DiceCast™ Episode 5: Props

Props can amaze your players, create a more immersive roleplaying experience, and go a long way towards dramatizing a scene. In this episode, we discuss the many ways to make cool, eye-popping props that are sure to make your game memorable, such as maps and sound effects. While the focus is on modern, investigative roleplaying genres, we are sure that these tips will fire up your imagination enough to make props for just about any kind of RPG.

We also announce the complete relaunch of our main corporate web site, www.polymancerstudios.com.

In other news, we are pleased to announce that the quickstart rules for our PUMMEL! (Pick-Up, Multigenre Miniatures, Easy to Learn) miniatures wargame system are now available for free download on Scribd. This is a very simple, fun, and playable miniatures wargame that is built for fast, furious action.

DiceCast™ Episode 4: An Interview with Ken St. Andre, creator of Tunnels & Trolls™

Ken St. Andre is the creator of Tunnels & Trolls™, one of the first RPGs ever made, in fact the first fantasy alternative to Dungeons & Dragons™. For those who are not familiar, T&T is a classic fantasy RPG with a richly-detailed campaign setting that is equally suited for gritty and light-hearted roleplaying. The game was innovative for making solitaire play possible, for allowing PCs to be orcs, and for being purely optimized for roleplaying, rather than for miniatures play. It holds the record for being the oldest RPG in continuous production by its original publisher (Flying Buffalo, Inc.). This episode is a special treat for fans of the Tunnels & Trolls™ RPG, fantasy gamers, and old school gamers in general.

This interview was done over the phone, so some of the audio is not "radio perfect." Mr. St Andre's words, however, are very clear, every bit as clear as his modesty and his commitment to making the fun, satisfying, and unique RPG that Tunnels & Trolls has been for over 30 years.

In other news, we announce the re-emergence of Polymancer's web site, www.polymancer.com.

DiceCast is available at the iTunes Music Store.

Links

• Trollhalla
  
• Tunnels & Trolls web page at Flying Buffalo's web site
  
• Tunnels & Trolls web page at Fiery Dragon Productions
  
• Polymancer official web site
  

DiceCast™ Episode 3: The Future of Roleplaying Games and a Review of Fantasycraft

In this episode, we discuss how popular RPGs seem to be moving away from the traditional "books only" format into formats with more components. Gaming that takes place "all in the mind" has fallen away to games that use miniatures, cards, and other tactile elements. This in turn has the potential to change the gaming experience from a "role-playing" experience, with talking and characterization as the focus, to "roll-playing," with tactical play as its focus.

We also review the new Fantasycraft RPG by Crafty Games.

DiceCast™ Episode 2: Worldwide D&D Day

We interviewed a number of gamers about how long they have been playing Dungeons & Dragons™, their thoughts on the game in general, and what the game means in their lives. We found that for the people who play it, this game is more than just a hobby or a leisure activity.

More information about Polymancer® Studios, Inc. is available at .

Special DiceCast announcement: Welcome to our new location

This audio bumper officially announces that DiceCast™ has been moved to dicecast.blogspot.com as well as that the show's RSS feed and iTunes™ Music Store entries have changed. Full details about how to change your subscription in iTunes and in other programs are given in the MP3 file.

This is a very short (01:04:00) announcement with a musical background. Podcasters are permitted, and in fact encouraged, to download this episode and include it in their shows (right-click the title and select "Save link as...").

Polymancer® Studios thanks you for your patience and welcomes you to DiceCast's new download location!

DiceCast™ Episode 1: Character Creation

The guys from Polymancer® Studios discuss character creation. Facets of character creation covered include choosing an archetype, creating a background and backstory without going overboard, personality; and making the character a unique, fun challenge both for you to roleplay, for others to play alongside, and for others to encounter.

While focused on gaming, much of the discussion is relevant to writers of fiction too.

More information about who we are and what we do is available at www.polymancer.com. Questions and comments are always welcome at dicecast@polymancerstudios.com.

This episode contains bumpers for the following podcasts: Wapcaplets, All Games Considered, 3.5 Private Sanctuary, and The Escapistcast. These podcasts, the other podcasts named here, and many others are members of RPGPodcasts.com.

This episode was originally posted on January 1, 2009.

DiceCast Episode 0: Starting a new campaign

In this premier episode of DiceCast™, the guys from Polymancer discuss starting a new campaign. Every consideration that a gamemaster or player needs to keep in mind when a new campaign is being set up is discussed here.

New opportunities for freelance writers are announced at the end of the cast.

This episode was originally posted on Wednesday, Sep 17, 2008.