Welcome to the final episode for series 37! We welcome back Tracy Barnett and discuss how the character creation process went for their new game, You Are The Dungeon, a solo journaling game about creating a dungeon and dealing with the adventurers that wander into your walls. In this episode we dive deep into discussion about this unique game, learn a bit about its sequel game, You Are the Tavern, and enjoy some outtakes at the very end!
Welcome to the final episode for series 37! We welcome back Tracy Barnett and discuss how the character creation process went for their new game, You Are The Dungeon, a solo journaling game about creating a dungeon and dealing with the adventurers that wander into your walls. In this episode we dive deep into discussion about this unique game, learn a bit about its sequel game, You Are the Tavern, and enjoy some outtakes at the very end!
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Ryan Boelter 0:00
Welcome to the final episode of our You are the dungeon series. This episode Tracy Burnett joins us again to discuss the character creation in this system, how it compares to other systems, and how different this game is to the other games we've covered in the past. It has some really great discussion in this episode, and I can't wait for you to hear it. Of course before we get to the action, first some announcements. First up, did you hear the news last Friday, Mr. Emery has started up Season Two of Cape and blade, a chi merit actual place stream that blends fantasy and superhero genres together. They are actually playing in the same world as season one, but with brand new characters. And it was absolutely phenomenal. If you haven't caught the opener to the new season this last Friday, check it out on demand at Cape and blade.com mera dot games, which will take you right to the utopia channel on Twitch. I will have links in the show notes. This means that for a few more weeks, at least, chi mera will be taking over a Friday night. Every other week, you'll be able to catch cavemen blade, and on the weeks in between this week being one of them, you can catch my stream A Tale of twinkle and our we just finished a climactic battle last time, and our heroes deserve a bit of rest and relaxation. So join us for a beach episode of sorts this Friday starting at 7:30pm. central time, live on twitch@twitch.com mirror tan games. That was kind of two announcements rolled into one. And I'm not sure what else to announce at the moment. But stick around after the show for our call to action as well as the outtakes for now. Let's dive back in what Tracy and see what sort of funding discussions we got up to about this game. Enjoy.
Amelia Antrim 2:48
Welcome back to our discussion episode. Last time we created our characters for you are the dungeon. This episode we'll be discussing the character creation process. We are thrilled to welcome back Tracy Barnett designer of this game. Would you like to reintroduce yourself and maybe tell everyone at home about the character you we made?
Tracy Barnett 3:12
Has anyone ever just said no, I don't want to reintroduce myself.
Amelia Antrim 3:15
No, but would you like to be the first?
Tracy Barnett 3:19
My name is Tracy and I make games I'm a queer non binary game designer. I'm a podcaster I do work for the one shot network. You can find me anywhere online at the other Tracy that is tr AC Why? my podcast is called 15 minutes a Fave I talked to people about their favorite thing for 15 minutes. It's nice and light and fun. Not always like we sometimes get pretty deep and 15 minutes. But it's good because I'm literally talking to the experts on their favorite thing which is the people who love things. Oh and my character. My character was the dungeon. Yeah,
Amelia Antrim 3:56
yeah,
Ryan Boelter 3:56
because you are the dungeon.
Unknown Speaker 3:57
Yes,
Ryan Boelter 3:58
I guess. Yeah, we're the dungeon I guess. What specific room Did you add? In the beginning to the dungeon?
Tracy Barnett 4:08
A very good question. I added the Temple of the ever flame to our bloodthirsty mermaid desiccated coral dungeon that we built in the previous episode. Yeah. The dungeon that was created by by a cracking
Amelia Antrim 4:25
a cracking Yeah,
Tracy Barnett 4:26
a cracking.
Ryan Boelter 4:27
So Amelia, why don't you tell us about your addition to the dungeon?
Amelia Antrim 4:31
Sure, I created the dark chamber of the crack in which over the course of our recording, turns out to be just a room that calls to people with whatever it thinks will lure them inside and then traps them in there.
Ryan Boelter 4:47
This sounds like a very messed up, you know, HGTV reality show. contest.
Amelia Antrim 4:58
I would watch that show.
Tracy Barnett 5:00
dungeon hunters
Amelia Antrim 5:03
you have to look at three dungeons decide which one's right for you. But you know they pick it before they record the show. It's ridiculous. And then they're always mad about the pink color and you can change that.
Tracy Barnett 5:16
I am a warlock patron of the unseen one. My husband is powered and of the righteous blight. We're looking for our lovely little Kraftwerk dungeon, maybe something with mortared stone, and our budget is 1 million gold.
Amelia Antrim 5:36
But also, we need it to allow chickens in the backyard.
Tracy Barnett 5:41
There has to be a chicken coop, the unhallowed chickens aren't going to raise themselves.
Amelia Antrim 5:47
Ryan, please tell us about the room you created.
Ryan Boelter 5:50
So I created the bottom bottomless chasm of perpetual light, which, which ended up being a combination angler fish and sarlacc pit. So it basically lewers people down with its promise of something shiny down there, and then eat them
Amelia Antrim 6:14
to whatever dungeon needs. That's true. All right, let's go ahead and dive into our discussion segment de 20. For your thoughts, the 20 for your thoughts.
Ryan Boelter 6:25
All right. In this segment, we want to talk to our guests about their thoughts on the character creation process and how it relates to this system into other games. But first, a question about you Tracy, as a designer? Where do you feel like your best design ideas come from? Or how do they present themselves to you?
Tracy Barnett 6:47
So we actually talked about this a little bit probably off mic maybe off recording about like, how are we talking about how this game came from, like a marketing meeting that I had with Jeff, Stormer. And Amelia or response was like, how does that? Like where's the linkage? Does
Amelia Antrim 7:07
your brain do that?
Tracy Barnett 7:09
The truth is that as I've been a game designer for more and more years, the route from a thing I saw in the world to making a game inspired by that thing I won't say based on but I'll say inspired by that thing. It's an easier and easier channel to have happen. So for example, I've now a year ago, just before all the pandemic stuff hit the US and everything locked down. I did a 90s game jam on itch back in January of 2020. Because the place that I work every Sunday, which is usually our slowest day, which I have time to like, be on Twitter and mess around and whatnot, is the 90s radio station day. So I hear a ton of songs from the 90s and I started a thread of song titles in the games you would make from that. I made that new way to Game Jam. Because why not? It's easy to make a game jam on itch. I figured a few people might be interested. And I was gonna make a game for the jam. But then I heard it's one of my least favorite songs that we hear. It's this thing we started by Bryan Adams. And it's just it's a buck wild song about like, how you can't avoid My love for you baby because we've started this thing and now we can't stop it right. But I ended up making a descendent from the Queen game called this thing we started which is about a monster breaking loose from like a research facility after some Dr. Frankenstein types have made it and you play the the doctors who are hunting after their creation. Oh, interesting. And I kick started it for Xen quest last year. But the reason I bring that up is because that was born from a really mediocre to bad Bryan Adams song. And the content of the game has nothing to do with the song save for the title. Because sometimes there are words or phrases or images or conversations that I have that just stick in my brain. And there's now a set of machinery up there, I guess that turns away at it and goes, oh well what about this thing? And because I am lucky to have experienced so many games and so many systems. I start like holding up possibilities really quickly. I'm like discarding that right like I start with everything starts with fate right? Like this is gonna be a fake game. No, it's not going to be a fake game, but it'll have aspects right and that sort of thing. So with this, I was like with with this thing we started I started going oh, what's going to be this or that? No, it should be descended from the Queen because we don't really know who the creation is. We Don't really know who the creators are and all be discovered by play because it's all question. Their questions are my favorite thing in the world. So when when you make games long enough for you do creative things long enough, you get like channels that are grooved into your brain that you just start following. And as long as you don't get too set in those ways, you can skip the track sometimes, right? You can jump to a new groove, you can keep doing innovative things. And so I don't worry about where my next idea is going to come from, because I can't stop them coming. I literally if you will, please. Holy Pardon me. I can't stop this thing I've started.
Unknown Speaker 10:49
I will not pardon you know, I
Ryan Boelter 10:51
I applaud that.
Amelia Antrim 10:55
Since the person who came up with Johann Sebastian like, I don't know if I'm mad about it. I like it. I think. I think that's the thing is like, I like it. And I'm mad that I like it.
Ryan Boelter 11:09
Those are the best types of punk.
Tracy Barnett 11:12
That Yeah, that's that's how my wife feels about puns to she hated puns when she met and now like, I don't know if it's like a Stockholm Syndrome, or if she is just slowly beating her down. So I hope it's I hope it's not that I hope it is. a realization is I think when people don't like ponds or or or like simple wordplay, I think there's almost like a, just a lack of joy in that part of their brain. Because
Amelia Antrim 11:40
most people though, that when I say I don't like beer, you're like, it's an acquired taste. And I'm like, I don't have the desire to acquire that taste. So like, just like if you keep trying, eventually. No, no,
Tracy Barnett 11:52
I think puns are. So it's that's a very interesting comparison. Because I love beer, right? Like I you both have talked to me. Yes, various points in time I sell beer as a living like that's what I do right now, from my day job. I fully if someone says I don't like beer, I will probe a little bit. Because sometimes sometimes it literally is No, you haven't found the right beer. Right. But, Amelia, you and I have talked and i know i'm not i'm not gonna recommend you a beer. But I think that because of the way that language works, wordplay and puns are links to a more fundamental enjoyment of how language is structured and interesting. And I think that there is literally a place in almost every person who can appreciate those moments of what language does. It's just that they get expressed in ways and at moments that are usually groan worthy. Yeah, that it can make it really easy to go, Oh, no, I don't want. I don't have anything to do with that. But I think that that, that puns in that level of wordplay are absolutely beautiful. Because they reflect the multifaceted ness of how language can be constructed.
Amelia Antrim 13:13
They, they definitely like it takes like a like, I don't want to say a higher level of intelligence, but there's like a level of like mastery of language that you have to have. Like, they're not like this low level, like, you know, so like, my son thinks puns are hilarious. And and like, I'm always shocked when he makes them because I'm like, I didn't know that you knew that we're gonna do that yet. Exactly. No. It's like, fascinating to me. But I think maybe you're right. It is just the moment or something. For me. It's like when I make a pun, I think it's hilarious. When other people make them. It's no good. Right?
Tracy Barnett 13:50
I think that part of that is every person's own individual brain makeup being disarmed by what the language did because it subverts expectations. And so if you are not a person who is okay with your expectations being subverted, like if you want to know what's coming, if you need things to be more predictable for how your brain is wired, yeah, puns can be really upsetting.
Amelia Antrim 14:16
Oh, that makes so much sense. Now.
Tracy Barnett 14:19
They feel and like, I mean, I know you a little bit earlier, which is why I kind of went down that path.
Unknown Speaker 14:24
Yeah, but I like things just so.
Tracy Barnett 14:27
But when you when you're the one that comes up with them, it feels clever.
Amelia Antrim 14:34
Like it that's a good moment.
Tracy Barnett 14:36
There. There are very few things that happen in terms of spoken or written language that are is intrinsically satisfying to the person saying or writing them as a pun or like a good lyrical substitution Allah weird owl, right? You can when you can hit the nuances. multiple meanings or you can hit the meter and the rhyme scheme of a line of a song and substitute in different words. There's something just visceral that clicks. Yeah. So I really forget how we got to talking about this. But I'm really glad that we got to
Ryan Boelter 15:19
listen to the first question of the discussion.
Tracy Barnett 15:25
It's fantastic. Yes, wordplay and puns are really good. And I will not ever malign someone if they don't if they say they don't like them. But that is a thing that unlike beer, I will say no, I think that the context just needs to be right. That's fair, even if that context is just you being the person in charge of the word play. Totally fine. Yeah, that beer is a different thing than that. That's a really good analogy. But it's a really good analogy, but like, I'm not going to force my opinions about about alcohol on to somebody appreciate that.
Amelia Antrim 15:58
I like root beer root beer is great. Yeah, awesome. When you sit down to play a game, what do you look for in a system as far as character creation, like what parts of character creation Do you need to have for it to like, make a really great character in your mind?
Tracy Barnett 16:17
The more I play games, the less I am concerned about what the system itself brings to the table in terms of what my character is going to do for me. I, I run games more often than I play them. And I'm even like, vaguely thinking back to when I was on this show last time, and I'm sure I gave some answer that was like, oh, it needs to have something about like, who they really are, like aspects of fate.
Amelia Antrim 16:44
No. Question, because you were on our show before. So I didn't want to ask this interview and exciting.
Tracy Barnett 16:52
I love it. But anyway, the point is, I'm not going to give an answer that is like aspects or fate or anything like that. I am in a new d&d campaign with my group, d&d, for all of its problems. And boy, there are a lot of them is like the lingua franca for our group, right? It's just really easy for us to settle in and play d&d. Yeah, but I'm not running at this time. And I I've run d&d for this group a number of times, and I typically just don't, I don't play. So I really wanted to take time to be a better player this time around, because I tend to play high charisma characters who can do this talky thing that I'm doing on this podcast right now. Right, and who can know things and just hold forth about whatever's going on? And yeah, I see, I see you there, Amelia. But I wanted to play a different kind of character. So I'm playing a paladin who was abducted as the mortal side of a changeling swap with the FE and grew up in the feywild, and is now back in the prime material plane and ostensibly hates the FE but left the feywild with an Aladdin, who is another player in the group, right? And on the verge, we started a level two. So if you play d&d at level three is when the Paladin takes their oath, right, the thing that they're going to be against or for, and I was gonna take the one that is all outsiders because like, no, that's all that's all bad. But I realized it was more nuanced than that. And so I'm going to take the oath of the ancients and actually acknowledge the feywild roots. And I say all of that, to say that not a single one of those things had to do with what Dungeons and Dragons does as a system for me to develop the character. Yeah. Like, there are systems that do a better job of that fate is a really good one, right? Because one of the mechanical parts of your character are your aspects, which are things that are true about your character. But as time goes on, I want to use the context of the story that's being told by the group, and what all the other players are bringing to the table to define who the character is, I want to evolve that definition as we play recontextualizing the character through the events of the narrative that happens, whether or not the system says it happens, right, maybe there's a die roll, that's, that makes something dramatic happened, and we use that as forward momentum. But maybe there's not maybe it's just decisions that I'm making about the character, and that's fine. So I'm a huge fan of systems that incentivize and mechanized character realities into the into the game, but if it's not there, I'm just going to just gonna do it anyway. I'm just going to make my do my best to embody the character that I want to play and make sure that I'm speaking into the narrative and that what happens as a result of that flows back into character?
Amelia Antrim 20:01
Yeah, I think that more and more, a lot of us are kind of doing that with those with games that don't do that. Because I think that I shouldn't say like us, but a lot of people who have kind of gotten used to playing story games and things when we go back to games like d&d. Like, we start throwing those things in there, because it's like, well, I, that shouldn't be there, I should know these things about my character. So I'm just gonna go ahead and like splash that character background and just make it up. And, you know, assume that these things are true, because the game doesn't like do anything to dissuade you from doing that either. There's nothing in there that says you can't do those things.
Tracy Barnett 20:38
Which is a really interesting lead into the next question that I see on the outline, because, yeah, well ask the question. I won't just go Yeah, so
Amelia Antrim 20:50
the question is, please,
Ryan Boelter 20:53
is a great way Why? Because I would
Tracy Barnett 20:55
not dare to ask your question.
Ryan Boelter 20:58
Yeah, the next question is, how do we think character creation in this game stacks up to other systems that we've played?
Tracy Barnett 21:05
And, yeah, I want to hear your, your his answers first, because you have a huge breadth of experience.
Amelia Antrim 21:12
Yeah. Well, games that we've played no games that we've created characters, for sure. Um, this is, I mean, this is unlike, like, we've done things like descend into midnight, or something where you kind of create the world along with the game, but like, that's not what this is. Even when we did anyone can wear the mask, we created the city. And that's not what this is.
Unknown Speaker 21:40
Like?
Amelia Antrim 21:42
I don't know. It's like, I'm almost hesitant to even call it character creation, because it's just like, its own thing. Like, that's, like, the game.
Ryan Boelter 21:50
Yeah, definitely. It's definitely it's the game. You're playing the game for the characterization? There's plenty systems that do that. Right. One last job does a lot of that. And, and there's there's quite a few others that I can't think of off the top of my head, that you can't finish your characters unless you play through the game a bit. Right? If not the entire game. Sure. Right. Yeah. Um, where where's this is, this is the beginning of this dungeons story. And when you're talking about a place as character, a place has history, but it has a beginning, right. And that's, that's just like any other character, when a character is is old, and or on their last breath. And the campaign is almost over. That character has history. But that character has a beginning. And that's character creation. So much, much that same way this this, this is a very interesting counterpoint to characters character turning into place as character. And I really, I really like how it how it feels organic, in that sense that you're creating something historical.
Tracy Barnett 23:12
Yeah, that was 100%. intentional, right? Because there are a lot of things that you can say about how dungeons are portrayed in games that include dungeons. Yeah, right. And we talked about some of this at the in the in the previous episodes, but a lot of the time in a fantasy setting. dungeons lack context. Yeah. Right. It's just the place where you go to do the thing that you do in this game, which is to, to your beat, enemies over the head until golden XP falls. And I wanted from, from all the inspirations that fed into this, as I talked about before, I wanted the dungeon to be the focus. Yeah. Because in in the context of a really like, classic dungeon crawl type dungeon. Yeah. You never defeat the dungeon. Right? Right. you survive it at best. Yeah. And I wanted that to lend agency to the dungeon itself. You know, because when you talk about I think having history you talk about multiple generations, or even just iterations, like more people came into town, and they hear about this place, right? So they go and check it out. Like, you have to have interactions with the place for the places history to be known. So what does that look like on the place's side of things? Yeah, right. If you're even if you think of it, solely mundanely, right, the dungeon has no agency. The dungeon is not actually Inviting in a new entity, it's not actually expanding its own territory, whatever it is, if you've got the old warehouse on the outskirts of town, that is your your dungeon To start off with, right? And people go and investigate it. And it's haunted as all get out. And they have to then leave, and a few of them don't make it out. And no one goes back there for like five years. Yeah, the natural progress of time is going to degrade the land around it. Maybe there's a crevasse that opens up nearby, right? So it's this weird meta fictional thing of like, maybe all of this can be explained by natural, you know, time wearing things down. Maybe the dungeon is essentially an entity that is drawing evil into itself and is making this place even more curse than it was before. The actual answer doesn't matter. Absent, you choosing to tell whatever story you want to tell with.
Ryan Boelter 26:01
One of the things that I love about this game, and I'm going to compare it to anyone can wear the mask by Jeff Stormer,
Unknown Speaker 26:07
please do.
Ryan Boelter 26:10
Because when we did anyone can wear the mascot it ended up you could turn that into a a campaign, back drop cranking machine where you play a few rounds. And now you've got more places, you've got more history, you've got more NPCs, etc, etc, etc.
Amelia Antrim 26:32
Yes, it's like you're building ever expanding?
Ryan Boelter 26:34
Yeah. And what's brilliant about this is, is if you're a GM, for like a dungeon delving type game, you could play a few rounds of this and get history for a dungeon and a map for a dungeon. And NPCs from that had experienced this dungeon, and now you've got new NPCs in the world that your players can meet. You've got a fully mapped out dungeon that is waiting to tempt your player characters for the the stuff within, and all that sort of stuff. And that's, that's amazing. That's amazing. You
Amelia Antrim 27:12
got to play your own game in the process.
Ryan Boelter 27:14
Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Tracy Barnett 27:16
Um, it's almost like that was intentional. I
Amelia Antrim 27:18
know. Almost.
Tracy Barnett 27:23
I, it's, I'm really proud of this game, like, y'all prior and edit before. And like, I love iron accelerating, right? We all know my feelings about that game. But in terms of like, small games like this, I have a lot less room for error, right? Because you, you have to, if you're doing a thing, you have to present it in a much more concise form. And it has to do what you set out for it to do without a lot of wiggle room, right? It just has to do it. Or if it if it doesn't, it just sort of falls apart a little bit. This may be the best thing I ever write, like, and I'm okay with that. I'm not, I may do iterations or riffs on this. Maybe I'll surpass this someday. But this game, it's a game in and of itself. Like you said, Ryan, you and me Oh, you can play it on its own. Right. And it can be a self contained thing. But the way it's set up, it invites you to use it for other stuff, right? It's just it's there. And I tried really hard to use language that evoke that. And, and tried to make it situated within a context. And it's a generic fantasy fantasy setting like we talked about, but I tried to make it so that when you when you first start answering those questions, your brain immediately just gets lit up like striking a match on the side of a box. Right? And you're like, Oh, I could and and off to the races. Yes. Like that was exactly what I wanted to happen when you started playing this game is that it lit you up and it made you want to go play a dungeon crawling thing or to or to run you know, two or three rounds of the of the thing and find out why this dungeon that's out in the middle of nowhere. There was constructed by a mad wizard has three different levels to a and they're all populated with different weird evils. Yeah, cool. Now, you know. Exactly. So
Amelia Antrim 29:35
yeah, we went through like around of this game. And I don't think that there was any point where I was like, I don't know what to do here. I don't know what to do next. Or like how to move this forward or like what I want other than naming the people, which
Tracy Barnett 29:53
is always is that's the right
Amelia Antrim 29:55
Yeah. Which like I could have gotten over I've got my stack of books. But I mean, I don't think that there was ever a point where it was like, I have no ideas on what to do with this or like something didn't evoke some kind of feeling or idea or like, choice to make.
Tracy Barnett 30:13
Yeah, and the the language that I used throughout this entire thing, this game is written in such a flowery fashion. Like, if this were a novel, it will be called purple prose, right? It is, it is luminous and hanging in the air. Like when when you read a sentence, like I'm just scrolling through the game here real quick, but like, decide who lives and dies. If there are any fractions that person lived, but is less some of their original limbs. Or, like, you read a thing where it's like, you let them go and spare some room for future desecrations. Like, I literally aside and I very deliberately did not use light and dark to a plot to imply good and evil. Like I was very deliberate about that choice, because very often darkness is can is conflated with evil. And that is a real problem if you are a dark complected person, if you are if you are melanated. Like that's not a good thing. But all the other words in the thesaurus that I could find like I wanted, I wanted atrocities and depredations in in COVID horrors, right. I want that language baked in there. Because you immediately recognize as a player, this place is bad. Yeah, this place is deeply evil in the ways that like, watching Hellraiser, right is deeply evil, right? It's just it. It needed to ooze all of that feeling so that you're never feeling lost. Because all if you're like, Oh, no, what do I do? The answer is something evil. Something bad something. What's going to happen to this person? something worse than the first thing you thought? Yeah. I'm really proud of this game. Yeah, no,
Amelia Antrim 32:01
I mean, I'm just looking at like the dispositions even that we have an RS prideful Ventnor, stalwart wonder, despised practitioner, hottie ruler, impoverished guide, contemplative Paladin, apathetic Shepherd, like they're already, like, so descriptive, that it's, it's easy to start working off of those things that you've given us enough structure, like, it's a very open game, like we could do anything. But there's enough little pieces there to start, like pulling out, you know, like, even the events to like the fates that we developed for these people. It's like, you know, it was just enough a taste of something, to evoke those feelings and emotions to be able to say, Oh, no, I think I've got it. Like, I know what I want here. Yeah,
Tracy Barnett 32:51
yeah, yeah. And that I, I keep saying I tried really hard to do X or Y. But like, this is the apotheosis of a lot of years of question based world building with players at a table, right? Because both versions of iron Edda that are out in the world, you build your holdfast, because of the questions of grants, right. And so I've seen a lot of people answer a lot of questions. And I have found that just that taste like you said, Emilia, is exactly what people need, if they already feel safe and comfortable at the table, right? Like, the three of us have done this podcast before we have played games in person, before we know each other, we're friends, all good. So like if you have that context of safety, and I know that I can speak freely. Now, when you get a taste of some idea, you can just run with it. And because this by design is a solo game. If hopefully you're comfortable enough with yourself, it is my sincere hope that you are right. If If you are not, my heart goes out to you. And I am here to support you and all your efforts. But like this is designed for you to sit down with yourself and go, what's the next worst thing I can do to these people? What does a knife in the dark mean? What does it mean when you're walking through these corridors and you get to sit down at an amazing feast. Like it becomes grotesque. It becomes immediately horrific. And that was the point of all of it is like no matter what happens in here, the dungeon is not good. It's not helpful. When you see a glimpse of a spring Meadow through a portal that should scare the crap out of you. And that's that's how this game and not you. That's the other cool thing. None of this is happening to you the player. You are the dungeon Yeah, you are this source of evil. It's happening to another character and so With that removed allows you to bring a level of maliciousness that is both appropriate to the narrative and also doesn't harm you as a person.
Ryan Boelter 35:09
Yeah. Until you pack this up and bring it to your here game of dungeon delving heroes and submit them to all the fun. Well, but
Tracy Barnett 35:20
even then, yeah, you're just bringing the dungeon. That's true, right? You're not bringing this table of horror. Oh, that's
Ryan Boelter 35:26
very true.
Tracy Barnett 35:27
You're just bringing the space you've created? Where in you have maybe you've established that there are, there's a cult of bloodthirsty mermaids in this underground.
Amelia Antrim 35:38
I really want to know more about those mermaids.
Tracy Barnett 35:40
Exactly. So now this space exists off the coasts of the Kingdom of whatever in the land of travel law. And your characters are gonna go and do that thing. And if the context is this road is harrowing and dark. Cool. How do you breathe underwater for one and two? What are you going to do in a temple full of bloodthirsty mermaids? We're in resides the ever flame the the dark chasm of the crack and, and this, the massively bright thing that apparently heats people like, cuz that recontextualizes it again?
Amelia Antrim 36:17
Yeah, I'm excited to like, oh, like, how to see how each level as you go forward gets, like, more and more intense, as we've you know, builds all of these. Yeah, creepy things we've developed,
Ryan Boelter 36:30
like, and now you've got the OSI Final Fours that moved in afterwards. Right. And, and who knows what else can can happen beyond that? Right?
Tracy Barnett 36:41
Yeah. And the thing is, everyone's going to hit a natural stopping point, right? If you're playing this on your own, you're gonna hit a point where you're like, you know, I've kind of told all of the gruesome stories that I want to tell this game is very dark. It's not a bright and hopeful game. You know, it. It's cathartic for at least a little bit, I think in the times we live in. But there comes a point where that's enough, right? You want to put it down and you're just done. Like, there's an account that a Twitter account that started up in this person, I don't know who they are, just a person online, started playing the game and like, wrote out I think, the last time I looked at it, the Google Doc was like 18 pages, like out of like, generations of people that had gone to this dungeon and how it was expanding and the history like, there was one point in time where I referenced someone's great, great, great, great, great grandfather's dagger that was left in the dungeon, right? Like those linkages all got drawn. They haven't posted in a while, and I totally get it. Like, maybe life intruded. Maybe it's something else. Or maybe the story's just done. Yeah. And that's okay. Like, you can stop this game whenever you want to when you feel like you've had enough of whatever it is it gives.
Amelia Antrim 37:59
Yeah, but also, like, more. I need to know more about these mermaids.
Ryan Boelter 38:07
Yeah, absolutely. Um, gosh,
Tracy Barnett 38:12
I just like last time, I covered like, a dozen of your questions.
Amelia Antrim 38:18
I feel like is that Really? You know, a click a wall here like,
Ryan Boelter 38:22
yeah,
Amelia Antrim 38:22
I mean, we we played we were playing the game. Like we didn't play the game. Yeah. Yeah.
Tracy Barnett 38:29
Yeah, it was. It's a very indie, and especially like, 15 years ago, indie RPG thing like the forge era RPG thing to say that character creation is play. And yes, it totally is, like apocalypse world is partially built on that foundation, right? This is a game where play and character creation are exactly the same.
Ryan Boelter 38:54
Like the amount of play and the amount of character creation are equal to each other. Yeah. And there's, there's,
Tracy Barnett 39:00
there's no way to disentangle them. They are the exact same process.
Ryan Boelter 39:04
Yeah, absolutely. So then, I know, this is his character creation, world building blended into one, which I love. What would you say is one of the biggest flaws of this process? And what is one of the best parts?
Tracy Barnett 39:26
I mean, the biggest flaw is that you have to actively just choose to do it. Right, because it's a solo game. It's not like you're playing d&d with your friends or or Pathfinder or fate or, you know, masks or whatever it is. There is no external impetus for you to play this game. Right. You know, unless you've seen people talking about it and you think that's really awesome. Yeah, you have to choose to sit down and deliberately engage in this very specific process. Because if you if you deviate from the process, as written too much You won't get the same result. It's very prescriptive. Much like how Vincent Baker writes in apocalypse world, if you are not running the game, like it's written, you're now playing apocalypse world, that's fine, you might get a really good story out of a game that's run like that, that's based on apocalypse world, if you deviate from the formula, this set out and you are the dungeon, you get nothing. Like it falls apart very quickly. So if you are not willing to take the time and sit down and engage, you're not going to get anything out of it, right. And it's one of those things where the biggest strength is also the biggest flaw, right? Like the strength lies in following that process. But that automatically means there are going to be people for whom this is not hit, right? Because they don't have contextually the bandwidth or the patience or the whatever, to engage with the game as it's
Amelia Antrim 40:56
well. And for some people, like role playing really is about the social aspect of it. Like that's the thing that we've talked about a number of times to their people. And I think I even my brother was talking about it, too. He's like, I play games as a chance to hang out with my friends. So he's like, I've never looked at playing online or anything, because it was about being around other people. And so solo games, I'm sure don't have the same sort of poll for those people that it's Yeah, you know, that's not what gaming is about for them.
Tracy Barnett 41:24
Yeah. And, you know, it's one of those things that like, Cool, yeah, it's the biggest flaw, but it's also not something I'm going to change. Right? There's, there's no reason to because it is so specifically what it is that you change, it would make it something totally different.
Ryan Boelter 41:40
So I mean, really, yeah, we kind of prove that you can just do this solo game with three people. True. You can pool your minds together, create this, and if we wanted to make an evening of this and just do a few rounds, and then and maybe build on it later and just create this huge mega dungeon after a while. Yeah, you know, we totally could,
Tracy Barnett 42:04
you know, or you could pull out the semi sequel that I'm writing for right now and do more different
Ryan Boelter 42:12
things. It sounds like that will just create more background for this. This this world that is implied that this dungeon Yes.
Tracy Barnett 42:29
Definitely. Um, yeah. So I'm, I'm actually by the time this comes out, I you'll be able to find it on my Patreon, or on edge. It's called You are the tavern. And the idea is just I mean it on its face. Very, very simple. Just like the dungeon you're playing the tavern. But the difference is, you're not building out yourself like taverns don't do that. dungeons are ephemeral. You know liminal spaces. Sure, a dungeon can build itself out in inviting new evils. Why not? But taverns reflect the context within which they're situated, right? If you've ever been to like an area bar, where regulars come in, they're always talking about what's going on in town or what's going on with them or what happened in a neighboring town. So what you build out in You are the tavern is the villager in. And so the stories that are told within the confines of the tavern reflect the world around the tavern. So you're building a town by telling stories about the town through the lens of the people who come to the tavern.
Ryan Boelter 43:38
I like that.
Tracy Barnett 43:39
Yeah, and, and it's a very, very easy stretch, and there'll be language, at least a page in the game devoted to this, that if you want to incorporate the dungeon into this thing, here's how you do it.
Ryan Boelter 43:53
That's very interesting.
Tracy Barnett 43:55
Yeah. And it's, it's an open secret, like I need to have nice easy things I can produce that can go on my Patreon and try and generate more revenue there. So I've got a series of probably after the tavern at least three more games that all referenced the same implied setting that when you take them in aggregate, you are the campaign
Ryan Boelter 44:19
setting. That's awesome. That's like that. Yeah, cuz there are a few games out there that that handle like you know, village creation or whatever as part of the the session zero, you know, I I'm playing beyond the wall with my with my local group, lately, and the whole point is, you build a village together, your backstory is literally on your character and just steps of the backstory that create a places in your village or NPCs in your village and stuff like that, right? is really cool. But But then after your characters are all done, you know Then the village has kind of locked in. But it's all surrounding the in the end is at the center of town. The end is the cornerstone, it's like the the tavern in sort of deal. And that that's, that's kind of the same thing with your other Tavern sounds like where, where you've got this cornerstone of the whole town, this Tavern this in, and everything around it can be nebulous until it's defined.
Tracy Barnett 45:29
Yeah, exactly. And I think that one of the things that sets this, apart from most ideas like this, it's a couple of things. One, the timescale is different between you are the dungeon and you are the tackle, right, I read the passage and you are the dungeon that says, as yours turned two centuries and centuries turned to aliens, right? Like the dungeon is long string, almost eternal. Yeah, right. And you are the tavern, it's as month turn to years and years trends two decades. So if you're if you take a timeline of this implied setting, and you chunk it out, like the dungeon construct all the way across, the top dungeon is just around. But the village might just have this little bit, the tavern or like it just exists in this in this one point. But then when I write you are the Palace of dreams, which is going to be the one that is like the the spaces that mortals dream when they fall asleep, which is also where the gods reside, like, the dungeon suddenly becomes this this small section. Because this one is this much bigger. Yeah. So if you if you decide to take all of these things, and one's going to be like an empire level, like a big city, like a decaying Empire kind of thing. If you take all of them, and you sort of play them with the same implied setting in mind, whatever that ends up becoming for you, you get these different slices of different spans of time. And if you were to choose to, like, take the applied setting and make it someplace you can play a game in, you find a point where there's a vertical slice that cuts through all the segments at the same time. And you pop that out. And you know that on a cosmological scale, this is happening on an empire scale. This is happening on the dungeons timeline, this is happening on the villages timeline, we are here.
Ryan Boelter 47:32
That sounds like a funnel. Oh,
Unknown Speaker 47:35
oh, my goodness.
Amelia Antrim 47:37
Totally unintentional, I'm sure.
Tracy Barnett 47:40
And, and not like explicitly intended, like I had not connected that up until you said it, Ryan. But you're 100%, right, like, so many of the things that we do in games, start at the broad and work to the narrow. And it's really important to do it that way. Like, if you start to narrow, you're too constrained and too confined, and you can't really, you feel no agency and making your decisions. If you start too broad, I could do anything. It's like trying to come up with a name. It's literally that literally anything. Yeah, it could be anything, okay, I've got nothing to go on here. But like with iron data, if you start with, these are your three pillar things, then you've got some context operate in and when someone asks you a question, even if you're just sitting at a convention table, you can hook back into that little quick thing that you heard the GM say, and you have an answer with with this game, or these games, you have context you're creating yourself. And the funnel is of like, you might not play them in order. I'm certainly not writing them in order write it and start cosmologically and then get to the dungeon and then get to the Empire and then get to the how it's gonna go. But when you if you make the dungeon, you're like, Okay, that's cool that this much has happened over this amount of time. And then you make the village you go, Oh, this fits over here. But only if you want it to no one's forcing you to connect these dots. You do it if you if you're doing if your brain is comfortable doing it and if you have an impetus to do it. Yeah, if not, you just play the games and enjoy them for what they are. And have fun like, like I said, I may never write a better game than this. There's it does a lot of things that I want to see games do. And it's not like the impact of it. The the cognitive load is not that heavy. Names aside.
Amelia Antrim 49:44
Besides that, it's good. Not only we discuss our story, we have our fanfiction section.
Unknown Speaker 49:52
Yeah. Hey,
Amelia Antrim 49:53
I mean, do we. What else do we say here? Like I mean, we
Ryan Boelter 49:58
20 more rounds. No,
Amelia Antrim 50:01
my dog is gonna be hungry. We can't do 20 more.
Tracy Barnett 50:05
But but the obvious answer is playing around. Right? Right. I don't know that we can take the time to do that. But that's the answer to the question. It's, there is no fanfiction section here because the fanfiction is what you take the time to do. Like, all three of us in our own time, we have this this Google Doc, we can take it and make a local copy of it. Because the people who are watching the podcast are going to want to see what we did. We could each just keep telling this story.
Amelia Antrim 50:35
That would actually be really interesting. If we all just like played another round and see where this goes.
Tracy Barnett 50:41
Yeah, because that's what this game is this game is an engine to just do your fan fiction.
Amelia Antrim 50:50
We might have to
Tracy Barnett 50:53
do because when character creation literally is play the line between where you want the stories to go, and then actually going someplace there. There's no line. It's just to quote, mean, girls, the limit does not exist.
Amelia Antrim 51:13
Brian, that's our bonus content is just a couple more rounds of this.
Tracy Barnett 51:19
bonus content number one here. But yeah, I mean, so that's that's what I know, this game is very different than what you've had on the show before. Because they're when you're just making a character for another system for another game. There's a finite wall, there's a wall you hit right before before play. Yes. And like I jokingly said, the limit does not exist. But that's what this is right? As you as you create a character and you get closer and closer and closer to play. You have to stop because functionally, there's nothing you can do to cross the wall. Right. But with this game, there's nothing to stop you aside from the time that you take to do the wall.
Amelia Antrim 52:04
No, you're actually you're like the four or four walls maybe I don't know, it might have 12 walls. We don't. We don't know. It's hard to say. We won't know until we play.
Tracy Barnett 52:16
Yeah, and literally playing to find out what happens planed it's continue the story playing to see what becomes of the dungeon. Because you have this assurance, you're never going to stop existing. And even with with you or the tavern, like there are going to be events that happen because it's going to be divided into seasons, right. It's essentially planting, growing, harvesting and enduring are the four seasons. There may be things that happen that diminish the size of the village around the tavern. But like even if you get to the point where you've diminished, so you get bad, bad, quote unquote, bad rolls, and it diminishes all the way down to the firewall, the last building has been demolished, and the taverns in ruins. The story isn't done, someone's going to come along in the next growing season and like settle in the ruins of the tavern. And it will be an it will be a safe space again. So all of the things that you are in this sort of game series have a permanence to what they are at least conceptual, that they can be inhabited by something and carried forward even if the linear history of the place has big gaps.
Ryan Boelter 53:30
Absolutely. So this is the part we we would take it up Level A and get into our advancement discussion.
Unknown Speaker 53:39
Take it up a level
Unknown Speaker 53:42
level level.
Amelia Antrim 53:43
Well, yeah, I mean, there's not really leveling up in this one. I did put a couple questions in here that I thought we could kind of, you know, talk about how does the fact that this is a solo game, affect how much you can advance, both mechanically and narratively. It sounds like not mechanically, it just like you just keep doing this. You just keep you keep plugging along.
Tracy Barnett 54:10
Yep. But But narratively, I think that this then becomes an exercise in how much effort or creativity you choose to put into what's going on. So at that point in time, the limit is you right and your own context that you bring to things which is why I specifically say that you can take time between phases. Because everyone who's done anything creative knows that you cannot just output an output and output and go and go and do ad infinitum. It just you have to stop at some point in time. Yeah. And I think it's actually a really good metaphor for the the phases in the game, the foray in the fallow, like, even in life, we have to have times where we're just not doing Anything, right? Where all of the aggregate knowledge or learning that we've gained has a chance to, like settle into who we are. So we can make it part of ourselves and then go use it. And so the game is like a model for that almost like if you get to the end of a, of a fallow cycle and you're like, I don't really want to bring in any more adventures right now. Cool, you stop it, put it down, you walk away, you do something else. And if at some point in time down the road, you're thinking about that dungeon, and you're like, Oh, I wonder, oh, that I put a siding blade trap in that one part, I wonder what's going to happen with that, then you pull it back out, and you bring in some adventures. And even if you finish with the foray section, and you're like, really not sure about inviting in a new evil entity don't feel like drawing some new boundaries. Don't feel like expanding right now. Cool, is stopping. And if at some point in time, you you start wondering what new degradations have populated, the level that exists below everything you've written so far, then you go and write it. Like, yeah, that's, that's the, because it reflects who you are as a person in the moment that you're doing it, it's going to flow with the rhythm of your life, and how, who you are in those in those given moments. And if you were to play a game like this, you know, now, and then you put it down, and you don't look at that for five years, just like anything, any other any other creative thing you've done, you're going to look back at it and go, I see who I was, then that's not exactly who I am now. Can I continue this now? No, maybe that's not the path I want to go down. But maybe you started a new dungeon to carry the metaphor forward. Right?
Ryan Boelter 56:52
Absolutely.
Tracy Barnett 56:53
Yeah. And it's very, it's very poisonous.
Ryan Boelter 56:55
Yeah. Like how it creates an artifact. Right? It when, when you're drawing these things out, you create a physical artifact that that has the record of what happened at this place.
Tracy Barnett 57:11
Yeah, that's why I say in the instructions that it's preferable to print it out, just because so many of the things that we do in play, do not carry physical artifacts with them. And especially because of the times we live in now, right? You're doing a lot of gaming on different online platforms, you're using d&d, beyond whatever it might be. But with this, you get to make a physical thing. If you choose to. Yeah, I don't ever want to feel like there's a pressure, right, because I want people to don't have the access to physical media to still be able to do the thing. But, you know, if you have the option, it's a really cool thing to be able to do. Because then you've got the dungeon again, in your head.
Ryan Boelter 57:53
Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And I know there is there's no real mechanical advancement aside from play the game or
Tracy Barnett 58:04
it's put, it's played the game over, but you're advancing who you are as a person, as you're playing it like, and boy, that's a way the kind of thing to contemplate, right? Like, that's a pretty existential, like, Oh, God, I have to be a better person or a different person, a grown or regressed person to, for it to be different. But the reality is, that's just what happens in life, like, you're not the same person that you were yesterday, and you're not the person today, who you're going to be tomorrow, there are infinitesimal little changes. And all of those get reflected in the kind of creative play that you do. And this game is just a reflection of who you are in a given moment.
Amelia Antrim 58:41
And I'm more okay with like narrative growth than mechanical or not, that I'm not okay with mechanical growth, but I find narrative growth more interesting and more appealing and play, then, like, I would rather play a character that is mechanically the same forever and ever and ever, then I would, you know, like, I don't want to part of this is like, I don't want to have to learn new mechanics, like, Don't make me learn a new rule for how to do a thing. The narrative growth is just more interesting to me as a player. I know that that's not true for everybody totally fine. But like, I would rather have narrative growth than or change, not even necessarily growth, but then mechanical numbers go up, like,
Ryan Boelter 59:25
Yeah,
Amelia Antrim 59:26
I know. That's very satisfying to some people. It's just like watching numbers go out. I mean,
Ryan Boelter 59:33
it's not like you're working towards in this game, like a level 40 dungeon. Right, right.
Tracy Barnett 59:38
Yeah. Unless that's a goal you've set for yourself. Right. And you choose to go and if so great. You're also the one in charge of deciding that you don't want to keep going if you don't want to keep
Ryan Boelter 59:49
Sure. Absolutely.
Amelia Antrim 59:50
You know why? Because you are the dungeon master. That's
Tracy Barnett 59:54
exactly
Unknown Speaker 59:57
what I did there.
Tracy Barnett 59:58
It's an ID. Isn't it amazing? How well that actually works.
Ryan Boelter 1:00:05
works great. So is there anything else then Tracy that you want to say about your the dungeon? before we head out? Going by it? Maybe?
Unknown Speaker 1:00:13
Yes.
Amelia Antrim 1:00:15
Like, honestly, so much fun. Yeah,
Tracy Barnett 1:00:19
I, I like all the games that I've made. This one is, this one sits with me more than then many that I've made. Like, it's kind of like iron era, right, I can't stop thinking about. And that that. Granted, you know, if you're using your own emotions as a gauge for what to engage with, it's always going to be at least a little bit flawed, because you can never right completely tell if you're being honest with yourself, or if you're
Amelia Antrim 1:00:51
going to be sad, though, for like what you said before about, like, if this is the best thing I ever make, I'm okay with that.
Tracy Barnett 1:00:58
Exactly. But like, there are things that, for better or worse, as a creator, I have to accept that I'll never be able to let go. And whatever that means, for me, if it means a lack of Crete of commercial success, or if it means that people are going to buy my stuff in droves, I have to be okay with the idea that there are things that I've made, that I cannot stop tinkering with, or or making. And iron Edda is one of those things like it will, I won't leave me alone. Yeah, that's fine. I have to accept that. I'll make new things for it as I'm able. I think this is another one. Because when I see the reactions that people have when they play those games, when I see them buy in to the process that the games offer, and I see that the engagement and the joy, and I know that there's something there, then I realize that I've made some great things. And the only thing stopping them from being perceived as great by the world at large is the system that we're operating within, which is capitalism. And that can you know,
Amelia Antrim 1:02:12
What a bummer.
Tracy Barnett 1:02:14
It's a family friendly podcast, I'm not gonna finish that sentence. But you get where I'm going. Like I there's, there's a there's a dividing line between what I can expect to happen, and what will happen that I have to be comfortable with, if I'm going to actually love some of the things that I've made. And I'm okay with that. Because iron at the end you are the dungeon as like template for gameplay are two things that I've made so far in my career that I just adore. And I don't ever want to feel like I need to apologize for that. So I'm not gonna
Ryan Boelter 1:02:52
Yeah, absolutely.
Amelia Antrim 1:02:54
nor should you.
Ryan Boelter 1:02:57
Well, Tracy, thank you so much for joining us to talk about you aren't the dungeon
Tracy Barnett 1:03:02
I thank you both for having me on again. I hope that this has helped ease your respective marches. Yes, because because that was kind of the original impetus. I think that life does not stop. But I had room to help bring something I hope pretty cool into what y'all were doing.
Amelia Antrim 1:03:23
This was a lot of fun. Like, first of all, it's always fun to talk to you. But like this is okay, I'm I'm not gonna lie to everyone here listening to this podcast, I totally bought the game while we were recording, because I was like I'm tired of listening to you read off the things and I need to be able to read them and see them too. So I did and like it's very cool. It's very cool. Like,
Unknown Speaker 1:03:46
that's awesome. I
Amelia Antrim 1:03:47
mean, it's only 10 pages 11 with the cover from the PDF, but like, I totally like I'm very excited to sit down and Ryan I hope we do this for some bonus content to sit down and like make some more
Ryan Boelter 1:04:00
more generations of Dutch complain that I agree this would be super fun to throw out there.
Amelia Antrim 1:04:05
Yeah, so hopefully there'll be some bonus content at some point too. But this was so much fun. This was so much good.
Tracy Barnett 1:04:10
I'm really glad if those of you listening want to buy this thing you can find it on my NGO page, which is the other tracy.h.io I think it's up on Drive Thru RPG is where I found Yeah, so you can go and find it you can find all my other games there as well. You can listen to 15 minutes of fame you find on Apple podcasts or Spotify or all that other good stuff. You are not difficult to find you can find me online. Just look for the other Tracy shout
Amelia Antrim 1:04:39
pretty loud.
Tracy Barnett 1:04:43
Yeah, go find my stuff. Please. If you liked this, go buy my stuff. And whatever you do, whether it's my stuff or not, I hope you're enjoying yourself.
Amelia Antrim 1:04:52
Well thank you again for sitting down with us and thank you to everybody for tuning in. We will be back in a bit
Ryan Boelter 1:05:00
What a fun time we had creating this dungeon. I think Amelia and I are going to plan getting a round or two of this recorded sometime after our next series gets recorded. So you want to keep an eye out for that, on the one shot network Patreon. For those that are giving $5 and up, you'll get access to this bonus content when it's available. So definitely check it out@patreon.com slash one shot podcast. And donating to the Patreon gives you all sorts of other great perks. And it's really a great way to support a group of great folks paying for hosting for all of these podcasts on the network, equipment repairs or replacement and so much more is basically where your money is going to guess we're right into the colon action off the bat. So one of the things I'd like to point out is the new keeping blade Season Two that is going on every other Friday on the utopia channel on Twitch. But also my stream A Tale of twinkle in awe. Also every other Friday on alternate Fridays at 7:30pm, central time@twitch.com era dat games, I really hope you'll stop by to check it out, either one or both of these streams. You know, this game is something truly special to me. And I really love that we're able to show it off like this. Other than that, I just wanted to remind you all that we are still in the need of more reviews to get us up in the rankings. Every review really helps us out and helps new listeners find the show. And the more that listen to the show, the better. We're just about to hit our three year anniversary on April 2, three years. And really, it's so wonderful seeing you stick with us week after week, and enjoy what we have to offer. I love what we are doing here so much. And I'm really glad we get to help showcase new systems in a way that not many podcasts out there do. And given some insight from people very familiar with the systems, or even the creators themselves has been a really great joy of mine as well. So you know would be a really awesome anniversary gift for both of us. More reviews. So head on over to one of the links for Apple podcasts, pod chaser or Stitcher that we have in the show notes or leave a review anywhere else you can leave them and let us know on Twitter at Creation Cast. We would love to hear from you and we would love to see you talking about the show more online. So in the meantime, thanks for listening, enjoy the outtakes after the credits. Take care, stay safe, and keep making those amazing people. We'll see you next time.
Ryan Boelter 1:08:30
Character Creation Cast is a production of the one shot Podcast Network and can be found online at www dot Character Creation cast.com. head to the website to get more information on our hosts this show and even our press kit. Character Creation Cast can also be found on Twitter at Creation Cast or on our Discord server at discord dot Character Creation cast.com I am one of your hosts Ryan Boelter and I can be found on twitter at Lord Neptune or online at Lord Neptune calm. Our other hosts Amelia Antrim can be found on twitter at ginger reckoning. Music for this episode is used with a Creative Commons license, or with permission from the podcast they originated from. Further information can be found within the show notes. Our main theme music is hero remix by Steve combs, and it's used with a Creative Commons license. This podcast is owned by us under Creative Commons. This episode was edited by Ryan Boelter. Further information for the game systems used and today's guests can be found in the show notes. If you'd like to leave us a rating or review. We have links to various preview platforms out there including Apple podcasts in our show notes. Also check the show notes for links to our other projects. Thanks for joining us. I remember we find that the best part of any role playing game is character creation. So go out there and create some amazing people. We will see you next time.
Amelia Antrim 1:10:16
Now we got to redo show blurbs show blurbs
Unknown Speaker 1:10:19
show show,
Amelia Antrim 1:10:21
show blurbs.
Ryan Boelter 1:10:24
Character Creation Cast is hosted by the one shot Podcast Network. If you enjoyed our show, visit one shot podcast comm where you will find other great shows like total party kill.
Amelia Antrim 1:10:36
Total party kill is a weekly live twitch stream where john Patrick Cohen, Eddie clinker and James Dougan play through cephalo fair games is gloomhaven. Join them in the stream to play along through the action and interact with a constantly changing cast of characters and special guests. Or watch them after the fact on the one show YouTube channel. TPK airs Thursdays at 7pm Central time@twitch.tv slash one shot RPG did it? I did. I think maybe it just like a tiny bit late because my little trackpad is. But it'll be okay.
Tracy Barnett 1:11:11
Yeah, we're all clicked over here clicked
Unknown Speaker 1:11:14
all clicked. All right,
Ryan Boelter 1:11:16
I'm gonna go for it.
Amelia Antrim 1:11:17
Oh, look at Tracy. They're all clicked up over there.
Ryan Boelter 1:11:26
Let's do a little to one. But that's okay.
Amelia Antrim 1:11:28
I always forget Google like you can't in the like the slides app and the docs app and stuff. I can't use my Apple Pencil. And it really bothers me because I pulled it up on my iPad and was like, oh, I'll be able to write in there and draw on. It won't let you. Oh, that's
Unknown Speaker 1:11:43
weird.
Amelia Antrim 1:11:44
That's a bummer. Because they're like, this is Google Ma'am.
Tracy Barnett 1:11:49
Ma'am, this is
Ryan Boelter 1:11:53
Oh, okay. All right. Um, so everything should be all set. I don't know if we're gonna have to alter any of the verbiage about what our characters were in the episode because we are the dungeon right
Unknown Speaker 1:12:08
did I I thought some of that out. But I might have missed some it.
Tracy Barnett 1:12:13
It's a little bit different. But I think it's fine to, to intro it in that way. And then to remind everyone that this game is really different. Yeah. Because you kept in the Tell us about your character section. But like, I like the idea of starting off with that. And all of us going with us. Yeah, it was all
Ryan Boelter 1:12:36
Yeah. All right. Well, if we are all set, I can do five seconds of background silence. And then we can get going
Amelia Antrim 1:12:45
and I can do five seconds of background noise. I'm just kidding. Sorry.
Unknown Speaker 1:12:48
Don't Don't
Amelia Antrim 1:12:50
stop smoking. I'm sorry.
Ryan Boelter 1:12:52
It's all right. All right, here we go. I got I got a call with my right hand cuz my left hands broken. Alright, here we go.
Amelia Antrim 1:12:59
Do we have a soundbite of that? I
Ryan Boelter 1:13:00
feel like we do. We do. We do. Yes we do. Oh, yeah.
Tracy Barnett 1:13:03
I was gonna say if not we should all three just say it with the same cadence and Ryan can real quick just cut them off.
Ryan Boelter 1:13:12
Well, that's what I did for Amelia and I we accidentally said let's make a place at the exact same time. One point. I don't even have to I didn't even have to fix it at all. It was like literally perfectly lined up.
Amelia Antrim 1:13:25
What was that for?
Ryan Boelter 1:13:26
I don't remember. It was like one of the first times that we had to make a place.
Tracy Barnett 1:13:30
Yeah, that's awesome.
Amelia Antrim 1:13:33
Do you have Do I need a tarot deck? I have one. Okay, I don't know where my eyes are. So I think that one
Ryan Boelter 1:13:43
here is a tarot deck.
Tracy Barnett 1:13:44
I have the I have the D 10. And the Tarot deck. And since it's technically a solo game, like, I'll just do out the cards and we'll go from there. Yeah, I I like I said, before we started recording, my whole goal was to make this very easy for y'all. So I have I have got you covered this is you just get to exist in this space and make a dungeon.
Amelia Antrim 1:14:05
It's Your Game. You're on our show, you bring the Tarot deck.
Tracy Barnett 1:14:11
This is this is one of those special special experiences where the person who's on the show is a friend and cares more about you to his people than they do about the show. And so I am bringing my knowledge of the show and my love for both of you to make this so just buttery.
Amelia Antrim 1:14:29
I so sincerely appreciate like I can't even tell you.
Tracy Barnett 1:14:33
It seems like you both like so I thought I would help. Yeah, appreciate it.
Amelia Antrim 1:14:39
Okay, so Brian, what's up with your left hand? You said you broke it's broken.
Ryan Boelter 1:14:43
It's not broken.
Amelia Antrim 1:14:44
Oh, tell me you broke your hand.
Ryan Boelter 1:14:48
So stupid thing. Okay, so this is an aside I'll get put into the outtakes I'm sure. for like two months. I've had some weird like issues with my tendons and muscles and stuff that have gone from my wrist to my elbow. And, and right, right around here on my wrist is like a pain point that if I do anything it just like is like somebody jabbing it with a needle. And it hurts really bad, I got some physical therapy on it. I had worn a full ham brace for a while, but that wasn't doing anything. And then they gave me this dinky little thing. Like, it's like there's this circular thing on there, if you can see it, yeah. And that goes over that little ball in your hand. Yeah, and then these things stretch, to kind of like, add a little bit of squeeze pressure to like both sides. So then it squeezes both sides, and it just holds it in place. So now I can do this, without my hand screaming at me. Oh, that's really nice. If I take this off, that will like, be almost just like, gut wrenching pain that's really
Amelia Antrim 1:15:55
nice. So that it's like not in the way and like it's so
Ryan Boelter 1:15:59
it is so much nicer
Amelia Antrim 1:16:00
because I have like a full like hand one because I have really bad carpal tunnel because funfact apparently pregnancy can give you a carpal tunnel. So I'm at like 24 I had carpal tunnel, and I still do. And those ones that like a full hand one. And let me tell you during a pandemic, when you need to frequently wash your hands, taking that constantly on and off to like, yeah,
Ryan Boelter 1:16:22
I have what I have is carpal tunnel, because it's not like much on the underside person. Yeah, because it's like all on the side. And then like there's some muscles right up in here.
Amelia Antrim 1:16:34
Yeah, and being able to do like this wouldn't be.
Ryan Boelter 1:16:37
Yeah, I still can't do certain things. I can't like press against stuff. Yeah, because if I do that, it like just shoot the pain right through here. But like bracing against a wall going up the stairs or whatever. That's that's how I use the railing with my left hand easily.
Amelia Antrim 1:16:54
Your right hand is alright. I am good. That's good. At least. You're one of those normal people. Okay.
Tracy Barnett 1:17:07
An indication that I am using my weird tarot deck that is a card that does not actually exist in the high Arcana of the regular one. I have time, which I think maps to me drawing a new cart.
Amelia Antrim 1:17:24
Let's get back to the outline.
Ryan Boelter 1:17:29
Yeah.
Amelia Antrim 1:17:31
Okay. We'll do our closer now. Yeah.
Unknown Speaker 1:17:37
To stop recording,
Ryan Boelter 1:17:38
yeah, we can stop recording for the session. And then he,
Amelia Antrim 1:17:44
okay, I did it that time.
Ryan Boelter 1:17:45
I also did it that
Amelia Antrim 1:17:47
correctly. I mean, I did it before too. Too soon. Too soon.
Ryan Boelter 1:17:53
It's fine. Oh,
Tracy Barnett 1:17:57
totally unrelated. But since I want this on a recording, so Ryan will hear it later. Ryan, I am extremely proud of you that you're out as non binary.
Ryan Boelter 1:18:04
Oh, well, thank you.
Tracy Barnett 1:18:06
I think I think that every non binary person needs to hear that especially people like myself who present masks to the world. Because that is not a thing that people expect when you say non binary. Oh, absolutely.
Ryan Boelter 1:18:18
Yeah. And yeah, being being dem I gendered is it's definitely something that not many people are used to hearing about. I certainly didn't know it existed until I read the word rain. This makes too much sense. I,
Amelia Antrim 1:18:41
I had to explain, like being non binary to my mom, because, like, I think Brian, you knew about that whole thing with my sibling school and like
Tracy Barnett 1:18:52
you posted all about.
Amelia Antrim 1:18:54
It was like so my mom, like my sibling, like left it No. And then like, had to run to school and my mom's like, explain. I was like, where do I start?
Tracy Barnett 1:19:06
Okay, your daughter is not your daughter, they're your trice.
Amelia Antrim 1:19:09
And I've been really like, like for parent even like you're going through this that like, the lack of words for things like what do you call your parents sibling? It's like, there are stupid words like, sibling or something like that, that are like stupid and you know, so like, they just call them Mars. Looks like, luckily, my sibling is young enough that they're, they're 13 years younger than me and only 11 years older than Nate, I think. So like closer in age, so it's totally fine to not use like anther uncle or whatever, but it's like, there just aren't words for things and like, Why? Why?
Tracy Barnett 1:19:53
Yeah, like, I encouraged my family very strongly to use they and then I don't really care about uncle that doesn't right there are words that don't hit me with that don't make me feel bad gender and stuff. uncle's one of them because they just don't care. I like Dad, I'm fine with dad non binary dad is actually a pretty cool look for that. I don't like father. I don't like Daddy, right like those those don't. Those don't hit right for me uncomfortable. Yeah, exactly. There's just there's a lot of, for me there's a lot of patriarchal Yeah, and also just weird stuff associated with those to me. But like dad vibes I'm cool with dad. Oops, that's like a, that's a that's a sleeve I fit into.
Amelia Antrim 1:20:44
I think that's the thing too, that like a lot of people don't understand is that like your level of like okayness with things on the gender spectrum are different too. Because like, it took my mom a minute to realize that like my sibling, totally still okay with like dresses and having their room painted pink didn't, you know, it was like, but don't call me by my old name. My mom get super offended at the term dead name. She was like, Great, well, it hurts my feelings. And I was like, my mom is one of those people that it's like, it's about her and you have to like, accept that it's about her. And so I had to tell my sibling I was like, just refer to it as your old name. Because it hurts her feelings because she picked that name for you. And now by using saying dead name, you're like offending her and telling her that you don't appreciate it. And my siblings like, but I use my middle name instead. Which was named after her dad. She's like the first name she picked because it sounded nice with the middle name. So she's like, shouldn't she be less angry about the middle? Like, the whole thing, just don't,
Tracy Barnett 1:21:44
it's the dead has a lot of psychological weight to it. So if you just say old it. And it's, it's tough. I remember because I, between Twitter and all the disk words run together, Amelia, I have no idea where you were talking about this. But I remember seeing you talk all about it. And how like, the age of your sibling factors into it, because they're just like, no respect, this is the thing and they're so hardcore about it. And like, there's no nuance to bring to your mom, who is a super sensitive and like, ya know, it's it's, it's fraught, and it's weird. And even like,
Amelia Antrim 1:22:21
when I like when my mom found out, found out I was by it was sort of like a similar style of conversation to the point where she was like, great. So your whole marriage was a sham? And I was like, I mean, it was but that's not why.
Unknown Speaker 1:22:35
Yes.
Amelia Antrim 1:22:37
whole other thing. But like, you know, it's like, great. So now you've lied to me for all these years. Like, No, I haven't. I haven't lied to you. I just didn't bother to tell you. And here's the thing he knew I was bi before we were married. Like he was fully aware. Everybody was on board. It was fine. Like just
Tracy Barnett 1:22:56
yeah. And then a very practical level. Who Why do you care who the language I'm attracted to?
Amelia Antrim 1:23:03
Well, you Brian. Yeah. I mean, cuz because you'll go
Tracy Barnett 1:23:08
Oh, okay. Now that that's, that's valid and also doesn't I mean,
Amelia Antrim 1:23:12
yeah. Also like, yeah, that don't use birth control. And don't you know, like,
Ryan Boelter 1:23:16
we're like those kind of people. Yeah, for me for some fun outtakes. I keep
Amelia Antrim 1:23:24
every birthday and Christmas now though. I buy my sibling, whatever, like non binary stuff I can find. So like I bought them for their birthday last year a shirt that says all day every day. And this year, I bought them a shirt that says ladies and gentle limbs just so that they can wear it around the house around my mom.
Tracy Barnett 1:23:43
You should get I'm sure you can find it somewhere. It's probably not places but you should get a shirt of warrior Oh, and while Luigi hugs.
Amelia Antrim 1:23:50
Oh, yes.
Tracy Barnett 1:23:53
Because those are the only two representations of like the colors of the non binary flag that I actually like, because I hate the colors of non binary.
Amelia Antrim 1:24:00
I was gonna buy them a shirt with a non binary flag on it and you go on it was like on T public or something. And then you go under that like the options and like you have to select a gender for the shirt. And I was like,
Ryan Boelter 1:24:14
no.
Tracy Barnett 1:24:16
Anyway, let's let's do the show thing.
Unknown Speaker 1:24:20
You're welcome
Tracy Barnett 1:24:21
for all the bonus content.
Ryan Boelter 1:24:22
No, it's fine. I was just gonna go at the end of this episode anyway, so yep. Often I'll have to throw one our language in there, but that's about it. Yeah, I do, like use it that way. It's
Tracy Barnett 1:24:38
a bonus content.
Ryan Boelter 1:24:39
Yeah. It only belongs in the outtakes. And like if I can if I can silence I had to do this in the last episode of series 36 where I literally just silenced the the bad word. And it almost sounds like just a hiccup in the audio recording. Just fine.
Amelia Antrim 1:25:01
Yeah. All right.
Ryan Boelter 1:25:05
There we go press install
Transcribed by https://otter.ai