Ludonarrative Dissidents
- Épisodes
- 93
- Parution
- toutes les deux semaines
- Dernier épisode
- 9 Nov 2026
À propos du podcast
Ludonarrative Dissidents is a podcast from Greg Stolze, James Wallis, and Ross Payton to explore and analyze tabletop RPGs. What does each game do, how does it work, and why do people play it? We are currently in season 3, and we've expanded to include sourcebooks and adventures. Visit our website at https://www.ludonarrativedissidents.com/ to get detailed show notes. Join our Discord at https://discord.gg/CQt5DbFZCD
Épisodes 93
Live with Chris Spivey and Adam Scott Glancy: Delta Green, Black Company and Darker Hue Studios
The season 4 Kickstarter is in its final days! Back today to help us get more episodes unlocked!Our guests, Chris Spivey and Adam Scott Glancy both work for Arc Dream and discuss Delta Green, The Black Company …
Notes de l’épisode
The season 4 Kickstarter is in its final days! Back today to help us get more episodes unlocked!
Our guests, Chris Spivey and Adam Scott Glancy both work for Arc Dream and discuss Delta Green, The Black Company RPG and Chris' work on Harlem Unbound and Haunted West. Don't miss this episode if you want to hear some gruesome and hilarious Cthulhu RPG anecdotes, WW1 history, and more!
The One Ring RPG and Microscope 2E: Live with Gareth Hanrahan and Ben Robbins
Special guests Gareth Hanrahan (The One Ring RPG and too many games to count) and Ben Robbins (Microscope) join us for another live episode of LND to discuss game design and history. Back the LND Kickstarter …
Notes de l’épisode
Special guests Gareth Hanrahan (The One Ring RPG and too many games to count) and Ben Robbins (Microscope) join us for another live episode of LND to discuss game design and history.
Back the LND Kickstarter today and join our book club on game design!
Vincent and Meg Baker and Season 4 Kickstarter Launch!
We hosted a live episode to talk about the launch of our Season 4 Kickstarter. Join me, Greg Stolze, James Wallis and special guests Meg and Vincent Baker (Apocalypse World, Dogs in the Vineyard and many more) …
Notes de l’épisode
We hosted a live episode to talk about the launch of our Season 4 Kickstarter. Join me, Greg Stolze, James Wallis and special guests Meg and Vincent Baker (Apocalypse World, Dogs in the Vineyard and many more) as we discuss the history of RPGs, possible games we may review for Season 4 and many other topics!
The Quiet Year: An Actual Play featuring creator Avery Alder and Dr. Emily Friedman
The Season 4 LND Kickstarter pre-launch page is live! https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/rosspayton/ludonarrative-dissidents-podcast-season-4The Quiet Year is a map game. You define the struggles of a …
Notes de l’épisode
The Season 4 LND Kickstarter pre-launch page is live! https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/rosspayton/ludonarrative-dissidents-podcast-season-4The Quiet Year is a map game. You define the struggles of a post-apocalyptic community, and attempt to build something good within their quiet year. Every decision and every action is set against a backdrop of dwindling time and rising concern.We were fortunate enough to have two very special guests for this episode.Avery Alder is the Quiet Year's creator and an award winning game designer. You can find her website at https://buriedwithoutceremony.com/ and she's on Bluesky at https://bsky.app/profile/lackingceremony.bsky.socialOrder the Quiet Year https://buriedwithoutceremony.com/the-quiet-yearor from DrivethruRPG https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/110152/the-quiet-year?affiliate_id=465273Dr. Emily Friedman studies actual play and storytelling. She has an upcoming book on the history of Actual Play. You can find her on Bluesky https://bsky.app/profile/ecfriedman.comand on https://patreon.com/ecfriedman
Ludonarrative Dissidents Season 4 Pre-Launch Live Episode 0 and Mothership: Wages of Sin Review
We recently completed season 3 and are going to launch a Kickstarter on October 13 to fund a fourth season! Follow the Kickstarter campaign to be notified when the campaign goes live!This live episode discusses …
Notes de l’épisode
We recently completed season 3 and are going to launch a Kickstarter on October 13 to fund a fourth season!
Follow the Kickstarter campaign to be notified when the campaign goes live!
This live episode discusses what will be new for the fourth season. We plan to have shorter book reviews in our live episodes, along with special segments. To that end, I review the new Mothership bounty hunting supplement, Wages of Sin.
We're also hosting a book club on game design, where each host reads and discusses multiple books with backers.
Swords of the Serpentine Actual Play
IN OUR TRADITIONAL style, as we reach the end of the season we’re bringing you a couple of Actual Play sessions of games that we’ve covered in earlier episodes, putting some actual ludo-ing into the customary …
Notes de l’épisode
IN OUR TRADITIONAL style, as we reach the end of the season we’re bringing you a couple of Actual Play sessions of games that we’ve covered in earlier episodes, putting some actual ludo-ing into the customary narrative.
This episode is the first part of the Ludonarrative Dissidents Season 3 finale and we are delighted that Kevin Kulp, co-designer of Swords of the Serpentine, volunteered to administer a one-off adventure for Greg, Ross and James. It was a splendid evening of entertainment, running the system through its paces as we hurtled through several of the setting’s notable locations, and finding every possible opportunity to fall in the water.
SWORDS OF THE SERPENTINE is a game of fantasy shenanigans in a labyrinthine sinking city populated by rogues, schemers, cultists, swashbucklers and your player characters, written by Kevin Kulp and Emily Dresner, and published by Pelgrane Press in 2022. It uses a variation of the Gumshoe system originally created by Robin D. Laws in 2007. The book has 396 pages.
No conventional show-notes this time, except to express our thanks to Kevin for giving up an evening to escort us through his co-creation, and to you for giving up your time to listen to it. Hope you enjoy it as much as we did.
Thank you for listening! The hosts of this episode were Ross Payton, Greg Stolze and James Wallis, with audio editing by Ross and show notes by James. We hope you enjoyed it. If anything in this podcast or these notes has spurred your interest then we invite you to come and chat about it on our friendly Discord.
If you click on any of the above links to DriveThruRPG and buy something, Ludonarrative Dissidents will receive a small affiliate fee. You will not be charged more, and the game’s publisher will not receive less, it’s a win-win-win. Thank you for supporting the podcast this way.
Dialect
DIALECT: A Game About Language And How It Dies is a 2018 single-session RPG by Hakan Seyalioglu and Kathryn Hymes, published by Thorny Games. It’s a game about a small community, isolated from larger groups …
Notes de l’épisode
DIALECT: A Game About Language And How It Dies is a 2018 single-session RPG by Hakan Seyalioglu and Kathryn Hymes, published by Thorny Games. It’s a game about a small community, isolated from larger groups, that first creates its own verbal forms to describe its situation, and then must adapt or lose them as the community reacts to external threats. It is critically acclaimed and a winner of multiple awards.
Ludonarrative Dissidents Livestream for August 2026
Our livestream discussion for August!Watch the episode on YoutubeDiscuss this episode on our Discord.
Swords of the Serpentine
SWORDS OF THE SERPENTINE is a game of fantasy shenanigans in a labyrinthine sinking city populated by rogues, schemers, cultists, swashbucklers and your player characters, written by Kevin Kulp and Emily …
Notes de l’épisode
SWORDS OF THE SERPENTINE is a game of fantasy shenanigans in a labyrinthine sinking city populated by rogues, schemers, cultists, swashbucklers and your player characters, written by Kevin Kulp and Emily Dresner, and published by Pelgrane Press in 2022. It uses a variation of the Gumshoe system originally created by Robin D. Laws in 2007.
Ludonarrative Dissidents Livestream for June 2026
Our livestream discussion for June!Watch the episode on YoutubeDiscuss this episode on our Discord.
Chicago by Night: Vampire the Masquerade 5th Edition
CHICAGO BY NIGHT is a 2018 city sourcebook for Vampire the Masquerade 5th edition, written by Matthew Dawkins and a host of others, and published by Renegade Game Studios, who have the rights to do all this …
Notes de l’épisode
CHICAGO BY NIGHT is a 2018 city sourcebook for Vampire the Masquerade 5th edition, written by Matthew Dawkins and a host of others, and published by Renegade Game Studios, who have the rights to do all this stuff these days. The most recent iteration of a sourcebook that first appeared in 1991, this edition is by far the longest at 357 pages. It describes the vampire culture, clans, people, locations, backstory and subterfuges of the eponymous city. (‘Eponymous’, because I always have to check, means ‘lending its name to’ a thing, not ‘taking its name from’). We talked about the latest edition of Vampire the Masquerade earlier this season and concluded that it did what it needs to in a suitable style, if you like that sort of thing. How does that fit with huge chunks of crunchy campaign-world detail like this? Don’t click that dial!
- Chicago by Night at DriveThruRPG (there’s more information here than at the publishers’ website)
- Vampire the Masquerade 5th edition at DriveThruRPG
- The original Chicago by Night from 1991 at DriveThruRPG
- Chicago by Night second edition (1993) at DriveThruRPG
Ludonarrative Dissidents Livestream for May
Our livestream discussion for May, featuring special guest Jerry Grayson of Khepera Publishing. Check out the Godsend Agenda today.Watch the episode on YoutubeDiscuss this episode on our Discord.
Ludonarrative Dissidents Livestream for April 2026
Our April livestream!Watch the livestream on YoutubeDiscuss this episode on our Discord.
Call of Cthulhu: In Medias Res
IN MEDIAS RES is a short modern-horror scenario (‘adventure’ is the wrong word for it) by John Scott Tynes, originally designed for Cthulhu Now and first printed in The Unspeakable Oath issue 10 in 1993. It was …
Notes de l’épisode
IN MEDIAS RES is a short modern-horror scenario (‘adventure’ is the wrong word for it) by John Scott Tynes, originally designed for Cthulhu Now and first printed in The Unspeakable Oath issue 10 in 1993. It was reprinted in The Resurrected #3 – Out of the Vault in 2003. Thirty years after its publication, it still lives up to its reputation as an unflinching piece of modern horror RPG design that’s genuinely horrific.
Ludonarrative Dissidents Livestream for March 2026
Our March livestream!Watch the livestream on YoutubeDiscuss this episode on our Discord.
Maelstrom
MAELSTROM is a paperback-format RPG written by Alex Scott and published in 1984 by Puffin Books, a division of Penguin Books in the UK. It contains rules for roleplaying in Europe, mostly England, at the time …
Notes de l’épisode
MAELSTROM is a paperback-format RPG written by Alex Scott and published in 1984 by Puffin Books, a division of Penguin Books in the UK. It contains rules for roleplaying in Europe, mostly England, at the time of the Tudors (the 1500s), with a solo adventure, a sample adventure and a herbiary. It is an interesting comparison to the other 1980s British RPG set in a faux-Europe of the early Renaissance, Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay, which was published two years later.
The game was re-released by Arion Games in 2008, and the company has also released an expanded version and several supplements, as well as standalone titles Maelstrom Domesday (set after the Norman invasion), Maelstrom Rome and Maelstrom Gothic.
Livestream for February 2026
We have a special guest, Adam Scott Glancy, one of the Delta Green co-authors! He clarifies a few points about Delta Green Countdown.Watch the livestream on YoutubeDiscuss this episode on our Discord.
Delta Green: Countdown
Sponsor: Technical Difficulties Podcast - check out an excellent actual play RPG podcast, featuring Delta Green, Eclipse Phase, and many other fine systems featured on LND.Delta Green Countdown is a massive …
Notes de l’épisode
Sponsor: Technical Difficulties Podcast - check out an excellent actual play RPG podcast, featuring Delta Green, Eclipse Phase, and many other fine systems featured on LND.
Delta Green Countdown is a massive sourcebook for the original edition of Delta Green. It blows the doors off the world of Delta Green, reaching wider and digging deeper to map the terrain of the twisted pulp apocalypse we call the dawning of the 21st century. How has it aged since then?
Livestream for January 2026
Our first livestream of the year! We talk about new games we played and a grabag of topics. Watch the livestream on YoutubeDiscuss this episode on our Discord.
Alice is Missing
ALICE IS MISSING is a self-contained one-session RPG for 3–5 players, designed by Spenser Stark and released in 2020 by Hunters Entertainment with Renegade Game Studios, after a Kickstarter that raised …
Notes de l’épisode
ALICE IS MISSING is a self-contained one-session RPG for 3–5 players, designed by Spenser Stark and released in 2020 by Hunters Entertainment with Renegade Game Studios, after a Kickstarter that raised $138,000. It’s been described as ‘unique’, ‘sublime’ and ‘a little masterpiece’, and has won a bagful of awards including three 2021 Gold ENNIEs and the Indiecade award for tabletop design.
LND Livestream for December
Our monthly livestream for December! Watch the livestream here.Discuss this episode on our Discord.
Mothership: Gradient Descent
Gradient Descent is a module/campaign setting/megadungeon for the SF-horror RPG Mothership, released in 2020. It is written by Luke Gearing, with art by Nick Tofani and layout by Sean McCoy, and was published …
Notes de l’épisode
Gradient Descent is a module/campaign setting/megadungeon for the SF-horror RPG Mothership, released in 2020. It is written by Luke Gearing, with art by Nick Tofani and layout by Sean McCoy, and was published by Tuesday Night Games. Dimensionally it is a tightly packed 64-page digest-sized booklet, and the PDF sells for $20, or as part of the Mothership deluxe boxed set.
Livestream for November 2025
Our monthly livestream for November 2025. We talk about larping, new games in development and Dragonmeet!Watch the Livestream here.Discuss this episode on our Discord.
EABA v 2.01
EABA (End All Be All) 2e is a generic roleplaying system with a core rulebook and a collection of sourcebooks designed by Greg Porter and published by his company BTRC (Blacksburg Tactical Research Centre). The …
Notes de l’épisode
EABA (End All Be All) 2e is a generic roleplaying system with a core rulebook and a collection of sourcebooks designed by Greg Porter and published by his company BTRC (Blacksburg Tactical Research Centre). The first edition was released in 2003, the second – which is what we discuss in this episode – in 2012.
Livestream for October 2025
Our livestream for October 2025!Watch it on Youtube.Discuss this episode on our Discord.
Livestream for September 2025
Our livestream for September 2025!Watch it on Youtube.Discuss this episode on our Discord.
Red Markets: Trabajo
Trabajo (Hebanon Games, 2019) is a 32-page ‘portfolio’, part sourcebook and part adventure pack, for the Red Markets post-apocalypse RPG of economic and undead horror, written by Ludonarrative Dissidents’ own …
Notes de l’épisode
Trabajo (Hebanon Games, 2019) is a 32-page ‘portfolio’, part sourcebook and part adventure pack, for the Red Markets post-apocalypse RPG of economic and undead horror, written by Ludonarrative Dissidents’ own Ross Payton. We analysed Red Markets last season and liked it a lot, as you can imagine, and this episode is an opportunity to hear more about how it looks in action, and get Ross’s insights into how he went about constructing this compact, intense supplement.
- Our previous episode covering Red Markets
- Trabajo at DriveThruRPG
- Red Markets at DriveThruRPG, ridiculously good value at just $5
Brindlewood Bay
Brindlewood Bay is a tabletop roleplaying game that combines Murder, She Wrote with H.P. Lovecraft. In it, you play a group of elderly women, members of the local Murder Mavens Mystery Book Club, who help the …
Notes de l’épisode
Brindlewood Bay is a tabletop roleplaying game that combines Murder, She Wrote with H.P. Lovecraft. In it, you play a group of elderly women, members of the local Murder Mavens Mystery Book Club, who help the authorities solve murder cases in a picturesque New England Town.
Unknown Armies: Jailbreak
JAILBREAK is a one-session scenario for Unknown Armies, originally written by Greg Stolze of this parish, in 1998 as a demo adventure for conventions, and subsequently published in the One Shots adventure …
Notes de l’épisode
JAILBREAK is a one-session scenario for Unknown Armies, originally written by Greg Stolze of this parish, in 1998 as a demo adventure for conventions, and subsequently published in the One Shots adventure anthology. It has since been described as one of the great horror adventures for any RPG. Greg is, of course, one of the creators of Unknown Armies, along with John Tynes, and his insights here into how the adventure came together, its structure, how it works and how it’s played are fascinating. Enjoy the episode!
Livestream for July 2025
Our livestream for July! We talk about Gencon, the Ennies, and we get a surprise visit! Watch the episode here on Youtube if you want to see the visuals.Discuss this episode on our Discord.
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