Podcasts about Character creation

The gang is BACK after a loooong Gothcon break!As Andreas is preparing for the next full season, we are digging our teeth into a little Tales from the Loop adventure!This is the Character Creation episode, we normally do not publish these, but in this case we felt it was necessary ;-)We're an actual play podcast where professional actors in Sweden play the best of Swedish RPGs. Led by one of Swedens most experienced and appreciated podcast game masters we play Tales from the Loop, a game published by Free League Publishing.Starring: Anneli Heed, Mattias Redbo, Ingela Lundh and Amanda Stenback.Game Master: Andreas LundströmThe original music for Sweden Rolls by Andreas Lundström

Characters are made and laughs are had We have a Patreon! What to support us? Click HERE! You can find us on Instagram (chaosenginepod) and Bluesky (chaosenginepod) You can also email us at chaosenginepod@gmail.com We have a discord now! Feel free to stop by if that interests you! Check out our friends: Pretending to be People! Stories & Lies Sorry, Honey I have to Take This Tabletop Talk Wilderspace Gaming Doomed to Repeat The Great Old Ones Gaming Negative Modifier Chaos Springs Eternal The Black Flare Podcast 9mm Retirement Radio Suffer Not

This episode is the first part of the discussion on what has changed between 5th Edition and the new updated ruleset, and the topic today is Character Creation! Opening Theme 0:00 Intro and Backwards Compatibility 0:22 Layout and Structure 6:28 Chapter One, Playing the Game 9:05 Chapter Two, Creating a Character 17:51 Chapter Three, Character Classes 20:25 Chapter Four, Character Origins 32:25 Outro and Closing Theme 40:33 DON'T FORGET TO LIKE & SUBSCRIBE! Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/user?u=84724626 Website: https://www.itsamimic.com Email at info@itsamimic.com Social: Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/itsamimic/?hl=en https://www.threads.net/@itsamimicpodcast Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/itsamimic/ Reddit at https://www.reddit.com/r/ItsaMimic/ Find Us On: Spotify at https://open.spotify.com/show/3Y19VxSxLKyfg0gY0yUeU1 Apple Podcasts https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/its-a-mimic/id1450770037 Podbean at https://itsamimic.podbean.com/ YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCzQmvEufzxPHWrFSZbB8uuw Dungeon Master 1:  Adam Nason Dungeon Master 2:  Coffee Bitch Dave Dungeon Master 3:  Kyle McQuaid Narrator:  Adam Nason Script By:  Adam Nason, Coffee Bitch Dave, Kyle McQuaid Director:  Adam Nason Editor:  Adam Nason Producer:  Coffee Bitch Dave Executive Producer:  Adam Nason Main Theme:  Cory Wiebe and Tyler Gibson Musical Scores:  Tyler Gibson Logo by:  Megan Lengle Other Artwork is owned by Wizards of the Coast. This episode is meant to be used as an inspirational supplement for Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition and tabletop roleplaying games in general.  It's A Mimic! does not own the rights to any Wizards of the Coasts products.

RPG System: Electric State by Free League (freeleaguepublishing.com)A group of uneasy acquaintances embark on a road trip north from the Los Angeles Metroplex to escape the corporate overlords that are after them. Will they survive the perils of a society in decline? Will they survive countless hours trapped in a van together?  ◇ Visit happyjacks.org/roadtonowhere for a full list of this campaign's videos and podcasts. CAST:  GM: CADave (he/him) https://cadave.carrd.co/ Kimi (she/her) https://kimihughes.carrd.co/ Cassandra Nyx (she/her), The Devotee Cai (he/they/she) https://estelofimladris.carrd.co Kilo (he/they/it), The Drone Pilot Kodi (they/them) https://www.kodigonzaga.com Ronnie Rhodes (they/them), The Doctor Visit https://www.happyjacks.org/roadtonowhere for a full list of this campaign's videos and podcasts.  Consider supporting the show on PATREON: https://www.patreon.com/happyjacksrpg ◇ Subscribe to our other podcast feeds! We have a weekly tabletop RPG talk show based on topics sent in from fans around the world, and a great collection of One-Shots if you prefer bite sized adventures. ◇ You can watch us on Youtube or Twitch! Hang out with other tabletop roleplaying fans in our Discord community! Tags: happyjacksrpg, tabletop, gaming, rpg, advice, dnd, d&d, podcast, roleplaying, happy jacks, stream, streaming, twitch, youtube, dm, gm, dming, gming, game master, dungeon master, campaign, dungeons and dragons, hjrpg, ttrpg, freeleague, electricstate

In which John, Ben, and Jess roll up characters for three different OSR systems: Dungeon Crawl Classics, Dolmenwood, and Shadowdark, bringing Sindar, Hrannick, and Korv to life. As they fill the sheets out, they explore how every detail sparks anticipation for play, and how what's left off of a character sheet can reveal clever, intentional design.Dungeon Crawl ClassicsDolmenwoodShadowDarkCheck out John's new podcast: Zombie StrainsContact Us!splatbookpod@gmail.comThe Splatphone!Roll For Topic

Welcome to the DMF. I'm Justin Younts. In this episode, we dive deep into the creative process of the incredibly talented Kerstin Schulze, whose work in film and television continues to push boundaries. Best known for her powerful performance as Sola and her standout role in The Righteous Gemstones, Kerstin is more than an actress—she's a true character architect.One of the most compelling examples of Kerstin's craft is her development of a deeply layered character named Hightower—a killer clown with a haunting backstory. From the start, Kerstin knew she didn't want this to be a one-dimensional villain. Instead, she focused on building a voice and presence for Hightower that would resonate on a human level. Inspired by classic characters like The Godfather, she gave Hightower a distinct vocal quality that immediately stood out.But the real magic came in the emotional layers Kerstin brought to the role. She saw beyond the clown makeup and chaos, tapping into the loneliness, rejection, and unfulfilled need for love that shaped Hightower's psyche. She made her a compulsive cleaner—obsessed with order as a way of coping with inner chaos—and through that lens, the audience could see the person beneath the persona.Kerstin's creative process is immersive. On set, she leaned heavily into improvisation, often asking herself, “What would Hightower do here?” One particularly memorable moment involved her climbing into a birdcage to express the character's sense of isolation and entrapment—unscripted, raw, and deeply revealing.Her method for learning lines reflects the same dedication. Kerstin records her dialogue and practices it on the move, internalizing it in a way that allows her to stay present and reactive in the moment. For her, it's not about memorization—it's about embodying the role completely, understanding the motivations behind every line, every look, every silence.In this episode, we get a rare glimpse into the mind of a performer who doesn't just play characters—she becomes them. Join us as Kerstin Schulze shares her process, insights, and the emotional truth that fuels her performances.Don't forget to like, share, and subscribe for more behind-the-scenes conversations with today's most compelling creative voices.00:00:00 - Introduction00:00:04 - Creating the Character Hightower00:00:36 - Hightower's Development On Set00:01:22 - Hightower's Motivation and Characteristics00:04:18 - Creating the Character War Manga00:05:52 - Learning Lines and Understanding the Story00:08:46 - Importance of Action and Understanding the Process00:09:40 - ConclusionFor more insights into her work and programs, you can visit her website at ⁠⁠partyanddiet.com⁠⁠ or follow her on Instagram at ⁠⁠@partyanddiet⁠⁠.

As we announced last week, today we're diving headfirst into Knights of the Old Republic II, Obsidian's follow-up to the BioWare game that dug into the ancient history of our favorite galaxy far, far away. (Though before we dig into that, we talk more about that announcement from last week to try to share some of our thoughts and process about getting where we got.) Because KOTOR II is a pretty big meal, we took our time today to set the table. We dig into our characters, the state of the galaxy after KOTOR II, the mods we used, and the various technical fixes we had to adjust for. If you're playing along with us on a device that can run mods, well here's that mod list (along with additional instructions) for you. (That last sentence had a link in it. If your podcatcher doesn't see one, try going to our site directly.) Finally, another little announcement. We know that many folks don't have time to play through all of KOTOR II along with us. To help those of y'all who nevertheless want to get a sense of the game, Austin will be uploading an episode-by-episode Let's Play to the official AMCA YouTube Channel. Here's the first episode!  (That was also a link.) Next Time: Peragus Support the show by going to Patreon.com/civilized! Show Notes Our KOTOR II Mod List The First Episode of the KOTOR II LP Episode 01 of ReBoot Hosted by Rob Zacny (@RobZacny) Featuring Alicia Acampora (@ali_west), Austin Walker (@austin_walker), and Natalie Watson (@nataliewatson) Produced by Chia Contreras (@a_cado_appears) Music by Jack de Quidt (@notquitereal) Cover art by Xeecee (@xeeceevevo)  

The Time Pals celebrate Star Wars Day and the re-release of “Revenge of the Sith” by going on a dungeon adventure set in the Star Wars universe. This time your Pals attempt to break the artificial intelligence storyteller with a lightsaber to the gut and craft a completely original story that won't at all resemble "The Book of Boba Fett" in meaningful any way.So join us on a hilarious special episode and find out how a gray Jedi became Mistress of the Dark, how a Hutt lost an empire, and what it means to be "Too SWEEET".Find all our links and episodes at:⁠⁠⁠⁠https://beacons.ai/timepalspodcast⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.instagram.com/timepalspodcast/⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.youtube.com/@TimePalsPodcast/videos⁠⁠⁠⁠Contact Us at:⁠⁠⁠⁠Timepalspodcast@gmail.comJoin us at our new home on the ⁠⁠Mayday Media Network⁠⁠ (⁠⁠⁠https://maydaymedianetwork.com/⁠⁠⁠) andbe sure to check out all our new Pals everywhere you get your podcastsShadoSpartan's Retro Reviews can be found here:https://www.youtube.com/@ShadoSpartanWanna help your poor poor co-hosts stay awake? Buy them a coffee at:https://buymeacoffee.com/timepalspodcastChapters00:00 Introduction to the AI Adventure03:01 Character Creation and Setting the Scene05:53 The Journey Begins: Choices and Consequences12:06 Conflict and Dark Choices17:54 The Rise of the Undead Army23:49 Conquering Nal Hutta29:47 Jabba the Hutt's Encounter36:04 The Dance of Power41:51 Establishing Control Over the Hutt Cartel48:01 The Final Showdown and New (world) Order#StarWars #podcast #geekcast #dadcast #adventure, #role-playing #dark choices #undead army #Jabba the Hutt #nWo #TimePals #Timepalspodcast #grayjedi

Auch ohne Vorbereitung ist diese Folge bestimmt ein Fest für euch. Wir reden heute u.a. über die Angst vor dem “was wäre wenn”, Zuschauer altern mit, Hännos böse KI, existenzielle Bedürfnisse, Fazit zu dem Dune Playtest, Schnittsoftware Kdenlive, Erinnerungen an C&C in Tempest Rising und The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered.Eure Fragen oder Themen unter dem Hashtag #die2onairLinks zu den Themen der Folge► Ich habe meine eigene KI und sie ist böse https://youtu.be/ygzokaPudFk► Kdenlive https://kdenlive.org► Tempest Rising https://store.steampowered.com/app/1486920/Tempest_Rising/► The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered https://store.steampowered.com/app/2623190/The_Elder_Scrolls_IV_Oblivion_Remastered/► Oblivion's Character Creation is an Atrocity https://youtu.be/masquhGgbcU► O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000) | Big Screen Laughs https://youtu.be/XoRIm2wF9Vc► Ren - Back on 74 / Message In A Bottle (Live retake) https://youtu.be/oqRaADSdJLEDie2 auf Twitter ⁠⁠⁠https://twitter.com/die2onair

I am joined by Darkfluid of the Silver Key podcast (https://darkfluid.substack.com/) who explains the game Rolemaster to me. The first part has been Basic Rules and Character Creation & Concepts. We have plans to revisit this topic and run some skills challenges & combats. Please also check out the recent podcast from Nerd's RPG Variety Cast where Jason discusses Rolemaster with GMShadow (https://creators.spotify.com/pod/profile/jason376/episodes/S2E24-Rolemaster-Ramble-with-GMsShadow-e30fld4)You can find Rolemaster products on DTRPG for later editions (1994, 1999). We refence mainly about the 1984 edition (RM2). Shout out to Nerd of the Rings (⁠www.youtube.com/@NerdoftheRings⁠). Great lore videos on all things LotR!Please check out our YouTube channel - The GMologist Presents (⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠www.youtube.com/@thegmologist)⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Today's art is the Cover Art from the RM2 boxed set & Character Law & Campaign Law book by Agnus McBride. You can send me a message (voice or text) via a DM on Discord, as an attachment to my email (gmologist@gmail.com) or to my Speakpipe account: https://www.speakpipe.com/Th-role-playing?keyword=eldrich%20tales)eGmologistPresents

Andreas and Amanda are joined by Emil from the actual play podcast ROAR (attentive listeners will remember him from our Gothcon liveshow "Stranger from the Mountains"). We get introduced to Nordic Skalds new upcoming game Yggdrasil Burns, a setting/game/hack published under the Mörk Borg 3-party license, and Amanda and Emil make their characters.We're an actual play podcast where professional actors in Sweden play the best of Swedish RPGs! Led by one of Swedens most experienced and appreciated podcast game masters we play Yggdrasil Burns, a game published by Nordic Skalds.Art: Johan NohrMusic: Andreas Lundström 

I am creating characters for dnd I make Duskwhirl, Caelum, and Lucius Linktree: https://linktr.ee/ShowferrTheme by Prodby SeaJ on soundcloud Logo by Broken Diamond Design

Step right up, folks! The Astral Sea's ablaze! Lae'zel is rebelling against the lich queen Vlaakith. Can the Astral Circus, a rogue band of circus performing secret agents, throw their lot in with the rebels without becoming cannon fodder? Find out! This is the Astral Circus, a Spelljammer Actual Play. System: Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition, Spelljammer CAST:  ➜GM: Jason (he/him) https://probablyokgames.carrd.co/ ➜ Jay Africa (he/him)  https://jayafrica.carrd.co/- Brutus Bartholomew Bux (he/him) Giff Monk, Way of the Shadow ➜ Dion Simmons (he/him)- Gralen Longstamp (he/him) Gnome Cleric, Grave Domain ➜ Sam (they/she) https://redpandroid.carrd.co/- Jaden Sapphire (he/him) Astral Elf Druid, Circle of the Stars ➜ Pooja (none) https://forgottensaves.carrd.co- Ezthe Perah (they/them) Chthonic Tiefling Sorcerer, Martial Sorcery ◇ Visit https://www.happyjacks.org/starscape for a full list of this campaign's videos and podcasts. ◇ Follow Happy Jacks RPG on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook or hang out with other tabletop roleplaying fans in our Discord community! ◇ Subscribe to our other podcast feeds! We have a weekly tabletop RPG talk show based on topics sent in from fans around the world, and a great collection of One-Shots if you prefer bite sized adventures. ◇ You can watch us on Youtube or Twitch! ◇ Keep us independent by becoming a Patreon! Our fantastic supporters let us play and say what we want instead of catering to companies for ad or sponsorship money. They are HEROES! https://patreon.com/happyjacksrpg Ⓒ2023 Happy Jacks RPG Network https://www.happyjacks.org

I wanted to do something to get us warmed up for the big Tunnels & Trolls mega-review coming up in March, so I'm rolling up a character in real time. We're going old-school with 5th Edition, so get ready for some classic T&T action. Watch as an old-school unlucky stat roll turns my planned Seraphina the Fairy into Clayfoot the Dwarf! I'll go through all the steps: rolling stats, picking a kindred, figuring out combat adds, and grabbing some gear. I'll also be chatting about some of the differences between T&T and D&D – you know, the stuff that makes it unique. Whether you're a T&T pro or have never even heard of it, come hang out and let's make a character together! It's all leading up to that mega-review, so you don't want to miss it. Share your thoughts via:

This is the episode! It's the episode of nerditry of the grandest scale! Today, Teebs and KidPhoenix are rolling Pathfinder characters on the podcast! They discuss character creation, including ancestry and class selection, while also exploring the differences between Pathfinder and D&D. Classes. Ancestries. Feats. Spells. Depending on their characters, they go through the entire gambit! The YouTube video features the hosts using Pathbuilder to build their characters without fail, so check that out as well. On our Facebook page, check out PDFs of the finished products and try as you might to pick apart what you like and don't like about their created characters. ⁠Follow and subscribe to our YouTube page as well as our other social media pages.⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

patreon.com/eidolonplaytest This week, the second half of Eidolon Playtest sits down to create their characters! Why is everyone so horny?? And boy, is The Conspiracy a remotely good idea? The answers to these questions may or may not be answered in the season to come! Buy our game at bit.ly/eidolon2e!

patreon.com/eidolonplaytest WELCOME TO EIDOLON PLAYTEST SEASON 4! The cast of Eidolon VGM—Molly, Lexi, Fabby, Mike, and Maxie—sit down with Luke to build their characters and establish some baseline worldbuilding about LUNA-1, the first city on the moon! Kinda seems like it sucks up there tbh! Buy our game at bit.ly/eidolon2e

SEASON 5 IS COMING MARCH 2025 In this episode we're creating characters for Sapphire Doom, using the second edition of Knave RPG. Our players will be Ka'tek, our version of fantasy dwarves, and they're going on a dangerous journey to fulfill their dream of... parenthood. We can't wait to share this adventure with you. It's going to be a grim, romantic tale about discovering the beauty that blooms in the darkest of shadows. To listen to the entire Episode 0, come join us on Patreon! Free members are welcome, and will receive monthly updates about our work. Paid members get access to exclusive behind the scenes content for every season of Out of Depth Plays. If you want to connect with us, the best place to do it is by going to: https://www.patreon.com/getoutofdepthFeaturing:Jae K. RenfrowGail RenfrowDavid JacksonTara Bouldrey ____________________________________Website: https://www.getoutofdepth.comInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/getoutofdepthTwitch: https://www.twitch.tv/out_of_depth_____________________________________Learn more about Knave 2e: https://questingblog.com/knave-2e/Disclaimer:Out of Depth Plays: Sapphire Doom is an independent production of Out of Depth and is not affiliated with Questing Beast LLC._____________________________________Music, Stems and SFX licensed by https://www.soundstripe.comSound design by Jae._____________________________________

On today's episode, Brian knows Kyle.Brian talks World Building, Character Creation and what it is like to be a Dungeon Master with his buddy Kyle.The boys eat some Crispy Chicken Sandwiches and Tater Tots. Can't forget the tots.Oh, and Kyle gets into some of his NPC voices with the help of a voice changer.All this and more on "Brian knows..."Follow "Brian knows..." on YouTube @brianknowsmeGet some "Brian knows..." merch @ ⁠http://www.tiny.one/MOTRTPodcast

At the end of our recovery month, we recorded another bonus which is a snippet of our character creation for our next issue! A lot of spaghetti is thrown at the wall here and not everything sticks. If you'd want to hear more character creation, let us know in the comments or on social media!Playset: Half a Million Dollars in a Grocery Bag by Jason MorningstarYou can find or contact us on most socials all @PulpPanicPod Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Meet my randomly generated Black Sword Hack character. He's not your average piece of Frazetta beefcake. Check out an example of BSH solo play at the Kill Ten Rats RPG YouTube channel.

Dive into the world of Vaesen RPG with the RPGBOT Podcast! This week, Randall, Tyler, and Ash explore the art of character creation, from crafting rich backstories to managing skills and resources. Discover how age, relationships, and headquarters shape your gameplay and storytelling experience. Whether you're a seasoned adventurer or rolling your first character, this episode is packed with tips, insights, and plenty of laughs to level up your RPG sessions! Summary: In this episode, the RPGBOT Podcast team delves into the intricate mechanics of Vaeson RPG, offering an in-depth exploration of its character creation system. The hosts discuss how attributes, skills, and age shape gameplay, highlighting the unique aspects of Vaesen that set it apart from other RPGs. They examine the process of rolling character backgrounds, motivations, and relationships, emphasizing how these elements contribute to rich storytelling and dynamic gameplay experiences. The conversation also touches on the role of headquarters in the game, showcasing how managing resources and addressing potential threats can influence both individual characters and their group. The hosts share their thoughts on the challenges characters face and the importance of developing meaningful relationships within the game. Their discussion blends personal anecdotes with practical insights, making this episode a valuable resource for both newcomers and seasoned RPG enthusiasts. Whether you're looking to refine your character-building strategies or simply learn more about Vaeson RPG, this episode offers engaging insights to inspire your next gaming adventure. Links Vaesen (affiliate link) Content from RPGBOT.net Vaesen & the Mythic Britain and Ireland Expansion - A Review RPGBOT.Podcast Episodes Zoe Franznick Reviews Free League's Vaesen Takeaways Set in 1800 Scandinavia during the Industrial Revolution, Vaesen RPG blends historical context with rich storytelling. Character creation is highly flexible, allowing players to choose between quick setups or deeply detailed builds. Age plays a crucial role, impacting character attributes and skills in significant ways. Backstories, motivations, and rolling for traits introduce depth and unpredictability to character creation. Dark secrets and relationships between characters enrich gameplay, influencing interactions and story dynamics. Resources reflect lifestyle and wealth, while headquarters provide a central hub for collaboration, upgrades, and potential threats. Investigation and mental skills are key mechanics, encouraging thoughtful problem-solving and narrative immersion. The game combines horror and mystery, offering players a chance to explore character development through secrets, rivalries, and team-building.

Dive into the world of Vaesen RPG with the RPGBOT Podcast! This week, Randall, Tyler, and Ash explore the art of character creation, from crafting rich backstories to managing skills and resources. Discover how age, relationships, and headquarters shape your gameplay and storytelling experience. Whether you're a seasoned adventurer or rolling your first character, this episode is packed with tips, insights, and plenty of laughs to level up your RPG sessions! Summary: In this episode, the RPGBOT Podcast team delves into the intricate mechanics of Vaeson RPG, offering an in-depth exploration of its character creation system. The hosts discuss how attributes, skills, and age shape gameplay, highlighting the unique aspects of Vaesen that set it apart from other RPGs. They examine the process of rolling character backgrounds, motivations, and relationships, emphasizing how these elements contribute to rich storytelling and dynamic gameplay experiences. The conversation also touches on the role of headquarters in the game, showcasing how managing resources and addressing potential threats can influence both individual characters and their group. The hosts share their thoughts on the challenges characters face and the importance of developing meaningful relationships within the game. Their discussion blends personal anecdotes with practical insights, making this episode a valuable resource for both newcomers and seasoned RPG enthusiasts. Whether you're looking to refine your character-building strategies or simply learn more about Vaeson RPG, this episode offers engaging insights to inspire your next gaming adventure. Links Vaesen (affiliate link) Content from RPGBOT.net Vaesen & the Mythic Britain and Ireland Expansion - A Review RPGBOT.Podcast Episodes Zoe Franznick Reviews Free League's Vaesen Takeaways Set in 1800 Scandinavia during the Industrial Revolution, Vaesen RPG blends historical context with rich storytelling. Character creation is highly flexible, allowing players to choose between quick setups or deeply detailed builds. Age plays a crucial role, impacting character attributes and skills in significant ways. Backstories, motivations, and rolling for traits introduce depth and unpredictability to character creation. Dark secrets and relationships between characters enrich gameplay, influencing interactions and story dynamics. Resources reflect lifestyle and wealth, while headquarters provide a central hub for collaboration, upgrades, and potential threats. Investigation and mental skills are key mechanics, encouraging thoughtful problem-solving and narrative immersion. The game combines horror and mystery, offering players a chance to explore character development through secrets, rivalries, and team-building.

Your favorite podcast crew at it again with another of the 101 series for you brand new players, and maybe even some of the long-time players who just like hearing a nice refresher. Whatever your reason is, you know it'll just be a good time as we dive into creating the character and the differences in ROLL and ROLEWant to Talk to us?Website:  Rage Across the InternetJoin the Forums to get the Code for our discord and come chat with us!Email: rageacrosspodcast@gmail.comTwitter: @rageacrossFacebook: Rage Across the InternetWe've got a YouTube too, check it Right HereSeason 4's theme is: No Culture by Silent Partner 

"Crunchy rules or simple vibes? Political intrigue or straight-up dungeon brawls? Survival in a dying world or low-power fantasy feels?" The latest RPGBOT.Podcast dives into everything you love (and fear) about tabletop RPGs that aren't D&D or Pathfinder. From decision trees to help you find your perfect game match, to the storytelling magic of Powered by the Apocalypse, and the chaotic survival of Mork Borg, there's something for everyone if you're willing to look past what you already know. Tune in if you've ever wondered, "Is my game too crunchy, or am I just lazy?" Summary In this episode, the hosts take a deep dive into the diverse landscape of tabletop RPGs, offering a wealth of insights into various systems, mechanics, and themes. They introduce the concept of decision trees, a practical tool to help players identify RPGs that align with their preferences. The discussion covers the spectrum of complexity, from the intricate 'crunch' of detailed systems to the simplicity of more streamlined games. Key highlights include: The Cypher System and Genesis: An exploration of these versatile systems, focusing on their mechanics and adaptability to different genres. Powered by the Apocalypse Framework: A look at its elegant simplicity and flexibility, making it an excellent choice for narrative-driven campaigns. Legend of the Five Rings vs. Adventures in Rokugan: A comparison of political intrigue-focused gameplay with combat-centric mechanics, illustrating the range of experiences within fantasy RPGs. Mörk Borg: An examination of its dark, nihilistic themes, where traditional heroism gives way to survival in a grim and decaying world. The conversation also ventures into niche areas, such as the unique storytelling potential of solo RPGs, and highlights specific systems like Numenera, with its futuristic exploration themes, and One Ring 2E, celebrated for its low-power fantasy and rich Tolkien-inspired lore. The hosts emphasize the importance of understanding a game's mechanics and setting realistic expectations to maximize the enjoyment of any RPG experience. Links Almost everything below is an affiliate link and Tyler doesn't want to copy+paste this a zillion times Achtung Cthulhu Adventures in Rokugan Alien RPG ALIEN RPG - A review ALIEN RPG: Cinematic Scenario Cycle Review ALIEN RPG - RPGBOT.News S2E34 All Flesh Must Be Eaten Apocalypse World Battletech Bladerunner Call of Cthulhu Candela Obscura Colostle CY_BORG Cyberpunk Red Cypher Core Rulebook Death in Space Death in Space – A review Delta Green Doctor Who RPG Doctors and Daleks FFG Star Wars Fallout RPG Forbidden Lands Genesys Core Rulebook Imperium Maledictum Warhammer 40000 Roleplay: Imperium Maledictum - A Review Legend of the Five Rings Lord of the Rings Roleplay 5e Marvel Multiverse RPG Masks Mork Borg Mörk Borg - A Review Mörk Borg Cult: Heretic - A Zine Review Mörk Borg Cult: Heretic - RPGBOT.News S2E32 Numenera Old Gods of Appalachia Pirate Borg Pulp Cthulhu Ruins of Symbaroum Ruins of Symbaroum - A Review Ruins of Symbaroum - RPGBOT.News S2E46 Shadowdark RPGBOT.Podcast - ShadowDark RPG Adventure Designer Kelsey Dionne Shadowrun Symbaroum The One Ring 2e The One Ring 2nd Edition - A Review The Walking Dead RPG Vaesen Vaesen & the Mythic Britain and Ireland Expansion - A Review RPGBOT.Podcast - Zoe Franznick Reviews Free League's Vaesen Vampire: The Masquerade How to Play Vampire: The Masquerade Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay Werewolf: The Apocalypse SPOOKTOBER - HOW TO PLAY WEREWOLF Takeaways Tyler's Interests Tyler loves wizards and wants to be one. Game Mechanics and Decision-Making The decision tree helps players find suitable RPGs. "Crunch" refers to the interaction with game mechanics. The Captain Crunch scale measures game complexity. Understanding game mechanics enhances the RPG experience. RPG Systems The Cypher System is easy to learn and play. Genesis is a generic system based on Fantasy Flight's Star Wars. Powered by the Apocalypse is a versatile framework. Powered by the Apocalypse games are easy to learn. Fate is complex and math-heavy. The Year Zero Engine is simple yet effective. Solo RPGs can be rewarding experiences. Character Creation and Progression Character creation in RPGs can vary significantly. Character progression in One Ring 2E requires patience and strategy. Adjusting difficulty can enhance the gameplay experience. Thematic and Genre Elements Monster Hearts is popular in the LGBT community. Legend of the Five Rings emphasizes political intrigue (combat is discouraged). Merc Borg presents a nihilistic view of RPGs. Adventures in Rokugan is more combat-focused than its predecessor. Colossal is a unique solo RPG experience. Mercord uniquely advocates for real-world arson in its gameplay. Numenera presents a science fantasy setting a billion years in the future. Players in One Ring 2E are grounded, facing impossible odds. Exploring the themes of low-power fantasy can lead to rich storytelling. Gameplay Depth The intrusion system adds depth to gameplay. The Eye of Sauron and Gandalf rune add depth to gameplay. Solo play in One Ring 2E is well-implemented and enjoyable. If you enjoy the show, please rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app. It's a quick, free way to support the podcast, and helps us reach new listeners. If you love the show, consider joining us on Patreon, where backers at the $5 and above tiers get ad free access to RPGBOT.net and the RPGBOT.Podcast, can chat directly to members of the RPGBOT team and community on the RPGBOT.Discord, and can join us for live-streamed recordings. Support us on Amazon.com when you purchase products recommended in the show at the following link: https://amzn.to/3NwElxQ How to Find Us: In-depth articles, guides, handbooks, reviews, news on Tabletop Role Playing at RPGBOT.net Tyler Kamstra Twitter: @RPGBOTDOTNET Facebook: rpgbotbotdotnet Bluesky:rpgbot.bsky.social Ash Ely Professional Game Master on StartPlaying.Games Twitter: @GravenAshes YouTube@ashravenmedia Randall James @JackAmateur Amateurjack.com Producer Dan @Lzr_illuminati

"Crunchy rules or simple vibes? Political intrigue or straight-up dungeon brawls? Survival in a dying world or low-power fantasy feels?" The latest RPGBOT.Podcast dives into everything you love (and fear) about tabletop RPGs that aren't D&D or Pathfinder. From decision trees to help you find your perfect game match, to the storytelling magic of Powered by the Apocalypse, and the chaotic survival of Mork Borg, there's something for everyone if you're willing to look past what you already know. Tune in if you've ever wondered, "Is my game too crunchy, or am I just lazy?" Summary In this episode, the hosts take a deep dive into the diverse landscape of tabletop RPGs, offering a wealth of insights into various systems, mechanics, and themes. They introduce the concept of decision trees, a practical tool to help players identify RPGs that align with their preferences. The discussion covers the spectrum of complexity, from the intricate 'crunch' of detailed systems to the simplicity of more streamlined games. Key highlights include: The Cypher System and Genesis: An exploration of these versatile systems, focusing on their mechanics and adaptability to different genres. Powered by the Apocalypse Framework: A look at its elegant simplicity and flexibility, making it an excellent choice for narrative-driven campaigns. Legend of the Five Rings vs. Adventures in Rokugan: A comparison of political intrigue-focused gameplay with combat-centric mechanics, illustrating the range of experiences within fantasy RPGs. Mörk Borg: An examination of its dark, nihilistic themes, where traditional heroism gives way to survival in a grim and decaying world. The conversation also ventures into niche areas, such as the unique storytelling potential of solo RPGs, and highlights specific systems like Numenera, with its futuristic exploration themes, and One Ring 2E, celebrated for its low-power fantasy and rich Tolkien-inspired lore. The hosts emphasize the importance of understanding a game's mechanics and setting realistic expectations to maximize the enjoyment of any RPG experience. Links Almost everything below is an affiliate link and Tyler doesn't want to copy+paste this a zillion times Achtung Cthulhu Adventures in Rokugan Alien RPG ALIEN RPG - A review ALIEN RPG: Cinematic Scenario Cycle Review ALIEN RPG - RPGBOT.News S2E34 All Flesh Must Be Eaten Apocalypse World Battletech Bladerunner Call of Cthulhu Candela Obscura Colostle CY_BORG Cyberpunk Red Cypher Core Rulebook Death in Space Death in Space – A review Delta Green Doctor Who RPG Doctors and Daleks FFG Star Wars Fallout RPG Forbidden Lands Genesys Core Rulebook Imperium Maledictum Warhammer 40000 Roleplay: Imperium Maledictum - A Review Legend of the Five Rings Lord of the Rings Roleplay 5e Marvel Multiverse RPG Masks Mork Borg Mörk Borg - A Review Mörk Borg Cult: Heretic - A Zine Review Mörk Borg Cult: Heretic - RPGBOT.News S2E32 Numenera Old Gods of Appalachia Pirate Borg Pulp Cthulhu Ruins of Symbaroum Ruins of Symbaroum - A Review Ruins of Symbaroum - RPGBOT.News S2E46 Shadowdark RPGBOT.Podcast - ShadowDark RPG Adventure Designer Kelsey Dionne Shadowrun Symbaroum The One Ring 2e The One Ring 2nd Edition - A Review The Walking Dead RPG Vaesen Vaesen & the Mythic Britain and Ireland Expansion - A Review RPGBOT.Podcast - Zoe Franznick Reviews Free League's Vaesen Vampire: The Masquerade How to Play Vampire: The Masquerade Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay Werewolf: The Apocalypse SPOOKTOBER - HOW TO PLAY WEREWOLF Takeaways Tyler's Interests Tyler loves wizards and wants to be one. Game Mechanics and Decision-Making The decision tree helps players find suitable RPGs. "Crunch" refers to the interaction with game mechanics. The Captain Crunch scale measures game complexity. Understanding game mechanics enhances the RPG experience. RPG Systems The Cypher System is easy to learn and play. Genesis is a generic system based on Fantasy Flight's Star Wars. Powered by the Apocalypse is a versatile framework. Powered by the Apocalypse games are easy to learn. Fate is complex and math-heavy. The Year Zero Engine is simple yet effective. Solo RPGs can be rewarding experiences. Character Creation and Progression Character creation in RPGs can vary significantly. Character progression in One Ring 2E requires patience and strategy. Adjusting difficulty can enhance the gameplay experience. Thematic and Genre Elements Monster Hearts is popular in the LGBT community. Legend of the Five Rings emphasizes political intrigue (combat is discouraged). Merc Borg presents a nihilistic view of RPGs. Adventures in Rokugan is more combat-focused than its predecessor. Colossal is a unique solo RPG experience. Mercord uniquely advocates for real-world arson in its gameplay. Numenera presents a science fantasy setting a billion years in the future. Players in One Ring 2E are grounded, facing impossible odds. Exploring the themes of low-power fantasy can lead to rich storytelling. Gameplay Depth The intrusion system adds depth to gameplay. The Eye of Sauron and Gandalf rune add depth to gameplay. Solo play in One Ring 2E is well-implemented and enjoyable. If you enjoy the show, please rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app. It's a quick, free way to support the podcast, and helps us reach new listeners. If you love the show, consider joining us on Patreon, where backers at the $5 and above tiers get ad free access to RPGBOT.net and the RPGBOT.Podcast, can chat directly to members of the RPGBOT team and community on the RPGBOT.Discord, and can join us for live-streamed recordings. Support us on Amazon.com when you purchase products recommended in the show at the following link: https://amzn.to/3NwElxQ How to Find Us: In-depth articles, guides, handbooks, reviews, news on Tabletop Role Playing at RPGBOT.net Tyler Kamstra Twitter: @RPGBOTDOTNET Facebook: rpgbotbotdotnet Bluesky:rpgbot.bsky.social Ash Ely Professional Game Master on StartPlaying.Games Twitter: @GravenAshes YouTube@ashravenmedia Randall James @JackAmateur Amateurjack.com Producer Dan @Lzr_illuminati

While Ryan is recovering from a real life trip, Sam and Tyler take a break from travel to talk about how they approach character building! Join them as they discuss where they start, whether they focus more on story or mechanics, and what to do when everyone wants to build a bard! Website: TabletopTravelGuide.com  Email: TabletopTravelGuidePodcast@gmail.com   Instagram: @TabletopTravelGuide Patreon: Tabletop Travel Guide Podcast Theme Music By: Raymond Gramke

Hello Wastelanders, In light of my new mainline episode not being quite finished, and the fact that I will be playing fallout 2d20 online with friend of the show 'Board Games with Thomas'. I decided to record me creating a new character and show you all a bit about how it works. The easter egg here is that this character I created will become a key figure in the Wasteland Story...story in the future. If you are only interested in the gripping story and don't much care how a character is made in fallout, then you can safely skip this one. For everyone else, I hope you enjoy and don't worry, the next ep is on the way... and its a big one! Cheers, PJ

The characters are made and the stage is set for the upcoming Urban Shadows campaign. Escape the Dungeon is a podcast by Mike Cripps, Zac Brass, Dom Brass, Nate Brass, and Tyler Knittle. If you like the show, please leave a 5 star review on your favorite podcast app. Escape the Dungeon is available on YouTube at youtube.com/@EscapeTheDungeonPod More information and links to social media is available at escapethedungeonpod.com  

Francis created the world of Raelis in high school for a gaming campaign with his best friends. Now, years later, things have changed. Bonds have been broken, relationships reforged, and the cold hand of fate has driven them all into different directions. They decide to return to Raelis for one last hurrah, but get trapped in a fantasy world stitched together from their obsessions, dreams, and nightmares. What will some of them do to get home? What will some of them do to stay forever? You can't split the party. System: DIE the Roleplaying Game by Rowan, Rook & Decard CAST:  ➜GM: Lloyd Gyan (he/him) https://druggeddwarf.carrd.co/ ➜ Jason (he/him) probablyokgames.carrd.co/- Tanner Harrington-Coates (he/him), Human, 30-something man, cheap suits, strip mall lawyer ➜ Noir (He/They) beacons.ai/thenoirenigma- Nathan Freeman (he/him), Human, 30-something man, expensive suits, Hedge Fund manager for a top three investment firm ➜ Sam de Leve (they/them) delevely.com/where-am-i/- Tristan (they/them), The Fool ➜ Vixie Belle She/Her linktr.ee/pocketdragonpub- Miranda Lopez (she/they), Ex-Airforce turned Illustrator, TTRPG enthusiast, divorced from Tanner ◇ Visit https://www.happyjacks.org/starscape for a full list of this campaign's videos and podcasts. ◇ Follow Happy Jacks RPG on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook or hang out with other tabletop roleplaying fans in our Discord community! ◇ Subscribe to our other podcast feeds! We have a weekly tabletop RPG talk show based on topics sent in from fans around the world, and a great collection of One-Shots if you prefer bite sized adventures. ◇ You can watch us on Youtube or Twitch! ◇ Keep us independent by becoming a Patreon! Our fantastic supporters let us play and say what we want instead of catering to companies for ad or sponsorship money. They are HEROES! https://patreon.com/happyjacksrpg Ⓒ2023 Happy Jacks RPG Network https://www.happyjacks.org

In this episode, we discuss Baldur's Gate 3 by Larian Studios. We break down the character, combat and story of the epic fantasy RPG.  22:15 - Character Creation and Playable Characters 57:15 - Combat and Encounters 1:55:20 - Tom Awesome's Top 5 - Similarities and Differences from D&D 2:20:15 - Story Outside is Overrated is presented by Premier Health. Thank you for listening! Please support OiO on Patreon. Contributions start at $2 a month. Download and subscribe to OiO wherever you get your podcasts. Connect with us on Facebook or email the show. Music courtesy of: http://www.bensound.com/royalty-free-music. 

Maddy, Jason and Kirk sit down with guest game master Matthew Mercer to roll their characters and plan out the coming adventure.Listen to Act Two right now by becoming a member at maximumfun.org/join.SCHEDULE:Triple Quest will be told in three acts, along with a "session zero" planning session. All episodes will be published to the members-only feed first, and will hit the main feed a month later. Part One and the planning session will debut at the end of September. Parts Two and Three will debut at the ends of October and November, respectively. LINKS:Join the Triple Click Discord: http://discord.gg/tripleclickpodTriple Click Ethics Policy: https://maximumfun.org/triple-click-ethics-policy/ 

We may be on hiatus but no need to miss us! Enjoy this episode of What Am I Rolling? - An RPG One Shot Podcast by Fiona Howatt. Fiona takes Am, Chloe, Ellie and Katie through a creepy game of SHIVER, and a more than slightly haunted farmstead. Check out the WAIR linktree to find out where you can hear the rest of this adventure and more awesome one shots!Content Warnings/Trigger Warnings: Violence towards animals, Offscreen death, Slasher and supernatural killers. Show Notes: This week, Fiona is joined by Chloe, Katie, Ellie and Am from the Deck of Many Aces podcast for SHIVER, the award winning tabletop roleplaying game bringing tales of the mysterious, the peculiar and the strange to life. Published by Parable Games, SHIVER has easy to learn rules which make it fast to play and keep players immersed in chaotic and dark magic filled stories. SHIVER uses symbolic dice to keep players engaged in the story as well as providing a visual role playing aid that does away with pesky arithmetic. Character creation is quick and easy with a simple skill point and ability system that links to the game's dice. You can find out more information about SHIVER and grab your own copy of the Parable Games website. Timestamps: Content Warnings: 00:00:00 Intro: 00:00:38 Gameplay overview: 00:02:51 Character Creation: 00:08:52 Introduction of players/characters: 00:33:32 The oneshot starts: 00:42:04 Outro and credits: 01:21:02 Credits: The 'What Am I Rolling?' podcast was created, recorded, and edited by Fiona Howat. The WAIR logo was created by Fiona Howat. This episode's players were Chloe, Katie, Ellie and Am - the cast of the Deck of Many Aces. This episode's RPG was SHIVER, the award winning tabletop roleplaying game bringing tales of the mysterious, the peculiar and the strange to life. Grab your own copy of the Parable Games website. The theme music was '8-bit march' by Twin Musicom (twinmusicom.org), licensed under a Creative Commons 4.0 License. Additional music in this episode: 'House on the Hill' by Evert Almond If you want to find out more about the podcast, check out the 'What Am I Rolling?' podcast website: www.WAIRpodcast.com. Fancy getting in touch? Email the podcast at WhatAmIRollingPodcast@gmail.com. Follow the podcast on Twitter and Instagram (@WAIR_Podcast) for the latest news on episodes. Linktr.ee: WAIR Podcast #AdventurersNeedNotApply Get bonus content on PatreonSupport this show http://supporter.acast.com/deck-of-many-aces. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We're using another system to accomplish a scheme in the Vampire game.  This is the elevator pitch and character creation session.  It's short and sweet, but not mandatory!

As we approach the end of the main story, Rhett's looking ahead to what comes next. One of the things we expect to happen in the next chapter is switching to the new set of Dungeons and Dragons rules: the 2024 revision. In a series of informal discussions, we'll go over some of the changes as we get comfy with the new rules. In this episode, Rhett finishes out the creation of our level 1 warlock, complete with some spells and eldritch invocations. Listen along for a comparison of spells between the 2014 and 2024 editions, and see what's changed. Let's get going!

The RPGBOT crew is going full moon this week with a deep dive into

As we approach the end of the main story, Rhett's looking ahead to what comes next. One of the things we expect to happen in the next chapter is switching to the new set of Dungeons and Dragons rules: the 2024 revision. In a series of informal discussions, we'll go over some of the changes as we get comfy with the new rules. In this episode, Rhett and Meredith tackle the new process of character creation. While there's a lot of familiar ground, there are a few notable changes that might be of interest to listeners. Join us as we kick off the process of creating our "slightly sketch" warlock. Let's get going!

For our first game of our 13 RPGs of Halloween were trying out the newest edition of Urben Shadows by Magpie games Urban Shadows is a political urban fantasy tabletop roleplaying game in which mortals and supernaturals alike vie for power in a modern-day city. Vampires, faeries, hunters, wizards, and more clash in the shadows...or make backroom deals for their piece of the streets and skyscrapers. No one is ever safe, and everything is always at stake. In Urban Shadows, you play unique and powerful archetypes, protagonists who are attuned to the supernatural world. While the mortal world remains ignorant of the struggles of the city's supernatural denizens, you are caught in the middle of the physical conflicts and political drama of the city's past, present, and future. In this 3 part series we share our one shot game, our group who are the Wizard (David), the Wolf (Golda) and the Vamp (Guenter) get summoned by the elders of the city to address an issue they are suited to deal with... Check out the Urban Shadows (2nd Ed.) QuickStart at DriveThruRPG at https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/333500/urban-shadows-2nd-ed-quickstart?affiliate_id=49631 Check out Magpie games at: https://magpiegames.com/ The Kickstarter for the second edition is here: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/magpiegames/urban-shadows-second-edition If you want to join in the fun and get in on a few games, please comment on the ongoing schedule over at our Patreon page on what you'd like to play we have games happening online and in person all month long: https://www.patreon.com/posts/13-rpgs-of-polls-113126454?utm_medium=clipboard_copy&utm_source=copyLink&utm_campaign=postshare_creator&utm_content=join_link Please support our shows at www.patreon.com/cppn and even join us in some games! Also keep an eye at the new things on our now affiliated Twitch channel: https://www.twitch.tv/creativeplayandpodcast Also follow us on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/CreativePlayandPodcastNetwork Enjoy our older streamed games and other episodes on our Youtube channel at: https://www.youtube.com/@creativeplayandpodcastnetwork Would you be interested if we hosted D&D and Edge of Empire games on Roll20 for you to join? Email us at Creativeplaypodcastnet@Gmail.com    

Ryan and Randal join Alex and James to roll up their first Starfinder Second Edition playtest characters for Alex’s upcoming one-shots. Listen Now! (mp3)

I walk you through Character Creation in this tutorial for the TTRPG Cy_Borg by Stockholm Kartell and Free League Publishing. This video is part of a Cy_Borg Crash Course Tutorial series that will cover all aspects of the game. We also have complete Actual Play series of this TTRPG lead by GM Rob Mulligan. Please explore our playlists and channel! Join us! Calling all game masters, players, edgerunners, choombas, wastelanders, vault dwellers, spice traders & space folders! We have a very active community for Cyberpunk, Fallout, Dune & more! If you're looking to join a game, run a game, network, learn something new, contribute an idea, chat or just hang out, we have the home for you! Check out the ttrpg related options below and be sure to say hello! https://discord.gg/VJv4FPC https://www.twitch.tv/cybernationuncensored https://twitter.com/CNUncensored https://www.patreon.com/CybernationUncensored https://www.youtube.com/cybernationuncensored/join https://www.instagram.com/cybernationuncensored/ https://www.facebook.com/CyberNationUncensored https://www.facebook.com/groups/2951164338265802 Explore our website! https://www.CybernationUncensored.com/ We're a brand dedicated to everything and anything Cyberpunk, dystopian and scifi! We stream live Cyberpunk RED, 2020, Fallout 2D20 & Dune 2D20 gameplay, a Game Master Tips series, Deep Dive series, Night City Live series and a GM Round Table series on the Cybernation Uncensored youtube and twitch channels! We discuss everything and anything Cyberpunk, including but not limited to 2020, RED, 2077, fallout & dune on our Cybernation Uncensored podcast! We also have a Cybernation Uncensored community blog, discord and group! Join us and let's network and have fun! We have a passion for creating Cyberpunk genre content and would really appreciate your support! #cyberpunk #cyborg #ttrpg --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/cybernationuncensored/support

Calling all scoundrels! A new crew is about to hit the streets of Duskvol in this Blades in the Dark one-shot. --- News, artwork, and more at ⁠⁠PowerWordCrit.com⁠⁠ Rate us on ⁠⁠Spotify⁠⁠ and ⁠⁠Apple Podcasts⁠⁠ Contact us on ⁠⁠Facebook⁠⁠, X/Twitter, or at PowerWordCrit@gmail.com --- Theme music “Dangerous Dark Disaster” from Epic Action by Joel Steudler. Background music used under the standard-license from filmmusic.io. Dreams Become Real by Kevin MacLeod Immersed by Kevin MacLeod Satiate - Only Strings by Kevin MacLeod Thunder Dreams by Kevin MacLeod --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/powerwordcrit/support

This week we sit down and create characters for The Good Life. If you're looking for more Delta Green action, check out: Pretending to be People! Stories & Lies Sorry, Honey I have to Take This Tabletop Talk Wilderspace Gaming Doomed to Repeat The Great Old Ones Gaming Negative Modifier Chaos Springs Eternal We have a Patreon! What to support us? Click HERE! You can find us on Instagram (chaosenginepod) and Hive (chaosenginepod) You can also email us at chaosenginepod@gmail.com We have a discord now! Feel free to stop by if that interests you! Published by arrangement with the Delta Green Partnership. The intellectual property known as Delta Green is a trademark and copyright owned by the Delta Green Partnership, who has licensed its use here. The contents of this document are ©

Welcome back, tarnished listeners - this time, we delve into the massive DLC released for 2022's critically acclaimed Elden Ring. Join us as we discuss olde English pronunciations, frustrating final boss fights, and way too much about fingers.Note: The music track at the start of the episode is “Character Creation”, composed by Shoi Miyazawa for the Elden Ring Original Soundtrack. We in no way have or claim ownership of this music.Support the show

Welcome back to our virtual couch here in the podverse. This week, come hang with us as we highlight some of the hottest new titles coming soon, deep dive into all things Character Creation, and discuss what videogames we think should be in the next Olympic games.00:00:00 - Welcome to the Coop00:03:20 - What We've Been Playing/Watching00:41:11 - Nintendo Indie World/Partner Direct Highlights00:54:21 - Deadlock01:04:44 - Deathsprint 6601:08:55 - InZOI01:10:17 - Character Creation Deep Dive01:37:08 - What Videogames Should Be in the Next Olympic Games?Thank you for listening. Help us keep CO-OP Plus One going by sharing the podcast and leaving reviews on your podcast platform of choice!Email us your questions related to gaming or ideas for Split Screen decisions and Underrated Overrated questions atcoopplusone@gmail.com

Sign up for your copy of the Armorsmith's Handbook at bit.ly/armorsmith today! Included in this this 175+ page sourcebook, we've created 20 drop-in merchants for your game of 5th Edition. Accompanying each armorsmith is A fully-illustrated portrait art piece A detailed background and roleplaying guideline A top-down map of their shop and a full table of unique wares tailored to their shop specifically. On these tables you will find food, wonderous magic items, spell scrolls, potions, and of course, magical armor. In fact, Aaron Gentry and Ray created 10 new pieces of magical armor for each armorsmith and Sandy Lawson created art for every single piece. That's 200 brand new fully arted pieces of magical armor for your game of 5th edition.

Max tells Roger about playing the Phantom in The Phantom of the Opera, and the boys discuss Halloween costume ideas and the Hawk Tuah girl on Monday, August 19th 2024. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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The One where we squabble about Caped Crusader and Neil has an interesting rental arrangement! Please support Signal of Doom & Legion Outpost on Patreon! Every single dollar helps the show! https://www.patreon.com/SignalofDoom Follow us on Instagram! Please like the Facebook Page! Follow us on X: @signalofdoom Dredd or Dead: @OrDredd Legion Outpost: @legionoutpost

Stephanie has a newfound interest in urban foraging for serviceberries in Chicago. Joël discusses how he uses AI tools like ChatGPT to generate creative Dungeons & Dragons character concepts and backstories, which sparks a broader conversation with Stephanie about AI's role in enhancing the creative process. Together, the hosts delve into professional growth and experience, specifically how to leverage everyday work to foster growth as a software developer. They discuss the importance of self-reflection, note-taking, and synthesizing information to enhance learning and professional development. Stephanie shares her strategies for capturing weekly learnings, while Joël talks about his experiences using tools like Obsidian's mind maps to process and synthesize new information. This leads to a broader conversation on the value of active learning and how structured reflection can turn routine work experiences into meaningful professional growth. Obsidian (https://obsidian.md/) Zettelkasten (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zettelkasten) Mindmaps in Mermaid.js (https://mermaid.js.org/syntax/mindmap.html) Module Docs episode (https://bikeshed.thoughtbot.com/417) Writing Quality Method docs blog post (https://thoughtbot.com/blog/writing-quality-method-docs) Notetaking for Developers episode (https://bikeshed.thoughtbot.com/357) Learning by Helping blog post (https://thoughtbot.com/blog/learning-by-helping) Transcript:  JOËL: Hello and welcome to another episode of The Bike Shed, a weekly podcast from your friends at thoughtbot about developing great software. I'm Joël Quenneville. STEPHANIE: And I'm Stephanie Minn. And together, we're here to share a bit of what we've learned along the way. JOËL: So, Stephanie, what's new in your world? STEPHANIE: So, as of today, while we record this, it's early June, and I have started foraging a little bit for what's called serviceberries, which is a type of tree/shrub that is native to North America. And I feel like it's just one of those, like, things that more people should know about because it makes these little, tiny, you know, delicious fruit that you can just pick off of the tree and have a little snack. And what's really cool about this tree is that, like I said, it's native, at least to where I'm from, and it's a pretty common, like, landscaping tree. So, it has, like, really pretty white flowers in the spring and really beautiful, like, orange kind of foliage in the fall. So, they're everywhere, like, you can, at least where I'm at in Chicago, I see them a lot just out on the sidewalks. And whenever I'm taking a walk, I can just, yeah, like, grab a little fruit and have a little snack on them. It's such a delight. They are a really cool tree. They're great for birds. Birds love to eat the berries, too. And yeah, a lot of people ask my partner, who's an arborist, like, if they're kind of thinking about doing something new with the landscaping at their house, they're like, "Oh, like, what are some things that I should plant?" And serviceberry is his recommendation. And now I'm sharing it with all of our Bike Shed listeners. If you've ever wondered about [laughs] a cool and environmentally beneficial tree [laughs] to add to your front yard, highly recommend, yeah, looking out for them, looking up what they look like, and maybe you also can enjoy some June foraging. JOËL: That's interesting because it sounds like you're foraging in an urban environment, which is typically not what I associate with the idea of foraging. STEPHANIE: Yeah, that's a great point because I live in a city. I don't know, I take what I can get [laughs]. And I forget that you can actually forage for real out in, you know, nature and where there's not raccoons and garbage [laughs]. But yeah, I think I should have prefaced by kind of sharing that this is a way if you do live in a city, to practice some urban foraging, but I'm sure that these trees are also out in the world, but yeah, have proved useful in an urban environment as well. JOËL: It's really fun that you don't have to, like, go out into the countryside to do this activity. It's a thing you can do in the environment that you live in. STEPHANIE: Yeah, that was one of the really cool things that I got into the past couple of years is seeing, even though I live in a city, there's little pieces of nature around me that I can engage with and picking fruit off of people's [inaudible 03:18] [laughs], like, not people's, but, like, parkway trees. Yeah, the serviceberry is also a pretty popular one here that's planted in the Chicago parks. So, yeah, it's just been like, I don't know, a little added delight to my days [laughs], especially, you know, just when you're least expecting it and you stumble upon it. It's very fun. JOËL: That is really fun. It's great to have a, I guess, a snack available wherever you go. STEPHANIE: Anyway, Joël, what is new in your world? JOËL: I've been intersecting two, I guess, hobbies of mine: D&D and AI. I've been playing a lot of one-shot games with friends, and that means that I need to constantly come up with new characters. And I've been exploring what AI can do to help me develop more interesting or compelling character concepts and backstories. And I've been pretty satisfied with the result. STEPHANIE: Cool. Yeah. I mean, if you're playing a lot and having to generate a lot of new ideas, it can be hard if you're, you know, just feeling a little empty [laughs] in terms of, you know, coming up with a whole character. And that reminds me of a conversation that you and I had in person, like, last month as we were talking about just how you've been, you know, experimenting with AI because you had used it to generate images for your RailsConf talk. And I think I connected it to the idea of, like, randomness [laughs] and how just injecting some of that can help spark some more, I think, creativity, or just help you think of things in a new way, especially if you're just, like, having a hard time coming up with stuff on your own. And even if you don't, like, take exactly what's kind of provided to you in a generative AI, it at least, I don't know, kind of presents you with something that you didn't see before, or yeah, it's just something to react to. JOËL: Yeah, it's a great tool for getting unstuck from that kind of writer's block or that, like, blank page feeling. And oftentimes, it'll give you a thing, and you're like, that's not really exactly what I wanted. But it sparks another idea, which is what I actually want. Or sometimes you can be like, "Hey, here's an idea I have. I'm not sure what direction to take it in. Give me a few options." And then, you see that, and you're like, "Oh, that's actually pretty interesting." One thing that I think is interesting is once I've come up with a little bit of the character concept, or maybe even, like, a backstory element...so, I'm using ChatGPT, and it has that concept of memory. And so, throughout the conversation, it keeps bringing it back. So, if I tell it, "Look, this is an element that's going to be core to the character," and then later on, I'm like, "Okay, help me brainstorm some potential character flaws for this character," it'll actually find things that connect back to my, like, core concept, or maybe an element of the backstory. And it'll give me like, you know, 5 or 10 different ideas, and some of them can be actually really good. So, I've really enjoyed doing that. It's not so much to just generate me a character so much as it is like a conversation back and forth of like, "Okay, help me come up with a vibe for it. Okay, now that I have a vibe or a backstory element or, like, a concept, help me workshop this thing. And what about that?" And if I want to say, "It's going to be this character class, what are maybe some ways I could develop it that are unusual?" and just sort of step by step kind of choose your own adventure. And it kind of walking me through the process has been really fun. STEPHANIE: Nice. Yeah, the way you're talking about it makes a lot of sense to me how asking it to help you, not necessarily do all of it, like, you know, kind of just spit out something that you're like, okay, like, that's what I'm going to use, approaching it as a tool, and yeah, that's really fun. Have you had good experiences then playing with those characters [chuckles]? JOËL: I have. I think it's also really great for sort of padding out some of the content. So, I had a character I played who was a washed-up politician. And at one point, I knew that I was going to have to make a campaign speech. And I asked ChatGPT, "Can you help me, like...here are the themes I want to hit. Give me a, like, classic, very politician-sounding speech that sounds inspiring but also says nothing at the same time." And it did a really good job of that. And you can tell it, "Oh, that's too long. That's too short. I want three sentences. I want five sentences." And that was great. So, I saved that, brought it to the table, and read out my campaign speech, and it was a hit. STEPHANIE: Amazing. That's really fun. I like that because, yeah, I don't think...I am so poor at just improvising things like that, even though, like, I want to really embody the character. So, that's cool that you found a way to help you be able to do that because that just feels like kind of what playing D&D can be about. JOËL: I've never DM'd, but I could imagine a situation where, because the DMs have to improv so much, and you know what the players do, I could imagine having a tool like that available behind the DM screen being really helpful. So, all of a sudden, someone's just like, "Oh, I went to a place," and, like, all of a sudden, you have to, like, sort of generate a village and, like, ten characters on the spot for people that you didn't expect, or an organization or something like that. I could imagine having a tool like that, especially if it's already primed with elements from your world that you've created, being something really helpful. That being said, I've never DM'd myself, so I have no idea what it actually is like to be on the other side of that screen. STEPHANIE: Cool. I mean, if you ever do try that or have a DM experience and you're like, hmm, I wonder kind of how I might be able to help me here, I bet that would be a very cool experience to share on the show. JOËL: I definitely have to report back here. Something that I've been thinking about a lot recently is the difference between sort of professional growth and experience, so the time that you put into doing work. Particularly maybe because, you know, we spend part of our week doing client work, and then we have part of the week that's dedicated to maybe more directly professional growth: our investment day. How do we grow from that, like, four days a week where we're doing client work? Because not all experience is created equal. Just because I put in the hours doesn't mean that I'm going to grow. And maybe I'm going to feel like I'm in a rut. So, how do I take those four days a week that I'm doing code and transform that into some sort of growth or expansion of my knowledge as a developer? Do you have any sort of tactics that you like to use or ways you try to be a little bit more mindful of that? STEPHANIE: Yeah, this is a fun question for me, and kind of reminds me of something we've talked a little bit about before. I can't remember if it was, like, on air or just separately, but, you know, we talk a lot about, like, different learning strategies on the show, I think, because that's just something you and I are very into. And we often, like, lean on, you know, our investment day, so our Fridays that we get to not do client work and kind of dedicate to professional development. But you and I also try to remember that, like, most people don't have that. And most people kind of are needing to maybe find ways to just grow from the day-to-day work that they do, and that is totally possible, I think. And some of the strategies that I have are, I guess, like, it is really...it can be really challenging to, like, you know, be like, okay, I spent 40 hours doing this, and like, what did I learn [chuckles]? Feeling like you have to have something to show for it or something to point to. And one thing that I've been really liking is these automated check-ins we have at the end of the week. And, you know, I suspect that this is not that uncommon for just, like, a workplace to be like, "Hey, like, how did your week go? Like, what are some ways that it was successful? Like, what are your challenges? Like, where do you need support or help?" And I think I've now started using that as both, like, space for giving an update on just, like, business-y things. Like, "Here's the status of this project," or, like, "Here's, you know, a roadblock that we faced that took some extra time," or whatever. Then also being like, oh, this is a great time to make this space for myself, especially because...I don't know about you, but whenever I have, like, performance review time and I have to write, like, a self-review, I'm just like, did I do anything in the last six months [laughs], or how have I grown in the last six months? It feels like such a big question, kind of like you were talking about that blank page syndrome a little bit. But if I have kind of just put in the 10 minutes during my Friday to be like, is there something that was kind of just for me that I can say in my check-in? I can go back and, yeah, just kind of start to see just, like, you know, pick out or just pay attention to how, like, my 40 hours is kind of serving me in growing in the ways that I want to and not just to deliver code [laughs]. JOËL: What you're describing there, that sort of weekly check-in and taking notes, reminds me of the practice of journaling. Is that something that you've ever tried to do in your, like, regular life? STEPHANIE: Oh yeah, very much so. But I'm not nearly as, like, routine about it in my personal life. But I suspect that the routine is helpful in more of a, like, workplace setting, at least for me, because I do have, like, more clear pathways of growth that I'm interested in or just, like, something that, I don't know, not that it's, like, expected of everyone, but if that is part of your goals or, like, part of your company's culture, I feel like I benefit from that structure. And yeah, I mean, I guess maybe that's kind of my way of integrating something that I already do in my personal life to an environment where, like I said, maybe there is, like, that is just part of the work and part of your career progression. JOËL: I'm curious about the frequency. You mentioned that you sort of do this once a week, sort of a check-in at the end of the week. Do you find that once a week is about the right frequency versus maybe something like daily? I know a lot of these sort of more modern note-taking systems, Roam Research, or Obsidian, or whatever, have this concept of, like, a daily note that's supposed to encourage something that's kind of like journaling. Have you ever tried something more on a daily basis, or do you feel like a week is about...or once a week is about the right cadence for you? STEPHANIE: Listen, I have, like, complicated feelings about this because I think the daily note is so aspirational for me [laughs] and just not how I work. And I have finally begrudgingly come to accept this no matter how much, like, I don't know, like, bullet journal inspirational content I consume on the internet [laughs]. I have tried and failed many a time to have more frequency in that way. But, I don't know, I think it almost just, like, sets me up for failure [laughs] because I have these expectations. And that's, like, the other thing. It's like, you can't force learning necessarily. I don't know if this is, like, a strategy, but I think there is some amount of, like, making sure that I'm in the right headspace for it and, you know, like, my environment, too, kind of is conducive to it. Like, I have, like, the time, right? If I'm trying to squeeze in, I don't know, maybe, like, in between meetings, 20 minutes to be like, what did I learn from this experience? Nothing's coming out [laughs]. That was another thing that I was kind of mulling over when he had this topic proposed is this idea of, like, mindset and environment being really important because you know when you are saying, like, not all time is created equal, and I suspect that if, you know, either you or, like, the people around you and the environment you're in is not also facilitating growth, and, like, how much can you really expect for it to be happening? JOËL: I mean, that's really interesting, right? The impact of sort of a broader company culture. And I think that definitely can act as a catalyst for growth, either to kind of propel you forward or to pull you back. I want to dig into a little bit something you were saying about being in the right headspace to capture ideas. And I think that there's sort of almost, like, two distinct phases. There's the, like, capturing data, and information, and experiences, and then, there's synthesizing it, turning information into learning. STEPHANIE: Yes. JOËL: And it sounds like you're making a distinction between those two things, specifically that synthesis step is something that has to happen separately. STEPHANIE: Ooh, I don't even...I don't know if I would necessarily say that I'm only talking about synthesis, but I do like that you kind of separated those categories because I do think that they are really important. And they kind of remind me a lot about the scientific method a little bit where, you know, you have the gathering data and, like, observations, and you have, you know, maybe some...whatever is precipitating learning that you're doing maybe differently or new. And that also takes time, I think, or intention at least, to be like, oh, do I have what I need to, like, get information about how this is going? And then, yeah, that synthesis step that I think I was talking about a little bit more. But I don't think either is just automatic. There is, I think, quite a bit of intention involved. JOËL: I think maybe the way I think about this is colored by reading some material on the Zettelkasten method of note-taking, which splits up the idea of fleeting notes and literature notes, which are sort of just, like, jotting down ideas, or things you've seen, things that you've learned, maybe a thought you had when you read a particular paragraph in a blog post, something like that. And then, the permanent notes, which are more, like, fully formed thoughts that arise out of the more fleeting ones. And so, the idea is that the fleeting ones maybe you're taking those in a notebook if you're doing it pen and paper. You could be doing it in some sort of, like, daily note, or something like that. And then, those are temporary. They were there to just capture information. Later on, you process that, and then you can throw them out if you need to. STEPHANIE: Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. This has actually been a shift for me, where I used to rely a lot more on memory and perhaps, like, didn't have a great system for taking things like fleeting notes and, like, documenting kind of [inaudible 18:28] what I was saying earlier about how do I make sure that the information is recorded, you know, for me to synthesize later? And I have found a lot more success lately in that fleeting note style of operating. And thanks to Obsidian honestly, now it's so easy to be like, oh, I'm just going to open a quick new file. And I need as little friction as possible to, like, put stuff somewhere [laughs]. And, actually, I'm excited to talk a little bit more about this with you because I think you're a little bit different where you somehow find the time [laughs] and care to create your diagrams. I'm like, if I can, for some reason, even get an Obsidian file open, I'll tab to Slack. And I send myself a lot of notes in my just own personal DM space. In fact, it's actually kind of embarrassing because I use the Command+K shortcut to navigate to my own personal DMs, which you can get to by typing me, like, M-E. And sometimes I've accidentally just entered that into a channel chat [laughs], and then I have to delete it really quick later when I realize what I've done. So, yeah, like, I meant to navigate to my personal notes, and I just put in our team chat, "Me [laughs]." And, I don't know, I have no idea how that comes up [laughs], what people think is going on. But if anyone's listening to this podcast from thoughtbot and has seen that of me, that's what happened. JOËL: You may not be the only one who's done that. STEPHANIE: Thank you. Yeah [laughs], that's good to know. JOËL: I want to step back a little bit because we've been talking about, like, introspection, and synthesis, and finding moments to capture information. And I think we've sort of...there's an unspoken assumption here that a way to kind of turbocharge learning from day-to-day experience is some form of synthesis or self-reflection. Would you agree with that statement? STEPHANIE: Okay. This is another thing that I am perhaps, like, still trying to figure out, and we can figure it out together, which is separating, like, self-driven learning and, like, circumstance-driven learning. Because it's so much easier to want to reflect on something and find time to be, like, oh, like, how does this kind of help my goals or, like, what I want to be doing with my work? Versus when you are just asked to do something, and it could still be learning, right? It could still be new, and you need to go do some research or, you know, play around with a new tool. But there's less of that internal motivation or, like, kind of drive to integrate it. Like, do you have this distinction? JOËL: I've definitely noticed that when there is motivation, I get more out of every hour of work that I put in in terms of learning new things. The more interest, the more motivation, the more value I get per unit of effort I put in. STEPHANIE: Yeah. I think, for me, the other difference is, like, generative learning versus just kind of absorbing information that's already out there that someone else's...that is kind of, yeah, just absorbing rather than, like, creating something new from, like, those connections. JOËL: Ooh. STEPHANIE: Does that [chuckles] spark something for you? JOËL: The gears are turning in my head because I'm almost hearing that as, like, a passive versus active learning thing. But just sort of like, I'm going to let things happen to me, and I will come out of that with some experience, and something is going to happen. Versus an active, I am going to, like, try to move in a direction and learn from that and things like that. And I think this maybe connects back to the original question. Maybe this sort of, like, checking in at the end of the week, taking notes is a way to convert something that's a bit more of a passive experience, spending four days a week doing a project for a client, into something that's a little bit of a more active learning, where you say, "Okay, I did four weeks of this particular type of Rails work. What do I get out of it? What have I learned? What is something new that I've seen? What are some opinions I have formed, patterns I like or dislike?" STEPHANIE: Yeah, I like that distinction because, you know, a few weeks ago, we were at RailsConf. We had kind of recapped it in a previous episode. And I think we had talked about like, oh, do we, like, to sit in talks or participate in workshops? And I think that's also another example of, like, passive versus active, right? Because I 100%, like, don't have the same type of learning by just, you know, listening to a talk that I do with maybe then going to look up, like, other things this person has put out in the world, finding them to talk to them about it, like, doing something with the content, right? Otherwise, it's just like, oh yeah, I heard this talk. Maybe one day I'll remember it when the need arises [laughs]. I, like, have a pointer to it in my brain. But until then, it probably just kind of, like, sits there, and nothing's really happened with it. JOËL: I think maybe another thing that's interesting in that passive versus active distinction is that synthesis is inherently an act of creation. You are now creating new ideas of your own rather than just capturing information that is being thrown at you, either by sitting in a talk or by shipping tickets. The act of synthesizing and particularly, I think, making connections between ideas, either because something that, let's say you're in a talk, a speaker said that sparks an idea for yourself, or because you can connect something that speaker said with another idea that you already have or an idea that you've seen elsewhere. So, you're like, oh, the thing this person is saying connects to this thing I read in a book or something another speaker said in an earlier session, or something like that. All of a sudden, now you're creating these new bits of knowledge, new perspectives, maybe even new mental models. We talked about mental models last week. And so, knowledge is not just the facts that you absorb or memorize. A lot of it is building the connections between those facts. And those are things that are not always given to you. You have to create them yourself. STEPHANIE: Yeah, I am nodding my head a lot because that's resonating with, like, an experience that I'm having kind of coaching and mentoring a client developer on my team who is earlier in her career. And one thing that I've been really, like, working on with her is asking like, "Oh, like, what do you think of this?" Or like, "Have you seen this before? What are your reactions to this code, or, like this comment?" or whatever. And I get the sense that, like, not a lot of people have prompted her to, like, come up with answers for those kinds of questions. And I'm really, really hopeful that, like, that kind of will help her achieve some of the goals that she's, like, hoping for in terms of her technical growth, especially where she's felt like she's stagnated a little bit. And I think that calls back really well to what you said at the beginning of, like, you can spend years, right? Just kind of plugging away. But that's not the same as that really active growth. And, again, like, that's fine if that's where you're at or want to be at for a little while. But I suspect if anyone is kind of, like, wondering, like, where did that time go [laughs]...even for me, too, like, once someone started asking me those questions, I was like, oh, there's still so much to figure out or explore. And I think you're actually really good at doing that, asking questions of yourself. And then, another thing that I've picked up from you is you ask questions about, like, what are questions other people would have? And that's a skill that I feel like I still have yet to figure out. I'm [chuckles] curious what you think about that. JOËL: That's interesting because that kind of goes to another level. I often think of the questions other people would have from a more, like, pedagogical sense. So, I write a lot of blog posts. I write a lot of talks that I give. So, oftentimes when I'm creating that kind of material, there's a bit of an inner critic who's trying to, you know, sitting in the audience listening to myself speak, and who's going to maybe roll their eyes at certain points, or just get lost, or maybe raise their hand with a question. And that's who I try to address those things so that then when I go through it the next time, that inner critic is actually feeling engaged and paying attention. STEPHANIE: Do you find that you're able to do that because you've seen that happen enough times where you're like, oh, I can kind of predict maybe what someone might feel confused about? I'm curious, like, how you got from being, like, well, I know what I would be confused about to what would someone else be unsure or, like, want more information about. JOËL: Part of the answer there is that I'm a very harsh critic myself. STEPHANIE: [laughs] Yes. JOËL: So, I'm sitting in somebody else's talk, and there are probably parts where I'm rolling my eyes or being like, wait a minute, how did you get from this idea to this other thing? That doesn't follow. And so, I try to turn that back towards myself and use that as fuel to make my own work better. STEPHANIE: Yeah, that's cool. I like that. Even if it's just framed as, like, a missed opportunity for people to have better or more comprehensive understanding. I know that's something that you're, like, very motivated to help kind of spread more of [laughs]. Understanding and learning is just important to you and to me. So, I think that's really cool that you're able to find ways to do that. JOËL: Well, you definitely want to, I think, to keep a sort of beginner's mindset for a lot of these things, and one of the best ways to do that is to work with beginners. So, I spent a lot of time, back in the day, for example, in the Elm language chat room, just helping people answer basic questions, looking up documentation, explaining sort of basic concepts. And that, I think, helped me get a sense of like, where were newcomers to the language getting stuck? And what were the explanations of those concepts that really connected? Which I could then translate into my work. And I think that that made me a better developer and helped me build this, like, really deep understanding of the underlying concepts in a way that I wouldn't have had just writing code on my own. STEPHANIE: Wow, forum question answering hero. I have never thought to do that or felt compelled to do that. But I remember my friend was telling me, she was like, "Yeah, sometimes I just want to feel good about myself. And I remember that I know things that other people, like, are wanting to find out," and she just will answer some easy questions on Stack Overflow, you know, about, like, basic Rails stuff or something. And she is like, "Yeah, and that's doing my good deed [laughs]." And yeah, I think that it also, you know, has the same benefits that you were just saying earlier about...because you want to be helpful, you figure out how to actually be helpful, right? JOËL: There's maybe a sense as well that helping others, once more, forces you into more of an active mindset for growth in the same way that interrogating yourself does, except now it's a beginner who's interrogating you. And so, it forces you to think a little bit more about those whys or those places where people get stuck. And you've just sort of assumed it's a certain way, but now you have to, like, explain it and really get into some of the concepts. STEPHANIE: So, on the show, we've talked a lot about the fun things you share in the dev channel in our Slack workspace. But I recently discovered that someone (Was it you?) created an Obsidian MD channel for our favorite note-taking software. And in it, you shared a really cool tool that is available in Obsidian called mind maps. JOËL: Yeah, so mind maps are a type of diagram. They're effectively a tree structure, but they don't really look like that when you draw them out. You start with a sort of topic in the center, and then you just keep drawing branches off of that, going every direction. And then, maybe branches off branches and keep going as you add more content. Turns out that Mermaid.js supports mind maps as a graph type, and Obsidian embeds Mermaid diagrams. So, you can use Mermaid's little language to express a mind map. And now, all of a sudden, you have mind mapping as a tool available for you within Obsidian. STEPHANIE: And how have you been using that to kind of process and experience or maybe, like, end up with some artifacts from, like, something that you're just doing in regular day-to-day work? JOËL: So, kind of like you, I think I have the aspiration of doing some kind of, like, daily note journaling thing and turning that into bigger ideas. In practice, I do not do that. Maybe that's the thing that I will eventually incorporate into my practice, but that's not something that I'm currently doing. Instead, a thing that I've done is a little bit more like you, but it's a little bit more thematically chunked. So, for example, recently, I did several weeks of work that involved doing a lot of documentation for module-level documentation. You know, I'd invested a lot of time learning about YARD, which is Ruby's documentation system, and trying to figure out, like, what exactly are docs that are going to be helpful for people? And I wanted that to not just be a thing I did once and then I kind of, like, move on and forget it. I wanted to figure out how can I sort of grow from that experience maximally? And so, the approach I took is to say, let's take some time after I've completed that experience and actually sort of almost interrogate it, ask myself a bunch of questions about that experience, which will then turn into more broad ideas. And so, what I ended up doing is taking a mind-mapping approach. So, I start that center circle is just a circle that says, "My experience writing docs," and then I kind of ring it with a series of questions. So, what are questions that might be interesting to ask someone who just recently had experience writing documentation? And so, I come up with 4,5,6 questions that could be interesting to ask of someone who had experience. And here I'm trying to step away from myself a little bit. And then, maybe I can start answering those questions, or maybe there are sub-questions that branch off of that. And maybe there are answers, or maybe there are answers that are interesting but that then trigger follow-up questions. And so I'm almost having a conversation with myself and using the mind map as a tool to facilitate that. But the first step is putting that experience in the center and then ringing it with questions, and then kind of seeing where those lead. STEPHANIE: Cool. Yeah, I am, like, surprised that you're still following that thread because the module docs experience was quite a little bit a while ago now. We even, you know, had an episode on it that I'll link in the show notes. How do you manage, like, learning new things all the time and knowing what to, like, invest energy and attention into and what to kind of maybe, like, consider just like, oh, like, I don't know, that was just an experience that I had, and I might not get around to doing anything with it? JOËL: I don't know that I have a great system. I think sometimes when I do, especially a more prolonged chunk of time doing a thing, I find it really worthwhile to say, hey, I don't want that to sort of just be a thing that was in my memory, and then it moves out. I'd like to pull out some more maybe practical or long-term ideas from it. Part of that is capture, but some of that is also synthesis. I just spent two weeks or I just spent a month using a particular technology or doing a new kind of task. What do I have to show for it? Are there any, like, bigger ideas that I have here? Does this connect with any other technologies I've done or any other ideas or theories? Did I come up with any opinions? Did I like this technology? Did I not? Are there elements that were inspirational? And then capturing some of that eventually with the idea of...so I do a sort of Zettelkasten-style permanent note collection, the idea to create at least a few of those based off of the experience that I can then connect to other things. And maybe it eventually turns into other content. Maybe it's something I hold onto for a while. In the case of the module docs, it turned into a Bike Shed episode. It also turned into a blog post that was published this past week. And so, it does have a way of coming back. STEPHANIE: Yeah. Yeah. One thing that sparked for me was that, you know, you and I spend a lot of time thinking about, like, the practice of writing software, you know, in the work we do as consultants, too. But I find that, like, you can also apply this to the actual just your work that you are getting paid for [laughs]. This was, I think, a nascent thought in the talk that I had given. But there's something to the idea of, like, you know, if you are working in some code, especially legacy code, for a long time, and you learn so much about it, and then what do you have to show for it [chuckles], you know? I have really struggled with feeling like all of that work and learning was useful if it just, like, remains in my memory and not necessarily shared with the team or, I don't know, just, like, knowing that if I leave, especially since I am a contractor, like, just recognizing that there's value in being like, oh, I spent an hour or, like, half a day sifting through this complex legacy code just to make, like, a small change. But that small change is not the full value of all of the work that I did. And I suspect that, like, just the mind mapping stuff would be really interesting to apply to more. It's not, like, just practical work, but, like, more mundane, I don't know, like, labor [laughs], if you will. JOËL: I can think of, like, sort of two types of knowledge that you can take out of something like that. Some of it is just understanding how this legacy system works, saying, oh, well, they have this user model that's connected to this old persona table, which is kind of unused, but we sometimes rely for in this legacy case. And you've got to have this permission flag turned on and, like, all those things that you had to just discover by reading the code and exploring. And that's going to be useful to you as long as you work in that legacy codebase, as long as you work through that path. But when you move on to another project, that knowledge probably doesn't serve you a whole lot. There are things that you did throughout that journey, though, that you can probably pull out that are going to be useful to you on other projects. And that might be maybe you came up with a new way of navigating the code or a new way of, like, finding how different pieces were connected. Maybe it was a diagramming tool; maybe it was some sort of gem. Maybe it was just a, oh, a heuristic, like, when I see a model, I like to follow the associations first. And I always go for the hasmanys over the belongstos because those generally lead me in the right direction. Like, that's really interesting insight, and that's something that might serve you on a following project. You can also pull out bigger things like, are there refactoring techniques that you experimented with or that you learned on this project that you would use again elsewhere? Are there ways of maybe quarantining scary code on a legacy project that are a thing that you would want to make more consistent part of your practice? Those are all great things to pull out of, just a like, oh yeah, I did some work on a, like, old legacy part of an app. And what do I have to show for it? I think you can actually have a lot to show for it. STEPHANIE: Yeah, that's really cool. That sounds like a sure way of multiplying the learning. And I think I didn't really consider that when I was first talking about it, too. But yeah, there are, like, both of those things kind of available to you to, like, learn from. Yeah, it's like, that time is never just kind of, like, purely wasted. Oh, I don't know, sometimes it really feels like that [laughs] when you are debugging something really silly. But yeah, like, I would be interested in kind of thinking about it from both of those lenses because I think there's value in what you learn about that particular system in that moment of time, even if it might not translate to just future works or future projects. And, like, that's something that I think we would do better at kind of capturing, and also, there's so much stuff, too, kind of to that higher level growth that you were speaking to. JOËL: I think some of the distinctions we're talking about here is something that was explored in an older episode on note-taking with Amanda Beiner, where we sort of explored the difference between exploratory notes, debugging notes, idea notes, and how note-taking is not a single thing. It can serve many purposes, and they can have different lifespans. And those are all just ways to aid your thinking. But being maybe aware of the kind of thinking that you're trying to do, the kind of notes you're trying to take can help you make better use of that time. STEPHANIE: I have one last question for you before we wrap up, which is, do you find, like, the stuff we're talking about to be particularly true about software development, or it just happens to be the thing that you and I both do, and we also love to learn, and so, therefore, we are able to talk about this for, like, 50 minutes [laughs]? Are you able to make any kind of distinction there, or is it just kind of part of pedagogy in general? JOËL: I would say that that sort of active versus passive thing is a thing that's probably true, just about anything that you do. For example, I do a lot of bouldering. Just going spending a lot of time on the wall, climbing a lot; that's going to help me get better. But a classic way that people try to improve is filming themselves or having a friend film themselves, and then you can look at it, and then you evaluate, oh, that's what I did. This is where I was struggling to get the next hold. What if I try to do something different? So, building in an amount of, like, self-reflection into the loop all of a sudden catalyzes that learning and helps you grow at a rate that's much more than if you're just kind of mindlessly putting time into it. So, I would go so far as to say that self-reflection, synthesis—those are all things that are probably going to catalyze growth in most areas of your life if you're being a little bit more self-aware. But I've found that it's been particularly useful for me when it comes to trying to get better at the job that I do every week. STEPHANIE: Yeah, I think, for me, it's like, yeah, getting better at being a developer rather than being, you know, a software developer at X company. Like, not necessarily just getting better at working at that company but getting better at the skill itself. JOËL: And those two things have a way of sort of, like, folding back into themselves, right? If you're a better software developer in general, you will probably be a better developer at that company. Yes, you want domain knowledge and, like, a deep understanding of how the system works is going to make you a better developer at that company. But also, if you're able to find more generic approaches to onboard onto new things, or to debug more effectively, or to better read or understand unknown code of high complexity, those are all going to make you much better at being a developer at that company as well. And they're transferable skills, so they're all really good things to have. STEPHANIE: On that note. Shall we wrap up? JOËL: Let's wrap up. STEPHANIE: Show notes for this episode can be found at bikeshed.fm. JOËL: This show has been produced and edited by Mandy Moore. STEPHANIE: If you enjoyed listening, one really easy way to support the show is to leave us a quick rating or even a review in iTunes. It really helps other folks find the show. JOËL: If you have any feedback for this or any of our other episodes, you can reach us @_bikeshed, or you can reach me @joelquen on Twitter. STEPHANIE: Or reach both of us at hosts@bikeshed.fm via email. JOËL: Thanks so much for listening to The Bike Shed, and we'll see you next week. ALL: Byeeeeeee!!!!!! AD: Did you know thoughtbot has a referral program? If you introduce us to someone looking for a design or development partner, we will compensate you if they decide to work with us. More info on our website at: tbot.io/referral. Or you can email us at: referrals@thoughtbot.com with any questions.