DMs After Dark

Honor + Intrigue | Episode 1: Slow Dueling in a Burning Villa

Out there in the vast expanse of ocean lie countless islands full of opportunity, treasures unclaimed, and mysteries waiting for fortunate, or maybe unfortunate, souls to come bring back into daylight...
 
100 years ago a French ship went missing - its crew and cargo assumed to be lost to time... until now.  Recently, a survivor has been spending the gold long thought gone with that ship, and rumors are swirling about an island with more gold than you can spend in a lifetime left for the taking.  The French and Spanish are already looking for clues, and our rowdy crew of pirates are being hired by the British to beat them to it. 
 
Can they retrieve the mysterious map from a bustling Spanish villa?  Will the pasts of our pirates (and penitent man of the cloth) come back to haunt them?  What awaits our crew on this strange island?
 
If you enjoy our streams, podcasts, or just our general nerdiness, please consider giving us a rating on your podcast app of choice! Like, follow, and subscribe to our Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram so you can comment & chat with us about all things RPGs.  
And, as always, come hang out and catch our live streams on our Twitch or catch up on our YouTube.
 
Music in the Episode:
Sailing Through The Wide Sea by MusicLFilesFree download: https://filmmusic.io/song/6243-sailing-through-the-wide-seaLicense (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-licenseArtist website: https://cemmusicproject.wixsite.com/musiclibraryfiles
The Wellerman by Alexander Nakarada (www.serpentsoundstudios.com)Licensed under Creative Commons BY Attribution 4.0 License

I Have the High Ground One-Shot

Before it even starts, before a sword is swung, a blaster pulled, or punch thrown, the dramatic dance of words, taunts and snide remarks sets up that tension, the stakes, the honor on the line...
 
Welcome to our 2 player one-shot of Jess Levin (Jess from Online)'s wonderful new game I Have the High Ground, a wonderful collaborative game about banter, posturing, and capes in the moments that lead up to a confrontation. 
 
Christian & Rene reprise their roles from the very first series we ever streamed, Dragomir and Jaoved from Troy's Shadows of Esteren series.  First, it was a blast to revisit these characters and the world of Esteren.  Second, this game is so good at staying simple in its mechanics and out of its own way to just keep the drama high, help you come up with fun banter between rounds and interactions.  And third, it's concise with us playing in less than an hour and a half, two players is so accessible for people without big gaming groups, and even if you do have a big table, you can EASILY use this game as a little bonus mini-game to ramp up tension and roleplay in a pivotal scene (in fact, Rene already has a plan to use this in his homebrew game)!
 
Please, please, don't sleep on this one and go check it out, it's a BLAST!
 
If you enjoy our streams, podcasts, or just our general nerdiness, please consider giving us a rating on your podcast app of choice! Like, follow, and subscribe to our Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram so you can comment & chat with us about all things RPGs.  
And, as always, come hang out and catch our live streams on our Twitch or catch up on our YouTube.
 
Music in the Episode:
Behind The Sword by Alexander NakaradaFree download: https://filmmusic.io/song/4755-behind-the-sword License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license Artist website: https://www.serpentsoundstudios.com/

Honor + Intrigue Character Creation

Yo ho! Ahoy! Arrgh ya landlubbers! Other vaguely piratey things to say!
 
Welcome to the Session 0 and Character Creation portion of our new series for Honor + Intrigue, a swashbuckling adventure RPG by Chris Rutkowsky, published by Basic Action Games.  Jess will be running us through her first series and we have a lot of fun exploring this game system and building some pretty cool characters, if we do say so ourselves.
 
If you enjoy our streams, podcasts, or just our general nerdiness, please consider giving us a rating on your podcast app of choice! Like, follow, and subscribe to our Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram so you can comment & chat with us about all things RPGs.  
And, as always, come hang out and catch our live streams on our Twitch or catch up on our YouTube.
 
Music in the Episode:
Sailing Through The Wide Sea by MusicLFilesFree download: https://filmmusic.io/song/6243-sailing-through-the-wide-sea License (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-license Artist website: https://cemmusicproject.wixsite.com/musiclibraryfiles
The Wellerman by Alexander Nakarada (www.serpentsoundstudios.com)Licensed under Creative Commons BY Attribution 4.0 License

1d6 | 1d4 - The DMies 1 Minute Preview Edition

You know what time it is! Chaos time courtesy of Sara's brain child 1d6 | 1d4!
 
For the first time we only have 1 minute each to talk about our topic, and this week's topic is...
 
Our first ever hopefully annual award show - The DMies!  We're going full Hollywood and making a big ol' spectacle of ourselves to pat each other on the back, laugh about dumb stuff we've said on the internet, and occasionally actually compliment one another on awesome moments from our first year in streaming.
 
The DMies will be live sometime in late September, because (I think) that's when the awards season is, but I don't actually know.
 
Anyway, if you enjoy our streams, podcasts, or just our general nerdiness, please consider giving us a rating on your podcast app of choice! Like, follow, and subscribe to our Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram so you can comment & chat with us about all things RPGs.  
And, as always, come hang out and catch our live streams on our Twitch or catch up on our YouTube.
 
Music in the Episode:
Queen Of Hearts (remake) by Mikael HellmanFree download: https://filmmusic.io/song/6902-queen-of-hearts-remakeLicense (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-licenseArtist website: https://filmmusic.io/artists/mikael-hellman

Pine Island One-Shot

Well hello there campers! Welcome to Camp Pine Island, a wonderful little tract of wilderness you'll be exploring all summer long!  Nothing at all is haunted, dangerous, or creepy at all, and the summer's going to be just peachy... right?
 
Thank you for checking out another installment of our one-shot shenanigans, this time with Rene running the DMs through he and Christian's original game Pine Island, a summer camp horror game using Caltrop Core, a d4 system by Lex Kim Bobrow and designed as part of DriveThruRPG's Pocket Quest game jam!
 
Join Christian, Sara, and Troy as they create campers to experience a pretty awful first night at summer camp!
 
If you enjoy our streams, podcasts, or just our general nerdiness, please consider giving us a rating on your podcast app of choice! Like, follow, and subscribe to our Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram so you can comment & chat with us about all things RPGs.  
And, as always, come hang out and catch our live streams on our Twitch or catch up on our YouTube.
 
Music in the Episode:
Headless Horseman by Alexander NakaradaFree download: https://filmmusic.io/song/6740-headless-horsemanLicense (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-licenseArtist website: https://www.serpentsoundstudios.com/
Atmospheres #6: Lost by Brian Holtz MusicFree download: https://filmmusic.io/song/7243-atmospheres-6-lostLicense (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-licenseArtist website: https://brianholtzmusic.com

Modified Rolls - Resolution Mechanics

Roll dice. Flip cards. Spend tokens. Pull the wooden block.
This episode of Modified Rolls breaks down the different types of resolution mechanics in roleplaying games and why they're important for providing a certain kind of experience.  From the mathematics of probability underlying the success/failure ratio of games to the tactile aspect of cards (just ask Amber & Christian how they feel about cards), different mechanics just feel different and might be more or less appropriate for the game you're trying to play.
 
Disclaimer: Rene & Christian argued a little but it was all in good spirit and constructive criticism, we're still nerdy buds who make and play games together.
 
Please rate us on your podcast app of choice and catch our live streams alternating Friday nights over on Twitch or catch up on our games over on our YouTube.
Like, follow, and subscribe to our Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
Feel free to email us with questions, comments, or just to tell us how awful our ideas are at DMsAfterDark@gmail.com
 
Music in the episode:
Energetic Upbeat by WinnieTheMoogFree download: https://filmmusic.io/song/6033-energetic-upbeatLicense (CC BY 4.0): https://filmmusic.io/standard-licenseArtist website: https://linktr.ee/taigasoundprod

Short Order Apocalypse Advanced One-Shot

Welcome to Hjem, we've got all things to make your house a Hjem... *sigh*...
 
In this one-shot between our Invisible Sun and upcoming Honor + Intrigue series, Sara runs us through Short Order Apocalypse Advanced by SaintBaileys on itch.io The game itself is available as Pay What You Want on Itch (https://saintbaileys.itch.io/), and is also featured in the Tiny Tome collection of short rules-light RPGs.
 
Christian, Jess, and Rene play as employees of a certain northern European based furniture store who have had enough of the retail grind and make a deal with a new employee, a one Lucy Fheir, to bring about the end of the world. The game is fast, funny, and super easy to jump right into.
 
If you enjoy our streams, podcasts, or just our general nerdiness, please consider giving us a rating on your podcast app of choice! Like, follow, and subscribe to our Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram so you can comment & chat with us about all things RPGs.  
And, as always, come hang out and catch our live streams on our Twitch or catch up on our YouTube.
 
Music in the Episode:
Song: SFRNG, Madzi, Just Isac & Custody - No Way BackMusic provided by NoCopyrightSoundsFree Download/Stream: http://NCS.io/NoWayBack

Modified Rolls - Mining Media for Your RPGs

I don't know about all of you out there in RPG podcast-land, but I'm a pretty typical millennial, binging TV series on streaming platforms and dealing with piles of books to-be-read that somehow just keep growing despite my best efforts.  Well, what if I told you literally everything you ingest makes great building blocks for your RPGs?!  Your in luck, because all you gotta do is a little bit of work and all your favorite things you wanna talk to your friends about but they haven't seen or read is gold for your games!
 
Take Home Points: Re-skin & re-flavor - don't copy your favorite characters, locations, or villains without changing them to be appropriate for your game; practice capturing the feel of your favorite media with words, since you likely won't have visuals that portray that like on screen; imitate accents!
 
Please rate us on your podcast app of choice and catch our live streams alternating Friday nights over on Twitch or catch up on our games over on our YouTube.
Like, follow, and subscribe to our Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
Feel free to email us with questions, comments, or just to tell us how awful our ideas are at DMsAfterDark@gmail.com
 
Music in the episode:
Startup  by Alex-ProductionsLink: https://filmmusic.io/song/9439-startup- License: https://filmmusic.io/standard-license

[Bonus] Invisible Sun Review

Greetings one more (but maybe not the last) time from the Actuality.  Christian sits down with Rene and Sara to talk a little bit about his process prepping for and running Invisible Sun.  We talk about the game from a design perspective, Christian's thought process for the concept of the Hollow Men and Elpada, and rates the game.
 
We hope to do more of these in the future following our series of games, and are working on a rating system to let you know our thoughts on the games we pick and play moving forward!
 
If you enjoy our streams, podcasts, or just our general nerdiness, please consider giving us a rating on your podcast app of choice! Like, follow, and subscribe to our Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram so you can comment & chat with us about all things RPGs.  
And, as always, come hang out and catch our live streams on our Twitch or catch up on our YouTube.
 
Music in the Episode:
Song: Lochlainn - The Garden [NCS Release]Music provided by NoCopyrightSoundsFree Download/Stream: http://NCS.io/TheGarden Watch: http://youtu.be/tZYlqiGgKQ4

Invisible Sun Finale - The Citadel of the Bornless One

It started with dreams.  Dreams of Shadow.  Dreams of each of our characters' goals and desires.  It, too, ends in dreams.  The Deeps of Sleep hold the headquarters of the Hollow Men and the Bornless One plots to erase the very concept the young girl Elpada represents.
 
Bridget shows her true self.  Darcian has a theory.  Henri guides the crew through strange new planes.  Istanbull guards his friends.  Frey has a score to settle.
 
If you enjoy our streams, podcasts, or just our general nerdiness, please consider giving us a rating on your podcast app of choice! Like, follow, and subscribe to our Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram so you can comment & chat with us about all things RPGs.  
And, as always, come hang out and catch our live streams on our Twitch or catch up on our YouTube.
 
Music in the Episode:
Song: Lochlainn - The Garden [NCS Release]Music provided by NoCopyrightSoundsFree Download/Stream: http://NCS.io/TheGarden Watch: http://youtu.be/tZYlqiGgKQ4