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Roleplay Rescue
Otherworlds With Daniel Jones
This is the fifth in a sequence of conversations I’ve been having with various friends within the roleplaying games community. This episode continues my quest to find the game I really want to play, focused today upon the question of how to achieve greater Otherworld-immersion and build the kind of Otherworld that matters to us. My guest is, of course, Daniel Jones.
Daniel is the originator of the term Otherworld-immersion and a proponent of the idea that changing the methodology of our roleplaying games is the key to changing the experience we have at the table. For those who don’t know him, Daniel is a published author, game designer, philosopher, podcaster - check out the Primaeval Fantasy podcast - and the man behind the Eudaimonic Geekery blog. If you want to hear our earlier conversations about Otherworld-immersion, please check out Season 6, Episode 10; Season 9, Episode 14; and Season 10, Episode 19.
Big thank you to Daniel from Primaeval Fantasy for coming and sharing his ideas with us.
Primæval Fantasy • A podcast on Anchor:
https://anchor.fm/primeval-fantasy
FRPG Thoughts | Good Daemon Geekery (danielionson.wixsite.com)
https://danielionson.wixsite.com/good-daemon
Game on!
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19. Voices From The Abyss
35:17||Season 14, Ep. 19This one’s filled with the voices echoing out the of Abyss - in other words, it’s a call-in episode. These all stacked up from the 4th December 2024 into 2025, so there’s plenty of good comments, questions, and ideas to hear.I love to hear from you because it encourages me. Without your voices - the listener’s feedback - it would feel a very empty and dark abyss to be shouting into. Big thanks in advance to Jon, Simon, Wiebe, Matt, Karl R, Michael, Andrew, and Carl D for taking the time to record me a message. Game on!Roleplay Rescue Details:Voice Message:speakpipe.com/roleplayrescuePatreon:patreon.com/rpgrescue Email:roleplayrescue@proton.meBlogroleplayrescue.com Bluesky Social:https://bsky.app/profile/ubiquitousrat.bsky.socialMeWe:https://mewe.com/p/roleplayrescueRoleplay Rescue Theme by Jon Cohen from Tale of the Manticore:https://taleofthemanticore.podbean.com/Logo and artwork by MJ Hiblen:https://www.patreon.com/MJHiblenART/18. More Playful Prep
29:20||Season 14, Ep. 18What if prep didn’t have to feel like work? What if there were ways in which we could be more playful with our prep? Would that transform the way in which we feel about being the GM?Following a call-in from listener Jon M, who was responding to some comments in GMJ #270, I was inspired to comment on the topic of making prep less like work and more playful. Big thanks to Jon for the call-in!Game on!Roleplay Rescue Details:Voice Message:speakpipe.com/roleplayrescuePatreon:patreon.com/rpgrescue Email:roleplayrescue@proton.meBlogroleplayrescue.com Bluesky Social:https://bsky.app/profile/ubiquitousrat.bsky.socialMeWe:https://mewe.com/p/roleplayrescueRoleplay Rescue Theme by Jon Cohen from Tale of the Manticore:https://taleofthemanticore.podbean.com/Logo and artwork by MJ Hiblen:https://www.patreon.com/MJHiblenART/17. Ten GM Rules with Jason Wiebe
01:08:32||Season 14, Ep. 17As the year turns from 2024 into 2025, I decided to invite Grail Knight Patron and regular caller Jason Wiebe to come and have a chat on air. The topic was broadly, “Becoming a Game Master” and based on the notion that Wiebe has been struggling his way to the GM’s chair over many years and finally feels he has a handle on what it all entails. For my part, I was curious to find out what he had to say.Jason is a long-time listener and Patron to Roleplay Rescue. Hailing from Montreal, Canada, he’s someone I’ve played with a fair bit over the past year or so and we’ve become solid friends. We hopped on to Zoom just prior to playing a game in Fellmyr and I simply pressed “Record”. Jason agreed to share the resulting conversation uncut. Here’s hoping it’s as interesting and enlightening for you as it was for me - we certainly exchanged a few emerging ideas that I didn’t expect. As it turns out, Wiebe had a whole list of ideas about being a great GM.Thanks to Wiebe for coming on the show!Game on!Roleplay Rescue Details:Voice Message:speakpipe.com/roleplayrescuePatreon:patreon.com/rpgrescue Email:roleplayrescue@proton.meBlogroleplayrescue.com Bluesky Social:https://bsky.app/profile/ubiquitousrat.bsky.socialMeWe:https://mewe.com/p/roleplayrescueRoleplay Rescue Theme by Jon Cohen from Tale of the Manticore:https://taleofthemanticore.podbean.com/Logo and artwork by MJ Hiblen:https://www.patreon.com/MJHiblenART/16. Tiny Roleplay with Frank T
33:40||Season 14, Ep. 16This episode is a pitch for building a tiny roleplay habit using 30-minute sessions and one-on-one play with the rules behind the GM’s screen. The idea, taken from solo play, is to gather more often for shorter periods. In busy lives, dropping online to play for 30 minutes is much easier to schedule. This is viable because RPGs work best on the accumulation of play over many sessions. One-on-one places the player’s focus on just their own character’s perspective. If we blend this with the desire for Otherworld-immersion, we can marry the character and player perspective in a powerful manner. Rules opacity is also easier for the GM to handle because there is only one PC sheet.Big thanks to Frank T for running this Tiny Roleplay experiment and allowing me to share the session recordings.Game on!Roleplay Rescue Details:Voice Message:speakpipe.com/roleplayrescuePatreon:patreon.com/rpgrescue Email:roleplayrescue@proton.meBlogroleplayrescue.com Bluesky Social:https://bsky.app/profile/ubiquitousrat.bsky.socialMeWe:https://mewe.com/p/roleplayrescueRoleplay Rescue Theme by Jon Cohen from Tale of the Manticore:https://taleofthemanticore.podbean.com/Logo and artwork by MJ Hiblen:https://www.patreon.com/MJHiblenART/15. The Most Important Game Mechanism
19:31||Season 14, Ep. 15The most important game mechanism is, of course, the Game Master of a roleplaying game. Roleplaying games are all about making choices as-if you are your character and then seeing what happens as a consequence. This week the Angry GM gave me a long-overdue kick up the butt when I read an article on his blog. This episode is a response to that kick up the butt. Big thanks to the Angry GM for his book and blog - I hope he won't mind the extensive quotation from them. Thanks to Frank T for calling in! Game on!The Angry GM's article: A Campaign Manager’s Guide to Selfishness | The Angry GMOR https://theangrygm.com/a-campaign-managers-guide-to-selfishness/The Angry GM's book in his Shop:https://angry.games/shop/ols/products/game-angry-how-to-rpg-the-angry-wayRoleplay Rescue Details:Voice Message:speakpipe.com/roleplayrescuePatreon:patreon.com/rpgrescue Email:roleplayrescue@proton.meBlogroleplayrescue.com Bluesky Social:https://bsky.app/profile/ubiquitousrat.bsky.socialMeWe:https://mewe.com/p/roleplayrescueRoleplay Rescue Theme by Jon Cohen from Tale of the Manticore:https://taleofthemanticore.podbean.com/Logo and artwork by MJ Hiblen:https://www.patreon.com/MJHiblenART/14. Towards Full Rules Opacity
33:58||Season 14, Ep. 14What happens if we lean in hard to the Roleplay in roleplaying game? What if we take away the elements which distract from the enjoyment of being in-character, as-character, in a fantastic world? The first move is to start caring more about the fantastic Otherworld. The second is to push for greater Rules Opacity.Thanks to Jason Wiebe for calling in once again. Game on!Roleplay Rescue Details:Voice Message:speakpipe.com/roleplayrescuePatreon:patreon.com/rpgrescue Email:roleplayrescue@proton.meBlogroleplayrescue.com Bluesky Social:https://bsky.app/profile/ubiquitousrat.bsky.socialMeWe:https://mewe.com/p/roleplayrescueRoleplay Rescue Theme by Jon Cohen from Tale of the Manticore:https://taleofthemanticore.podbean.com/Logo and artwork by MJ Hiblen:https://www.patreon.com/MJHiblenART/13. Recovering Purpose and Agency
26:51||Season 14, Ep. 13Why do I spend so much of my time drifting from game to game, system to system, and between diverse imaginary worlds? Why do I find it hard to settle on a game and make it come alive? Am I doomed to roam for the remainder of my life never quite experiencing the games I want to enjoy?I’ve been adrift in the hobby for a long, long time. And then something clicked. That click was a simple question: What’s it for? The answer is simple: the RPGs that I want to play are first and foremost vehicles for agency. But, as with all answers to the basic question, “What’s it for?” there is a need to ask that question at the second level too: what’s this particular game - the campaign I am currently cooking up - what’s that for? And that is the question that I need to start asking when I build my next RPG experience for my players.Thanks to Jason Wiebe for calling in once again. Game on!Roleplay Rescue Details:Voice Message:speakpipe.com/roleplayrescuePatreon:patreon.com/rpgrescue Email:hello@rpgrescue.comBlogroleplayrescue.com Bluesky Social:https://bsky.app/profile/ubiquitousrat.bsky.socialMeWe:https://mewe.com/p/roleplayrescueRoleplay Rescue Theme by Jon Cohen from Tale of the Manticore:https://taleofthemanticore.podbean.com/Logo and artwork by MJ Hiblen:https://www.patreon.com/MJHiblenART/12. Voices From The Void
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