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Casting Shadows Podcast

Episodes:

Runeslinger’s podcast about the play of old, new, and future roleplaying games. Here we act, react, and interact intentionally with the very alchemy of play~

For more RPG investigations, visit the Casting Shadows blog

Watch Annotated Actual Plays, RPG discussions and debates, product overviews, and practical tips for playing and running RPGs on YouTube


Leave a voice message for the podcast via Speakpipe

Sample Episodes

Actual Play Alien RPG Alien RPG 1e Call of Cthulhu Campaign Play Campaign Recap Co-GM Corporia Cosmic Horror Delta Green gaming GM Advice GM Techniques Group Management Hollow Earth Expedition Horror Imagination in RPGs Immersion and Engagement Learning RPGs Listener Calls Memory New Players Player Techniques Playing NPCs Preparation for Implementation Preparation for Improvisation Pulp Action Roleplaying Games rpg RPGaDAY RPG Characters RPG Concepts RPG Conversation rpgs RPG Vocabulary Special Guest Story as By-product Story as Product Story Divide Sword and Planet System Matters Teaching RPGs This Podcast Ubiquity Year Zero Engine

Recent Episodes

On the idea of a "Better Game" Casting Shadows

This episode is another review of a post from the Casting Shadows blog, though this time the Wayback Machine is just taking us five short years (and a few decades of observation and experience) into the past. This time we look at a post based on the increasingly narrowing rhetoric around the technique of the Session 0 which tries to restore the balance required in that technique for long-term play. This time, the full post is presented before I get into any commentary from the present of the time of recording. Among the things in that commentary is a link to an earlier video on the same theme, but slightly different topic. It is linked below and is called Theories & Practices. It's almost a rant. One of two I may have recorded in all my time sharing RPG ideas. LINKS:A friend of the show, Patrick Mullen, on his Processing GURPS blog has recently referenced the Can I make my game better post in a post of his own about his process of setting up a new campaign. I think we need many such examples of the great variety of approaches and needs we gamers have and so I share the link here:Zero HourTheories & Practices video mentioned in the episode. This video was recorded in 2014 in response to an uptick in extreme views in the regular cyclical confrontation between preferences between 'Just play!' and 'Elitist Theory instead of play!' ⁠Can I make my game better?⁠ blog post on Casting ShadowsCONTACT:Leave a voice message via ⁠⁠SpeakPipe⁠⁠https://speakpipe.com/castingshadowspodcast.comSeek me out on BlueSkyhttps://bsky.app/profile/runeslinger.bsky.socialVisit the written bloghttps://castingshadowsblog.comCheck out other episodes of this podcasthttps://castingshadowspodcast.comStill using e-mail?runescastshadows AT gmail
  1. On the idea of a "Better Game"
  2. On what might be in a name, and Listener Calls
  3. Biting Bullets with Jason Hobbs
  4. A Friendly and Impossible chat with RPG Sean~
  5. On Memory and RPGs, featuring Arcane Alienist

Who is
Runeslinger?

Anthony Boyd

Under the Internet handle, Runeslinger, Anthony has been sharing his ongoing explorations into RPGs online since launching the Casting Shadows YouTube channel in 2009 and the written blog in 2010. A roleplaying gamer since 1983, Anthony enjoys few things more than RPGs.

Described as being indistinguishable from Bacchus minus the wine, revelry, farming, and general licentiousness, Runeslinger is a known appreciator of Roleplaying Games, swords, unlovely music, things that go well with gravy, and efficient sources of caramel.

He lives quietly with his wife and a vast pack of once-discarded dogs, in South Korea, where the mountains hold moot.