've already made all the mistakes, so come learn from ours! We'll discuss some of our own juiciest mistakes and setbacks from our years of games work - maybe even some from projects we've worked on together? - and explore how we used those experiences to grow, improve our craft, and do better the next time.

Episode 182 - Replication Versus Reinvention

Recorded at Metatopia 2017

Presented by Brendan Conway and Kevin Kulp.

When you're designing a game, you often start by picking a kind of genre, or even a particular work, that you'd love to experience as an RPG. But many of the strongest games out there take it beyond just replicating a particular story; they say something new or different. How do you do that, and why should you spend the time to make sure you do?

Episode 179 - Fiction and Game Writing

Recorded at Metatopia 2017

Presented by Elsa Henry and Lauren Roy.

Fiction writing and game writing are definitely two separate skillsets, but they are complimentary. This panel will feature people who do both, discussing how to develop these skillsets to further both parts of your career, with extra attention to the ways they diverge and how to know which skills to use. Where do these skillsets not overlap, how do they fight against one another? What are the best ways to develop both skills without shortchanging one or the other.

Episode 171 - RPG Design and Publishing for Newcomers Q&A

Special Episode

Presented by Jason Pitre, Anna Meade, Sarah 'Doombringer' Richardson, and Eloy Lasanta. 

 

In this special episode, most the panelists from the previous gencon panel get together to answer questions posed by attendees.  The questions on offer are... 

Q1: I've got a game, it's playtested: how do I get to market?

Q2: Outside of the mechanical or thematic design of the game, which part of development and release is the most challenging for you, and in what way?

Q3: What is the best value services to ensure a successful kickstarter?

Q4: How should one go about acquiring a publisher for their design?

Q5: How do you balance an RPG across as many levels as possible when the system is rather complex? Is it just a long slog or is there a faster method than what I currently use?

Q6: How to turn a story/setting concept into a workable game system?

Q7: I'd love any advice specifically on making Powered by the Apocalypse games.

Q8: What is the single most important element of an RPG system that can determine its success or failure?

Q9: How technology is changing the Design and Publishing process?

 

Enjoy this special episode!

 

Episode 170 - RPG Design and Publishing for Newcomers

Recorded at GenCon 2018

Presented by Jason Pitre, Anna Meade, Jerry Grayson, Eloy Lasanta, and Sarah "Doombringer" Richardson. 

This panel serves as a welcome introduction to the twin fields of roleplaying game design, and publishing. It features a long discussion on how and why we design games, how games have to be about something, and how we can practically turn our ideas into products. This was a two hour panel full of brilliant insights from the panel speakers and has some fun banter to boot. 

Note that the audience submitted a number of questions in advance of the panel, which we will be responding to in next week's episode!

Episode 166 - Literary Criticism and Feedback

Recorded at Metatopia 2017

Presented by Tim Hutchings and Evan Torner.

Criticism and Feedback: How to Talk about that Game You Just Played. How do we talk about games in a productive, useful way? The panel will discuss methods and tools for giving useful, critical feedback for the game play experience. We will introduce critical methods from the creative arts and inclusivity-promoting discussion tools pioneered by Games to Gather in Portland, Oregon.

Episode 161 - From Imposter Syndrome to Arrogance

Recorded at Metatopia 2017

Presented by Kiva Fecteau, Beth Rimmels, Doug Levandowski, James Dagg, Nicole Perry.

From Imposter Syndrome to Arrogance - Knowing When To Step Back.  How do you measure your success in a field where most people don't have salaries or corporate titles to compare, "bad" games can be hugely popular, and the timeline of creative spark to marketable product can often be years? In other words, when are you an "Industry Pro?" No matter how much they've done, some people continue to feel that they haven't yet hit the mark. Yet others who are completely new to the industry may feel that they have all the answers. Both attitudes can hold back your ability to flourish in the gaming industry

Episode 159 - Anatomy of a Fight

Recorded at Metatopia 2017

Presented by Michael Malecki, Elsa Henry, Shervyn von Hoerl, Monica Speca.

Join us for a workshop to create a combat system that could possibly allow for the fluid and chaotic nature of combat but not be overwhelmingly disruptive to play style. The first half of the panel will cover offensive and defensive theories. We will go over the positives and negatives of things such as Narrative play, Slow-Fu, and Physical Combat. After a brief Q&A, those who building a system are welcome to stay and workshop with experts.

Episode 153 - From Idea to Product

Recorded at Metatopia 2017

Presented by John Adamus, Bryan Shipp, Laura Simpson, Tim Rodriguez

Games are a hydra on a roller coaster on fire. There's so much to do, so much to avoid doing, so much to plan for, and so much to hope works out. We'd like to talk about the process.

Episode 150 - Breaking Into Boardgames

 

Recorded at BreakoutCon 2018

Presented by: Sen-Foong Lim, Rob Daviau, Allysha Tulk, Nicole Hoye
Moderator: Daryl Andrews

Have you ever wanted to be a boardgame designer? Join our wonderful panel of guests to discuss what it takes to get started down this path!

Episode 149 - GM Masterclass

Recorded at BreakoutCon 2018

Presented by: Robin Laws, Daniel Kwan, Emily Care Boss, and Michelle Lyons-McFarland
Moderator: Corey Reid

Learn how the best GMs run the best games. No matter what system or play style you love, this panel will have tips and tricks to help you level up your game.

Episode 148 - Making your First RPG

Recorded at BreakoutCon 2018

Presented by: Mark Richardson, Anna Kreider, Emily Griggs, Misha Bushyagar

Moderator: Jonathan Lavallee

The wondrous journey from beginning to end of working on your first game. It's a highlight reel of the big process parts and what to keep track of to make your first game as successful as possible.

Episode 144 - Hierarchical Thinking in Games

Recorded at Metatopia 2017

Presented by Gil Hova, Jonathan Gilmour.

From Jones Theory to "this game fired that game", hierarchical thinking - comparing one thing to another in a way that ranks one as better than the other - is very popular in the gaming world. How useful is it? Are there situations where it hurts us? We will talk about the pros and cons of hierarchical thinking, and dive into why it's so appealing to us game fans.

Episode 143 - The Forge Retrospective

Recorded at Metatopia 2017

Presented by Bill White, Brennan Taylor, Lisa Padol, Evan Torner, and more. 

Everything You Ever Wanted To Know About The Forge (But Were Afraid To Ask). The Forge (www.indie-rpgs.com) was an online discussion site for indie TRPG design, publication, and play that was active from 2001 to 2012. Across tens of thousands of discussion threads, Forge participants hashed out new ways of understanding the dynamics of tabletop RPG play, and developed a new conceptual language for talking about game design, as part of a larger project of promulgating the "indie RPG" message that anyone can design and publish the game they want. This larger mission largely accomplished by 2010, according to its founders, the Forge closed its forums in 2012. But the ideas it offered still have value, and so five years after the closing of the Forge we look back and assess its insights, its accomplishments, and its imbroglios. Presented by Bill White, game designer and game studies scholar currently working on a book about the Forge, along with several regular posters from that era

Episode 141 - What are you scared of?

Recorded at Metatopia 2017

Presented by Darren Watts, Christopher O'Neill, Roberta Taylor.

You've got a board game, card game, RPG or LARP in your head, but something's stopping you from settling down and doing the work to get it done and out there in the world. What is it? Let's get into your head and smack down the voices telling you it can't be done. 

Episode 138 - Professionalization

Recorded at Metatopia 2017

Presented by Michelle Lyons-McFarland, Jason Pitre.

Professionalization has been defined as "transformation into a profession of the highest integrity and competence." Integrity and competence are laudable goals for the profession as a whole, but how do we get there? What practices should we pursue? How do we differentiate between industry/business/community relationships, and are we willing to do so? This roundtable will try to hit on some best practices and identify the obstacles that stand in our way. 

Episode 137 - Don't Shred your Game

Recorded at Metatopia 2017

Presented by Dev Purkayastha.

A workshop for designers who have playtested their game - here or elsewhere - and have gotten challenging feedback. It's easy to feel discouraged, but it's important to take the next step. The goal of this workshop is to provide encouragement towards the ongoing process, rather than workshopping specific feedback.

Note: This is a workshop rather than a panel, but there is some good advice and discussion worth your time.

Episode 134 - It Takes a Village

Recorded at Metatopia 2016

Presented by Jason Pitre, Jeff Tidball, Stephen Tasker, Darren Watts.

As a game master, you use NPCs to describe the setting, and to interact with the PCs. As a designer, you help shape the kinds of NPCs that fill those roles. This panel is all about different ways that designers can establish NPCs and relationships in their designs. Who do the PC's love, hate, defend, or overthrow?

Apologies for the poor sound quality.

Episode 132 - Worldbuilding Towards Story

Recorded at Metatopia 2016

Presented by Kenneth Hite, Bill White.

The principles of worldbuilding for games are not the principles of worldbuilding for novels (depth of field) and certainly not the principles of worldbuilding for physics (plate tectonics). What are they? How can you apply them to a pre-existing world, real or fictional?

Episode 125 - The Iceberg Method

Recorded at Metatopia 2016

Presented by Kenneth Hite.

In this year's iteration of "Ken Rambles About Stuff", Ken argues for the 'Iceberg Method' of game research. He is also likely to touch on how (and how much) to do research for setting design purposes, and may even divagate into the how and why of researching other game mechanics.

Episode 118 – Breaking into Board Games

Breaking into Board Games

Recorded at Breakout Con 2017

Presented by Pam Walls, Tim Brown, Eric Lang, Sen-Foong Lim, and moderated by Daryl Andrews.

Want to design a board game? Have no idea how to get into the industry? Join our wonderful set of panelists to talk about how to enter the board game design world, do some playtesting, and get your game published.

You can subscribe to us here!  RSS Feed iTunes

 

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Episode118-Breaking_Into_Boardgames

Episode 117 – What’s up in Tabletop Games?

What’s Up in Tabletop Games?

Recorded at Breakout Con 2017

Presented by Michelle Lyons-McFarland, Jonathan Gilmour, Robin D. Laws, Eric Lang, and moderator Jonathan Lavallee.

Bombard our panelists with questions about tabletop gaming and the many directions it’s headed in.

You can subscribe to us here!  RSS Feed iTunes

 

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Episode 116 – Creating Horror in Games

Creating Horror in Games

Recorded at Breakout Con 2017

Presented by Michelle Lyons-McFarland, Jonathan Gilmour, and moderator  Jacqueline Bryk,

Like ghosties, ghoulies, long-legged beasties, and things that go bump in the night? Join us for a panel on how to incorporate gothic horror tropes into your project or campaign!

You can subscribe to us here!  RSS Feed iTunes

 

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Episode 114 – GM Troubleshooting

GM Troubleshooting

Recorded at Breakout Con 2017

Presented by Robin Laws, Matt McFarland, Anna Kreider and moderator Fraser Ronald.

Solve your toughest GMing problems with the aid of our masterful panelists. Discussing the challenges of the game master’s life.

You can subscribe to us here!  RSS Feed iTunes

 

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