Taking 20 Podcast

Should you use cliffhangers to entice your players?  If so, how and how often?  Fear not.  This short episode has got all of that covered.  Give it a listen and don't forget to subscribe and provide comments and feedback!

Happy Valentine's Day!  The Monster Series resumes this time focusing on those alpha dogs of the necromantic RPG world:  liches.  How do DMs use them in their campaign?  What tactics should they take on the battlefield?  Tune in and find out.

Wizards of the Coast and Paizo have wisely removed some of the problematic depictions of ancestries and ethnicities, adding nuance to those previously portrayed as universally evil.  How does that change our games and what does it mean for DMs?    

Sometimes it's good to be bad.  Evil campaigns can be amazing adventures unto themselves and can allow good role players to really stretch their wings and embrace being horrible people.  There are traps and potential gotchas to both running and being in a campaign.  Here's how to avoid them.

This episode idea is courtesy of Daniel in Melbourne, Australia who wanted to know where I get my ideas for quests.  In this episode, I talk about the different types of quests that you can run, sources for quest ideas, the importance of flexibility when it comes to quest solutions, and finally best practices for the two categories that all quests should fall under.

There's been a lot of character optimization discussion online the past couple of months.  What is it?  Should players always optimize their characters?  On the flip side, DMs need to say yes to player choices, right?  Not always.  Jeremy discusses the situations when optimization may be necessary, encouragement for DMs to say yes to their choices when possible, and the powerful ability to say No when necessary.

Another worldbuilding episode where we discuss ways you can make your campaign world feel different than the mundane rock we currently live on.  Before you tackle making your first outlandish world, give this a listen!

We all remember our first time, nervously fumbling about.  Maybe it was with someone you know well, perhaps a stranger.  Maybe it was with a group of people you went to school with.  And if we do things the right way, maybe we can be there to support someone's first time having sex...er...tabletop gaming.  In this episode we talk about how we support these new players and new Game Masters at our tables.

You've been playing Skyrim and you'd like to test your players' wits by adding a clever puzzle to baffle them in their bonnets and worry them in their wigs.  How do you add puzzles without making them boring or too deadly?  How do you add puzzles that make sense?  Tune in to find out!  I'd love to hear your feedback or episode ideas to feedback@taking20podcast.com.

In the cold open, Jeremy responds to the "I'm Quitting Pathfinder 2e" video by Cody at the Youtube channel called "Taking 20" (not affiliated).

Chances are you've watched or listened to a live let's play podcast as they used music, sound effects, and visual puzzles during an episode.  What are some tips for doing that in my home game?  Jeremy can help with that!