Episode 26: It Was Good Enough For Shakespeare.

NPC Cast Episode 26: It Was Good Enough For Shakespeare.

In this episode, NPC Chris and NPC Del talk about how you can use classic story structure to plan your RPG sessions! (51min)

Some things we discuss on this episode:

Robert McKee: A famous writing instructor guy.

The Bones Kickstarter: A successful miniatures Kickstarter project by Reaper Miniatures.

NPC CAST: YOUR PLACE FOR FACE TO FACE GAMES.

Total Party Kill – Angels Over Bourbon Street – Episode 5

TPK: Angels Over Bourbon Street – Episode 5

Welcome to the NPC Cast ACTUAL PLAY! The guys are joined by their friends Matt C. and Grace as they make their way within a World of Darkness! [I could have taken any number of out of context quotes to have been placed here.]

Rise of Aester: A LARP around the Seattle area, which Friend-PC Grace helps run!

NPC CAST: YOUR PLACE FOR FACE TO FACE GAMES.

Campaign Diary: Ark, The Eternal Refuge – Hidden Info

By NPC Aaron

I apologize for the lack of an article last week.  I will try to prevent that from happening in the future. The email portion of my campaign did not go as well as I had hoped, and I was left with very little to write about.  This was nobody’s fault but my own, but it did serve to remind me of a valuable GM lesson, and I’ll start today’s article with that. Afterwards, I’ll explain some ways you can best utilize hidden information in your games.

Episode 25: 3 Men and a Shinto.

NPC Cast Episode 25: 3 Men and a Shinto.

In this episode, the guys design three bullet-point games based around one of the legends of the silver screen! (57min)

Some things we discuss on this episode:

Red Dragon Inn: A game about drinking that isn’t necessarily a drinking game.

Wordsmith:  A fast-paced word game by Alistair Wong.

Maggibot: A game blog by our good friend Marguerite!

Nicolas Cage’s IMDB: Yeah. That.

NPC CAST: YOUR PLACE FOR FACE TO FACE GAMES.

Total Party Kill – Angels Over Bourbon Street – Episode 4

TPK: Angels Over Bourbon Street – Episode 4

Welcome to the NPC Cast ACTUAL PLAY! The guys are joined by their friends Matt C. and Grace as they make their way within a World of Darkness! Ain’t no sunshine.

Rise of Aester: A LARP around the Seattle area, which Friend-PC Grace helps run!

NPC CAST: YOUR PLACE FOR FACE TO FACE GAMES.

Episode 24: DXV is the Homie.

NPC Cast Episode 24: DXV is the Homie.

In this episode the guys chat about deckbuilding games, and tell you what it is they like (and don’t like) about them! (52min)

Some things we discuss on this episode:

Dominion: The OG deckbuilder, by Donald X. Vaccarino.

Ascension: A deckbuilding game co-designed by a number of professional Magic the Gathering Players!

Core Worlds: A sci-fi deckbuilder by Andrew Parks

Legendary: A deckbuilding game set in the Marvel Universe.

Resident Evil Deckbuilding Game: Pretty much what it says.

Miskatonic School for Girls: A deckbuilder by Luke Peterschmidt

High Command: The upcoming Privateer Press deckbuilding game!

Fate Core on Drive-Thru RPG: The largest source of online RPG PDF distrubution, now with many pay-what-you-want options!

Free RPG Day: A day, for Free RPG’s.

Rory’s Story Cubes: A dice-based storytelling game, suitable for youngsters!

NPC CAST: YOUR PLACE FOR FACE TO FACE GAMES.

Total Party Kill – Angels Over Bourbon Street – Episode 3

TPK: Angels Over Bourbon Street – Episode 3

Welcome to the NPC Cast ACTUAL PLAY! The guys are joined by their friends Matt C. and Grace as they make their way within a World of Darkness! No doubt.

Rise of Aester: A LARP around the Seattle area, which Friend-PC Grace helps run!

NPC CAST: YOUR PLACE FOR FACE TO FACE GAMES.

Campaign Diary: Ark, The Eternal Refuge – The Hook

by NPC Aaron

Last week we talked about character creation and world-building.  We fleshed out character concepts and the parts of the cities they came from.  That was the easy part.  Now we move on to the first session, which is honestly the hardest part.  The first session is like a first impression, you only get to make it once.  If your players don’t buy in for the first session then its going to be hard to get them to buy in at all.

Getting Your Players To Care

Your players need to have something in common.  They can already be part of a formed organization, they can have a mutual ally bring them together for a task, or they can be forced to go through some ordeal together.  I usually go with the third option for my games because then I can give the players as much freedom in character creation as possible since my games are more open world sandboxes than predestined stories.

Looking over last week, our character’s only common thread is that they all hang out at Eaton’s Alehouse.  This was by design so that I could bring them together by threatening it.  I came up with a small adventure hook to capitalize on this.  I decided that a crime lord in a neighboring district was having trouble with his competition and had decided to try to move his protection racquet to the peaceful neighborhood of Greenstreets.

Episode 23: The Campaign Crucible!

NPC Cast Episode 23: The Campaign Crucible!

cru·ci·ble  – Noun

1) A ceramic or metal container in which metals or other substances may be melted or subjected to very high temperatures.
2) A place or occasion of severe test or trial: “the crucible of combat”.

In this episode, the guys each introduce 1 ingredient and forge a campaign concept from all 3! (61min)

Some things we discuss on this episode:

Savage Worlds: A universal RPG that can accommodate a variety of settings.

Fate Core: A pay-what-you-want RPG from Fred Hicks and the folks at Evil Hat.

Spark RPG: An RPG by Jason Pitre.

Kingdom RPG: A World-Buiding RPG that is on Kickstarter now!

Welcome to Night Vale: A fictional podcast in the style of community updates. With mysterious happenings!

Free RPG Day: A day, for Free RPG’s.

NPC CAST: YOUR PLACE FOR FACE TO FACE GAMES.

Total Party Kill – Angels Over Bourbon Street – Episode 2

TPK: Angels Over Bourbon Street – Episode 2

Welcome to the NPC Cast ACTUAL PLAY! The guys are joined by their friends Matt C. and Grace as they make their way within a World of Darkness! Please don’t sue us CRJ.

*Our apologies, as there was a slight audio error in this episode when it was first released. An artifact from the otherwise impeccable and in no way amateurish editing that NPC Chris does for the show. We have re-uploaded the episode without this error. Thanks to James for pointing it out!

Rise of Aester: A LARP around the Seattle area, which Friend-PC Grace helps run!

NPC CAST: YOUR PLACE FOR FACE TO FACE GAMES.

Campaign Diary: Ark, The Eternal Refuge – The Beginning

by NPC Aaron.

Welcome readers! This is the first edition of a new article here on NPCcast.com detailing the campaign that we play with our group.  My hope is to both provide you with some insight on how I approach running a game and also allow you to see a story unfold and characters evolve.  This week I am going to detail the process I went through devising the premise and setting of the game, the world-building that we did in the first session, and the type of characters that the players have made for the setting.