Changeling the Podcast

The nature of evil is a wiggly thing in all the World of Darkness games, but especially in Changeling. Who's to say whether a rabid beastie or a diabolical Eiluned is more dastardly than the other? Surely it's a matter of perspective. Still, among the various groups in the game, the Thallain and the Dauntain in particular are treated as Bad News, suitable as antagonists due to their extreme disalignment with the goals and values of Kithain and Gallain. Naturally, that hasn't stopped players from wanting to play them. We're talking today about whether that's a good idea—or perhaps, how to make that less of an evil idea. Can they mix with others in a motley? What sorts of stories can you tell with a thoroughly corrupt or broken changeling? The main takeaway is that you shouldn't just jump into playing a character from one of these groups without some extensive considerations. We've done our best to lay those out so that if you do indeed stroll down that primrose path, you'll be prepared to do these fiendish fae justice. We're primarily discussing from a C20 perspective, but if you're unfamiliar with the older editions' takes that we reference here, it might behoove you to go WAY back in time and listen to our episodes on the books Autumn People (https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-9-autumn-people/) and The Shadow Court (https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-19-the-shadow-court/). For all your other communicative needs—the ones that have to do with our show, anyway—consider one of these links instead: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) runs a tasting event every second Wednesday of the month, pairing Nightmare Legacies with fancy cheeses. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) suffers under the Brand of the Scribbler, unable to write just one word when ten will do. Und wenn du lange in einen Abgrund blickst, blickt der Abgrund auch in dich hinein. [And when you gaze long into an abyss the abyss also gazes into you.] —Friedrich Nietzsche, Also Sprach Zarathustra

So, we had thought, surely the supplements for Changeling: the Lost's first edition can't be as dense as the corebook. Surely there will be some let-up in the sheer volume of material crammed into the pages. And yet, here we are with the first book in the line, Autumn Nightmares, applying nostrums to our eyes and brains after the sea of tiny text and dizzying array of concepts and creatures contained therein. Have we regrets? Always, but not about this one. The book is focused on antagonists for the Lost: their fellow changelings, their former Keepers, their fetches and so forth. Underneath it all is the idea that the Autumn Court's pet emotion of fear is a defining part of the Lost experience... so if we forged ahead through these pages without stopping, is that bravery? Better philosophers than us will have to answer. In the meantime, as we recover our wits, here are two hours of our findings! The book is available for purchase at https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/50679?affiliate_id=3063731 if you're so inclined. And another inclination you may have is to get in touch with us! If so, a smattering of options include: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Pooka G (any pronoun/they) keeps a small farm of Hedge-squirrels who are superb dream-thieves, but have worryingly started to unionize. Amelia Fetch (she/her) is still paying the price for giving Lady Bolevile only three stars on Yelp. Let us not speak of it further. Fear cannot be without hope nor hope without fear. —Baruch Spinoza

If you've been listening to our show for a while (or hanging out on our Discord!), chances are you've heard Josh mention Dr. Jenna Moran's game Nobilis. In some ways adjacent to the World of Darkness and Exalted, in some ways adjacent to its own distinctively hallucinogenic blossom-laden spatial warp of hyperconsciousness, it seemed like a good choice for our first discussion of games outside of our usual bailiwick. And indeed, there is lots of inspiring cross-pollination to explore! We're giving an overview of the game's third edition corebook in this episode—mostly Josh explaining and trying to alleviate Pooka's confusion—and some thoughts on parallels for Changeling players. Perhaps other entries in this series of episodes will follow, where we examine other games outside the WoD? It's always best to start with the trippiest and see how things go from there. As discussed in this episode, Nobilis has had kind of a torturous publication history, but a version of the third and most recent edition—the one we talk about here—is available at https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/89003/nobilis-the-essentials-volume-1?affiliate_id=3063731 (and hey, it appears to be on sale at present!). Some other links that might be of use are the usual passel of socials we espouse: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) committed a level 9 Domain miracle and only got this lousy T-shirt. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) would be the Mimulus God rather than the Hollyhock God, but the dental benefits are terrible. There is no excellent beauty that hath not some strangeness in the proportion. —Francis Bacon, "Of Beauty"

At long last, with this third installment, we are at last finished our readthrough of the Changeling: the Lost 1st edition corebook. Here's hoping that when we get to 2nd edition, we can just breeze through and say "nyaaahhh, it's mostly the same but here are things that have changed." (Doubtful.) This week, we're talking about Entitlements, the sample freehold setting of Miami, our thoughts overall on the book, and listener questions that we've been saving til the end. But of course, this is only the first step in our considerations of 1e Lost, for there's a handful of supplements that we will work through in the coming months, and after that, who can say? Until then, we hope this deep dive was informative, and whether you're learning about CtL for the first time or thinking "thanks the fates they finally got more into the other Changeling," may it have whetted your appetite for more. One last time, you can pick up the PDF of the 1e corebook if you're so inclined, at https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/50010?affiliate_id=3063731. And more socially, points of ingress to our own digital freehold include: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Pooka G (any pronoun/they) can't believe that Appendix II passed up the chance for a manatee Beast motley politely guarding the coast. Amelia Fetch (she/her) secretly thinks the book's covers should've had actual thorns, to dissuade all but the most dedicated players. The trick is to combine your waking rational abilities with the infinite possibilities of your dreams. Because, if you can do that, you can do anything. —Guy Forsyth in Waking Life

Another week, another as-rapid-as-we-dare readthrough of the Changeling: the Lost 1st edition corebook. This time, we're having a look at Chapters Three and Four. "But Pooka and Fetch," you might say, "this was supposed to be a two-part series, not a trilogy. How could you spend just under two hours talking about two measly chapters?" Well, when those two chapters clock in at ~120 pages with small text, little art, and extensive detail on both the intricate bespoke systems of the game and how to run the damn thing... as you'll discover, we had plenty to talk about. Still, we hope that the brisk clip of our discussion and the occasional wisecrack will help keep you engaged. (And seriously, there's only one more episode left for this book before we put it down, if not for good, at least for a breather.) As indicated previously, the 1e corebook is available for purchase at https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/50010?affiliate_id=3063731. Our usual passel of links below as well: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Pooka G (any pronoun/they) spun the Hedge like a roulette wheel, and just look what happened... Amelia Fetch (she/her) sells jewelry made of seashells and mysteries at the goblin market for the low low price of only three soul fragments! This was the way he had to go; he had no choice. He had never had any choice. He was only a dreamer. —Ursula K. LeGuin, The Lathe of Heaven

As the light half of the year breaks over the horizon, it's time at last for us to take the deepest of breaths and open the tome that is the Changeling: the Lost 1st edition corebook. The density of the text and the number of pages meant that this was always going to be a multi-part endeavor, but we did our best to keep the wild tangents we could have gone down to a minimum. In this installment, we're covering the introductory material and the first two chapters... which is a solid 170 pages of material with very tiny font, so we really still had to pack it in. We're commenting on elements as they relate to Changeling: the Dreaming throughout, so for any veterans who haven't tried one of the games but are curious to know about what they could bring into the other, we hope it will be of use! And as a historical curiosity—for now the second edition has obviated many of our comments here—perhaps it will show the roots of the setting to newer Lost players. About this trilogy of episodes, we've got hopes and perhaps left and right. And what, besides abductions and transformations and oneiromancies, could be more fae than that? If this preliminary dive inspires you to purchase a copy of the book, you can do so at https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/50010?affiliate_id=3063731. And if you are otherwise inspired to get in touch with us, that is also possible, through the links below: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Pooka G (any pronoun/they) greatly prefers hanging out with Alec Bourbon's lighthearted and garrulous cousin, Bill Tequila Sunrise. Amelia Fetch (she/her) has three dots in Back to School Mantle and Court Goodwill with Christmas in July. I saw pale kings and princes too, Pale warriors, death-pale were they all; They cried—'La Belle Dame sans Merci Hath thee in thrall!' —John Keats, "La Belle Dame sans Merci"

We're visiting other shelves on the bookcase again, this time to dig into World of Darkness: Hong Kong. As with the Tokyo citybook, this was a Year of the Lotus supplement that was ostensibly for all the oWoD gamelines, but in truth was more vampire-centric than anything. Still—the tilts at the other games are present, and to help us sort through the Prodigals, we were joined by Terry Robinson from Mage: the Podcast (recorded before his passing) and Josh Heath from Werewolf: the Podcast (with whom Pooka recorded a follow-up segment more recently). From a Changeling perspective, the book notably contains example of hsien that are not quite built like Kithain, but are still a far cry from those in Land of Eight Million Dreams, which would not come out for several more months. The book overall is a richly described take on the city, and while its approach and accuracy are... debatable, some of it surprisingly prescient for what would follow in the next 25 years. If you'd like to go beyond taking our word for it, you can pick up a copy of the title at https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/344?affiliate_id=3063731. And as with the Tokyo episode, some links for the ad hoc World of Darkness Podcast Network: Werewolf: the Podcast can be heard at https://keepontheheathlands.podbean.com/, and Josh Heath's other endeavor, OpCast (arms around the Trinity Continuum), may be perused at https://creators.spotify.com/pod/show/opcast; Mage: the Podcast is at https://magethepodcast.com/ In the long ago times of Season One, we spoke with Josh about Werewolf/Changeling crossover (https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-8-werewolf-changeling-with-josh-heath/), and with Terry on Mage/Changeling crossover (https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-14-mage-changeling-with-terry-robinson/) And for our usual passel of links: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) warns you not to meddle in the affairs of dragons, for you are crunchy and taste good with hoisin sauce. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) has few weaknesses, but a maximalist signage aesthetic such as found in Kowloon is one of them. We all need stories. What happens in our daily lives changes our stories. —Wong Kar-Wai

It's rare that the fae and the dead have much to do with each other, which is surprising given that within the latter category, the wraiths called Sandmen are oneiromancers extraordinaire. Manipulating the dreams of mortals from beyond the grave, they should be one of the more likely sorts of Prodigal a changeling may encounter. They are suggested as antagonists (in the C20 corebook, if not elsewhere), but what do these dramatic ghosts get up to on their own time? We're opening up their splatbook, Guildbook: Sandmen, to answer this question and learn more about being a theatre person for all eternity, for better or worse. Perhaps you'll be inspired to introduce them on the fringes of dreams in your own game for an unsettling bit of mystery... We previously talked about crossover between Changeling: the Dreaming and Wraith: the Oblivion waaaay back in Season One; check out that episode (#25) here: https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-25-changeling-and-wraith-crossover/. And if you'd like to purchase the guildbook in question, you can follow the mist-shrouded path to https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/143?affiliate_id=3063731. Aside from all that, should you want to send missives in dreams to us, you have a range of options: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) makes use of a relic shepherd's crook to ensure no vaudevillian Sandmen get too fast and loose with Phantasm. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) worked in a haunted theatre during university, but the ghost mostly just hid among remaindered prop furniture. To die, to sleep; — To sleep, perchance to dream: — ay, there's the rub; For in that sleep of death what dreams may come, When we have shuffled off this mortal coil, Must give us pause. —William Shakespeare, Hamlet, III.i.64–68

When talking about these games that we love, sometimes we may give the impression that we know more about the history behind the scenes than we let on. It's when we have the opportunity to interview an actually knowledgeable person that the extent of how much we don't know becomes obvious. So it goes today, as we talk with Pete Woodworth about the creation and development of Changeling: the Lost back in its earliest days. As one of the stewards of Changeling: the Dreaming who helped carry over some of the ideas in the new World of Darkness, Pete had anecdotes to share and perspectives to illuminate about how one game informed the other. (And secrets, too, that fall somewhere between curious and earthshaking, but we'll let you decide towards which end of that spectrum these tidbits fall closest.) We hope you'll find these stories as intriguing as we did for this rich and complicated game. Pete's website, Positively Woodworthian, can be found at https://peterwoodworth.com/, from which you can check out his various works around the TTRPG sphere. As for various links on our end, you might try any of the following: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Pooka G (any pronoun/they) feels the lack of mixed goblin fruit salad mechanics was a significant oversight by the writing team. Amelia Fetch (she/her) wants to know who is responsible for Vainglory and what in the world they were thinking. If change is inevitable, predictable, beneficial, doesn't logic demand that you be a part of it? —Captain Kirk in Star Trek, "Mirror, Mirror"

For a solid year now, we've been going on about the Changeling 30th Anniversary project, a celebration of three decades of this game we all know and love and dedicate too much headspace to, probably. We've also mentioned that one of the things we're trying to do for this Season is a series of books produced by the podcast for release on the Storytellers' Vault. Well—the day has finally come. This week, we're talking with guest Andrew Goodman in his capacity as co-author on the first two volumes, The Changeling Cookbook and Kithbook: Swan Maidens. We recorded this back in early February, back when we foolishly thought that both books would be out in a matter of days. Here we are, nearly two months later, eating humble pie—for which there is not actually a recipe in the Cookbook, unfortunately. But may these nevertheless be a catalyst to get the other ones done in timely fashion; we'll be releasing episodes in tandem with the other books as they come out. If you'd like to pick up the Changeling Cookbook, it's available now at: https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/517123?affiliate_id=3063731. Kithbook: Swan Maidens is coming soon, and this page will be updated to reflect its release. And if you have comments on either book, or on this project as a whole, or you just want to chat about whatever fae-flavored business, herewith our usual passel of links: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) prefers diffident pie, which is like humble pie, but with more boysenberries and whipped cream on top. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) advocates instead for a slice of arrogant cake, many-tiered and covered in garish pink fondant. A cookbook is only as good as its worst recipe. — Julia Child

Apologies for skipping an episode release last week—there's a point at which even a pooka must throw in the towel for a day or two to recover from the wheel of reading, preparing, recording, editing. Now that things are a bit settled, we're back on track as we delve into the Changeling-adjacent library again today to talk about Sorcerer[s]! The hedge magicians of the World of Darkness haven't made many inroads into the game line, but today we're talking about a few groups that might be relevant, a few fae-impacting powers they possess, and a few tips for including them in your chronicle. (How many fews does it take to make a several? or a many?) Scattered across a number of books all somewhat titled "Sorcerer", these unexpectedly powerful mortals provide potential antagonists and allies for any motley. The three books in question, should you wish to snag them for your own: World of Darkness: Sorcerer (the original) is at https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/339?affiliate_id=3063731 Sorcerer for Mage Revised is at https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/263?affiliate_id=3063731 Sorcerer for Mage 20th Anniversary Edition is at https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/401413?affiliate_id=3063731 And you too can start your journey on the sorcerous Path of Podcasting by getting in touch at: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) advocates for more dank eldritch grimoires on audiobook and in readable EPUB format. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) sold their soul to learn the Path of Rock and Roll.

The gravity of Changeling: the Lost's first edition corebook is slowly pulling us in... but before we get there, let's make a few stops along the way. Two whole months before the game was officially released at GenCon 2007, there were a number of introductory and ancillary materials that helped drive up interest. This includes the Demo rules summary and quickstart adventure, "Dwelling in Darkness", featured in previews on the White Wolf website, as well as the usual swag: Storyteller's screen, character sheet pad, fancy dice. While we're focusing mostly on the first one today, the others helped to set the aesthetic of the game that was about to launch, If you're looking to dip your toes into 1e, then the quickstart may be just the thing for you, before the headlong plunge. Listen along as we try our best to give comprehensive and spoiler-free summaries of what is found therein! Naturally, things are available on the Storytellers' Vault, namely https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/28293?affiliate_id=3063731 for the Demo, https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/50484?affiliate_id=3063731 for the Character Sheet Pad (but why, in this day and age), and https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/126290?affiliate_id=3063731 for the Screen, although if you print it out, you'll want to stick it to something sturdy. Dice are unfortunately not yet available for print on demand. And as for our own links...! Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Pooka G (any pronoun/they) was forced to check for Clarity after snorting a handful of Pixy Stix. Amelia Fetch (she/her) suspects that most of the Miami freehold's political intrigues could be solved with a well-placed pack of Hedge-gators. Percy: Oh, Edmund, can it be true? That I hold here, in my mortal hand, a nugget of purest green? Blackadder: Indeed you do, Percy. Except it's not really a nugget, but more of a splat. Percy: Well, yes, a splat today, but tomorrow, who knows, or dares to dream! —Blackadder II, "Money"

The other gamelines in the World of Darkness rarely engaged with Changeling very deeply, but now and then, a book would have a chunk of pages illuminating some new corner of the lore. We're looking to Vampire this week, and in particular the first Dark Ages corebook and the original Dark Ages Companion. This first edition of Dark Ages, using the second edition Vampire ruleset, was contemporaneous with early Changeling—and it shows. These two books show glimpses into fae conceptions that didn't quite make it into the deep history, let alone Dark Ages: Fae when that finally dropped, but we're curious about how they might still be of use. And beyond that, the rich setting information in this line is useful for anyone looking to set up a medieval Europe game that is more CtD than DA:F. We promise this is not a deep readthrough of 500 Vampire pages! That being said, as promised, the Fishmalk: Even mad vampires can use a friend once in a while! The two books in question are available for purchase at https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/2672?affiliate_id=3063731 and https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/100?affiliate_id=3063731, respectively. We are available but not for purchase at: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) rolls Chimerical Alchemy to distill dreamstuff into heraldic tinctures impossible for human eyes to discern. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) has successfully used the Ride Skill only once and on a camel. Uns ist in alten maeren  | wunders vil geseit von heleden lobebaeren  |  von grozer arebeit von vroevden hohgeciten  |  von weinen und von klagen von chvener recken striten  |  muget ir nu wunder hoeren sagen. (We have been told in ancient tales many marvels / of famous heroes, of mighty toil, / joys and high festivities, of weeping and wailing, / and the fighting of bold warriors – of such things you can now hear wonders unending!) —The Nibelungenlied, tr. A.T. Hatto

It's the dawning of a new age here at Changeling: the Podcast, as we begin to eye that entity known as Changeling: the Lost... veteran Storyteller and noted gaming authority Fetch joins us as co-host for this run of episodes that will proceed through Season Four. We're beginning with a deep dive into the (new) World of Darkness 1st edition corebook, the central text for the games that succeeded the original run of World of Darkness. This edition ran from 2004 through 2013 (or thereabouts) before being succeeded by the "Chronicles of Darkness" that ended late last year. We're talking this time around about Fetch's background with the games, the context of the gaming landscape in the mid-Naughty Aughties, mechanical differences in nWoD, and the themes/moods of the setting—which are quite different as well as being quite the same. If you've never delved into the series, then this will be a primer for you to get your feet drenched, and if it's old news to you, we hope it will be an engaging refresher nonetheless. If you're inclined to purchase the book, drop by https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/1124?affiliate_id=3063731. Otherwise, for communication purposes, you can drop us a line via any of the following: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Pooka G (any pronoun/they) is more "Horror Stylish" than vice versa, or so say the latest and greatest society rags. Amelia Fetch (she/her) gets 9-again on Occult rolls because of that deal made with that entity that one time, let's leave it at that? O, brave new world That has such people in 't! —William Shakespeare, The Tempest, V.i.217–218

And so it begins...! meaning Season 4, of course. We have a nice little backlog of recordings to edit, bowdlerize, and disseminate to the masses in the coming weeks and months. While we're done with the core line of Changeling: the Dreaming, there are a number of books we'd like to consider from the old World of Darkness. First up among these is World of Darkness: Tokyo, a Wraith book pretending to be an all-the-lines book (with a smattering of Changeling material). This episode was recorded a few months ago, but delayed due to the passing of our friend Terry Robinson, who appeared in it as a representative of Mage: the Podcast (along with Josh Heath for Werewolf: the Podcast). We've decided to move forward with producing this one in his memory. And then who knows in which pages we'll be losing ourselves next week...? Some links: Josh Heath's Werewolf: the Podcast lives at https://keepontheheathlands.podbean.com/, and OpCast (arms around the Trinity Continuum!) at https://creators.spotify.com/pod/show/opcast; Terry's Mage: the Podcast (of which Pooka is now also officially a co-host) dwells on https://magethepodcast.com/ Linking to the same key episodes from the last time we did a Grand Crossover of our podcast: here's the one with Josh where we talked about Werewolf/Changeling crossover (https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-8-werewolf-changeling-with-josh-heath/), and the one with Terry on Mage/Changeling crossover (https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-14-mage-changeling-with-terry-robinson/) Should you wish to acquire the text for yourself: https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/347?affiliate_id=3063731 The socials, as usual: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) fashions ikebana out of used circuit boards mounted on skewers. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) secretly yearns to occupy a designated seat at the end of the counter at a humble, impossibly delicious izakaya. Tokyo, city of my dreams! Will you fulfill my one desire and give me a life of my own? Yes, I believe you will, I know you will, in spite of the hardships and trials in store. —Kaneko Fumiko (金子 文子), from Prison Memoirs of a Japanese Woman, tr. Jean Inglis

One last minisode to tide you over through Winterregnum...! As you may or may not be aware, not all the audio we record makes it into the final episodes. It's been a while since an episode with some outtakes, so we've returned to the cutting room floor for random bits of conversation. Here's the list of disconnected items and the episodes they're from: "Sensible advice" (from Episode 19, The Shadow Court) "Dual-wielding" (from Episode 19, The Shadow Court) "Neck fashions" (from Episode 28, Isle of the Mighty: England with Andrew) "Elizabeth II" (from Episode 28, Isle of the Mighty: England with Andrew) "Kith creation" (from Episode 29, Isle of the Mighty: Scotland) "Dots of 90s White Wolf" (from Episode 30, Isle of the Mighty: Wales with Terry) "Coracles" (from Episode 30, Isle of the Mighty: Wales with Terry) "Geography lesson" (from Episode 30, Isle of the Mighty: Wales with Terry) "Lifetime movie" (from Episode 33, The Immortal Eyes Novels) "Lasers and feelings" (from Episode 36, Glamour and Banality) "Death of a freehold" (from Episode 36, Glamour and Banality) "Mage Banality" (from Episode 39, Dreams and Nightmares: Part One with Terry) "The Most Important Dream Realm" (from Episode 39, Dreams and Nightmares: Part One with Terry) "Pooka's proudest moment" (from Episode 44, The Shining Host with Pete) "The world of DIE" (from Episode 45, Queerness and Kinship) "Texas" (from Episode 49, Kingdom of Willows) There's more where that came from, but probably this will suffice for now, as a sampler. And yes, this is really just filler material, but in these curious and uncertain times, we're doing what we can to stoke the balefire and keep ourselves grounded with voices and memories. Otherwise, we are as always available at the usual passel of links: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) keeps spare minutes in a chronometric piggy bank for future splicing into bonus hours of undiluted time. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) once played "Exquisite Corpse" with a sluagh, but not the kind you'd think.

We're kind of scraping the bottom of the barrel for the last dregs of content from the vaults. On the LARP side of the equation, there are a few remnants from various Mind's Eye Theatre books that never made it into either The Shining Host or the Shining Host Player's Guide, which we have collected to discuss in today's minisode. These basically consist of live-action Dauntain, adapting the Time of Judgment stories, a piece of fiction, and a meditation on supernatural phenomenology (whew). We've gathered these together so that you don't have to, and we're giving a bit of commentary, but as far as we can tell, this is really it for the Dreaming official content in print (with one exception) that we know of. If you do feel compelled to pick up either Laws of the Hunt (revised) or Laws of Judgment, you can find them at https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/182?affiliate_id=3063731 and https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/1621?affiliate_id=3063731, respectively. And if you're looking to chat with us instead, some places to do so include... Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) once threw a LARP with nothing but dollar-store buntings, a tray of mini-pizzas, shaving cream, and gumption. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) scrapes the bottom of barrels knowing that it's just barrels all the way down. The real challenge is to make art out of these bits and pieces of our reality. —Joe Lewis

Welcome to 2025, changelings and changelants! We said that Winterregnum was going to be our hibernation season... but truth be told, there are too many things to do and not enough time to do them, so yes, we're going to continue to put some content out for the coming weeks. The Season proper will launch in February as usual. Whether the episode numbering will tick up to 101 in this intercalary period remains to be seen, but for this week, at least, we'll keep with the convention for giving fractional numbers to minisodes. This time around, Pooka has a chat with Bloodied Porcelain about Hallowed Haven Studios about their upcoming Changeling: the Dreaming actual play, "District of Dreams"! The first live episode will launch on Friday the 10th, so we hope you'll be able to tune in... but if not, audio recordings will be available thereafter on their website and on podcast platforms near you. For more information and other ancillary material—teasers, prologues, etc.—check out the various HHS places around the interwebs: Website: https://hallowedhavenstudios.com/ District of Dreams home page: https://hallowedhavenstudios.com/district-of-dreams/ Hallowed Haven on Twitch (for watching live): https://twitch.tv/hallowedhavenstudios Hallowed Haven on YouTube (for post-viewing): https://www.youtube.com/@hallowedhavenstudios Hallowed Haven on Discord (for community chatting): https://discord.gg/hallowedhaven Their Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/hallowedhavenstudios And our own interweb scramblings can be found at: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your host Pooka G (any pronoun/they) lived in DC for a while, but had to go to Virginia just to find green hair dye, because DC was that kind of town. You measure democracy by the freedom it gives its dissidents, not the freedom it gives its assimilated conformists. —Abbie Hoffman

Woo-hah! We got here at last. Yule is upon us and it's time for another State of the Podcast before we enter our Winterregnum period. As stated before, there will likely be a bit of content here and there through the coming weeks, but—with one or two possible exceptions—no full episodes until some point in February. And when we come rocketing back at that point, well, we have a thing or three in store for you. In this bit of bonus content, we're talking about statistics from the Season, plans for the next one, little life updates, and whatever else crossed our brains on a chilly weekday night. Although we won't be releasing much to the winter airwaves, you are still welcome to get in touch with us through the usual socials below! The conversation rolls on, and if you don't want to miss what's happening, our freeholds are always welcome to you: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) has set up the nocker sugar shack what makes the Glamour syrups and chimerical caramels. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) offers heady sacrifice to the gods in eager anticipation of First Snow...! Et quand viendra l'hiver aux neiges monotones, Je fermerai partout portières et volets Pour bâtir dans la nuit mes féeriques palais. (And when old Winter puts his blank face to the glass, I shall close all my shutters, pull the curtains tight, And build me stately palaces by candlelight.) —Charles Baudelaire, "Paysage" (tr. George Dillon)

Like any grumps, we often ruminate on the past and what it has (and hasn't) brought us. After the closing of the old White Wolf forums post-Time of Judgment, those in search of community found our way to various places on the internet, one of the most noteworthy of which for the two of us was Shadow'n'Essence, a message board forum with extensive space for each of the WoD lines (and more!) in the 2000s. You may have heard us wax poetic about it in our online games episode a couple weeks ago. The vibrant atmosphere and creative energy among the Changeling fans in particular is something still fondly remembered, and sometimes people turn up years later to talk about it—like Chris Bern (aka Swordsman), former coordinator (aka Vilicus) of the Changeling section of the site, who joins us for this minisode walk down memory lane. Tune in to hear us talk about things as they once were, and if you were on SnE, we'd be delighted to hear from you...! Chris' repository of Changeling bits from the days of yore can be found at: https://theshepherdsfreehold.wordpress.com/. And as for us, it's the usual mishmash of places: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (zenten) absconded with a Glamour slushie machine and the gods of internet past can't have it back. Pooka G (AlecRavager) will use however many Chronos Unleashings it takes to stir the slumbering PHPbeast. Should auld acquaintance be forgot, And never brought to min'? Should auld acquaintance be forgot, And days o' auld lang syne? —traditional, adapted by Robert Burns

Once again, it happened...! Pooka is in attendance at PAX Unplugged this weekend, and spent Friday afternoon rushing around doing on-the-spot interviews with creators whose work is somewhat Changeling-aligned. Herein are five short interviews about games that touch on the fae, dreams, imagination, and more. The sound quality in this minisode is particularly awful, which is what happens when you're doing interviews in a giant hall filled with 10,000 people, but at least everybody was as lovely and informative as they could be on a frantic day. Hopefully these will inspire you to seek out new and interesting games to expand your horizons, and if you happen to be at the convention, check out the booths in questions! The various creators and their web presences: Imagining Games (publisher of Broken Tales): https://www.imagininggames.com/ and https://www.instagram.com/imagining_games/ World Champ Games by Adam Vass (publisher of Babes in the Wood and Ever Dream This Man?): https://www.worldchamp.io/ Osprey Games (publisher of Through the Hedgerow and The Terror Beneath): https://www.ospreypublishing.com/us/osprey-games/ NerdBurger Games by Craig Campbell (publisher of Good Strong Hands): https://www.nerdburgergames.com/ Rown, Rook & Decard (publisher of DIE, Spire, and Royal Blood): https://rowanrookanddecard.com As for ourselves... Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your host Pooka G (any pronoun/they) has no voice today, and must game. (Credit to Mike from Darker Days Radio for this too-true line.) The thing about performance, even if it's only an illusion, is that it is a celebration of the fact that we do contain within ourselves infinite possibilities. —Daniel Day-Lewis

Maybe it's pretty obvious that we do a lot of gaming online nowadays, and that as hosts of a podcasts, we are thorough netizens who have thoughts and feelings about the interwebs. Nevertheless, online games have their own particular dynamics, opportunities, and cultures that we thought it might be good to explore, for people who are less or un-familiar with the experience. We're joined by veteran Storyteller of online gaming, Fetch, who shares wisdom from her extensive experience, which we compound with hoary reminisces about the forums and text-based ditherings of yesteryear (which we would not trade for anything of this world). This isn't an episode about the digital Dreaming itself, although maybe that's yet another entry for the Season 4 wishlist; this is an episode about how, through gaming, to dream digitally. Some of the links we discussed in the episode include: Lot-Casting Atemi, a tool for all your Exalted character management needs: https://www.lotcastingatemi.com/ Hammertime, the location-sensitive timestamper for Discord: https://hammertime.cyou/ Fetch's independent games including Necromancer and Do Androids Run on Electric Spoons?: https://ameliafetch.itch.io And her Bluesky as well: https://bsky.app/profile/ameliafetch.bsky.social As for ourselves: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) once used Metamorphosis with Prop 5 and Scene 5 to briefly transform all of mIRC into a single honeybee. Pooka G (any pronoun/they), upon seeing in online game a (╯°□°）╯︵ ┻━┻, will politely do a ┬──┬◡ﾉ(° -°ﾉ). On the internet, nobody knows you're a dog. —Peter Steiner

In the annals of Changeling history, there are many books that have been promised without coming to fruition. The Changeling atlas, Kingdom books beyond Willows, Book of Glamour... the litany goes on. Things are less clear for C20, but one title with a particular twisty path was By Night Studios' Mind's Eye Theatre: Changeling, which was almost official before it was de-officialized, and then eventually released on the Storytellers' Vault, but with a different team, even though their books for the other lines are official... or something. In any case, at nearly 400 text-dense pages, this is by far the largest homebrew Changeling product on the Vault, and its vaguely formal connections to the line meant that it was a candidate for reading. Pooka is joined by special LARP correspondent Amanda to talk about the book's evolution, particulars, and reception within the community. Much mixing of opinions ensues! You can purchase the PDF from https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/326469?affiliate_id=3063731 if you're so inclined. Amanda also recommends reading the essay "The Economy Cool" by Jason Andrews at https://jasonbandrew.com/role-playing-games/role-playing-game-articles/the-economy-of-cool/. And naturally, if you want to get in touch with us, you can reach out via any of the following: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your host Pooka G (any pronoun/they) wonders if the mind's eye is covered by the company vision plan. The thing about performance, even if it's only an illusion, is that it is a celebration of the fact that we do contain within ourselves infinite possibilities. —Daniel Day-Lewis

And so here we are. It's time to open up the last few chapters of the Changeling 20th Anniversary Player's Guide, thereby ending our readthroughs of the game's canon. Feels weird, to be honest. When we started the show, it felt like we'd be going through the library of official texts forever, and now that there are no more, there's a bittersweetness much like when the game was canceled (and then canceled again). We don't know whether it will reincarnate in the future, as the fae are wont to do, but if there's one thing the last three years have taught us, it's that the community is as vibrant and inventive as it ever was. So while we're discussing Síocháin and Imprints and Lycians and swan maidens on this episode, our thoughts are already reaching forward to see what new dreams are on the horizon. (And we hope you'll continue with us on that journey...!) Once again, the book can be purchased at https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/274520?affiliate_id=3063731, and if you want to listen to our previous two episodes on the title: Chapters 1 and 2: https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-92-c20-players-guide-part-one/ Chapter 3: https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-95-c20-players-guide-part-two/ And if you'd like to get in touch with us, the options are ample! Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) jousts every Wednesday with the snarky Oppidan guarding the Chaudière Bridge. Or is that Pont de la Chaudière? Pooka G (any pronoun/they) wears Goth voile that gives all movements fierce angles and has unlimited throwing shapes up the fishnet sleeves. It is today that we must create the world of the future. —Eleanor Roosevelt

What do you get when you cross the infinity of the Dreaming's possibilities with eight billion humans? Questions about how many of them are changelings, that's what. This week, we're applying the art/science of demography to the fae, throwing numbers and proportions and calculations around like so much spaghetti, so that we can see what sticks. You may ask, why does this matter—but how many and what kinds of changeling are running around the setting for your game will impact its feel. And not just the fae themselves: a local expression of the game's themes and moods depends upon Dreamers, Autumn People, and even just those mundane humans we talked about last time. So take note, Storytellers! We hope that after listening, you too will be able to graph a demo, Dreaming-style. The spreadsheet to which Josh refers to throughout the episode, with some proposed numbers based on the population of various divisions of Concordia, can be found at: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1rv_S2aGs1VtfeCvhyOoq_iZ10w9Eag2ERlo-UONllcY. We also refer to two episodes from our sibling show, Mage: the Podcast, on the subject of games with high numbers of mages and low numbers of mages, and how adjusting those numbers creates a different play experience. Pooka may have been using Chronos when talking about these, as it appears only the former has actually been released thus far. Nevertheless, check it out at: https://magethepodcast.com/running-and-playing-low-mage-count-games/. Our own bureaux of statistics: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) bribes fae of the Kingdom of Northern Ice into filling out the census form with maple syrup dross. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) traverses the Kingdom of Apples in a balloon-ship, dropping leaflets about the benefits of mixed-use zoning. A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky, dangerous animals, and you know it. —Agent K in Men in Black

Changelings, lest we forget, are part human. Spending time in a meatsack isn't always Glamourous or exhilarating (though it can be both), but it's an inherent part of their experience that can be interesting both in and of itself, and as a contrast to the escapist fantasies that the Dreaming is built on. Yet players and Storytellers often gloss over those aspects of the characters that populate their games. So! We're here this week to try and redeem mortal life in Changeling a bit, giving due consideration to some of the more human elements that might come up at the table. Day jobs and homework, customer service interactions and strangers on the street, Dreamers and Kinain and Autumn People alike... there are many possibilities that you can explore. Naturally, we won't be covering them all, but maybe some of the tidbits here will help you craft a game experience that feels a little more real and useful for when you step away from the table at last. Our perfectly mundane contact information: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) is fourth on the leaderboard for messing with Autumn People in the halls of Canadian government. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) might not be Kinain, but plays one on TV. And you may find yourself living in a shotgun shack And you may find yourself in another part of the world And you may find yourself behind the wheel of a large automobile And you may find yourself in a beautiful house, with a beautiful wife And you may ask yourself, "Well... how did I get here?" —Talking Heads, "Once in a Lifetime"

It's that time again! This second installment of our trilogy of episodes on the Changeling 20th Anniversary Player's Guide continues as we flip through Chapter Three. What's that, you say? An entire installment on a single chapter of a single book? Well, yes, because this "World of Dreams" section takes up a third of a dense text and covers a lot of ground, visiting four continents in swift succession. We're taking an honest look at how the fae histories of these regions are handled, the kiths that dwell there, and the stories one might be able to tell that connect with the game as a whole. Slight spoiler: we have a bone or five to pick, and honestly two to three of them were immediately resolved by In the Realm of Gods and Dreams, which you can hear about at https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-90-in-the-realm-of-gods-and-dreams/. But don't let all this stop you from learning a thing or two about changelings around the world and how they got that way...! As mentioned in our last C20PG episode notes, you can pick up the PDF (or print on demand book) at https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/274520?affiliate_id=3063731. Visit our own digital world of dreams around the various platforms below if you want to contact us: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) is still searching for Carmen Sandiego. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) just realized while typing this post that Brazilian Carnival didn't get mentioned once, which is getting added to this chapter's ever-lengthening list of iniquities. I'll put a girdle round about the earth / in forty minutes. —Robin Goodfellow, A Midsummer Night's Dream, II.i.175–176

What is love? (Baby, don't hurt me!) In the context of tabletop RPGs, sex and relationships and all the matter around them can be tricky business to navigate for players and Storytellers alike. In the context of romance and Changeling, there are all sorts of specific considerations to think about. What are the norms of chivalrous courtship in this or that noble's jurisdiction? How do cantrips complicate physical pleasure and emotional fulfillment? Can a redcap truly feel love? Questions of this sort abound in the pages of the supplements, as it sometimes seems like every other characters has some kind of sexual or romantic thread to their story. This episode is not an exhaustive treatment of everything that might come up in the game... but we try to cover some important topics and give some pointers about handling at the table. As for links...! We alluded to the recent episode at our sibling-show, Mage: the Podcast, on this topic; check it out at https://magethepodcast.com/adding-romance-to-games-with-friday-stout-and-sebastian-yue/. We made reference as well to our Session Zero episode (https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-38-session-zero/) on hashing out discussion around sensitive topics before you jump into a chronicle. And as usual, you can reach out to us strictly platonically at: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) theorizes that non-binary polycules are held together by them-ical bonds. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) prefers to get to know people in the deuterocanonical sense. Love, love is a verb; Love is a doing word Fearless on my breath— —Massive Attack, "Teardrop"

Changeling: the Dreaming's tagline is as a "game of modern fantasy", and it deals with folklore, epics, and magic... so when you talk to most people about it, they rarely bring up science fiction as a genre that the game ties into. We beg to differ. Dreams of technology, visions of futures utopian and dystopian alike, the consequences of humankind's hubris, and alien anxiety all fit very neatly into the setting. We're taking the opportunity to discuss how you might incorporate some of sci-fi's themes and ideas into your game, both generally and specifically. As with most such discussions, the topic is waaayyyy bigger than we could cover in a single episode, but we hope that this tip of the asteroid—along with the many media we name-drop throughout—will serve as inspiration for you to make your game as bombastically SCIENCE!-y as can be. One of those name-dropped texts is the noteworthy homebrew Countless Dreams, available on the Storytellers' Vault at https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/314491?affiliate_id=3063731. Do consider giving it a flip-through and seeing if it's your kinda thing! And while you're clicking around on the intertubes, you might as well scope out some of our online presence as well: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) keeps appointments in stardates to three decimal places. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) built an ansible but couldn't connect it to 5G, so the superluminal calls keep dropping. It is said that science fiction and fantasy are two different things. Science fiction is the improbable made possible, and fantasy is the impossible made probable. —Rod Serling

It begins...! We couldn't bring ourselves to go through Changeling 20th Anniversary Edition Player's Guide (quite a mouthful, but we have to distinguish it from the original) in one go, both because it's an incredibly dense text and because it's the Last Book. So, we're splitting it up into a trilogy of episodes. This first one covers Chapters 1 and 2, with an overarching theme of "politics and society among the Kithain." One of our episode ideas was to talk about politicking in the context of Changeling, so this kind of gets at that. Yet there are also numerous setting pieces to cover here which are somewhat tangential to that topic: Banner Houses, "secret" societies, opinions about anarchy. We do our best to give everything a fair shake, even for the stuff that may not deserve one. The tome itself is available on the Storytellers' Vault at https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/274520?affiliate_id=3063731. And naturally, if you'd like to drop us a comment, you have a surfeit of options for doing so...! Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) remembers when the Acadian sidhe had not a Resurgence, but a tintamarre. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) wonders whether there are any foodie Banner Houses who get to just lounge around eating Dreamer-made desserts (and if so, are they taking applications). POLITICS, n. A strife of interests masquerading as a contest of principles. —Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary

It's been a while since we've done a dive into media, so—here goes! Friend of the show Charles Siegel joins for Pooka for a discussion of how video games and tabletop games inform and resemble each other. We go through a shortlist of ten titles for inspiration to round out this series of episodes (for now) (the other big one is music, and no way are we getting the rights to do that one). In our opinion, each of these games features a variety of elements that tie into those of Changeling: the Dreaming. Obviously, there are a lot more out there, but a shortlist seems sufficient for our purposes. We're of the opinion that video and tabletop games inform each other If you'd like to acquaint yourself with the titles in question, behold some videos: American McGee's Alice (2000) — opening video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oSMZsT4UhyQ Braid (2008) – trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uqtSKkyJgFM Final Fantasy (so many years) — here's the piano collection for FFVI as one example of Uematsu's music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6SJisxnVFZo Kingdom of Loathing (2003 – present): https://www.kingdomofloathing.com/ Persona 4 (2008) – opening video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h73LvR8V2LA Pokémon Go (2016 – present) – one of many rare Pokémon hunts: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MLdWbwQJWI0 Psychonauts (2005) – trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aDbDShqvc_o Tandem: A Tale of Shadows (2021) – trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JKiv1skvUJQ Untitled Goose Game (2019) longplay: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gruIyw_AHYE Yume Nikki (2004) – longplay: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yr4iJL1LZwY Meanwhile, Charles can be found around the following parts of the interwebsphere: Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/charlessiegel Storytellers' Vault: https://www.storytellersvault.com/browse.php?author=Charles%20Siegel Tellurium Games: https://www.tellurium.games/ As for ourselves, drop us a line at any of the following: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your host Pooka G (any pronoun/they) used to tear it up at Dance Dance Revolution and is still proud of that A+ on "So Deep". You have no chance to survive make your time. HA HA HA HA. —Cats, Zero Wing

For many years, the Changeling community has longed for a better take on the hsien of East Asia. In our previous episode on their introductory 2e supplement, Land of Eight Million Dreams, we discussed at length how these fae were portrayed in... not the greatest fashion, and it's a characterization that the 20th Anniversary didn't really fix. But! The latest release from Hsienfan on the Storytellers' Vault, In the Realm of Gods and Dreams, breathes new life into what was a sometimes confusing, often cringey group of changelings, and manages to re-write many of the assumptions about the game along the way, both systems and setting. We had the opportunity to sit down with the author and walk through the book in its entirety. The open dev process used for its creation means that you may have seen glimmers and drafts along the way; now we have a 300+ page chomker in all its glory to digest. lf you've been eagerly looking for some thorough information about its contents, well, here goes... (Hsienfan's appearance on our show is also dedicated to his wife, Coco Vanille, without whose publishing prep and prowess this book would not exist. Forgetting to mention this in the outro is purely on Pooka, who is terrible at reading everything in emails, and missed this request. Many thanks from us as well to Coco for helping make this tome a reality!) You can pick up the book at the Storytellers' Vault by visiting https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/492660?affiliate_id=3063731, and here are some other internet places to check out on the side: The RPG.net forum thread to ask author questions: https://forum.rpg.net/index.php?threads/in-the-realm-of-gods-and-dreams-q-a-on-asian-urban-fantasy.922068/ Reddit Q&A: https://www.reddit.com/r/WhiteWolfRPG/comments/1f115so/in_the_realm_of_gods_and_dreams_qa_hsien_nostalgia/ Our episode on Land of Eight Million Dreams, for reference: https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-54-land-of-eight-million-dreams/ And as usual, you can bother us via: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) has waiting been waiting too many years already for the film Moderate Trouble in Sensible Canada. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) journeyed into the West and all they got was this lousy T-shirt. Half of the poetry of life would be gone, if we did not feel that life was either a dream, or a voyage with transient travelers. —Lin Yutang, The Importance of Living

And so we return! We're coming back from hiatus a little bit later than anticipated, both because it was a busy summer, and because we realized there aren't really that many episodes to get through before the end of the year. So, now that it feels more like autumn in this bit of the world, it's time to get through the rest of C20 and ancillary things on our list. One of the latter is Graceful Wicked Masques, the 2nd edition Exalted book that covers the Fair Folk. While this text is solidly outside the era of "Exalted is the prehistory of the World of Darkness kinda maybe", there's still a lot of connective tissue we see between this text and Changeling: the Dreaming. (If you need ideas for Deep Dreaming games or True Fae, for example, this is absolutely a good resource.) So we are once again diving into the library and seeing what gems we can unearth...! The book PDF can be purchased at https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/58880?affiliate_id=3063731, and our previous episode on the 1st edition Fair Folk book can be listened to at https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-79-exalted-the-fair-folk/. For all other social media and communication needs, see if you can surprise us at: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) has commissioned a study on what happens when a Fair Folk gets re-un-shaped, but the PIs keep disappearing. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) applies Fair Folk charm names to baking; today is an Oats Enfolding Butter Berry-Surmounting Technique day. Free from desire, you realize the mystery. Caught in desire, you see only the manifestations. Yet mystery and manifestations arise from the same source. This source is called darkness. —Laozi, Tao Te Ching ch. 1, translated by Stephen Mitchell

One more minisode for the summer! We'll be back to our usual schedule of full episodes in September, but we thought we'd share a cross-production that we participated in a couple weeks ago. Barney Smith from Storycomic reached out to do an interview with us about Changeling: the Dreaming, our podcast, and associated thoughts. So we have shamelessly appropriated the audio from that interview and are sharing it here, which we hope will tide you over for a bit longer... Over at Barney's site, there are a dizzying number (nearly 400! how does one even) of chats with authors of all stripes. Go have a scroll through and find a few that interest you, why don'tcha? The website: https://www.storycomic.com/ The podcast (or one of them): https://storycomic.podbean.com/ The YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCm6frhFag219q2lHM7Fa4qQ And as usual, if you'd like to get in touch with us, our socials are below: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) has been spotted at anywhere that's anywhere in the best parts of Ottawa. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) has scuttled away from detection behind the finest trash cans in Philadelphia. Inject a few raisins of conversation into the tasteless dough of existence. —O. Henry

A surprise minisode, just in time for Highsummer week! We've talked about the Immortal Eyes novels, we've talked about the Anthology of Dreams, and we've even mentioned Pomegranates Full & Fine... but what about the rest of the Changeling fiction from the 90s? This includes The Splendour Falls, a short story collection released in tandem with 1st edition; "Playing with Fire", part of the Essential World of Darkness omnibus; and "The Muse", a story in the following Quintessential World of Darkness omnibus. Pooka managed to get their hands on physical copies of each—since they are not available in PDF form, and long out-of-print—to read and expound upon their contents. It's a bit of filler until we get into the second half of Season 3 (soon!), but hopefully will whet your appetite for more. For our previous episodes on TTRPG tie-in fiction and its relevance to the game, check out: Our episode on the original Immortal Eyes trilogy: https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-33-the-immortal-eyes-novels/ Our conversation about Vampire/Changeling crossover, which touches on the novel of same: https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-47-changeling-vampire-crossover/ Our recent diversion into the C20 fiction offerings: https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-81-anthology-of-dreams-cup-of-dreams/ Per the announcement at the start of the episode, please also check out friend of the show Fetch's new game, The Necromancer, at: https://ameliafetch.itch.io/the-necromancer! This was written for the QUEER WRATH game writing jam (https://itch.io/jam/queerwrath) and has been simultaneously submitted to the Trans FURY jam (https://itch.io/jam/trans-fury-jam). And while we are lazing our way through the days of summer, you can find us as always at: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your host Pooka G (any pronoun/they) believes that life is indeed stranger than fiction, but pretty mundane when compared to sea shanty. I am always at a loss to know how much to believe of my own stories. —Washington Irving, "To the Reader"

And so we come once again to a bit of downtime, as we wind up the first half of Season 3. It's just another minisode on the eve of the solstice, to let you know where things stand and what we've been up to, plus some of our plans when we return in six weeks, give or take. We're getting our schedule of recordings together and making plans for getting through some books we want to read, and thinking ahead to our Changeling 30th Anniversary celebration next year... but mostly we're looking forward to a bit of rest and relaxation. Thanks for your continued support, and keep an eye out for our return! In the meantime, stay up to date with our summery goings-on at: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) will be spending the break perfecting that flan recipe. Flan for everyone! Flan for ever. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) is typing this from the other side of the planet, due to Secret Piskey Tendencies. Vacation is what you take when you can't take what you've been taking any longer. —The Cowardly Lion in The Wizard of Oz

We were going to just release this bit of content as Patreon content because it's our shortest yet, but by popular demand, here it is as a minisode...! For all of you Storytellers who feel the need to hide yourselves away from your players, or maybe just shield your dice from revealing too much, the Storyteller's screen is a time-honored tool of the trade. Changeling has had three over the years, one for each edition: some flimsy cardboard, some slightly sturdier cardboard, and most recently for C20, a glossy masterpiece of solidity. For the next eight and a half minutes, we give some comparative notes on what one finds there. May it be helpful to anyone in the market for a physical piece of obfuscation! Ourselves, we hide behind the following: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) has a screen that just keeps unfolding until it fully encloses the Storyteller in an geodesic cardboard fort. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) prefers to Storytell from a raised dais, concealing dice rolls and notes from the plebs with lights and smoke. I have, as it were, my own sun and moon and stars, and a little world all to myself. —Henry David Thoreau, Walden

Yes, we already did an episode on those long-suffering boggans, but don't you think they deserve another? Having dealt with the fanmade "old" Kithbook: Boggans previously (check out https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-77-old-kithbook-boggans/), we are now moving on to the new Kithbook: Boggans, released as a Kickstarter goal for C20. In the spirit of the older editions' kithbooks, the text deals with boggan history and society, some famous examples of their kith, and tidbits of lore for the discerning crafty-fae. This rounds out at last the full set of kithbooks from the original commoners (because the sidhe had plenty of their own books already), and also our slate of Lost in the Library episodes before our summer hiatus...! So we hope this will tide you over for book content, for the time being. You can purchase the book at: https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/242685?affiliate_id=3063731 Feel free to stop by our other spaces online, as long as you wipe your feet first: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) judged the Craftlympics this year and doesn't regret giving a "3" to that one wilder; they know who they are. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) wonders if the Wife of Bath would be on Tinder. It's a dangerous business, Frodo, going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you don't keep your feet, there's no knowing where you might be swept off to. —Bilbo Baggins in J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

The freehold is the center of changeling life, providing safety, community, and a connection to the Dreaming for wayward Kithain. But what makes each of them unique? We get some extensive systems and suggestions to answer this question in Book of Freeholds, a C20 supplement that greatly expands previous editions' take on building them. It's a short but dense book, and in this episode, we scour it for the double handful of drossy tidbits that players and STs alike will find useful. You can purchase the book at: https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/239407?affiliate_id=3063731 And follow the trod to find us at: Discord (our digital freehold!): https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) is well known hither and yon for keeping a tidy, ship-shape thorpe. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) tried to start a freehold, but bought too many decorative soaps and accidentally made a B&B instead. My house— 't's out of the ordinary! That's right— Don't wanna hurt nobody...! —Talking Heads, "Burning Down the House"

Alternate and/or historical settings for Changeling is always something that piques our interest. So we were keen to read the Gimme Shelter Player's Guide supplement (released April 2) that presents the fae of Swinging Sixties London. We're joined this week by the book's author, Bram Clark, who talks with us about his take on this slice of pre-Resurgence life. Clocking in at over 300 pages, the Guide is one of the longest homebrews on the entire Storytellers' Vault. Our conversation goes through the development, art, design... Bram's associated Player's Kit presaged something intriguing, but this was beyond what we expected. Hopefully this episode will give you some ideas about how to use it at your table! Many a link below! The book itself: https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/476344?affiliate_id=3063731 The pay-what-you-want Player's Kit to give you a taste: https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/408608?affiliate_id=3063731 Bram's website, Esoteric Orders: https://www.esotericorders.com/ Bram's Instagram, showcasing some of the art and inspiration in the book: https://www.instagram.com/bramclark/ We make reference to the generous character sheet work of Chris "MrGone" Leland, whom you can support by buying through the STV: https://www.storytellersvault.com/browse.php?author=Chris%20%22MrGone%22%20Leland And the links for our own stuff: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) asks that you not bend, spike, fold or mutilate. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) zhooshes their riah before a bona cackle with the omi-palones, and nanti scharda. If someone thinks that love and peace is a cliché that must have been left behind in the Sixties, that's his problem. Love and peace are eternal. —John Lennon

Now that we're through the corebook for C20, other supplements seem like small (but no less nourishing) potatoes. This time around is a double feature: we're flipping through Yours to Keep, the jumpstart and intro adventure for the edition, and Ready-Made Characters, a set of 13 write-ups (one for each core kith) and sample motleys to use in your game. Joining us is author of the first book, Christine Beard!, who talks about some of the process for reading, running, and writing jumpstart modules like this one. The two supplements feature some solid material to get you into the game beyond the corebook proper, so we encourage you to have a listen and hear what's what...! Links and things: Yours to Keep on the Storytellers Vault: https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/217594?affiliate_id=3063731 Ready-Made Characters on the same: https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/225641?affiliate_id=3063731 Christine's website, The Petite Warlock: https://thepetitewarlock.com/ Christine's Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@petitewarlock Christine's actual play podcast, The Cracked Die, for Pathfinder: https://crackeddie.com/ And our panoply of social media as per usual: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) runs games with ready-mades, but they are not Changeling characters; they are Duchamp sculptures. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) assumes that a horror RPG jump-start would be called a jump-scare, yes? End, begin, all the same. Big change. Sometimes good, sometimes bad. —Aughra in The Dark Crystal

And so we come to the third part of this trilogy, wherein we talk about changes to this edition. There are hundreds of little tweaks and adjustments to be found in the Changeling 20th Anniversary corebook, but we're focusing on a dozen of the most significant that stand out to us. (Slight spoiler: there's another big one that we realized after the fact we didn't talk about it... but luckily, it will apply in an upcoming episode as well.) We're looking at retconned metaplot, restructured magic systems, alternative ways of thinking about different groups of fae, and more. It's not that these three episodes have been the most comprehensive look possible at this edition and what it represents—it's just the most comprehensive we could bring ourselves to get through. If you need the first two episodes in the series, or to purchase the corebook itself: https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-82-changeling-20-walkthrough/ https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-83-changeling-20-the-new-stuff/ https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/210616?affiliate_id=3063731 Some other bits that found passing or heavy mention in this episode include: Our episode on War in Concordia, a text which goes deep into the late 2e metaplot: https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-66-war-in-concordia/ And on the subject of Inanimae: the Secret Way, the text which previously talked about the nature fae: https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-53-inanimae-the-secret-way/ The Changeling 30th Anniversary project we've been talkin about here and there: https://www.changeling30.com And the submission form for one of the books slated for that project, the Changeling Cookbook, can be found at: https://forms.gle/GMvvE26hfy628GBw9 Lastly, the places you can bother us gently and politely: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) would have liked to see the Concordia map re-drawn with lines that made sense. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) could have gotten on board with the pages of each chapter having their own musky aroma. And so the days float through my eyes But still the days seem the same And these children that you spit on As they try to change their worlds Are immune to your consultations They're quite aware of what they're goin' through. —David Bowie, "Changes"

Whew. Doing a walkthrough of the corebook was kind of a marathon, but treating it as a text in isolation is only part of the story. In this (thankfully shorter, because we recorded it the same day as the first) installment, we're drawing on our grump knowledge of the previous editions to talk about the new material in this one. There's a lot that we could have covered in that description, but we're sticking with some of the big items overall: the kith creation system, Revelry, new Thallain. Everything that builds on previous editions' systems will be covered in the third and final episode of this set, on the changes in the edition. For now, these are just some ruminations and opinions on the unexpected elements that stand out to us. Some links to bits that we mentioned in this go-through include: The kith creation workshop episode: https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-67-kith-building-workshop/ Unofficial Kithbook: Boggans by the fans: https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-77-old-kithbook-boggans/ Pooka's homebrew supplement, Kithbook: Ghille Dhu: https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/381967?affiliate_id=3063731 Minisode on Monde des Ténèbres : France: https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-63-5-le-monde-des-tenebres-france/ Minisode on Trolle, Träumer, Tiefe Wälder: https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-71-5-trolle-traumer-tiefe-walder/ And if you want to reach out to weigh in on what you think we should be doing next: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) wanted edible Treasure creation rules to roll up some nocker-crafted cheese puffs. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) demands mechanics for why so many changelings incarnate into human hosts with names nearly the same as their fae ones. Invention, it must be humbly admitted, does not consist in creating out of void, but out of chaos. —Mary Shelley, Frankenstein

Well, here we are at last...! After dozens of episodes covering the earlier days of the line, we are beginning our read of Changeling: the Dreaming 20th Anniversary Edition, the corebook proper. This first in a trilogy of episodes will be a walkthrough of the book, giving some concise information and commentary about each chapter. It's primarily geared towards new players, but if you are a veteran at this point, we hope you'll still enjoy the refresher. Next up are an episode about the new features of this, and then some of the changes (and our feelings on them). We reference a whole bunch of past installments in this recording, including: Any of our media inspirations episodes, but maybe this one on films: https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-50-thirteen-films-for-inspiration/ Kith creation workshop: https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-67-kith-building-workshop/ Running a Session Zero for Changeling: https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-38-session-zero/ Deep dive into Dreams and Nightmares (first of three): https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-39-dreams-nightmares-1-near-dreaming/ Advanced Storytelling techniques: https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-55-advanced-storytelling-techniques/ Nunnehi roundtable: https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-31-nunnehi-roundtable/ Deep dive into Land of Eight Million Dreams: https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-54-land-of-eight-million-dreams/ And if you want to reach out to weigh in on what you think we should be doing next: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) only needs eight more signatures for the petition to move the border of the Kingdom of Northern Ice. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) keeps accepting tokens of enchantment, and would you believe it, they're all caramel shortbread. The White Rabbit put on his spectacles. 'Where shall I begin, please your Majesty?' he asked. 'Begin at the beginning,' the King said gravely, 'and go on till you come to the end: then stop.' —Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland

Behold, the bonus episode! Back in December, Pooka had a chit-chat at PAX Unplugged with Terry of Mage: the Podcast and Mike of Darker Days Radio. This was released on Mage: the Podcast a couple weeks ago, but we're cross-posting it here as some random content to tide you over until everything is ready for the C20 corebook dive in a couple days. It's just a meandering conversation about TTRPGs at conventions, the state of the hobby, and our random thoughts while sitting at a table in a room that (partway through) we were informed we really weren't supposed to be in. We're rebels like that. Go check out: Mage the Podcast at: https://magethepodcast.com/ Darker Days Radio at: http://podcast.darker-days.org/ And the usual get-in-touch-with-us biz: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your host Pooka G (any pronoun/they) tried the Dallas RPG, and it was astonishingly good, but then it turned out it was all a dream. Consider that everything is opinion, and opinion is in thy power. —Marcus Aurelius

We've spoken before about what novels and short stories bring to the World of Darkness. At best, they can provide a naturalistic feel for a lived-in world that players and Storytellers can explore; at worst, they confuse the reader and muddle the rules of the setting. There aren't nearly as many items in the data set as for other World of Darkness games (looking at you, Vampire, with your multiple clan novel series), but we received two for the 20th Anniversary Edition that bookended the line. C20 Anthology of Dreams is a collection of ten short stories that appeared before the corebook, and Immortal Eyes 4: Cup of Dreams is the fourth novel in the Immortal Eyes saga, as well as the final text released for the edition. It may be a little weird for us to combine (technically) the first and last books in the C20 run, but we decided that tackling the role of fiction like this all at once made the most sense. So we came, we read, we opined, and herein our thoughts on what these two books add to the line. Our previous episode on the Immortal Eyes trilogy is at https://changelingthepodcast.com/podcast/episode-33-the-immortal-eyes-novels/, if you'd like to do a comparative listen. You can also buy these two books at https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/209390?affiliate_id=3063731 and https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/292748?affiliate_id=3063731 for a pittance! We'd also like to highlight the Changeling Cookbook project mentioned in the intro to this episode. This is a project for our Changeling 30 initiative, to be launched next year: a dozen books released over the course of 2025, in collaboration with members of the CtP community. For this one in particular, we welcome tasty recipe submissions from our audience, which you can send in at https://forms.gle/PJspJTuMsuj4tjmr7. More information about the particulars can be found on that form; we hope you'll consider sending something in! The usual haunts for otherwise contacting us: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) drank from the Cup of Dreams and only got this lousy T-shirt. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) used the Anthology's pages to press flower chimera, and now they're pressing back. "Go and tell your master that we have been charged by God with a sacred quest. If he will give us food and shelter for the night, he can join us in our quest for the Holy Grail. "Well, I'll ask him, but I don't think he will be very keen. He's already got one, you see." —King Arthur and the French soldier in Monty Python and the Holy Grail

As much as we enjoy flipping through pages and making sweeping claims about Changeling, we have never (alas) been directly involved in the production of the official game line. So for this roundtable, we invited some guests with insider knowledge: four of the writers and developers involved with the 20th Anniversary Edition. We obviously couldn't pull the curtain back too far, but these Bears With Balloons told anecdotes, shared insights, and gave us an idea of what it's like to work on a game line like this. Much laughter ensued, and we hope you'll enjoy listening as much we enjoyed chit-chatting. We've got a whole smörgåsbord of links this time, to point you towards everyone's various web presences and projects: Christine Beard's website is The Petite Warlock, at https://thepetitewarlock.com/ Christine's Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@petitewarlock Christine's Pathfinder actual play podcast, The Cracked Die: https://crackeddie.com/ Charlie Cantrell can be found as PookaKnight on many social media, such as: https://twitter.com/pookaknight?lang=en Charlie's Changeling project Facebook page is Radio Free Arcadia: https://www.facebook.com/RadioFreeArcadiaPublishing/ Ian Lemke develops material for Green Ronin: https://greenronin.com/blog/author/ianlemke/ Ian's company, Nepenthe Games, wherein the Nevermore Gothic horror RPG: https://nepenthegames.com/ If you'd like to late-back the Nevermore Kickstarter: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/nevermorerpg/nevermore-roleplaying-game Peter Woodworth's website is Positively Woodworth, at https://peterwoodworth.com/ Pete and Charlie both worked on Trinity Continuum: Aether; inform yourself at https://theonyxpath.com/category/worlds/trinitycontinuum/trinity-continuum-aether/ And for our own, should you wish to get in touch with us... Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) should have realized that attending a Round Table would be followed by a quest for the Cup of Dreams. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) would have preferred an Oblong Dolmen, but you work with what you've got. You get ideas from daydreaming. You get ideas from being bored. You get ideas all the time. The only difference between writers and other people is we notice when we're doing it. —Neil Gaiman

When we covered Dark Ages: Fae, we mentioned that it was the one canonical historical setting kind of for Changeling. That's not entirely true, because in the earliest days of the Exalted line, its world was lightly framed as the "prehistory" of the World of Darkness. While that aspect fell out of the setting pretty quickly, the first edition still echoes many of the modern World of Darkness games, recycling terms and ideas in novel ways. The counterpart to Changeling is Exalted: the Fair Folk, wherein we learn about the mysterious patterns of chaos pretending to be people that live in the Wyld outside the borders of Creation. That's close enough for our liking—join us as we read through this chomker of a tome and see what we can extract to inform a Changeling: the Dreaming game experience. Maybe what we find will be unexpected...! Or, you know, it might not. We can neither claim nor dismiss any kind of surprise. If you've a hankering for old-school Exalted fatsplat corebooks, you can snag this one at https://www.storytellersvault.com/product/1602?affiliate_id=3063731 for your collection. Otherwise, our own Middlemarch Demesnes are as follows: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) practices Unexpected Magical Protagonist Style, the martial art that recounts a mass market paperback fantasy main character arc. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) searches for a Charm that reshapes those pesky human dreams and emotions into tasty baklava. HISTORY, n. An account mostly false, of events mostly unimportant, which are brought about by rulers, mostly knaves, and soldiers, mostly fools. —Ambrose Bierce, The Cynic's Word Book

Don't worry, we're not totally casting off our roots quite yet. While Changeling: the Dreaming was in deep freeze, the mantle of "modern personal horror fae game" was taken up by Changeling: the Lost, a rather different entry in the (new) World/Chronicles of Darkness. At a glance, Lost shares a lot of terms and concepts with Dreaming, but digging into it, the game diverges significantly from its predecessor. This doesn't mean it's a bad game! We're giving it a fair shake this week and talking generally about some of its setting, the unique position it carves out among the lines, and how we feel it relates to Dreaming—especially since this was maybe the primary replacement we had to work with until C20. Navigate the Hedge to leave us some goblin fruit at: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) has a Contract that runs maple syrup in the veins of enemies. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) prefers goblin viennoiseries. And in his brain, Which is as dry as the remainder biscuit After a voyage, he hath strange places cramm'd With observation, the which he vents In mangled forms. —William Shakespeare, As You Like It, II.7

As we alluded to in our minisode about the unreleased Book of Glamour and Keys to the Kingdom, there was one more title done dirty by the unceremonious end of Changeling's 2nd edition. The long-lamented Kithbook: Boggans was on the putative release schedule (and available for pre-order) until long after the line's conclusion. When it became clear that the book would not be materializing, [cue dramatic music] an intrepid band of netizens and boggan devotees, led by Thad Papke, took it upon themselves to assemble their own Kithbook. And this kithbook would be a beacon unto the community! For it would shine a light on the kith in all their misunderstood glory, completing the cycle and inspiring players and STs alike to rise up and say, our game! our kithbook! our Concordia! (OK, maybe the last part didn't quite happen like that.) Nevertheless, it's a solid piece of text from an era when the culture of homebrew was a lot more scattered (a historical context we discuss in this episode). Eventually, the boggans did get their own official kithbook—to be covered in a future episode—but for over a decade, this was what was on offer, setting an impressive bar for future fan efforts. Have a listen to our discussion at: You can also craft us a message via: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) proudly owns the boggan Treasure shoebox that untangles all the random wires and cables you store within it. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) absconded with the boggan Treasure toaster oven that perfectly reheats any kind of leftovers. Yet such is oft the course of deeds that move the wheels of the world: small hands do them because they must, while the eyes of the great are elsewhere. —Elrond, of Frodo, in J.R.R. Tolkien's Fellowship of the Ring

We're tackling a slightly heavy subject today, talking about neurodiversity and ableism in the context of Changeling: the Dreaming. There are numerous ways in which these arise allegorically and literally in the pages of the game. We cover a few broad topics, but really we're just scratching the surface here, framing our interpretations of the themes with our particular perspectives and experiences. Regardless of what your own may be, we hope this episode encourages you to pause and think, and maybe do some exploring outside the realm of the game itself. (And if it's not your cup of tea, we won't be offended if you skip—but we look forward to seeing you next time!) To get in touch with us: Discord: https://discord.me/ctp Email: podcast@changelingthepodcast.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100082973960699 Mastodon: https://dice.camp/@ChangelingPod Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/changelingthepodcast YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ChangelingThePodcast your hosts Josh Hillerup (any pronoun) reserves Unleashings for dealing swiftly with the prejudiced and ignorant. Pooka G (any pronoun/they) swoons into phonological pleasure from the double dactylic rhythm of the word "neurodiversity". Difference is that raw and powerful connection from which our personal power is forged. —Audre Lorde