Tavern Watch Podcast

Deep in the bowels of the vampirate-laden Maelstrom, our scurvy scallyways discover something truly unexpected: an entire forest, inside the hull of a ship. Not only that, but those crows seem to be cawing somewhat ominously, and inside the forest is a cave. But the real machinations of the pelagic vampires are yet to be discovered, Albrecht the Tideborn still stalks those who would disturb whatever is happening aboard the ship, and there's still something high above waiting for our crew to find... even if it's hanging by a thread.Our spooky season game of Pirate Borg continues, with GM Phil Ulrich running full-sail adventures among the dead for:Eric O'Dea as Cornelius "Noseface" Collins, an erstwhile sorcerer and escapee from cannibals who is growing increasingly, concerningly, gangrenousTrish Olson (AwkwardishPanda) as Octavia, a swashbuckler who just happens to also be at least half octopusLiz Harper as Tama, an actual talking parrot -- a very pretty blue lucky parrot, to be precise, although she wasn't born that wayThis is the second in a four-part actual play of Limithron's Pirate Borg, running the boat portion of "Into the Maelstrom" from their first expansion, Down Among the Dead. Watch for new episodes every Monday! If you missed episode 1, you'll definitely want to check that out first.The music in this episode is "Dark Tides," by PhatPhrog Studios.

On the briny seas of the Dark Caribbean sails a ship unlike any other; a ghostly ship, made of rotting wood with sails of red flesh, heralded by an ominous green fog, and crewed by vampiric pirates: the Maelstrom. Last time it made landfall, the Maelstrom took aboard several captives, including a specific VIP; on top of that, the ship contains untold wealth gathered from across the seas, and a mysterious Spanish Inquisitor has offered a bounty of silver for each of these vile pelagic vampires that meets their permanent end -- especially their captain, Albrecht the Tideborn. That's more than enough to get our scurvy scallywags interested, wouldn't you think?Captaining our spooky season actual play of Pirate Borg is GM Phil Ulrich, and our crew of cutthroats and ne'er-do-wells for this excursion is:Eric O'Dea as Cornelius "Noseface" Collins, an erstwhile sorcerer and escapee from cannibals who is growing increasingly, concerningly, gangrenousTrish Olson (AwkwardishPanda) as Octavia, a swashbuckler who just happens to also be at least half octopusLiz Harper as Tama, an actual talking parrot -- a very pretty blue lucky parrot, to be precise, although she wasn't born that wayThis is the first in a four-part actual play of Limithron's Pirate Borg, running the boat portion of "Into the Maelstrom" from their first expansion, Down Among the Dead. Watch for new episodes every Monday!The music in this episode is "Dark Tides," by PhatPhrog Studios.

Against all odds, the Dungeons & Dragons Warcraft crossover book seems like it might actually be good. It could've gone the way of the cheap cash grab, but instead early previews make it look like Wizards of the Coast and Blizzard have put a lot of thought into the implementation of classes, dungeons, and all of the details that make Warcraft Warcraft. Honestly, no one is more surprised than us.And in more tabletop news, we took a look at some upcoming projects like biopunk fantasy RPG Twisted Lands, Shiver's upcoming book of cryptids, and Yatagan, a cosmic space opera RPG drawing from Turkish and Mongolian culture and myths. AI continues to suck, with automated agents begging game site Rascal to buy their automatically generated D&D module and 90,000 LLM scraper bots taking down EN World, but at least the UK Games Expo has banned AI products from the show floor. Plus an exciting little sneak peek at Dragonlance!Music from this episode is “Midnight Tale” Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com), licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License.

There are a lot of interesting things to touch on in the tabletop RPG space in this month's Tavern Watch Podcast, especially if you're a fan of Paizo's games like Pathfinder or Starfinder. Paizo offering everything they've ever published on DriveThruRPG looks to be a winning move as the company continues to struggle with a large stock of print books to be locked up in the Diamond Comics Distributors bankruptcy. It looks like Paizo and other publishers may finally be getting their books back, but it's been over a year. It's good to see another way to get Paizo books.We have a short but spirited (pun fully intended) conversation on the use of gods, patrons, and other higher powers in your game, which can be a fun narrative hook as long as they don't overrule player agency. D&D news is a little quiet between book releases, but there is a new Underdark-themed Unearthed Arcana, which you can pick up and playtest for yourself. Plus Phil effusively glazes Lancer for five or ten minutes because we talked about giant anime mechs and that is evidently one of his sleeper phrases (plus they have new books coming out next year).Music from this episode is "Midnight Tale" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com), licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License.

Some days in the Wasteland, you accidentally stumble into a robot-operated dinosaur cloning facility, and then you have to make an ethical judgment on what to do with the lives of intelligent (and very polite) cloned dinosaurs and deathclaws. But being a resident of the Wasteland means being adaptable, so we'll probably figure it out. So join us for the final episode of our actual play of the Fallout TTRPG! GM Matt Rossi is leading our oddball crew of adventurers, so it's really no surprise that we've wound up here. These are our players:Liz Harper as Nellie, a Miss Nannie who's long-since moved from babysitting to robot repair... though being able to wrangle toddlers is a widely applicable skill for adventuring.Rob Flanagan as Fidget, a scavenger who's making the most of life in the Wasteland, but he's gotten a bit lost on his way back home to West Virginia.Eric O'Dea as Hack, a super mutant who's the backbone of this party... and the only one who's fought a Deathclaw before. Possibly for fun.This is the third of a three-part actual play series of Fallout, a 2d20 game from Modipheus that does a good job of replicating the feel of the video game version. Listen to the first episode here, the second episode here, and look for new episodes of Tavern Watch every Monday! If enjoy this actual play, you can pick up your own copy of Fallout from Modipheus or check out the free quickstart for a preview of the rules.The music in this episode is "In Your Arms" by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com), licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License.

It turns out being kidnapped by talking Deathclaws really isn't that bad, as long as you don't mind the moral quandaries that come along with them... and I'm not sure anyone in our party is actually came prepared for moral quandaries, but we're going to do our best. Join us as GM Matt Rossi escorts us across the wasteland in this actual play of the Fallout TTRPG!Here's our misfit crew for this adventure, and not a philosopher among them:Liz Harper as Nellie, a Miss Nannie who's long-since moved from babysitting to robot repair... though being able to wrangle toddlers is a widely applicable skill for adventuring.Rob Flanagan as Fidget, a scavenger who's making the most of life in the Wasteland, but he's gotten a bit lost on his way back home to West Virginia.Eric O'Dea as Hack, a super mutant who's the backbone of this party... and the only one who's fought a Deathclaw before. Possibly for fun.This is the second of a three-part actual play series of Fallout, a 2d20 game from Modipheus that does a good job of replicating the feel of the video game version. Listen to the first episode here, and look for new episodes every Monday! If enjoy this actual play, you can pick up your own copy of Fallout from Modipheus or check out the free quickstart for a preview of the rules.The music in this episode is "In Your Arms" by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com), licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License.