Episode 166: Jim Pinto Talks About D&D as "Work," Player Agency vs. Consumer Agency, and the DM/Player Compact

Episode 166: Jim Pinto Talks Player Agency  and the DM/Player Compact

Our guest for episode 166 is the prolific game designer Jim Pinto who has some interesting thoughts about current trends in role playing games and how they present challenges to all game masters, novice and experienced alike.

Jim Pinto has worked on products like Legend of the 5 Rings, The World's Largest Dungeon, and Shadow of the Demon Lord. His most recent work at Post World Games, including the Protocol and Praxis series of games, have challenged traditional role playing game dynamics and have become influential to designers like Greg Gorden.

While there are a lot of books discussing how to be a good game master and how to run the best role playing sessions, not a lot has been written about what responsibilities the players have to the game master. In the most recent episode of Geekerati Radio (Episode 166), I chat with game designer Jim Pinto of Post World Games about how each edition of D&D has made game mastering more like work and less like play and about what the proper role of the game master is.

As always, I don't want to reveal too much about the discussion here. I want you to listen to the episode after all, but I have provided a list of some of the products and concepts we talk about in the episode below.

Concepts

• Jim's concept of reliant focused play.
• Game master's fiat.
• Player Agency vs. Consumer Agency.
  What is the proper role of the game master?

Products and Outside Articles

• Glen Blacow's "Aspects of Adventure Gaming" which was published in Different Worlds #10 (which you can still purchase from the publisher here).
• Robin’s Laws of Good Game Mastering
• A Theory of Fun
• Call of Cthulhu 7^th Edition
• The Goblin Crown by Robert Hewitt Wolfe which I reviewed here.
•  Critical Role

Planning a Real Play Podcast

Those of you who have been reading/following Advanced Dungeons and Parenting ever since the Cinerati days know that I used to host a podcast called Geekerati with Shawna Benson, Bill Cunningham, Eric Lytle, and Wes Kobernick. We had a great run for a couple of years and were able to book guests like Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman (DRAGONLANCE), Tim Minear (FIREFLY, ANGEL, AMERICAN HORROR STORY), Rob Long (CHEERS, KEVIN CAN WAIT), David Goetsch (BIG BANG THEORY), Brandon Sanderson (MISTBORN, ALCATRAZ Vs., STORMLIGHT ARCHIVE), Susan Palwick (FLYING IN PLACE), Matt Forbeck (BRAVE NEW WORLD, ENDLESS QUEST, BLOOD BOWL), Shane Hensley (SAVAGE WORLDS), and many more. It was hard work, and we were never able to catch the fire we hoped, but it was an experience I wouldn't trade for the world.

Recently, I've gotten the podcasting bug again. After chatting with friends with similar interests, we decided that instead of trying to relaunch Geekerati that it would be fun to create a real play podcast of a 5th edition D&D campaign. Our group won't be the first to do this, there are several excellent podcasts and streamers out there, but it's something that we think will be a great experience for a number of reasons. First, it might just catch on and we might be able to connect with people who have similar groups to our own. Second, we think that it will make our own role playing skills better. After all, knowing that someone might be listening might get you to focus on how much role playing your are doing. Finally, we are noticing that it is forcing us to thing about world building since we all agree that it might be more fun to create our own setting and share that with the world.

I've got a great group lined up, but we are still in the planning and logistics phase. We don't even have a name for our podcast yet. We do, however, already have a number of ideas for our setting and I will be sharing those over the summer as it gets flushed out more. I'll also be introducing you to some of our players and their characters. First here, then on a website for the podcast.

Speaking of websites...it's about time I started moving the Geekerati episodes over to my personal website at www.christianlindke.com instead of having them only on the Blog Talk Radio site.

For those of you interested, here is a quick glimpse of a VERY rough draft of the country where our campaign will take place.

Geekerati Radio Flashback Friday -- Susan Palwick Discusses SHELTER

Susan Palwick is an award winning Science Fiction and Fantasy author who currently teaches English at the University of Nevada Reno. Many of her novels and stories deal with emotional trauma or questions of identity, and that includes her novel SHELTER. Susan kindly discussed her book with me and the other Geekerati hosts back in 2007.

It was a special moment in the Geekerati history as it was one of our first author interviews. We've done many more over the past six years, but this one was quite special. It isn't special solely for its place as an early episode, it is also special because Susan was one of my mentoring professors as an undergraduate. There is absolutely no way I would have been able to complete my degree if it hadn't been for her compassion - and the compassion of a couple of other wonderful academics.

Listen to internet radio with Geekerati Radio on BlogTalkRadio

All Too Rare Geekerati Podcast Update

I post surprisingly few updates about the Geekerati podcast that Shawna Benson and I do on a fairly regular basis. I think that it is time for a change on that front. Shawna and I have been doing the podcast, along with a couple of other co-hosts like Bill Cunningham, since 2007 and will be live streaming our 126th episode this evening. We average 2,400 downloads an episode with most falling between 1,000 and 5,000 depending on who we have as a guest in a given week. We have had one or two episodes with over 40,000 downloads, but those were with guests who had very large followings and who heavily promoted their appearance on our humble show.

We live stream the show on Wednesdays at 8:30pm Pacific, although this has changed over the years to match our busy lives, and episodes are available for download on the website or on iTunes immediately after the show finishes airing. We recommend listening to the show on the website and putting up with the advertisement at the beginning of the show, as this helps us recoup some of the costs of hosting the show with Blog Talk Radio. The live streaming format has certain advantages for time crushed people like Shawna and me, but it does come with the requisite risks of technical glitches. We have certainly had our share of those. If you want to hear how throttled bandwidth affects Skype audio, check out our conversation with Stephanie Thorpe about the Elfquest Anniversary.

Over the years Shawna and I have had some fantastic guests, including:
 

1. Matt Forbeck (Game Designer) -- Matt's actually been our most frequent guest, with Shelly Mazzanoble coming in at second. This makes them our favorite guests.
2. John Rogers (Leverage, The Core)
3. James Lowder (Game Designer and Editor)
4. Marc Bernardin (Alphas)
5. Susan Palwick (SF Author)
6. Tim Minear (Firefly)
7. David Goetsch (Big Bang Theory)-- Back in 2008 even.
8. Aaron Ginsburg (Thrilling Adventure Hour)
9. Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman

This is far from an extensive list. Shawna and I are quite proud of what we've been able to do with the show. So why don't you join us tonight as we chat with Clark Perry to discuss the upcoming show DEFIANCE.

It's not Monday, but it is Geekerati time again.

My Geekerati podcast normally airs live, like a radio show, every Monday night at 7pm Pacific, but with the holidays this week and next it is a little off schedule. That means that the episode that would normally have aired Monday night will now be airing tonight.

Our guest on Geekerati this week is Ken Edwards, the games editor over at Blogcritics.org, and he's going to debate the best video games of 2007 with our resident video game guru Eric Lytle. Unlike when I use the word "gaming," Ken Edwards usually means video gaming. I'll chime in with a couple of games I enjoyed as well in the video game front, but I'd be lying if I didn't say that I'll be throwing in a little of the table top as well.

So expect a little discussion of Savage Worlds and Mr. Jack, in addition to discussion about Mass Effect, tonight on Geekerati Radio.

ABOUT GEEKERATI RADIO – Geekerati Radio is an online radio show hosted by Christian Johnson, Shawna Benson, Bill Cunningham, and Eric Lytle which features discussion of popular culture by geeks for geeks and is a featured show in the BlogTalkRadio network. The Geekerati Radio show airs Monday nights at 7pm Pacific and the archives are available 24/7