This game is going to be another or a new version of Battlestar Galactica. Now, I am curious to see how well the theme works in this game. I will likely get Unfathomable because it’s about 50% of the price of a used copy of Battlestar Galactica. However, Fantasy Flight doesn’t have access to the IP anymore, so they are going the Arkham route with it. I think that that the theme will work well enough, but it might not be as immersive.

Personally, I think this game could have worked well with a Marvel IP on it. The Secret Invasion storyline, in the comics and coming to Disney+ as a show as well, has you wondering who is a Skrull. In fact there are characters who are Skrulls who might not remember they are actually Skrull the whole time. Obviously I’m partial to the Marvel IP, but that was always my thought.

The OP Brings Onward To The Table

Disney/Pixar’s Onward is one of their movies that might get less love than some, but one that I really like. It hits on that nerdy adventure stuff that I dig as a role playing fan, in particular, Dungeons and Dragons. The OP is taking that IP to the tabletop with Quests of Yore: Barley’s Edition.

This is going to be purely a role playing game versus more of a board game. What I like about this is that it has a theme that is nerdy but less nerdy. Pixar has such a name for itself that people will be interested just based off of that. Dungeons and Dragons has already bridged the masses some with things like Critical Role and then Stranger Things. This is another thing that can go onto the shelves at Target and get people to buy it.

Portal Games Puts out Information On Dune: House of Secrets

Announced at the digital PortalCon this spring, Dune: House of Cards now has a pre-order and release date. July 12th for pre-orders and October 15th for a release date. This game, from the sounds of it, leverages some of what they have already done with Detective: A Modern Crime Board Game. In at least that it is going to be a story and different chapters that you play through.

I could do a “Let There Be Hype” on this one. I am really excited for it. It seems to be based off of Detective: A Modern Crime Board Game system, which I love, and I am interested in the Dune games. The original Dune is a massive all day event. And the Dune Imperium looks interesting but also looks dull aesthetically. So I want to try it but not so sure about owning it. Dune: House of Secrets, I am very interested in playing it and owning it. This seems like a game that will immerse me in the world of Dune and that just is cool.

Three big pieces of news and all that I’m pretty interested in. I will likely be picking up two of them, Dune: House of Secrets and Unfathomable. Which of these looks the most interesting to you?

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Ultraman, the Netflix show, is based off of the same character as the 1966-1967 show from Japan. The original show revolves around aliens attacking earth and until Ultraman shows up, the Science Patrol (yes, it’s called the Science Patrol), are unable to drive back the aliens. Now, it’s the next generation of Ultraman. The Science patrol is still around, but the alien threat is now from aliens who are living on earth. When an alien shows up that was last seen 12 years ago when a plane crashed killing everyone on board, the Science Patrol kicks it up a notch.

The show isn’t all that complex a show plot wise, it’s aliens do something, and the human who is Ultraman shows up and has a moral quandary about he’s doing. And it kind of repeats that trope throughout the show, but it does have some through lines in the show. Especially at the end of the season you get a through line in a few episodes. This isn’t a show that has a ton of major through lines though. You tend to just get two or three episodes that are somewhat tied together. But I think some of that simplicity is what makes the show work. They don’t try and confuse it too much with misdirection upon misdirection.

I think it also works because the style of animation on the show is an interesting 3D anime style animation. It wasn’t something that I thought I’d like, but they do a solid job with it. I do think that there are a few spots where it is rough around the edges, but in some ways, that’s some of the charm of the animation style. You get that billow of smoke that looks solid, but not as good as you thought it was going to be. And since it is based off of something in the 1960’s, not sure how faithfully, having that little bit of feel where it’s trying to do something on the cutting edge is fun. It kind of works with the premise of Ultraman, and you also end up with some 3D animations that are just amazing.

Anime shows often come down to how the voice acting is done, especially in watching a dub. Netflix didn’t really hold back on getting talent for this, which was great. You have Josh Hutcherson voicing the main character and Critical Role cast members Matt Mercer and Liam O’Brien voicing character as well. So you have solid voice acting, and there’s something fun about recognizing voices in an anime, especially when it isn’t just the main few voice actors that you get on many a Funimation dubbed show.

Overall, this is a very fun show. It doesn’t try to be too much and do too much. As Kristen said about it, there’s just something fun about it, and I think that is the best away to describe it. It’s definitely a show for teenagers and adults, but it doesn’t mean that it’s too heavy. And it doesn’t have sex in it really, there’s just alien blood and once in a while human blood and various gore that you see. Even that isn’t too bad compared to what it could have been. And it’s just nice to have that action show where the character is growing that doesn’t end up relying on violence of fan service. So don’t go into it expecting anything that profound or deep, but do expect a good time.

Have you watched Ultraman on Netflix? Did you like the show?

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In 201, I want to take it more into actually playing your character, bringing your character to life at your table, so it has a different voice than just your voice.

I think it’s something that is pretty easy to do, have a character that sounds like you, acts like you, and thinks like you. And I don’t think that is a bad way to role play, sometimes, but there is much more that you can do beyond that to really play your character in Dungeons and Dragons and not just play yourself.

So, why do I think you shouldn’t just play yourself or your idealized version of yourself?

For me, I see role playing as an opportunity to put yourself in someone else’s shoes and see the world from a different perspective. Now, I don’t mean that you should play a racist jerk because that’s different from who you are, you’re probably going to be annoying everyone at the table, but playing a character who has issues with another race and using that are an opportunity for your character to grow, can work well if done delicately. But even beyond that, you can play someone who has a different view of religion than you do, a different view of politics, of money, or murder hoboness than you do. Or in a different vein but equally as challenging, it can be an opportunity to play an extrovert when you yourself are in introvert, or vice-a-versa.

That’s the theory on why you might play someone different than you and I encourage it, but how do you go about doing that and doing it in a way where it isn’t a stereotype?

I think a good starting point is to create a character who has a tick of some sort. It could be that they are extremely scholarly, or maybe they have a catch phrase (keep it short and use it sparingly), or some default fighting style (every character should have one), but more than that, something that you can always do as your character in a role playing situation. Or something that is interesting about them. In a one-shot game at a convention, I played a monk dinosaur who was observing the other dinosaurs in the tribe and using it as an anthropological study. When I needed a role playing hook, I would lean into that. Or in another game, I was playing a mage who dressed like The Dude from The Big Lebowski and did drugs, so when I needed a role playing hook, I’d channel that.

These are pretty simple hooks, but they gave me a way to always step back into the character. Another way to think about it is to compare it to learning an accent, or doing an accent. Most of the time there is a phrase or a word that you can use to do your version of an accent. It’s that thing that allows you to step into the accent, in the same way, these ticks or hooks are ways for you to step into playing your character. It sounds weird, but it’s going to be a faster way to role playing your character and a good way to jump start it. It also makes it easier to step into role playing someone who isn’t just like you, because you have that way to change your mindset.

I want to address one more thing about these hooks before I talk about combat again. And that is the idea of using an accent or silly voice for your character. This can be used well to keep yourself in character. Such as whenever you are speaking in that voice, you are in character, and when you aren’t, you are out of character. However, there are a lot of people who aren’t great at doing voices. If you’ve listened to Dungeons and Flagons, you can tell that I will do voices for NPC’s and monsters when I’m running the game, but I have a pretty limited selection of voices that I can do. So don’t feel pressure to do this for your character, and don’t compare yourself to Critical Role when doing voices, they are professional voice actors, they literally make a living doing voices.

Now, I want to circle back to combat for a split second. I talked earlier about having your move. The default thing that you go with when you play your character. It’s important to have this a character not just for role playing, as it will become your characters thing, but also for the game, so that you can make combat go more quickly. I know for a lot of people, myself included, I prefer the role playing aspect of the game, versus the combat aspect of the game. And combat, if not done well, can end up being a longer part of the game than the role playing. So, the signature/default move for your character is there for two reasons. One, it does give that hook to get you into the mindset of your character in a combat. Two, and as importantly, it means in combat you are ready for your turn. If you know that you can always roll two attacks with your great sword, when it comes to your turn, you are ready to go. Sometimes you’ll do different things, but if there is nothing obvious and different to do, you can take your turn fast. That’s why I think it’s something that should be required by the Dungeon Master and players at the table to hold people to having that default move.

Now we’ve talked a bit more about how you can get into character and play a character who isn’t just like you. Next time I want to talk more about creating a direction and arc for your character within the game that you control.

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After a weeks time, Nori has become attuned to her sword. She finds out some interesting things about it at the Wizarding School Von’thre used to work at. What does it all mean, and where did the sword come from?

If you have questions for Nerdologists: Dungeons and Flagons emails them to nerdologists@gmail.com or find us on Facebook or Twitter! We’ll be doing a recap and Q&A every twenty-five episodes.

Our players are:

Ashley – Nori the Mountain Dwarf Champion Fighter

Kristen (@Kefka73) – Syldi the Half-Elf Rogue Thief

Clint – Von’thre the High Elf Divination Wizard

The DM:

Peder (@TheScando)

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For the purposes of this post, I’m going to make a couple of assumptions:

1. You’ve already gotten the books
2. You’ve already roped some friends into playing with you

So, with those assumptions out of the way, let’s hop into the first topic:

Where in the World are you going to start?

I capitalized “world” for a reason — this part is going to be about world-building. It is one of the bigger things that eats into a DM’s time, and how you set up your world will make a big difference in your game. There are countries, continents, oceans, cities, and all sorts of other things that you need to think about when creating a world. You then follow that up with who is ruling this country, who is the mayor in that town, who runs the bar, what are the guards’ names, and so on. Next, you’ll need to come up with about 100k different Non-Player Characters (NPCs). Which sounds miserable.

Or instead of starting from scratch, you could spend a bunch of time reading D&D books to learn the history and lore of the land, and once you have all the backstory down, you could lay your own story on top of it — for example, you could develop your own version of existing worlds like the Forgotten Realms, Eberron, or Ravenloft. But again, this seems like a ton of work if you are just picking it up on the fly.

So what is one to do?

I’ve had luck with two different ways of world-building. I’ve used the Forgotten Realms as a base and placed my own city and my own little area on the Sword Coast and just ran a game that was completely unconnected to the rest of the D&D world but that was set in a place that already existed. I didn’t have to come up with what the land looked like; I could see it on a pre-made map. I was able to build out my own city creating a handful of different NPCs that the PCs (Player Characters) interacted with. This worked quite well, especially for a short game that ran for a handful of sessions. The players were in a limited area, and they were given solid direction within that area. If that game had been meant to go on any longer than just a few sessions, I would have needed to start studying up on the greater Sword Coast area.

The other way that I’ve done it (and the way I’m currently doing it for the world in Dungeons & Flagons) is to create a small chunk of the world as I go. I had only created the town of Green Sparrow in any depth, and knew some about the Lieth Barony. East Tadalia and Barbuga were both made up on the fly. Once I knew that the characters wanted to and were going to go to Barbuga, I sat down and came up with the seven pirate princes, and fleshed them out and drew a map of the island so I knew what that looked like. But even with this method, I still allowed Wizards of the Coast to do some of my work for me. For example, Chauntea is an actual D&D deity of nature, so I just piggy-backed off of that at some points.

Checklist Version:

1. Start by picking an area where the players are going to start the game.
2. Figure out what towns are nearby
3. Figure out any important taverns/buildings in the town
4. Figure out any important people in the town
5. Make it a living world

Item #1: Keep this a small area. I’m going to suggest setting it on a coast; this makes it easy to create a reason for all the players to be together. Also surround it with wilderness on the other sides. You don’t have to plan wilderness so much; you just need to know the type of terrain for it, and now you have a large play area to start with. You can draw a map of this area if you want, but it won’t always be needed. However, it might be necessary as you get to larger places, just for your own reference, even if the players never see it.

Item #2: Keep your main town smaller-sized. Even if the characters are from the big city, it is very possible for them to be traveling up and down the coast. And with a smaller city, you don’t need to plan out that large an area all at once.

Item #3: Most coastal towns are going to have a number of basic things going on. Docks of some sort, inn/taverns, and a handful of shops, for example. Decide what the important places are, and just focus on developing those, or allow your players to create them. The Stacked Fishwench, our tavern in Dungeons & Flagons, was clearly made up on the fly, and I didn’t even have to give it a name myself. But the name of the tavern clearly implies a bunch about the place, so I just ran with it.

Item #4: Again, keep this simple. Create the captain of the town guard, a mayor, the major players in the town, and not many others, to keep the number lower — both to make them easier to keep track of, and so you don’t have to do so many voices. For example, you can have a standard NPC bartender who has a single voice across multiple towns; you don’t have to be a person of a million different voices like Matthew Mercer to run an entertaining game.

Item #5: Even though you might have only built up a small section of the world, spend time making it a living world. Know how your PCs might affect what is going on in the world, for better or worse. Know that if they leave one thing alone, something else might happen elsewhere. Give the players real choices to make in your world, and as the world grows, have events happen that your PCs have only heard hints about; that makes the story even more immersive for the players.

Most importantly, make the world yours. If you want to spend the time up front to build a huge world in which you know the inns and outs of every town, you can do that. Just know that whatever you come up with, the important thing is to have fun doing it, and to give the players an ability to make a difference in the world.

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If you’re like me when it comes to nerding, you probably find that your eyes are often bigger than your stomach, so to speak. There are so many wonderful nerdy things to do, but a limited time for them. When you’re not engaging in nerdy pursuits, there are friends to visit, chores to do, errands to run…and of course, a job you need in order to purchase the necessary components for nerdy activities. And, you know, other important stuff, like food.

As my life seems to constantly be getting busier despite my efforts to make it the opposite, I’ve come to realize that things are probably never going to slow down, and if I want to do anything nerdy amidst all the hullabaloo, I’m going to have get creative about it. But luckily, we nerds are good at that. Here are some of the ways I’ve found to fit nerdy fun into an overbusy schedule:

Multitasking

This is a fairly obvious one, but an important one nonetheless. Sometimes, in order to find time for nerdy activities, you have to create time where none apparently exists (case in point: I’m writing this blog post after my calligraphy class, whilst watching Critical Role. Procrastinate? Me?! Never…).

A good strategy for this is thinking about how you can fill the downtime/waiting time you inevitably have in a given week with something you want to do. For example, you could get some reading done on the bus or subway, or listen to podcasts during your lunch break. You could watch your favorite vlog while you’re getting ready for work, play a little Gameboy or PSP while waiting in line, or knit a few more rows on your Doctor Who scarf while you’re riding shotgun on the way to a friend’s place. Little pockets of dead time pop up on a daily basis, and taking advantage of them is the perfect way to fit a little nerdery into your week.

Turning friend time into nerdy time

You should spend time with your friends no matter what — so why not ask them to join in the nerdy shenanigans with you, and take part in a nerdy thing you love with people you love hanging out with? Invite friends over for a game night, get together for a themed party, or go out to see that sci-fi flick you’ve been looking forward to watching. The possibilities are endless!

If your friends are already nerdy, this sort of thing will happen naturally on a regular basis, but it’s also a great way to introduce friends to nerdy pursuits they may not have discovered yet. And if your friends are (gasp!) not very nerdy, well…they are. They just don’t know it yet. And it’s up to you to show them!

Focusing on one nerdy activity for a while

This is a strategy I’ve just started putting into practice (and need to start doing more, to be quite honest). Personally, I’m into books, shows, movies, vlogs, writing, video games, anime, manga, comics, board games, role-playing games, drawing, and crafts. For a start. And I know I’m not the only one who has more nerdy interests than they know what to do with. And, of course, since I love it all, I want to do it all (simultaneously, sometimes). But before I even begin, I get overwhelmed by the sheer possibilities, and end up doing none of them as I squander my precious free time trying to figure out where to start.

This strategy is a pretty simple one — think about the interests you’d like to pursue, pick one of them (yes, just ONE; you can do it! I believe in you!) and focus on it for a week, or a few weeks, or even a couple of months. Once you’ve spent some time beating a video game, switch to catching up on your favorite show, and then to starting a new book series. This way, you eliminate the decision paralysis problem we know so well, and get to devote good, focused time to something you really enjoy doing. And even though you’ll feel like you’re doing less, the idea behind this strategy is that you’ll accomplish a lot more than you would otherwise, because you’re intentionally choosing to engage with something instead of taking things as they come while waiting for the day when you’ll finally have enough free time (a day which, in all probability, will never come anyway).

So there you have it! These are few of the ways that I find time to at least get closer to doing the amount of nerdy stuff I want to do. What are some ways you’ve found to fit more nerdery into your life? Share with us in the comments!

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