Dungeons in the Attic

Intro

DITA Cast (0s)

I just always liked acting and I like being a big strong guy that hurts people.

Intro music (2s)

♪ I don't wanna know about your imperfections ♪ ♪ I don't wanna know about your imperfections ♪ ♪ And your actions don't prefer to leave you ♪

Tom Anderson (11s)

Hello everyone and welcome to Basic AF.

Tom Anderson (13s)

I am Tom Anderson, your co-host.

Tom Anderson (15s)

It's a fresh new episode and I am joined as always by my good friend and co-host Jeff Battersby.

Tom Anderson (21s)

Hello, Jeff.

Jeff Battersby (22s)

Tom Anderson! How are you? I'm great. How are your buffalo bills now that you're part of Bills Nation?

Tom Anderson (24s)

I'm doing well.

Tom Anderson (25s)

We're celebrating the Lunar New Year here.

Tom Anderson (27s)

The bills, uh, we're not gonna, we're not doing sports today, buddy.

Tom Anderson (31s)

So no sports, no, no, no.

Jeff Battersby (34s)

I got it. I'm not going to ouch you to Bills Nation, but I think as soon as you put your stamp of approval on the buffalo bills, that was the end for them.

Tom Anderson (44s)

You know, I'm almost inclined to go along with it, but they've

Tom Anderson (48s)

they've come up short so often and I feel so bad for the Bills fans because they're so genuinely nice and

Jeff Battersby (52s)

Yeah.

Tom Anderson (55s)

You know Broncos did that back in the 80s So I know remember that and so it's like there's I think we're brothers and sisters in pain I think that's why we get along so well. Yeah. Yeah, you and me too both. We're brothers in pain as well

Jeff Battersby (1m 2s)

Yeah, okay. Good. Good for you. Excellent.

Jeff Battersby (1m 5s)

Well, yeah, that's a different kind of pain. It's because we talk to each other on a regular basis. That's what causes us pain, but

Tom Anderson (1m 7s)

right So Jeff, this is episode 54, if you can believe that.

Jeff Battersby (1m 12s)

whoo, I can't

Tom Anderson (1m 14s)

So show notes will be available at basicafshow.com/54.

Jeff Battersby (1m 18s)

And Tom we have a guests

Jeff Battersby (1m 22s)

This week. Yeah plural. This is a another plural. So the last show, you know, we had a couple guests on we've we've

Jeff Battersby (1m 30s)

Multiplied by two Tom

Jeff Battersby (1m 32s)

Do us a favor, before we introduce who we have with us, play us a clip.

Tom Anderson (1m 39s)

I'd be happy to.

Welcome Dungeons in the Attic!

Jeff Battersby (1m 56s)

So we'd like to welcome to the podcast for this once every other week thing

Jeff Battersby (2m 2s)

The cast and crew and DM of the Dungeons in the Attic podcast. Welcome aboard

DITA Cast (2m 11s)

Thank you for having us.

DITA Cast (2m 12s)

Hello, hello.

DITA Cast (2m 13s)

Hello.

Jeff Battersby (2m 14s)

Whoo, all right, so Dungeons the Attic I'm gonna let them tell or on themselves in a minute but Dungeons in the Attic is a

Jeff Battersby (2m 23s)

D&D podcast actually technically it's

Jeff Battersby (2m 26s)

a role playing game RPG podcast that's at the time of this recording has just released their seventh episode it's quite good quite good storytelling and I'm gonna hand it off to the Dungeon Master and you can go around everybody can introduce themselves and then we'll get to talking about this because it's really fun podcast and we're really a psyched to have

DITA Cast (2m 49s)

Thank you so much for having us. Hi guys. I'm Michael. I am the dungeon master of

DITA Cast (2m 55s)

The Dita podcast and I am joined by my fabulous players

DITA Cast (3m 1s)

Peter who is playing Cassian. I'm Kristen and I play as a Maeve. I'm Sebastian I'm playing Pleiades and my name is Steve playing Zell

DITA Cast (3m 11s)

Yeah, and that's so this is the the five of us

DITA Cast (3m 15s)

uh... and we have actually a new member joining soon

DITA Cast (3m 19s)

have to listen to the podcast to figure out who that is going to be rates uh... the five of us right now and we've been operating out of peters attic which is where we got the name for dungeons in the attic and uh... yeah we just released our seventh episode which is uh... huge relief for us we read somewhere that uh... most pat most podcast don't survive past don't get to episode seven so releasing episode seven was a big feeling, so we're very--

DITA Cast (3m 49s)

Thank you so much. - Thanks.

Jeff Battersby (3m 50s)

That's awesome, congratulations.

DITA Cast (3m 50s)

Thank you.

DITA Cast (3m 51s)

Thank you so much.

Jeff Battersby (3m 51s)

That's a really, really, really big thing.

DITA Cast (3m 52s)

Thanks.

Jeff Battersby (3m 54s)

So, I know some of you,

Jeff Battersby (3m 57s)

that's how we got you on this podcast.

Jeff Battersby (3m 58s)

And you've been working on this for quite a bit of time.

Backstory & Character Intros

Jeff Battersby (4m 2s)

So why don't you first tell us,

Jeff Battersby (4m 4s)

give us a little bit of backstory

Jeff Battersby (4m 7s)

as to what world we're in and kind of what the back story is for it.

Jeff Battersby (4m 15s)

for this particular crusade that you're currently on.

DITA Cast (4m 19s)

Sure, sure, yeah. So we're playing in the world of Aldebaran. I imagined this world that is... There's a real star called Aldebaran in the Milky Way. It's not far from here.

DITA Cast (4m 36s)

And who's to say if it has any exoplanets that actually can support life? But we imagined this world that is ancient and old, and we imagined this world where Aldebaran...

DITA Cast (4m 49s)

And the star is slowly dying. It's at the end of its life cycle. It's a huge red sun.

DITA Cast (4m 56s)

Essentially, it's a very dying Earth sort of setup. If you've ever read any... The Dying Earth series, those sort of stories of this world that's been through countless civilizations and the histories are just piled on top of each other, civilizations on top of each other.

DITA Cast (5m 18s)

that the world is very

DITA Cast (5m 19s)

strange and very exotic, and it's near its end, essentially. Although, who's to say whether or not the characters know that or not. But they live in this sort of, you know, post-apocalyptic dying world, and right now, the setting we're mainly going to be in is Gajah Den. Gajah Den is the Imperial City, or what once was the Imperial City, which is now sort of decaying after this great empire has fallen.

DITA Cast (5m 49s)

And these four characters are familiar with, live in, or know about the great city of Gajah Den, and they either hail from it or are, well, basically the whole plot and all the drama is going to be centered around Gajah Den and the person who rules Gajah Den, the Witch Queen.

DITA Cast (6m 13s)

And that is going to be our main villain for this season of...

DITA Cast (6m 19s)

Dungeons in the Attic.

Jeff Battersby (6m 21s)

All right, cool. And so you've got four players in this who are in basically exploring or discovering the world

Jeff Battersby (6m 29s)

Kristen, why don't we start with you? Why don't you tell us?

Jeff Battersby (6m 32s)

again, your character's name which I believe is Maeve but

Jeff Battersby (6m 36s)

Tell us Who your character is and what your characters?

Jeff Battersby (6m 42s)

secrets are

DITA Cast (6m 44s)

Oh, all of them? I can't tell all of them.

Jeff Battersby (6m 45s)

Not all of them right you have to listen to the podcast but give us a little give us a little backstory

DITA Cast (6m 46s)

You'll have to listen to the podcast.

Jeff Battersby (6m 51s)

on on your character Maeve

DITA Cast (6m 52s)

Sure, so the essentials of my character is that her name is Maeve.

DITA Cast (6m 58s)

She is probably about 19 years old,

DITA Cast (7m 1s)

and she's a young bard hailing from the city of Gajaden.

DITA Cast (7m 5s)

So in Hyperborea Dungeons and Dragons,

DITA Cast (7m 8s)

the bard class is a subclass of the thief class.

DITA Cast (7m 12s)

So my--

DITA Cast (7m 16s)

--and eventually, for reasons or methods that maybe I won't go into too much detail because it's part of my character development,

DITA Cast (7m 24s)

she learned to pick up instruments, she learned the history of the city of Gajaden,

DITA Cast (7m 30s)

and carries with her a vast array of lore, of information.

DITA Cast (7m 36s)

So she's constantly checking out her environment,

DITA Cast (7m 40s)

racking her memory to see what she knows, if anything around her can offer her--

DITA Cast (7m 44s)

any clues. She loves to talk to people and learn more about what's happening in the city or around the city.

DITA Cast (7m 52s)

She's just-- she's a social character with sort of defensive qualities, I would say, who--

DITA Cast (8m 2s)

whose story I am really eager to explore because we've really only just finished the first chapter of all of this.

DITA Cast (8m 8s)

But that's generally what Maeve is doing. She's a young bard thief, and she kind of--

DITA Cast (8m 14s)

Maeve got lumped in with the rest of these guys in their first adventure, never having met any of them before.

Jeff Battersby (8m 20s)

Okay, and that is one of the conceits at the start of this, correct?

Jeff Battersby (8m 23s)

None of you know each other, is that right?

DITA Cast (8m 26s)

That's correct, yeah. They're all prisoners heading to the same prison, Mirak Mines, high in the Mirak Mountain Range.

Jeff Battersby (8m 33s)

All right, cool.

DITA Cast (8m 34s)

Yes.

Jeff Battersby (8m 34s)

Peter, tell us about your.

DITA Cast (8m 38s)

My character's name's Cassian. He is of a different race than everyone else.

DITA Cast (8m 44s)

He's an Ulfafolk, we call 'em.

Jeff Battersby (8m 49s)

Okay explain sounds like you almost said a heffalump which

DITA Cast (8m 56s)

So they're kind of like an ancient people of this, like, Aldebaran, I guess.

DITA Cast (9m 6s)

And yeah, he-- they're in a way, they're like the elves, I guess, of this world. I would consider them in a way.

DITA Cast (9m 14s)

So they have kind of, you know, this historical background in this world compared to, like, the-- what are the people? The actual humans?

DITA Cast (9m 24s)

Moshem.

DITA Cast (9m 25s)

Moshem, yeah. So they're, like, far older than them.

DITA Cast (9m 28s)

So he comes from, like, the background of-- he's a Runegraver, which is, like, a cleric subclass.

DITA Cast (9m 35s)

And he uses, you know, like, a deity to cast his spells and does, like, weird things where, like, he cuts his hand off.

DITA Cast (9m 44s)

And opens-- reads, like, a rune poem and has to have, like, some sort of medium, like, of stone or bone or, like, a twig or something.

DITA Cast (9m 54s)

And he inscribes runes on them and then, like, says the poem to cast a spell.

DITA Cast (9m 58s)

And he's very, I guess, like, reserved is kind of the word.

DITA Cast (10m 7s)

Yeah, he kind of comes from a background of being lonesome, given he's--

DITA Cast (10m 14s)

you know, kind of like this outsider of the city.

DITA Cast (10m 19s)

Because they don't live in the city, these people.

DITA Cast (10m 22s)

They have, like-- they live, like, kind of out in the woods or the desert areas.

DITA Cast (10m 27s)

And yeah, he kind of got lumped into this with everybody, too.

DITA Cast (10m 30s)

Just visiting the city and being sent away to the mines.

DITA Cast (10m 36s)

Yeah, I mean, I haven't revealed very much about him yet, so I don't want to really give too much away.

Jeff Battersby (10m 41s)

No, no, no.

Jeff Battersby (10m 42s)

Yeah.

Jeff Battersby (10m 42s)

And we don't expect you to do that, but just kind of to give us an idea of who you are and what, what's going on.

DITA Cast (10m 44s)

Yeah.

Jeff Battersby (10m 46s)

All right.

DITA Cast (10m 47s)

Yeah.

Jeff Battersby (10m 47s)

Cool.

DITA Cast (10m 50s)

Yeah, I'm Sebastian. I play Pleiades.

DITA Cast (10m 52s)

Pleiades is a very interesting character because he's the one character that isn't actually a prisoner.

DITA Cast (10m 57s)

You kind of just found him in a coffin in the middle of the desert.

DITA Cast (11m 2s)

They open the coffin and they find this guy with just a completely messed up burnt face who can shoot fire missiles and blind people.

DITA Cast (11m 11s)

He's kind of a very much a fish out of water type character.

DITA Cast (11m 14s)

He's very optimistic because he's kind of like a newborn baby.

DITA Cast (11m 17s)

He's excited about the world and what's in it to the point where it's like a very blinding optimism.

DITA Cast (11m 23s)

Almost to the detriment of others at one point.

Jeff Battersby (11m 27s)

Okay. Steve.

DITA Cast (11m 30s)

Hello.

DITA Cast (11m 31s)

Yeah, so I play a character named Zell.

DITA Cast (11m 34s)

Zell is a Ledger Domainist, which is also a subclass of Thief.

DITA Cast (11m 38s)

So Maeve and I share similarities in that way.

DITA Cast (11m 42s)

But what a ledger to mean is...

DITA Cast (11m 44s)

specifically, is a thief and a magician blend, and they get to choose a class of magic, and the one that I chose for Zell is Illusionist.

DITA Cast (11m 55s)

He likes to blend in, stay on scene.

DITA Cast (11m 59s)

He also is from Gajaden, and he doesn't know Maeve, or at least know her directly.

DITA Cast (12m 7s)

The city's huge and vast, and there's a lot of people, so more than likely they don't know each other, but they're probably in the same.

DITA Cast (12m 14s)

Bars and taverns and stuff like that. So maybe

DITA Cast (12m 17s)

He's heard her music

DITA Cast (12m 20s)

Zell is 21 he is

DITA Cast (12m 24s)

You know very mysterious in a lot of ways he keeps to himself. He doesn't necessarily offer a lot up

DITA Cast (12m 31s)

he I think also there's an element of searching within himself to figure out who he is because

DITA Cast (12m 38s)

Certain things in the story that have yet to be revealed

DITA Cast (12m 44s)

You know are left leaving him wondering

DITA Cast (12m 47s)

Why he is where he is and what his purpose is in life and stuff like that

DITA Cast (12m 54s)

So, yeah, so that's that's pretty much it he's also very daring too he he has no problem kind of

DITA Cast (13m)

Rushing forward and doing whatever it takes

Jeff Battersby (13m 6s)

All right, so I have listened to this podcast, I'm halfway through the sixth episode and oh, you're welcome, my pleasure.

DITA Cast (13m 13s)

Thank you, by the way. Thank you for listening.

DITA Cast (13m 15s)

Thank you, man. Thanks a lot.

Jeff Battersby (13m 19s)

What's been really intriguing to me is how, so we're listening to you discover this world and we're listening to you discover this world as both characters, the characters that you've you've just given us.

The Dynamics of Storytelling in D&D

Jeff Battersby (13m 36s)

is also while it's certainly, you know, running the game and making, you know, has essentially created this world that we're living in.

Jeff Battersby (13m 44s)

But what I find really interesting is the back and forth that all of you are playing with each other.

Jeff Battersby (13m 51s)

So there are moments when, you know, it's Kristen and Peter and Sebastian and Steve and Michael in the room.

Jeff Battersby (13m 57s)

And there are other moments where it's the characters.

Jeff Battersby (14m 3s)

It hit I find

Jeff Battersby (14m 6s)

this really entertaining. The storytelling in this is delightful, and it really is. It feels

Jeff Battersby (14m 16s)

in some ways like some combination between watching someone play a video game,

Jeff Battersby (14m 24s)

you know, being able to kind of see what's going on and kind of having that back and forth that's going on there, and sitting back and having a story told to me, which I really love about it.

Jeff Battersby (14m 36s)

It's an interesting world. You guys get yourself into interesting trouble throughout. Some of this,

Jeff Battersby (14m 44s)

without giving too much away, comes to very errant dice rolls that have not played too well in the favor of the characters. But Michael, first of all, what led you to want to,

Jeff Battersby (15m)

one, create this world, two, start this podcast?

DITA Cast (15m 4s)

Great question. I Spent so much of my creative life

DITA Cast (15m 8s)

Since as young as you know being in middle school trying to write things and trying to write my own stories and I always hit this sort of block where I knew where the story was going and

DITA Cast (15m 21s)

I sort of became bored right like I I I would write out the whole plot in my mind And then I would get bored of the story that I had already written And so I couldn't bring myself to.

DITA Cast (15m 34s)

To actually go and write it and maybe that's a flaw of mine, but I just I kept hitting these blocks where I was like already know how it ends. So I'll just move on to the next story right? I didn't want to spend the time to write it out for someone else to read. I was already bored. That's a problem right for a creative and then I discovered Dungeons and Dragons in college.

DITA Cast (15m 56s)

Some friends of mine had a spot open for a game. They asked me if I'd like to fill in I played.

DITA Cast (16m 4s)

And I my mind was blown. I couldn't believe that there was this medium of storytelling that allowed for the story to be generated on the spot in a way that wasn't just dictated right? We're not just saying and then this happens and then this happens and then this happens, which can feel very contrived and sort of, you know, if good things happen or bad things happen, it doesn't really feel like, you know, they needed to happen that way.

DITA Cast (16m 31s)

it feels like you could have just decided something else or...

DITA Cast (16m 34s)

What are the stakes, right? But there was this game that could generate story in the moment, and there were rules that enforced those happenings, right?

DITA Cast (16m 44s)

So even if I wanted my character to save the day, they might not. And the intensity of that, could this happen? Could it not? What's going to occur every single moment?

DITA Cast (16m 59s)

that was addictive to me. I was like, how do I do more of this?

DITA Cast (17m 4s)

And ever since college, D&D has become this intense passion for me, bringing people around a table to enjoy the energy of each other, to enjoy telling a story together that nobody knows how it's gonna go, including me, the DM.

DITA Cast (17m 20s)

And that's my favorite thing about it is that I can,

DITA Cast (17m 23s)

I'll write little, I'll write, I have an arc, if you will,

DITA Cast (17m 27s)

for the whole, you know, let's say the next 100 episodes.

DITA Cast (17m 31s)

I'd have a general idea of where things should go.

DITA Cast (17m 34s)

But every single episode, every single die roll is carving out the river of this story.

DITA Cast (17m 42s)

Each of these players is designing the story without them even realizing they're doing it.

DITA Cast (17m 47s)

And I think this first chapter is a great example of that.

DITA Cast (17m 53s)

If you listen to the chapter in the second episode, something occurs that basically derails,

DITA Cast (18m)

not derails, but takes the chapter in a whole different direction.

DITA Cast (18m 4s)

And it's that magic of those random die rolls generating story on the spot and the inspiration that comes from that, that's what I love about this kind of work. So that's where I gained that love.

Jeff Battersby (18m 21s)

So let me ask you a question. And Tom, interject at any point in time if you want to. But yeah, yeah. It's like a mic check. So you've, you've created a world. There is talk in the podcast about a map that you've created a bitmap map of your world. But what you're telling me is it while you've kind of

Tom Anderson (18m 26s)

Yeah.

Tom Anderson (18m 29s)

Yeah.

Jeff Battersby (18m 51s)

things, the dice rolls surprise you as much as they surprise

Jeff Battersby (18m 56s)

everybody in the room. So how much story are you? Are you generating? Like, in an improv fashion? I mean, you know, you

Jeff Battersby (19m 7s)

did something happens, somebody makes a decision. And that's,

Jeff Battersby (19m 10s)

that's the interesting thing about this. Tom, and I will both tell you, well, I can't speak for Tom, I can speak for myself that, you know, Dungeons and Dragons and role playing games. When we were kids, it was all part of the scene.

Jeff Battersby (19m 21s)

panic. You know, it was. Yeah, well, but what's interesting,

DITA Cast (19m 23s)

I mean, it's still very much that, don't get us wrong.

Jeff Battersby (19m 31s)

you know, all the all the bad press that that these role playing games God. If anybody who's actually played a role playing game knows that that was BS, you know, there's not.

DITA Cast (19m 45s)

Hmm

Tom Anderson (19m 45s)

and it was right up there with the um playing the rock records backwards you need to get the messages there subliminal mass messages and everything yeah yeah ozzy got dragged to court for that remember that it's a suicide solution song yeah yeah yeah back in the day yeah

Jeff Battersby (19m 49s)

Yeah, yeah. Backmasking, man.

Jeff Battersby (19m 52s)

Right.

Jeff Battersby (19m 58s)

Yeah, yeah.

DITA Cast (20m)

Yeah, a couple of them yeah got sued for that right yeah, that's funny

Jeff Battersby (20m 3s)

Yeah, so.

DITA Cast (20m 5s)

Yeah, the Beatles I think had one of those on the white

Jeff Battersby (20m 5s)

But...

Jeff Battersby (20m 7s)

Oh, yeah, absolutely they did. Yeah, yeah.

Tom Anderson (20m 8s)

I believe they did, yeah.

DITA Cast (20m 9s)

In a little Nicky they have one in Chicago has one

Jeff Battersby (20m 14s)

Oh, wait, Chicago the Band?

DITA Cast (20m 15s)

Yeah, it's in the movie Little Nicky, the Adam Sand movie, he plays it backwards and he goes, I command you in the name of Lucifer to spread the blood of the universe.

DITA Cast (20m 25s)

[LAUGH] >> It's just like Chicago kicks ass.

Jeff Battersby (20m 25s)

That's, that's, that's very funny.

DITA Cast (20m 29s)

[LAUGH] >> My favorite scene.

Jeff Battersby (20m 36s)

Anyway, um, what my point being, um, this is very much storytelling.

Jeff Battersby (20m 45s)

And I, I think what surprises me most is, uh, how surprised not only They are the characters when they discover something.

Jeff Battersby (20m 55s)

They have a dicey dice roll, but Michael, you have a couple of "Oh no" moments in these.

DITA Cast (21m 4s)

Boy, oh boy, I every single time I put a

DITA Cast (21m 10s)

Combat encounter so everything that happens is usually called an encounter, right?

DITA Cast (21m 15s)

You're either meeting a new character that you're gonna talk to or you're meeting some giant spider that you're gonna have to fight that They're all called encounters and every time I create a what I call a combat

DITA Cast (21m 24s)

Encounter it doesn't have to end up with combat, right?

DITA Cast (21m 27s)

they can figure it out and figure a way around it, but every time I put something in front of them that wants to kill them I Panic I

DITA Cast (21m 34s)

every single time because

DITA Cast (21m 36s)

You're and I'm not a computer. I can't determine what the percentages are of them surviving these encounters. I don't have the time

DITA Cast (21m 44s)

That a game developer has to balance everything to make sure that players feel like they've had a fair challenge

DITA Cast (21m 50s)

so I put these things in front of them with a just a basic, you know, just my my my

DITA Cast (21m 56s)

experience having run these games for this many years of what I think is gonna be a fair in combat encounter and I just have to hope the dice fall in.

DITA Cast (22m 4s)  

• Yeah, Mike actually has a dab pad.

DITA Cast (22m 7s)

You can see him sweating, and he's, (panting)

DITA Cast (22m 11s)

"Please survive."

Tom Anderson (22m 14s)

Bye.

DITA Cast (22m 15s)

He's like, "I'm not gonna die."

DITA Cast (22m 17s)

Yeah, he's like, "I'm not gonna die."

DITA Cast (22m 18s)

Yeah, he's like, "I'm not gonna die."

DITA Cast (22m 19s)

Yeah, he's like, "I'm not gonna die."

Tom Anderson (22m 25s)

So let so real quick that yeah, real quick.

DITA Cast (22m 28s)

Please survive.

Jeff Battersby (22m 33s)

Tom, you were gonna say something?

The Role of the Dungeon Master

Tom Anderson (22m 36s)

So for people that may not be familiar with the concept and everything and how the, how the game operates.

Tom Anderson (22m 41s)

So as dungeon master, what is your primary role?

DITA Cast (22m 46s)

My responsibility at all times is to entertain and the way you do that, the way you do that,

DITA Cast (22m 52s)

which is, I think this is the most concise way to do that, to entertain, is you create challenges and you don't create challenges that have one solution. You create challenges that are open-ended, right? I made a mistake in the second episode of creating a puzzle that had one solution and that, I knew that rule already going into it, but I second-guessed

DITA Cast (23m 16s)

myself because I was like, "Oh, I'm doing something new. I'm making a story. Maybe I should do like a traditional puzzle." That was a mistake because any sort of challenge in D&D that has only one solution is not going to be an entertaining challenge. Entertaining challenges in D&D allow the players to work together to talk about and create their solution.

DITA Cast (23m 41s)

So a great example is just a gorge, right? Something to cross over, right? And you don't

DITA Cast (23m 47s)

they have to knock over a tree and let it land so they can cross it. You let them decide how they're going to do it. Maybe they've got a teleportation spell. Maybe they've got somebody who can jump really far. Maybe they want to throw a rope, but you just let them enjoy the challenge and then you give them another challenge after that. And all you got to do, it's very basic.

DITA Cast (24m 6s)

I've learned that it's a very simple formula. You just create challenges one after the other

DITA Cast (24m 12s)

that allow them to think creatively and that are varied.

DITA Cast (24m 15s)

So you do.

DITA Cast (24m 16s)

A physical puzzle here, they gotta get across this gorge.

DITA Cast (24m 19s)

Then you have an encounter with a troll and you gotta fight that.

DITA Cast (24m 22s)

So we've had a physical puzzle and a combat puzzle and then you hit them with a role play puzzle.

DITA Cast (24m 28s)

So now they gotta talk to this king and convince him to let them be on his land, right?

DITA Cast (24m 33s)

So you give them each a little bit of a different part of a story.

DITA Cast (24m 37s)

Combat, a physical challenge, chatting with a character,

DITA Cast (24m 41s)

and you just give them these challenges that they can overcome in whatever way they see fit and they're going to be entertained.

DITA Cast (24m 47s)

And that's my formula.

DITA Cast (24m 49s)

But that's my responsibility as a Dungeon Master, essentially.

Jeff Battersby (24m 50s)

Okay. Awesome. That's the only way to do

DITA Cast (24m 54s)

That's my take on it.

DITA Cast (24m 56s)

I can't claim that to be the official way that Dungeons & Dragons TM operates.

DITA Cast (25m 1s)

But that's how I do it.

DITA Cast (25m 3s)

And it's a very stressful experience.

DITA Cast (25m 5s)

You're trying to make sure that the people in the room are having a great time.

DITA Cast (25m 8s)

And you've got to find the most efficient way to do that every single week.

DITA Cast (25m 12s)

And I think I found something that works for me.

Jeff Battersby (25m 16s)

Cool. Let's, Tom, play a clip. Maybe the spider clip is a good choice.

Tom Anderson (25m 22s)

All right, all right, here we go.

Tom Anderson (25m 26s)

Okay, so instead of you firing this arrow,

Tom Anderson (25m 28s)

what happens is you lift your bow and you pull back.

Tom Anderson (25m 33s)

And you hit Zell.

Tom Anderson (25m 34s)

And just as you pull back,

Gameplay Experiences

Tom Anderson (25m 37s)

the black mask that's blocking the tunnel unfurls.

Tom Anderson (25m 44s)

And you see these glinting eyes, dozens,

Tom Anderson (25m 47s)

it looks like dozens of eyes, some of them big,

Tom Anderson (25m 50s)

some of them small, spread out all around its head.

Tom Anderson (25m 52s)

And the giant spider unfurls its long...

Tom Anderson (25m 57s)

Fire missile.

Tom Anderson (26m 1s)

I don't want this to end.

Tom Anderson (26m 2s)

ts long spindly legs and its fangs,

Tom Anderson (26m 6s)

hairy fangs come out dripping venom.

Tom Anderson (26m 11s)

And it starts moving forward towards you,

Tom Anderson (26m 14s)

blocking the whole tunnel.

Tom Anderson (26m 16s)

I'm gonna shoot at one of its eyes with my flame missile.

Tom Anderson (26m 19s)

That would be fun if you could get the first.

Tom Anderson (26m 22s)

initiative so let's roll initiative. Oh yes that's right.

DITA Cast (26m 27s)

That still makes my skin crawl. - I'm so funny.

DITA Cast (26m 30s)

Sebastian does this every combat encounter we have.

DITA Cast (26m 34s)

I'm in the middle of a description, and he's like, "I'm going to stab it now."

DITA Cast (26m 37s)

Or any time there's any description of something, "I'm going to grab that."

DITA Cast (26m 41s)

"I'm going to go look at that."

DITA Cast (26m 43s)

Which he's not wrong to do. He's basically trying to skip the cutscene.

DITA Cast (26m 47s)

Yeah, yeah, yeah. - Skip the cutscene.

DITA Cast (26m 49s)

The dialogue, like, "Yep, yep, yep, and mission's over."

Tom Anderson (26m 53s)

I, I think I'm going to borrow that at work next time someone pisses me off.

DITA Cast (26m 53s)

Nah.

Tom Anderson (26m 56s)

I'm just going to scream out fire missile.

DITA Cast (26m 58s)

[LAUGH] >> That's good, yeah.

DITA Cast (27m 1s)

We gotta make that into a shirt one day.

DITA Cast (27m 3s)

[LAUGH] >> That image of you pointing with the smile and it says fire missile, yeah.

DITA Cast (27m 8s)

I love it.

Jeff Battersby (27m 10s)

So, this clip, it's from episode what?

Jeff Battersby (27m 14s)

Which episode was that in?

DITA Cast (27m 16s)

That is episode 7. Of 8.

Jeff Battersby (27m 17s)

Okay, so that's the one I haven't even listened to.

Jeff Battersby (27m 19s)

No wonder I didn't recognize it.

DITA Cast (27m 22s)

Yes, yeah, if you're on 6 you got, yeah, you're just about.

Jeff Battersby (27m 24s)

I got a little ways to go to catch up to that one.

Jeff Battersby (27m 28s)

But one of the things I want to point out, you're doing...

Jeff Battersby (27m 32s)

There's a lot going on here.

Jeff Battersby (27m 34s)

You've got some sound design going on.

Jeff Battersby (27m 36s)

You've got...

Jeff Battersby (27m 38s)

And I know you give credit to, I guess, where you're getting these clips from.

DITA Cast (27m 43s)

Sirenscape, it's a website that provides royalty-free music as long as you sign up for their monthly charts.

Jeff Battersby (27m 48s)

Okay

DITA Cast (27m 51s)

They're great.

Jeff Battersby (27m 53s)

Awesome, yeah, but it's it what's interesting is, you know that that whole scene even even though I mean What was that Tom that was under probably under a minute worth of yeah worth a worth of audio

Tom Anderson (28m)

About a minute

Jeff Battersby (28m 4s)

It was pretty intense

Jeff Battersby (28m 6s)

so to the players

Jeff Battersby (28m 10s)

What What are you guys feeling in these moments as you're as you're playing this game with you know?

Jeff Battersby (28m 18s)

as you're discovering the spider

DITA Cast (28m 21s)

I think I'm pretty accurate to my character. I'm kind of very excited to kill this thing

DITA Cast (28m 27s)

So immediately saying Oh giant monster. I'm like, I can't wait to just strangle this thing with my bare hands

DITA Cast (28m 36s)

For me it's remarkable because you're as the as the player you're watching it unfold and watching the story come to life before you but As the character it's a reality

DITA Cast (28m 46s)

So I am looking at my character sheet looking at the spells that I have trying to assemble

DITA Cast (28m 51s)

the room, the other people around me, what kind of state of health is everybody in, you're trying to be ready to take action, whether that's to fight or to flee.

DITA Cast (29m 1s)

You're really there are two kinds of things happening where you're enjoying the story,

DITA Cast (29m 5s)

but you're also participating.

DITA Cast (29m 6s)

So it's really incredible.

Jeff Battersby (29m 9s)

So you made mention of something Kristen called a character sheet and again for those that aren't kind of in the club, you know, who have not maybe ever played a role-playing game. Can you just explain what it is that you're talking about?

DITA Cast (29m 25s)

Sure, so a character sheet is essentially a small piece of paper that has a lot of information on it that dictates how your character will play or can affect different situations.

DITA Cast (29m 39s)

So the five, or the six rather, the six main stats in Dungeons & Dragons, or maybe specifically our campaign, are Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma.

DITA Cast (29m 53s)

And so, based on these stats...

DITA Cast (29m 55s)

You can use whatever you have a higher score in to play effectively in a particular scenario.

DITA Cast (30m 3s)

So, we have your character stats, and then I also have how much health I have.

DITA Cast (30m 8s)

What die do I roll when I'm using my weapon?

DITA Cast (30m 11s)

What kind of weapons do I have?

DITA Cast (30m 13s)

What kind of things am I carrying in my knapsack?

DITA Cast (30m 16s)

All of this information is on my quick reference character sheet that I look at just to double check how I'm going to play for a particular character.

DITA Cast (30m 25s)

And if you're in different types of campaigns playing different characters,

DITA Cast (30m 29s)

you'd have a different character sheet breakdown that you could easily reference for many different situations.

DITA Cast (30m 35s)

Does that kind of make sense?

Jeff Battersby (30m 36s)

Yeah, it does. And when you say, you know, so you have for for each of those traits that you have, you have different

Jeff Battersby (30m 46s)

levels. Is that something you decide? Or is that something that you, you know, in the process of beginning this game that you're rolling dice to kind of figure out what you actually get strength wise or health wise? Or how is that decided?

DITA Cast (31m 3s)

Yeah, Mike or anybody at the table, you can correct me if I yeah, maybe Steve can speak to this.

DITA Cast (31m 8s)

Steve is really our technical guy.

DITA Cast (31m 10s)

He's big into rules, big into the technicality of everything.

DITA Cast (31m 13s)

And he'll often point at our character sheets and say, Oh, actually, you roll a you roll a D6 on this.

Jeff Battersby (31m 17s)

All right, Steve, hit it. Tell us.

DITA Cast (31m 18s)

Yeah. So yeah, Steve, speak to this.

DITA Cast (31m 20s)

Yeah, I'm the I'm the I'm the bad guy.

DITA Cast (31m 22s)

I'm like, Oh, you didn't follow that rule.

DITA Cast (31m 25s)

You know, I try to I like to play as authentic as possible.

DITA Cast (31m 29s)

So, you know, what's on the player sheet matters.

DITA Cast (31m 33s)

What's determined is when you're creating your character,

DITA Cast (31m 37s)

the character sheet that Kristen just talked about outside of your name and a lot of the creative things which you just come up with on your own,

DITA Cast (31m 45s)

your strength, your decks, constitution, intelligence, wisdom and charisma.

DITA Cast (31m 48s)

Those are all rolled.

DITA Cast (31m 49s)

And each game you roll different set of dice.

DITA Cast (31m 53s)

In this case, you roll to determine like your strength, for example,

DITA Cast (31m 58s)

you would roll 46 and you take the three.

Jeff Battersby (32m 2s)

Okay, explained. Just because, again, for the non-nerdy birds out there.

DITA Cast (32m 4s)

So.

DITA Cast (32m 7s)

I'm a non there. Yeah.

DITA Cast (32m 8s)

So a D6 is a six sided dice and you're rolling these four dice to determine what that number is going to be within strength.

DITA Cast (32m 16s)

And in this particular game, the system we're using, it says if you're going to roll for strength decks, constitution, intelligence, wisdom and charisma,

DITA Cast (32m 24s)

you have to roll 46.

DITA Cast (32m 26s)

After you roll those 46, you take the three highest and you add them together.

DITA Cast (32m 30s)

So let's say you got a 6, a 3.

DITA Cast (32m 34s)

And you take the 2 away, you add 6, 3, and 3 together, and you get that number, and that's your strength.

DITA Cast (32m 41s)

And then you go on, and you do the same thing for every other particular attribute.

Jeff Battersby (32m 46s)

Okay, and and when you face a a challenge and something happens to you. Do you lose?

Jeff Battersby (32m 54s)

Like can if you have a strength of six can it go down to five four three or

DITA Cast (33m)

It's it doesn't typically but it can depending on what sort of monster you're facing So there are certain monsters in the world of D&D that can drain

DITA Cast (33m 12s)

Certain stats. Yes, like like vampires. For example, they're

DITA Cast (33m 17s)

One monster that can sap a certain

DITA Cast (33m 21s)

Attribute but generally speaking your attributes stay the way they are and with each attribute is attached either a certain

DITA Cast (33m 30s)

Minus which then goes into so on the on the player sheet. There's something called like a stat block and each stat block has a certain

DITA Cast (33m 39s)

Minuses and pluses depending on what you had rolled in each of these attributes

DITA Cast (33m 43s)

so then when you roll your d20, which is generally what you're doing to determine most things outside of I don't get too complicated outside of d6 which is

DITA Cast (33m 53s)

Usually used for tests of strength or decks or things like that

DITA Cast (33m 57s)

They just these numbers give you bonuses

DITA Cast (34m)

So, let's say you're doing something

DITA Cast (34m 3s)

That's strength related and you have a 16th strength out of 18 Usually it's you know, 18 and is the highest and I believe 9 is the lowest right?

DITA Cast (34m 12s)

No, it can go it can go all the way down to zero zero Yeah, but the an average score is around 9 10 11 or 12, right?

DITA Cast (34m 20s)

If you've got somewhere around 16, that's pretty high strength. Yeah, so you would roll and you roll a d20 which is a 20-sided dice, and let's say you got a.

DITA Cast (34m 31s)

And let's say your strength is a 16.

DITA Cast (34m 33s)

That might give you, just making this up off the top of my head, it'll give you a plus two.

DITA Cast (34m 37s)

So now you roll that 15, and then you would add the plus two so you actually rolled a 17, and that will help you,

DITA Cast (34m 44s)

hopefully, pass a certain thing you're trying to do,

DITA Cast (34m 48s)

whether it's to hit a monster, or to jump a small gap,

DITA Cast (34m 52s)

or climb a building, whatever it is.

DITA Cast (34m 54s)

But essentially, on the sheet, you have these attributes,

DITA Cast (34m 58s)

they're rolled and whatever.

DITA Cast (35m)

They are you get plus or minus so that you then put in each stat block according to what attributes you're talking about and

DITA Cast (35m 6s)

there's a lot of complexities to

DITA Cast (35m 9s)

This particular game because it's an older system. So it's a lot more

DITA Cast (35m 14s)

Little nuanced things that I don't want to you know get into because it gets a little bit more complicated But you also have saving throws and movement speed and things like that

DITA Cast (35m 22s)

obviously movement, you know like an average would be let's say 30 30 feet and if you're playing on a map and

DITA Cast (35m 29s)

and each square.

DITA Cast (35m 30s)

is a good idea.

DITA Cast (35m 37s)

that again, depending on all these stats that are rolled out, which are fundamentally the building blocks to your character,

DITA Cast (35m 44s)

will hopefully add to everything else.

DITA Cast (35m 47s)

So like your saving throw, if you rolled very high on something,

DITA Cast (35m 50s)

that will give you a higher saving throw.

DITA Cast (35m 53s)

If you're in a precarious situation, Mike would say,

DITA Cast (35m 56s)

"Alright, roll a saving throw for disease, or a saving throw..."

DITA Cast (36m 1s)

for death, or something like that.

DITA Cast (36m 3s)

And then you would have, for example,

DITA Cast (36m 6s)

Peter's character, Cassian, he has a saving throw of a 16,

DITA Cast (36m 8s)

so if he has to roll and make it...

DITA Cast (36m 11s)

Sorry, I don't mean to give that away.

DITA Cast (36m 14s)

If he has to roll to save, he has to roll his D20,

DITA Cast (36m 17s)

and he has to get above a 16.

DITA Cast (36m 19s)

16 or above.

DITA Cast (36m 20s)

Yeah, 16 or above.

DITA Cast (36m 21s)

And you hope you don't have any minuses that were, let's say he rolled a 16,

DITA Cast (36m 25s)

and then he had a -1 somewhere on his stat block that would now take that away

DITA Cast (36m 30s)

and now he fails his save and there's a penalty to that and all.

DITA Cast (36m 33s)

But that's basically it.

Jeff Battersby (36m 33s)

Got it. All right. Very cool. Go ahead.

DITA Cast (36m 35s)

It's a good lead-in, I think, to our philosophy as a group,

DITA Cast (36m 41s)

is that there are technically a lot of rules in D&D,

DITA Cast (36m 46s)

but we don't want them to take center stage.

DITA Cast (36m 49s)

We want the rules to be guide rails that help us keep the game moving forward,

DITA Cast (36m 56s)

forward an engine but we there are there are a lot

DITA Cast (37m 1s)

like for example movement speed we don't use that we're using theater of the mind so we're not playing with five inch squares we're playing in this created space in our head so we ignore movement speed there's also rules for encumbrance like how much you're carrying and if that slows you down we ignore that unless it becomes something that is dramatically interesting right like this they're carrying you know like Zell is unconscious and they're trying to carry him across the desert then that's then that's dramatically interesting.

DITA Cast (37m 30s)

But there's a lot of things that we forego from the system's rules in order to facilitate story first.

DITA Cast (37m 38s)

And even the creators of D&D, Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson, would tell you a lot of these rules you don't need.

DITA Cast (37m 44s)

They're there if you want to get into the nitty-gritty, but there's very basic concepts you can use to facilitate any story.

DITA Cast (37m 51s)

So as intimidating as all that sounds, it's important for people that have not played D&D to know that you need to know very little to have.

DITA Cast (38m)

of fun with this system.

Jeff Battersby (38m 3s)

Awesome. Yeah, I will say, in my experience listening to this podcast, it's obvious that story is central, not the rules of the game, so to speak. Which I find really enjoyable.

Jeff Battersby (38m 20s)

Like I said, it's very narrative in terms of what's going on story-wise. And again,

Jeff Battersby (38m 25s)

it's clear that you guys are really, you're really enjoying what you're doing.

DITA Cast (38m 27s)

Thank you so much.

Jeff Battersby (38m 33s)

Just as a reminder, I'm a poet, Terry Gross here. We're talking with the cast of the Dungeons in the Attic podcast, and this is The Basic AF Show. And we're going to go to NPR affiliates for the news. So, Tom, why don't you play the next clip?

Tom Anderson (38m 54s)

All right, here we go.

Tom Anderson (38m 57s)

Finally, your vision becomes clear.

Tom Anderson (39m)

These are not trees at all.

Tom Anderson (39m 2s)

They're three charred corpses affixed to wooden stakes.

Tom Anderson (39m 7s)

And what's more, there's something wrong with them.

Tom Anderson (39m 11s)

They're human and not quite human.

Tom Anderson (39m 14s)

The man finishes cutting down one of the corpses and it falls to the ground with a sickening crunch.

Tom Anderson (39m 20s)

He turns to you and you can see that look in his eyes.

Tom Anderson (39m 25s)

He's been you.

Tom Anderson (39m 26s)

He knows exactly what you're going through.

Tom Anderson (39m 30s)

This is what they will do to you if they ever find you.

Tom Anderson (39m 34s)

This is why you have no family.

Tom Anderson (39m 37s)

To them, you are dead.

Tom Anderson (39m 40s)

We are family now.

Tom Anderson (39m 42s)

You and I.

Tom Anderson (39m 44s)

Cassian, you awaken and remember where you are.

Jeff Battersby (39m 53s)

And so with that clip, we now have to add a trigger warning to the beginning of the

Jeff Battersby (39m 57s)

corpse trigger warning to the beginning of the podcast episode.

DITA Cast (40m)

Well, we do tag the explicit tag for our podcast, just in case, because we do have some violence and some gory descriptions sometimes.

Jeff Battersby (40m 4s)

We'll say that again.

Jeff Battersby (40m 9s)

That's fine.

Jeff Battersby (40m 16s)

That was really great.

Jeff Battersby (40m 17s)

That was a really great segment.

Jeff Battersby (40m 18s)

So unlike your characters in this, uh, in this.

Jeff Battersby (40m 23s)

podcast and Dungeons in the Attic, the people that are getting together, uh,

Jeff Battersby (40m 27s)

each of you, uh, knew each other well beforehand, you know, you didn't just show up and start doing this podcast.

What Led to DITA?

Jeff Battersby (40m 32s)

Why don't you tell us a little bit about how the five of you got together and

Jeff Battersby (40m 37s)

what precipitated the, uh, the idea of actually creating a podcast around, uh,

Jeff Battersby (40m 46s)

uh, an RPG.

DITA Cast (40m 48s)

Absolutely. So I, my, my wife and I, Kristen, and I, we moved to Beacon.

Jeff Battersby (40m 56s)

"What? You guys are married? No, I didn't. Okay, great."

DITA Cast (40m 58s)

Wait, really?

DITA Cast (41m)

During COVID.

Tom Anderson (41m)

Jeff, you didn't know this?

DITA Cast (41m 4s)

We're all finding out for the first time. Congratulations.

DITA Cast (41m 7s)

Nice to meet you. During COVID, Kristen and I moved to Beacon.

DITA Cast (41m 12s)

And I was in the throes of my, you know, I'm at home a lot. I

DITA Cast (41m 18s)

want to play, I've been wanting to get a group together to play RPGs for so long. And at that time, Kristen was playing a little bit here and there. But it wasn't necessarily something she was ready to put aside time for she was working on a lot of creative projects. So I had to find a group. And when I got to

DITA Cast (41m 35s)

Beacon, I ran into Steve at a bar. And we got to talking about D&D. And we sort of just impromptu decided we were going form a little group and then we.

DITA Cast (41m 48s)

I found a couple of other friends of ours that I met basically that year.

DITA Cast (41m 54s)

And we formed a little tiny group in Beacon.

DITA Cast (41m 57s)

And we were playing out of our friend's apartment and having a blast.

DITA Cast (42m 1s)

And eventually those campaigns ended after a year or so.

DITA Cast (42m 5s)

And I was looking to play again.

DITA Cast (42m 8s)

I was sort of, you know, it was a dry season again.

DITA Cast (42m 12s)

And I was looking for another group.

DITA Cast (42m 14s)

I, uh, Steve and I, we sort of were like, all right, let's, let's put together.

DITA Cast (42m 18s)

another game. Who can we get? And we, uh, talked to Peter, who I knew from my job and Sebastian,

DITA Cast (42m 27s)

who I actually knew through a coworker as well. Um, and they'd never played before, but we sort of knew each other a little bit. And we said, Hey, you know, you want to play D and D with us.

DITA Cast (42m 39s)

And they joined us and we started playing January of last year. So that's 2024, January of 2024.

DITA Cast (42m 48s)

Playing during a big snowstorm. And we played this game called shadow dark. It's basically D and D,

DITA Cast (42m 53s)

but rules light version. And we stayed up until, I don't know, past midnight during the snowstorm,

DITA Cast (43m 1s)

just having a blast doing this really introductory little dungeon. And, and we were all just, they,

DITA Cast (43m 7s)

Sebastian had never played, uh, any D and D before. And I, I mean, I won't speak for you,

DITA Cast (43m 12s)

Sebastian, but you know, yeah. So the way the.

Jeff Battersby (43m 14s)

Now tell us about that, Sebastien, because that's kind of interesting.

DITA Cast (43m 18s)

I was introduced to this was kind of weird. It was just very happenstance where it was a new year's Eve party that my sister invited me to shout out to Louisa. Uh, I just had no plans.

DITA Cast (43m 31s)

And I was like, she's like, you got to come over, you know, he'll meet people, have fun. And I was like, all right, fine. And then I made, well, I knew Pete beforehand because Louisa is dating Pete.

DITA Cast (43m 41s)

Oh, I know I knew Pete. And then I met Steve and Michael that night. And they're like, Oh,

DITA Cast (43m 47s)

You should totally like

DITA Cast (43m 48s)

Play with us and in my head i'm like yeah, you know I'll just play like a session or two and then I could just go back to my computer where I like to be

DITA Cast (43m 56s)

but then like I think maybe first session I like immediately fell in love with like

DITA Cast (44m 2s)

immersing myself into a world and acting like a completely different person because I just always liked acting

DITA Cast (44m 9s)

And I like being a big strong guy that hurts people

Jeff Battersby (44m 14s)

Are you that in real life?

DITA Cast (44m 16s)

Uh, no, he's a gender driver.

DITA Cast (44m 19s)

I would like to seem like I am, but I'm really not.

DITA Cast (44m 23s)

Yeah, so we started playing.

DITA Cast (44m 25s)

We were having a great time and we kept meeting up for these just, you know,

DITA Cast (44m 28s)

casual, uh, impromptu sessions.

DITA Cast (44m 30s)

And we would play for hours at Pete's house and we decided to move everything up into his attic so that we wouldn't be bothering his girlfriend Louisa while she's trying to watch something or have some friends over.

DITA Cast (44m 42s)

So we're upstairs, not that she was bothered by it.

DITA Cast (44m 44s)

She loves us and loves the group, but you know, give her some space.

DITA Cast (44m 48s)

The attic, which is sort of a recording studio for Peter.

DITA Cast (44m 51s)

He's a really talented musician and a singer.

DITA Cast (44m 55s)

And he's, he's been in several bands.

DITA Cast (44m 57s)

Um, and he has a lot of experience, a lot of equipment.

DITA Cast (45m)

And that wasn't on our minds when we started, uh, started hanging out in the attic and rolling some dice, but we played this whole campaign together.

DITA Cast (45m 8s)

I think we did like six, seven months of play together meeting up, I think every week and long hours too.

DITA Cast (45m 15s)

We would play it five, six hours, five, five o'clock and go to a.

DITA Cast (45m 18s)

Yeah.

DITA Cast (45m 19s)

And the beauty of it too is, uh, you know, when Mike was telling me about it, so Shadow Dark was a Kickstarter that, um, me and Mike both, um, threw money at and when he got it,

DITA Cast (45m 31s)

he was really excited to play and he asked me and I was like, yeah.

DITA Cast (45m 34s)

And he was like, yeah, I just want to, you know, do like two or three sessions.

DITA Cast (45m 37s)

That's it.

DITA Cast (45m 38s)

You know, I just want to just try this little thing.

DITA Cast (45m 39s)

You know, it wasn't even supposed to be what it is today, which you know, is, is amazing,

DITA Cast (45m 43s)

you know, cause this family is, that we've become is amazing.

DITA Cast (45m 48s)

maybe two, three sessions,

DITA Cast (45m 49s)

want to see how the mechanics go and see what the story's like and yeah.

DITA Cast (45m 53s)

And then fast forward,

DITA Cast (45m 54s)

we ended up doing six months of this story and we went through all this.

DITA Cast (46m)

We got to max level and they were super powerful.

DITA Cast (46m 2s)

They went from zeros to heroes, super powerful characters,

DITA Cast (46m 5s)

defeated the villains and saved the world and it was just awesome.

DITA Cast (46m 9s)

We had a great time.

DITA Cast (46m 10s)

But at the end of that, at the tail end of that,

DITA Cast (46m 13s)

we started getting this idea like,

DITA Cast (46m 14s)

wouldn't it be fun to record these episodes for us to listen to, just for us?

DITA Cast (46m 18s)

And we broke out the mics and started recording.

DITA Cast (46m 20s)

And then that turned into us being like,

DITA Cast (46m 22s)

well, Sebastian was like, oh, what if I did sound effects?

DITA Cast (46m 25s)

And Peter was like, oh, what if I made some music for it?

DITA Cast (46m 29s)

And Steve was like,

DITA Cast (46m 31s)

oh, what if I got our characters drawn up?

DITA Cast (46m 33s)

And suddenly we were just, without even meaning to,

DITA Cast (46m 36s)

starting to move in this creative direction where we were turning it into a show, but we didn't know it.

DITA Cast (46m 41s)

And then we kind of looked at each other one day and we're like, why don't we make a podcast?

DITA Cast (46m 45s)

Like, let's just do it.

DITA Cast (46m 46s)

And other people are doing it.

DITA Cast (46m 48s)

And we're like, okay, let's do a big one.

DITA Cast (46m 49s)

And there's also the Glass Cannon Podcast that we listened to, and we loved those guys.

DITA Cast (46m 54s)

And they're big.

DITA Cast (46m 55s)

And why can't we do it?

DITA Cast (46m 57s)

So we bought the mics and we,

DITA Cast (47m)

you can see it in our promotional photos,

DITA Cast (47m 2s)

Peter soundproofed the whole attic,

DITA Cast (47m 5s)

as much as he could anyway.

DITA Cast (47m 7s)

And we bought a table and got to work.

DITA Cast (47m 10s)

And that's where it came from.

DITA Cast (47m 12s)

But I think it really generated from watching all of us contribute.

DITA Cast (47m 18s)

All of us suddenly saying, "I'll do this and I want to do this and I want to do this," and I'd never seen that before.

DITA Cast (47m 24s)

And Steve had been poking me for like three years to start a podcast, and I kept saying, "No, no, no, that's a lot of work. No, no, let's just have a fun time. Let's be casual."

DITA Cast (47m 36s)

And then when I saw everybody contributing and getting excited, I had to say yes. And then, you know, we sort of fell into it in a beautiful way.

DITA Cast (47m 44s)

Yeah, and then after, you know, and then after we formed it, you know, Mike had...

DITA Cast (47m 48s)

basically came to us and said, you know, "I think I want to bring in another person to this to, you know, open it up a little bit."

DITA Cast (47m 56s)

And he...

DITA Cast (47m 57s)

It was sort of four guys just saying, like, "Oh, that'd be cool.

DITA Cast (47m 59s)

Oh, yeah, that'd be cool."

DITA Cast (48m)

"Yeah, would this be tight?"

DITA Cast (48m 1s)

"Yeah."

DITA Cast (48m 2s)

You know, and then he...

DITA Cast (48m 3s)

You know, I had played with Kristen many times in other sessions that...

DITA Cast (48m 11s)

She would jump into...

DITA Cast (48m 12s)

Yeah, jump into that, you know, Mike would be, you know, running with a bunch of other people and stuff like that.

DITA Cast (48m 17s)

And so, he said, you know,

DITA Cast (48m 18s)

to all of us, you know,

DITA Cast (48m 19s)

I really want to bring Kristen in.

DITA Cast (48m 20s)

I think she would be dynamic for the podcast, you know,

DITA Cast (48m 24s)

all of her theater skills and her voice and all that stuff.

DITA Cast (48m 27s)

And we were like, yeah, duh, like, of course bring her in.

DITA Cast (48m 30s)

Yeah.

DITA Cast (48m 31s)

And, you know, she's here and it's amazing.

DITA Cast (48m 33s)

Yeah.

DITA Cast (48m 34s)

I mean, in our previous campaign,

DITA Cast (48m 35s)

we did have a female character that was just basically controlled by everybody.

DITA Cast (48m 39s)

Oh yeah.

Jeff Battersby (48m 40s)

Yeah, power to the patriarchy great, that's good [laughs]

DITA Cast (48m 45s)

No, no, no.

DITA Cast (48m 45s)

I played, I played the f***ing character.

DITA Cast (48m 48s)

I played, you played, you played her, but I was the voice.

DITA Cast (48m 51s)

Yeah, yeah, I played her and Steve rolled for her.

DITA Cast (48m 55s)

Yeah. And she was like often disappointed in the decisions.

DITA Cast (48m 58s)

Yeah. So there was always like that empty space that we kind of were like missing somebody there. And she perfectly filled that role for us.

DITA Cast (49m 6s)

You were looking for the female perspective to say, no, boys, we are not doing that.

DITA Cast (49m 11s)

That's mean and bad.

DITA Cast (49m 12s)

Rude. Yeah.

DITA Cast (49m 13s)

And so, yeah, I do really I love playing with these guys.

DITA Cast (49m 17s)

I'm flattered that they asked.

DITA Cast (49m 19s)

And I do feel like I'm able to give them like a bit of a feminine perspective and kind of open the story up a little bit in the way that I can. I've really been enjoying it so far.

Jeff Battersby (49m 31s)

Yeah, I'm gonna agree with that. I really love the fact that it's not four dudes sitting in a closet playing a game.

DITA Cast (49m 40s)

Because you would listen back to those recordings and be like, there's a little something missing here because we're all agreeing with each other, basically, you know, and there's just like a little energy that we knew had to be corrected.

Jeff Battersby (49m 48s)

No.

Jeff Battersby (49m 49s)

It's a beautiful day.

DITA Cast (49m 56s)

And getting Kristen on was perfect.

DITA Cast (49m 59s)

She is the final missing piece of this puzzle.

Jeff Battersby (50m 2s)

Yeah, I definitely love that. It's a it's a nice it adds. I will say it adds a lot to your storytelling.

DITA Cast (50m 8s)

I totally agree. She had so much.

DITA Cast (50m 10s)

For sure.

Jeff Battersby (50m 12s)

Alrighty. So Tommy, you got anything?

Tom Anderson (50m 16s)

I do actually, if you don't mind, okay because I know we're getting close on time but um so with with the episodes and you mentioned early on when we started Michael that you had you know maybe a hundred um in mind how much time would you say per episode goes into kind of the creative prep work maybe laying the framework for for the story and and the arc of what you might have in that particular episode and then.

Jeff Battersby (50m 18s)

Okay. No, I know. Yeah, we are. So hit it.

Pre-Gaming Strategies

Tom Anderson (50m 46s)

I don't know if you guys do like pre meetings beforehand to kind of game plan, you know, here's kind of what we're going for. But as you mentioned there. Um, a bit ago, a lot of those is dynamic and it can change based on roles and things that come up. So I'm just curious, like, how much of kind of preparation.

DITA Cast (51m 8s)

That's a great question. And this is something that a lot of DMs struggle with dungeon masters. That's what that stands for is

DITA Cast (51m 15s)

How much prep work to put in to the game, right?

DITA Cast (51m 19s)

There's a general rule of thumb out there that says in an hour of gameplay

DITA Cast (51m 26s)

Those characters can get up to about three things

DITA Cast (51m 31s)

Three not not overly intense but three generally

DITA Cast (51m 35s)

things, right? They can maybe explore

DITA Cast (51m 38s)

one chamber, right? Then do one puzzle, and then have one combat encounter in about an hour. That's a really rough estimate, right? So we structure our podcast to be an hour and about 15 or an hour 30 at the most for digestibility for our listeners, mostly, but also for me, because it is a lot of prep

DITA Cast (52m 4s)

behind the scenes. So what I do is I essentially.

DITA Cast (52m 9s)

After an episode pardon me after an episode ends.

DITA Cast (52m 12s)

I'll start thinking about where I want to take things next and what sort of challenges will be novel that I have in mind and then I will sit down usually the day before and do two hours of prep and I will sketch out basic ideas and then the day of I I make sure I have off those days and the day of I'll spend in the morning.

DITA Cast (52m 35s)

I usually go usually go to a cafe, and I'll spend

DITA Cast (52m 38s)

Another two hours refining.

DITA Cast (52m 40s)

So it's essentially a four hour process for me.

DITA Cast (52m 44s)

Yeah, two of those being generative and two of those being polishing.

DITA Cast (52m 48s)

And then you mentioned how things can sort of go off the rails and random dice rolls can take things in odd directions.

DITA Cast (52m 55s)

And that is another skill that a DM has to have is you have to be able to roll with the punches,

DITA Cast (53m)

especially because players are known.

DITA Cast (53m 5s)

This is sort of like the big joke of players.

DITA Cast (53m 8s)

Indeed, they're known for ignoring what you have prepared and deciding to do something entirely different that catches their eye and you have to be ready for that at all times.

DITA Cast (53m 20s)

And what that means is instead of prepping storylines and plots that can easily be derailed, you prep tools, you prep situations, right?

DITA Cast (53m 33s)

right? You prep challenges and those things these sort of ideas of challenges.

DITA Cast (53m 38s)

And tools can be inserted anywhere you need them, right? So if I want to create a magic item that can fuse two things together, you put one in one end and one in the other and it fuses together two things, that's a tool, right? And that tool doesn't necessarily need to be something that happens right away or happens when I say it, when, when it should narratively, it's in the world and I've prepped it and it's ready to go. And a challenge can be brought anywhere and inserted anywhere. So...

DITA Cast (54m 8s)

It's... You're gonna be more efficient with your prep time if instead of prepping this rigid railroad storyline,

DITA Cast (54m 15s)

you're prepping tools and scenarios that you can then free-form throw out when you need to.

DITA Cast (54m 23s)

Now, I just want to preface that by saying that not every DM runs their game that way, and there are multiple ways to have fun.

DITA Cast (54m 31s)

That's how I have fun. That's all.

DITA Cast (54m 33s)

Yeah, I also think, too, because Tom had asked this, is there any, like, pre-meeting on, like, what direction we want to go?

DITA Cast (54m 38s)

Oh, right.

DITA Cast (54m 39s)

Everything is spontaneous. We are literally creating it on the fly. There's no... I mean, the only pre-meeting we have is Krista leads us through a warm-up to get our voices ready, our minds awake, and, you know, bodies feeling loose, but...

DITA Cast (54m 54s)

Yeah, we have no idea what we're gonna get to.

DITA Cast (54m 56s)

We have no idea what we're doing, how it's gonna happen, you know what I mean? You know, we know the story, we know what's going on within that moment, but, you know, we never sit down beforehand and say,

DITA Cast (55m 8s)

"Tom's gonna do this and Maeve's gonna do that," because, you know, we're carving the story out with our imaginations, with the help of the dice roll, with, you know, Mike leading us through everything that we make, whether it's a reward or a consequence.

DITA Cast (55m 23s)

So it's a surprise for everyone, and, you know, it keeps you on your toes, because you have to be ready for, you know, every moment, especially the role-playing stuff. You know, you can get into it, into the weeds with role-playing, which...

DITA Cast (55m 38s)

You know, creates, you know, a lot of relationship-building and, you know, furthering and deepening of a story or stories. You know, combat, I mean, you know, we don't know.

DITA Cast (55m 49s)

I mean, one bad role, and all of a sudden, combat takes half an hour longer than we ever anticipated. And one good role, and all of a sudden, Mike's like, "Oh, I didn't really prep anything after this." But you never know that, because he has all these tools on his belt or behind the screen that he uses, and all of a sudden, it's like, just...

DITA Cast (56m 8s)

that magic. Yeah and and I think ultimately a DM needs experience to understand what it feels like when the characters have completely ignored what they're what he's prepared and he has to just make it up. Oh sorry we got some dogs. Dogs are loose.

Tom Anderson (56m 25s)

[LAUGH] It's a regular occurrence on this show, so.

Jeff Battersby (56m 25s)

Hey, there's a dog in every episode or the episode's a dog all by itself.

DITA Cast (56m 27s)

But you know it's it's very similar to being a stand-up comedian in the way

Tom Anderson (56m 32s)

[LAUGH] That happens.

DITA Cast (56m 38s)

sometimes you're gonna bomb and that's gonna be an experience for you. I've played games and run games where the what I've come up with doesn't land and it's not as much fun as I was hoping it would be and it's just that one of those things where you got to keep doing it and keep bringing things to the table and keep trying and try to be as freeform as you can because you will eventually get a sense for what your strengths are and you will play into them and you'll know what your weaknesses are and you'll prep those so

DITA Cast (57m 8s)

right like a list of names I'm bad with coming up with names on the fly so I have a list of names ready to go.

Tom Anderson (57m 13s)

pull from, right? Yeah. And I think that spur of the moment element, you know, brings some of the

Tom Anderson (57m 21s)

genuine reactions, uh, to the episodes where it's, you're not really sure what's coming up next.

Tom Anderson (57m 27s)

Um, like in the clip we listened to there with the fire missiles. Um, and I think it, it seems authentic, not, not scripted. You know what I mean? So it's like, oh, that happened. And you're and you're like, "Oh God, not this again."

Jeff Battersby (57m 41s)

Yeah, sometimes that's exactly what he says.

Tom Anderson (57m 41s)

But you didn't know that was coming.

Tom Anderson (57m 43s)

But... (laughs)

DITA Cast (57m 46s)

And then what's even more fun about that is that I said,

DITA Cast (57m 49s)

"If you roll a good initiative, I'll let you do that."

DITA Cast (57m 52s)

And guess what he did?

DITA Cast (57m 53s)

He rolled top initiative.

DITA Cast (57m 54s)

So he got to do it right off the bat.

DITA Cast (57m 56s)

Which Sebastian does almost all the time.

DITA Cast (57m 59s)

It's amazing, he's, I don't know.

DITA Cast (58m 2s)

I'm a shoot first, ask question later is gonna get me.

DITA Cast (58m 6s)

But I also, you know, I compare D&D to,

DITA Cast (58m 10s)

I could choose your own adventure book and I--

DITA Cast (58m 11s)

I feel when we're playing, people are listening to us,

DITA Cast (58m 16s)

tell them a story, and when it comes to that part where they have to choose which way they're gonna go and they're either gonna go to page 38 or 105 and see what happens, we're just doing,

DITA Cast (58m 26s)

we're picking for them.

DITA Cast (58m 29s)

So, you know, that's the part I like about it is we don't know and we only do after we make that decision

DITA Cast (58m 36s)

with a dice roll.

DITA Cast (58m 37s)

It's exhilarating, honestly.

Jeff Battersby (58m 41s)

All right. Well, we really appreciate having all of you on.

Where to Find DITA

Jeff Battersby (58m 46s)

Michael, Kristen, Peter, Sebastian, Steve.

Jeff Battersby (58m 49s)

You have an amazing social media presence.

Jeff Battersby (58m 52s)

Why don't you tell us where we can find you,

Jeff Battersby (58m 54s)

including where we can subscribe?

DITA Cast (58m 59s)

Absolutely, so we are at Dita podcast. That's D ITA podcast on Instagram

DITA Cast (59m 7s)

We have our Spotify page

DITA Cast (59m 10s)

Dungeons in the attic that we're operating primarily out of Spotify right now And we're trying to get on other platforms that should be done

DITA Cast (59m 19s)

Very soon within the second week of February will be basically everywhere

Jeff Battersby (59m 25s)

I can't wait so I don't have to go to Spotify to listen.

DITA Cast (59m 25s)

Yes people asking.

DITA Cast (59m 29s)

I know a lot of people asking us to make sure we're on Apple, so we're getting there, we promise.

DITA Cast (59m 34s)

Also, Sebastian, what were you going to say?

DITA Cast (59m 37s)

Well, I am the zoomer of the group because I am the youngest one, so I'm in charge of the TikTok.

DITA Cast (59m 43s)

That's right.

DITA Cast (59m 44s)

And soon we'll be rolling out some YouTube videos,

DITA Cast (59m 47s)

which for some reason they let me be in control of.

DITA Cast (59m 52s)

I'm very excited for everyone to see that soon.

DITA Cast (59m 55s)

And what's our TikTok?

DITA Cast (59m 56s)

our tiktok is adidapodcasts

DITA Cast (59m 59s)

tiktok, youtube, instagram, spotify, and we're on x as well we also have a patreon, dungeons in the attic, and we'll give you guys all those links as well and then

Jeff Battersby (1h 21s)

They've already won up this time. They're on Patreon.

Tom Anderson (1h 21s)

Yeah. Yeah. Well, I know we haven't asked, so we don't know that's true yet.

Jeff Battersby (1h 25s)

Nobody wants to pay for this.

Jeff Battersby (1h 30s)

No, no, yeah, we haven't asked.

Tom Anderson (1h 31s)

But yeah, if you'll drop all those links in the show note, we'll make sure that they go into the actual show note for the episode so people can can pull those up. Yeah.

DITA Cast (1h 35s)

Yes, you got it. Yeah, absolutely

Jeff Battersby (1h 38s)

Awesome. All right. Um, as a reminder, you can always get to us at feedback@basicafshow.com. You can also send us little messages from your favorite podcast app, including

Close

Jeff Battersby (1h 50s)

voicemails and all that jazz.

Jeff Battersby (1h 51s)

So feel free we do we do like your contact even when you say that Tom and I look like idiots because we do. The show music Psychokinetics Celsius 7 really grateful as I've said many times fits who we are to a T and what's going on here and our podcast art is Randall Martin Design so highly encourage you to Check out Psychokinetics, check out...

DITA Cast (1h 1m)

Thank you.

Jeff Battersby (1h 1m 21s)

Celsius 7. Celsius 7 got a ton of stuff. You might get him to let us put out his playlist, publish his playlist somewhere, but he's got a lot of stuff out there that is well worth listening to. And Tommy, I think that's it. What do you got to say? Yeah, I think so.

Tom Anderson (1h 1m 38s)

That's it.

Tom Anderson (1h 1m 40s)

All right, Michael, Kristen, Peter, Sebastian, Steve.

Tom Anderson (1h 1m 44s)

Thank you all so much for coming on.

Tom Anderson (1h 1m 45s)

We really do appreciate it.

DITA Cast (1h 1m 45s)

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much

Tom Anderson (1h 1m 46s)

It was fun.

Tom Anderson (1h 1m 47s)

I didn't know what to expect and, uh, and I enjoyed it.

Tom Anderson (1h 1m 49s)

It was a lot of fun.

Jeff Battersby (1h 1m 50s)

Roll the dice, Tom.

DITA Cast (1h 1m 51s)

Our pleasure, thank you so much guys

Tom Anderson (1h 1m 54s)

All right.

Tom Anderson (1h 1m 55s)

And listeners, thank you guys for hanging out with us as always.

Tom Anderson (1h 1m 58s)

Um, as we've said a hundred times, not really, it's 54 times.

Tom Anderson (1h 2m 2s)

Um, there are a lot of choices for this type of content and we're honored that you spend some time with us.

Tom Anderson (1h 2m 9s)

And until next time, please do have a great rest of your day or your night.

Outro Music (1h 2m 12s)

I don't wanna know about your imperfections, dude Prefer to leave you on a pedestal so I'll improve 'Cause if I'm finding out you know that I'm just like you That gon' smash my whole world, lost in illusion

Jeff Battersby (1h 2m 14s)

See ya!