A podcast about board games, role playing games and gaming conventions! We bring on game designers, creators, players and game masters to talk about their passion.
Episodes
Monday Apr 01, 2019
Monday Apr 01, 2019
Twitter makes for interesting connections. We met Ari there and he had desires to be on a podcast. In talking with him some we realized he had insight into a world Rich and I only saw from a distance. Live Action Role Play (LARP) and specifically a national organization of fantasy LARP called the New England Roleplay Organization (NERO) We learn some surprising facts and briefly expose my own history of Vampire Larping back in the 90s with mixed results.
This game is bigger and more interesting than I ever knew. Shame on me for not being open to it sooner.
You can find Ari on twitter @ari_covert
Listen now on:
iTunes | GooglePlay | Spotify | Stitcher
Other places you can connect with the HSG Squad:
Facebook @High Shelf Gaming Podcast
Twitter @highshelfgaming
Friday Night Twitch /highshelfgaming
Discord Chat https://discord.gg/tMPCXgN
Sunday Mar 24, 2019
Sunday Mar 24, 2019
In this episode, we are joined by Patrick Kanouse, a sci-fi and mystery novel author, who happens to be a huge fan of Traveller RPG. As one of the first and certainly the most popular space opera RPGs Traveller is one of the classic mainstays of the role-playing industry. Patrick helps us unpack some of the primary themes of Traveller and break down the various editions of the game.
We chat about the big draws for the system. Like the iconic character creation process that's a risk vs reward system that can lead to PC death before the game even begins. We also chat about how insanely flexible the system is from a technology perspective which leads to some cool discussions around some of the most popular Sci-Fi shows out there today and their possible origins (spoiler: we're pretty sure those creators played Traveller).
We also take a swing at talking about Traveller's impact on the industry. Certain rules of traveller have made it into so many other games like our big favorites: Cyberpunk and Dungeons and Dragons 5th Edition.
Some helpful links:
Listen now on:
iTunes | GooglePlay | Spotify | Stitcher
Other places you can connect with the HSG Squad:
Facebook @High Shelf Gaming Podcast
Twitter @highshelfgaming
Friday Night Twitch /highshelfgaming
Discord Chat https://discord.gg/tMPCXgN
Thursday Mar 14, 2019
Thursday Mar 14, 2019
Steve from our past episodes about LEGO Mind Storms joins us to talk about a series of LEGO events throughout the United States, Brickworld. This unique LEGO convention is a place for experienced builders to connect and trade tips and display their creations to the public. We get into a LOT of Steve's creation, talking about Super Robo Rally and some of what we can expect at Gen Con this year but more so talking about the Great Ball Contraption!
This should serve as a lightweight guide to the convention and give a good overview of what kinds of things you'd find at any Brickworld event and even other LEGO Fan events!
Listen now on:
iTunes GooglePlay Spotify Stitcher
Other places you can connect with the HSG Squad:
Facebook @High Shelf Gaming Podcast
Twitter @highshelfgaming
Friday Night Twitch /highshelfgaming
Discord Chat https://discord.gg/tMPCXgN
Monday Mar 04, 2019
Monday Mar 04, 2019
A great friend of mine, Mitch, has somehow convinced his company to let him use the office at night to run a 10-person Dungeons & Dragons game! Such a cool story and we wanted to share his nuggets of wisdom with our audience. It started out as a simple board game night to team build in a way that was totally free to his employer. Mitch slowly ratcheted up the complexity of the games he provided, and the duration of game night grew organically. Soon enough, it was a tiny step further to make it a D&D game for those interested.
Mitch can be found on Twitter and Tumblr as @Coolkidmitch!
Listen now on:
iTunes GooglePlay Spotify Stitcher
Other places you can connect with the HSG Squad:
Facebook @High Shelf Gaming Podcast
Twitter @highshelfgaming
Friday Night Twitch /highshelfgaming
Discord Chat https://discord.gg/tMPCXgN
Monday Feb 18, 2019
Monday Feb 18, 2019
Rich and David finally get to talk about a game they fell in love with years ago at Gen Con 50. Yes, it's XCOM The Board Game by Fantasy Flight. Yes, it has an application you need to play it, but we were hooked back then and wanted to give it a couple years to see if our enthusiasm stuck. It did. Here are our thoughts on it.
Note: There's a mature joke in here. Not sure I've been super consistent when we joke about penises but in this episode we do. Also a political joke, which we never do. Not sure what was up this session, we felt pretty loose and in high spirits. Don't burn us down, or do, whatever. We're not in charge of anything important. Hope it's fun for you too.
Listen now on:
iTunes GooglePlay Spotify Stitcher
Other places you can connect with the HSG Squad:
Facebook @High Shelf Gaming Podcast
Twitter @highshelfgaming
Friday Night Twitch /highshelfgaming
Discord Chat https://discord.gg/tMPCXgN
Wednesday Feb 13, 2019
Wednesday Feb 13, 2019
Rob Croy, from The Table is Yours podcast, returns to talk Horror RPGs and Call of Cthulhu by Chaosium. This episode dives into the system but spends most of its time talking about how to start and maintain a horror game. We spend a lot of time discussing 'horror maps' and other methods to keep the suspense up without letting the terror escape the game. Horror games can be tricky, but a ton of fun when they come together.
We also discuss several great modules by Chaosium that could be adapted to fit your group and even other systems quite easily.
Resources:
CoC quickstart rules - scroll to find the Free PDF
Scenario - Masks of Nyarlathotep
The Trajectory of Fear - a guide to how to map horror throughout a game
Listen now on:
iTunes GooglePlay Spotify Stitcher
Other places you can connect with the HSG Squad:
Facebook @High Shelf Gaming Podcast
Twitter @highshelfgaming
Friday Night Twitch /highshelfgaming
Discord Chat https://discord.gg/tMPCXgN
Thursday Feb 07, 2019
Thursday Feb 07, 2019
Rich and David are back to talk all about the history of their favorite gaming convention, Gen Con. How it got started, and what steps led to its enormous success. Everything from the humble beginnings as a place to play "Fight in the Skies!" and other war games to the ideal incubator for D&D and TSR. early on Gen Con becomes the place to launch games like Magic the Gathering, whos founding company goes on to purchase TSR and Gen Con... Really an interesting story.
::Correction! We claim Gen Con is the largest convention in the world... There is another. and it's an impressive 3x larger with 190,000 attendees! over in Germany: https://www.spiel-messe.com/en/
^ Turns out this convention does turn style accounting instead of estimating headcount. It's a fair bit smaller than GenCon. Unless it doesn't, then it is larger. We're getting conflicting reports and I can't read German.
Some additional resources:
Interactive site with maps, timelines, and every Gen Con program cover
40 Years of Gen Con, a hardcover book detailing waaaay more than we ever could
Listen now on:
iTunes GooglePlay Spotify Stitcher
Other places you can connect with the HSG Squad:
Facebook @High Shelf Gaming Podcast
Twitter @highshelfgaming
Friday Night Twitch /highshelfgaming
Discord Chat https://discord.gg/tMPCXgN
Monday Jan 28, 2019
Monday Jan 28, 2019
Mike returns! Rich and Dave talk with Mike about the apps, tools, resources, and websites we use when making worlds, adventures, and games for tabletop roleplaying games (TTRPGs) like D&D, Shadowrun, Cyberpunk, and others. In this episode, we make a theme song, talk about my celebrity look alike, try and help the audience, talk about old school web tools like Web Rings, and oh yeah MAKE A THEME SONG. It's a terrible song, but I love it, so it stays in.
Tools we cover:
Archivist Elements - Android App full of DM tools
DiceCloud D&D 5e Character Tracker
Reddit's World Building subreddit (join their Discord, it's awesome!)
Legend Keeper - A great way to keep all the lore of your world organized and tagged to maps
Dragon's foot - early DnD resource!
Listen now on:
iTunes GooglePlay Spotify Stitcher
Other places you can connect with the HSG Squad:
Facebook @High Shelf Gaming Podcast
Twitter @highshelfgaming
Friday Night Twitch /highshelfgaming
Discord Chat https://discord.gg/tMPCXgN
Wednesday Jan 23, 2019
Wednesday Jan 23, 2019
A competitive introverts dream game - Shara returns to chat with us about a game we've all been playing a ton of in our Friday night twitch streams - Roll for the Galaxy. This is a dice chucking, dice pool building sci-fi game that's tons of fun for the type of gamer who doesn't need a lot of interaction or 'screw your neighbor' type play. Born from Race for the Galaxy, Roll for the Galaxy is its far more successful offspring.
We talk basics, clarify some confusing rules, and strategies for the base game and touch on the expansion just a bit.
Listen now on:
iTunes GooglePlay Spotify Stitcher
Other places you can connect with the HSG Squad:
Facebook @High Shelf Gaming Podcast
Twitter @highshelfgaming
Friday Night Twitch /highshelfgaming
Discord Chat https://discord.gg/tMPCXgN
Tuesday Jan 15, 2019
Tuesday Jan 15, 2019
We bring Heather back to chat about a broad swath of fantasy RPGs. If your group has been playing tons of D&D 5e, and wonder what else is out there we cover lots of systems. We cover diceless systems like Amber and Dread, low-dice systems focused on story and roleplay, and more tactical and crunchy systems that are popular and available. We even sneak in a Fantasy / Sci-fi hybrid of ShadowRun.
Also, In the end, Rich exposes his fursona as a bear.
We've already covered so many games that we discuss in greater detail. Here are some links to our past episodes covering these great games:
The Witcher Part 1, Part 2
Pathfinder 1st Edition, 2nd Edition (pre-beta)
Legend of the Five Rings and other Samurai Fantasy RPGs
Listen now on:
iTunes GooglePlay Spotify Stitcher
Other places you can connect with the HSG Squad:
Facebook @High Shelf Gaming Podcast
Twitter @highshelfgaming
Friday Night Twitch /highshelfgaming
Discord Chat https://discord.gg/tMPCXgN