Setting the Stage, Campaigns for D&D and Other RPGs

Ian from the Shrimps and Crits podcast comes to tell us about the campaigns he runs there! The podcast is in its second season using the Ironsworn system for the world of Dania. The campaign was inspired by folk songs of the American South. A traveling band of enchanted scarecrows goes across Dania, playing the music of folk singer, Joe Crumb. Dania is inflicted by natural disasters of intermittent red Fury Fog that drives people into homicidal rage.Shrimp and Crits has a website and is available on all your regular podcast platforms. Go take a look!You can find the TTRPG content that Ian's done on MaudlinGames.comCheck out the Setting the Stage website!Want to be on the show? Fill out this survey.Join our Discord!Support Setting the Stage on Patreon!

Susannah tells us about her world, the Dragon Knight Universe! She's written books and published two podcasts set in the universe. It's an alternate history of Earth where magic and monsters are real, but hidden from most people behind a veil of secrecy. To fight the monsters, witches created the Dragon Knights, a group of people with magical powers similar to those of dragons. The Dragon Knights succeeded and the world is mostly safe now, but new threats are always lurking around the edges of reality.The Thornvale and Felhaven podcasts are available on all your favorite podcasts. You can learn more about them on the Thornvale Podcast website.And the book published for the Dragon Knight Universe, Deep Hollow, is available on Amazon.The Actual Playce Discord Server is a great place to discuss actual plays as a fan and as a creator.Check out the Setting the Stage website!Want to be on the show? Fill out this survey.Join our Discord!Support Setting the Stage on Patreon!

Hem returns! Our previous guest from Episode 83 back with another BRP horror game. This time about zombies taking over Iceland. Three brave family members receive a special package that might put an end to the Endtimes. They just have to get the package off the island and into the hands of some researchers. Hem plans on releasing a new episode every day through October as part of the spooky season.The title of the show is "VARÚÐ! Dead Ísland" with Varúð pronounced like Vahr-ooth. You can learn more on the VARÚÐ RPG website.This is Hem's first video show, so you can watch VARÚÐ! Dead Ísland on YouTube as well as listen to it on your podcast app.All other associated info is available on the VARÚÐ RPG Linktree.For other shows produced by Hem check out Blighthouse Studio's website.Check out the Setting the Stage website!Want to be on the show? Fill out this survey.Join our Discord!Support Setting the Stage on Patreon!

Avery presents her world of Traumwald which means Dream Forest. Traumwald was a peaceful, magical world inhabited by anthropomorphic animals of all kinds. Their peace was shattered by the attack of the Ichal, a biomechanical hive mind species similar to the Borg. The Ichal are led by the dark god Ulvakros who seeks to absorb all life into himself. The Ichal have spread across different dimensions and now they have come to Traumwald as the next stop on their mission of multiversal conquest.Traumwald has a D&D 5.0e supplement that Avery made. It's a setting and a campaign in one book. Species generation rules allow you to create any sort of animal species for your PC. There are lots of new subclasses to play and a new base class, the Ascetic. The campaign is adaptable with a dynamic faction system for tracking the events as they unfold at your table. Each campaign run in Traumwald is guaranteed to be different as the factions fluctuate and change to player actions. You can lift the faction system for your personal campaign as well!You can find Traumwald on Avery's itch.io page.Check out the Setting the Stage website!Want to be on the show? Fill out this survey.Join our Discord!Support Setting the Stage on Patreon!

Our guests today are Jay and Sandra from the 3RPG podcast. Their podcast is a talk show, typically with three hosts. Unfortunately the third host Chris was unable to make it.Jay and Sandra are working on a RPG product dubbed The Balance of Aksio. It's a new narrative fantasy TTRPG system with point buy character creation. The world within Balance of Aksio grew out of games that Jay and Sandra have been playing together since high school. Lots of history from important characters over the in-game centuries they have been playing. Balance of Aksio comes with numerous storytelling aids to help with character decision making, generational play, and how to cover long gaps between adventures.Balance of Aksio also introduces a unique idea for running your NPCs. Rather than make all the decisions yourself, Jay and Sandra recommend outsourcing the NPC actions to people you know outside of the campaign. Give those people a profile of the NPC and the decision they are facing. Then let those people decide what the NPC would do without your own biases as a GM entering the equation. Quite a clever way to introduce new developments in your game that even you can't predict!There's a 3RPG Podcast website and the show itself is available on all major podcast platforms.I guested on the 3RPG podcast for episode 61. Check it out!Check out the Setting the Stage website!Want to be on the show? Fill out this survey.Join our Discord!Support Setting the Stage on Patreon!

Flare talks with us about his campaign world, Akridon. Three continents dominate the world, Tyros for humanoid races and Dusklands for bestial races. The third continent is known as the Scourge, having being destroyed in a cataclysmic war centuries ago. The world draws a lot of inspiration from the World of Warcraft setup with duality featuring in the continents, the racial appearance, and the gods of the world. And just like in WoW, the two sides often need to team up against larger threats that appear.Flare has a Google Doc with more information about Akridon if you're interested!Vote in the CRIT Awards! Voting is open until August 23rd.Check out the Setting the Stage website!Want to be on the show? Fill out this survey.Join our Discord!Support Setting the Stage on Patreon!

I interviewed Daniel, my cohost of the Tabletop Community Spotlight! Daniel created his own setting called Ithasen with an in-progress wuxia TTRPG system called Metanoia to go along with it. Ithasen has a spiritual force known as Ren that pervades the world. Ren is a magical manifestation of the user's, or Rennim's, will upon the universe. Rennim that cultivate their will grow stronger and capable of more amazing feats as the concentrate their power and force of personality.Within Ithasen there are seven lineages of people that decide what type of Ren they can use. Anamor use conversion Ren. Elkyr use flux Ren. Janim use elasticity Ren. Nyl use influence Ren. Okoi use recurrence Ren. Haqol use harmony Ren. Finally, Daruner use use coalescent ren. The two races lineages that drive unique politics in Ithasen are the Daruner and the Haqol.Daruner children absorb the Ren talents of both their parents, becoming a perfect blend of Daruner and another lineage parent. Through this mixing, a Daruner family could potentially include all other lineages within itself. This power has placed Daruner as the nobility of Ithasen.Haqol's power of harmony allows them to amplify the Ren powers of others. This puts Haqol in a vulnerable position as unscrupulous people will do anything to incorporate Haqol lineage into their bloodline. Haqol have experienced something akin to a genocide as their lineage has been consistently absorbed by other lineages and diluted over the centuries.There's a whole lot more than that so strap in!Daniel has a fully setup GitHub Wiki for information on Metanoia and Ithasen that you can explore.There's a Metanoid Discord server you can join to discuss the rules and setting with other fans.The occasional musing on TTRPGs can be found on Daniel's blog, Tabletop Discourse.GoCorral YouTube Channel for watching the Tabletop Community Spotlight.Vote in the CRIT Awards! Voting is open until August 23rd.Check out the Setting the Stage website!Want to be on the show? Fill out this survey.Join our Discord!Support Setting the Stage on Patreon!

Justin tells us about their new actual play show, Oops! All Healers. Justin is the GM side of the two person YouTube channel, So You Wanna Be A DM? (SYWBADM), that they host with Taylor. SYWBADM is a variety channel about different parts of TTRPGs. The main segment of their channel is a weekly talking head discussion on some RPG related topic. There are occasional guests or single segments with just Justin. There's also actual plays! Justin favors short actual plays of about 5 sessions in length. The latest one is called Oops! All Healers, a medical procedural drama using D&D 5e as the system. Can D&D be adapted for that system and can the players handle the different cases that come their way?So You Wanna Be A DM? YouTube ChannelSo You Wanna Be A DM? LinkTreeCheck out the Setting the Stage website!Want to be on the show? Fill out this survey.Join our Discord!Support Setting the Stage on Patreon!