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RPGBOT.Podcast

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NeuAZEROTH UNPLUGGED w/ D&D WoW Principal Game Designer - JAMES WYATT, THIS IS YOUR LIFE!!!12.11.2026 · 42 Min.
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Über den Podcast

The RPGBOT.Podcast is a thoughtful and sometimes humorous discussion about Tabletop Role Playing Games, including Dungeons and Dragons and Pathfinder as well as other TTRPGs. The discussion seeks to help players get the most out of TTRPGs by examining game mechanics and related subjects with a deep, analytic focus. The RPGBOT.Podcast includes a weekly episode; and The RPGBOT.News and The RPGBOT.Oneshot. You can find more information at https://rpgbot.net/ - Analysis, tools, and instructional articles for tabletop RPGs. Support us at the following links: Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/rpgbot BlueSky: https://bsky.app/profile/rpgbot.net TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@rpgbotdotnet The RPGBOT.Podcast was developed by RPGBOT.net and produced in association with The Leisure Illuminati.

Folgen 552

  1. AZEROTH UNPLUGGED w/ D&D WoW Principal Game Designer - JAMES WYATT, THIS IS YOUR LIFE!!!

    42 Min.Staffel 6 · Folge 138

    James Wyatt explains twenty years of game design while Tyler tries to squeeze eight pages of questions into thirty minutes, Randall wonders whether he could have finished a PhD instead of playing WoW, and Ash …

    Shownotes

    James Wyatt explains twenty years of game design while Tyler tries to squeeze eight pages of questions into thirty minutes, Randall wonders whether he could have finished a PhD instead of playing WoW, and Ash demands more totems. Grab your warglaives, prepare your spell slots, and try not to anger the Wizard Supremacy Committee. We're going behind the scenes of World of Warcraft in D&D, and somebody's going to have to explain all of this.

    Show Notes

    James Wyatt joins Tyler, Randall, and Ash to discuss the World of Warcraft D&D crossover, bringing decades of Wizards of the Coast experience and a surprising amount of personal history with Azeroth. From adapting iconic WoW classes to explaining why mana didn't replace spell slots, James shares the design decisions behind bringing World of Warcraft to D&D 5e without turning the tabletop game into an MMO.

    The conversation digs into Shaman Barbarians, Demon Hunters, Beastmaster Rangers, scaling Druid forms, powerful feats, and the return of the Swashbuckler. James also talks about using World of Warcraft to motivate himself to finish his first Eberron novel, how the crossover came together, and why players should feel free to bring Azeroth's character options into other D&D campaign settings.

    After James departs, the RPGBOT crew tackles community questions, evaluates the strongest and weakest subclasses, debates crafting mechanics, and explains why the World of Warcraft setting book offers plenty for both players and Dungeon Masters. Naturally, Tyler wants more mechanical details, Randall appreciates a coherent design philosophy, and Ash still wants totems.

    Key Takeaways

    • D&D first, Warcraft second. The goal was to bring Azeroth into Dungeons & Dragons, not recreate World of Warcraft's video game mechanics.
    • Shaman Barbarians make sense. Inspired by Thrall, the Path of the Elements and Path of the Spirit Guardian turn Rage into supernatural power.
    • No mana system. Spell slots remain because D&D's resource management and resting mechanics are fundamental to the game.
    • Azeroth isn't a prison. WoW subclasses, feats, spells, and character options can work in other D&D settings, including Ravenloft and the Forgotten Realms.
    • Class feats are powerful. Several new feats offer major optimization opportunities, although the crew questions whether some are too strong.
    • Some subclasses shine brighter than others. Swashbuckler, Discipline Cleric, Mystic Brew Monk, and Demon Hunter Ranger stand out, while Shadow Priest and several Death Knight options disappoint.
    • New design ideas may return. Beast companions with Weapon Mastery and level-scaling Druid forms could influence future D&D character options.
    • Crafting gets attention. The World of Warcraft crafting system offers more structure than existing official D&D 5e options, but still leaves magic item recipes largely to the DM.
    • The book serves players and DMs. Character options, setting lore, dungeons, and adventure outlines make it useful beyond a dedicated Warcraft campaign.
    • The crossover has history. James has been experimenting with tabletop adventures in Azeroth for roughly twenty years, making this project a particularly personal one.

    Welcome to the RPGBOT Podcast. If you love Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, and tabletop RPGs, this is the podcast for you.

    Support the show for free: Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any podcast app. It helps new listeners find the best RPG podcast for D&D and Pathfinder players.

    Level up your experience: Join us on Patreon to unlock ad-free access to RPGBOT.net and the RPGBOT Podcast, chat with us and the community on the RPGBOT Discord, and jump into live-streamed RPG podcast recordings.

    Support while you shop: Use our Amazon affiliate link at https://amzn.to/3NwElxQ and help us keep building tools and guides for the RPG community.

    Meet the Hosts

    Tyler Kamstra – Master of mechanics, seeing the Pathfinder action economy like Neo in the Matrix.

    Randall James – Lore buff and technologist, always ready to debate which Lord of the Rings edition reigns supreme.

    Ash Ely – Resident cynic, chaos agent, and AI's worst nightmare, bringing pure table-flipping RPG podcast energy.

    Join the RPGBOT team where fantasy roleplaying meets real strategy, sarcasm, and community chaos.

    How to Find Us:

    In-depth articles, guides, handbooks, reviews, news on Tabletop Role Playing at RPGBOT.net

  2. HOW TO PLAY SHADOWDARK 2 - CHARACTER CREATION: Live Fast, Die Hard, Leave a Lootable Corpse

    39 Min.Staffel 6 · Folge 137

    Welcome back to Shadowdark, where character creation is quick, the dice hate you, and your carefully crafted adventurer might get murdered by a household rat. This week, Tyler walks Randall and Ash through …

    Shownotes

    Welcome back to Shadowdark, where character creation is quick, the dice hate you, and your carefully crafted adventurer might get murdered by a household rat. This week, Tyler walks Randall and Ash through building characters using randomly rolled stats, questionable class choices, and whatever equipment they can afford. Randall builds a fighter who probably should have been a wizard, Ash creates a two-hit-point thief, and everyone prepares for the inevitable meat grinder. The good news? Making characters is easy. The bad news? You're going to get really good at it.

    Show Notes

    In Part 2 of our Shadowdark RPG How to Play series, Tyler, Randall, and Ash tackle character creation in Kelsey Dionne's old-school dungeon crawler. From rolling 3d6 ability scores and choosing ancestries to picking classes, backgrounds, talents, and equipment, we walk through building a Shadowdark character from scratch.

    Randall rolls his way into an unlikely elven fighter, while Ash embraces the chaos with a halfling thief sporting two hit points and a dangerous amount of confidence. Along the way, we explore Shadowdark's four core classes, randomized character advancement, inventory management, and why bringing enough torches matters more than your tragic backstory.

    Then it's time to prepare for the Shadowdark level-zero gauntlet. Armed with questionable stats, random equipment, and absolutely no survival instincts, our disposable adventurers are ready to discover whether character creation is actually just the first step toward character disposal.

    Key Takeaways

    • Shadowdark character creation is fast, simple, and built around old-school D&D randomness.
    • Ability scores use 3d6 rolled in order, with limited opportunities to reroll particularly bad results.
    • The six core ancestries provide straightforward traits, while fighter, priest, thief, and wizard offer distinct approaches to surviving the dungeon.
    • Class talents are randomly determined, making character advancement unpredictable and optimization less important.Backgrounds provide situational advantage on relevant checks without complicated skill lists.
    • Alignment, deities, and character titles add personality and flavor without slowing down character creation. - Starting gold, gear slots, weapons, armor, and torches force players to make meaningful equipment choices before entering the dungeon.
    • Level-zero characters begin with random abilities, ancestry, and limited equipment, often without a weapon.
    • The Shadowdark gauntlet encourages players to bring multiple disposable characters, with survivors earning a chance to advance to level one.

    Welcome to the RPGBOT Podcast. If you love Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, and tabletop RPGs, this is the podcast for you.

    Support the show for free: Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any podcast app. It helps new listeners find the best RPG podcast for D&D and Pathfinder players.

    Level up your experience: Join us on Patreon to unlock ad-free access to RPGBOT.net and the RPGBOT Podcast, chat with us and the community on the RPGBOT Discord, and jump into live-streamed RPG podcast recordings.

    Support while you shop: Use our Amazon affiliate link at https://amzn.to/3NwElxQ and help us keep building tools and guides for the RPG community.

    Meet the Hosts

    Tyler Kamstra – Master of mechanics, seeing the Pathfinder action economy like Neo in the Matrix.

    Randall James – Lore buff and technologist, always ready to debate which Lord of the Rings edition reigns supreme.

    Ash Ely – Resident cynic, chaos agent, and AI's worst nightmare, bringing pure table-flipping RPG podcast energy.

    Join the RPGBOT team where fantasy roleplaying meets real strategy, sarcasm, and community chaos.

    How to Find Us:

    In-depth articles, guides, handbooks, reviews, news on Tabletop Role Playing at RPGBOT.net

  3. D&D 2024 PHB - RANGER CHANGES Remastered - What's stopping me from building a Ranged Fighter with Eldritch Knight and taking Magic Weapon

    1 Std. 9 Min.Staffel 6 · Folge 136

    In this episode of the RPGBOT.Podcast, we break down the changes to the Ranger class in the 2024 rules of Dungeons and Dragons. We go through each class feature and highlight the differences from previous …

    Shownotes

    In this episode of the RPGBOT.Podcast, we break down the changes to the Ranger class in the 2024 rules of Dungeons and Dragons. We go through each class feature and highlight the differences from previous versions.

    Summary

    We discuss the improvements to spellcasting, the changes to Favored Enemy and Favored Foe, the addition of more expertise, and the new subclass features. We were disappointed with the capstone feature, Foe Slayer. Overall, we acknowledge that while the Ranger class has seen some improvements, it still has its flaws and is considered by some to be the worst class in the 2024 rules.

    We dig into the subclasses of the Ranger class in D&D 5e. We talk about the Beastmaster, Feywanderer, Gloomstalker, and Hunter subclasses. We highlight the changes and improvements made to the subclasses in the 2024 rules, but also point out some issues and frustrations. We discuss the balance between using Hunter's Mark and other class features, and the impact of concentration on the Ranger's gameplay. We were unenthusiastic with the changes made to the Gloomstalker subclass and the nerfs to the Hunter subclass. Overall, we feel that the Ranger class still has some design flaws and missed opportunities.

    Our conversation concludes with a discussion on the changes made to some signature ranger spells, including the removal of concentration requirements. We were concerned about the heavy dependence on Hunter's Mark and the lack of flavor in the ranger class. We suggest that the ranger subclasses could be better suited as fighter subclasses, allowing for more diverse and flavorful gameplay. Despite the criticisms, they acknowledge that the 2024 ranger is an improvement over the 2014 version.

    Links

    Takeaways

    • The Ranger class in the 2024 rules has seen some improvements compared to previous versions.
    • The changes to spellcasting, such as the ability to change prepared spells and the reduction of reliance on concentration, are considered positive.
    • The Favored Enemy and Favored Foe features have been updated to provide more versatility and options for the Ranger.
    • The addition of more expertise and the removal of the bonus action requirement for two-weapon fighting are welcomed changes.
    • However, the capstone feature, Foe Slayer, is considered underwhelming and disappointing.
    • While the Ranger class has seen improvements, it is still considered by some to be the worst class in the 2024 rules. The 2024 rules made improvements to the Ranger subclasses, but there are still some frustrations and missed opportunities.
    • The Beastmaster subclass can be effective without relying on Hunter's Mark, but it can feel limited and overshadowed by other options.
    • The Feywanderer subclass received no changes and remains a strong option for Rangers.
    • The Gloomstalker subclass was nerfed and lost its extra attack feature, which disappointed the hosts.
    • The Hunter subclass also received changes, but the removal of options and the reliance on Hunter's Mark led to some dissatisfaction.
    • The hosts discuss the issue of concentration and the impact it has on the Ranger's gameplay.
    • Overall, the hosts feel that the Ranger class still has design flaws and could benefit from further improvements. The removal of concentration requirements for certain ranger spells is seen as a positive change, allowing rangers to use a wider range of spells in combat.
    • The heavy dependence on Hunter's Mark as a damage boost is a concern, as it limits the variety of spells rangers can use.
    • The hosts suggest that the ranger subclasses could be better suited as fighter subclasses, as they offer more diverse and flavorful gameplay options.
    • Despite the criticisms, the hosts acknowledge that the 2024 ranger is an improvement over the 2014 version.

    If you enjoy the show, please rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app. It's a quick, free way to support the podcast, and helps us reach new listeners.

    If you love the show, consider joining us on Patreon, where backers at the $5 and above tiers get ad free access to RPGBOT.net and the RPGBOT.Podcast, can chat directly to members of the RPGBOT team and community on the RPGBOT.Discord, and can join us for live-streamed recordings.

    Support us on Amazon.com when you purchase products recommended in the show at the following link: https://amzn.to/3NwElxQ

    How to Find Us:

    In-depth articles, guides, handbooks, reviews, news on Tabletop Role Playing at RPGBOT.net

    Tyler Kamstra

    Ash Ely

    Randall James

    Producer Dan

    • @Lzr_illuminati

  4. ROLL FOR WARCRAFT - What if an MMO had opportunity attacks?

    1 Std. 11 Min.Staffel 6 · Folge 135

    World of Warcraft has finally come to Dungeons & Dragons, which means decades of raids, questionable class balance, faction arguments, and deeply buried MMO trauma can now happen around your kitchen table. Ash …

    Shownotes

    World of Warcraft has finally come to Dungeons & Dragons, which means decades of raids, questionable class balance, faction arguments, and deeply buried MMO trauma can now happen around your kitchen table. Ash is our designated Azeroth lore master. Randall once escaped World of Warcraft before it could destroy his college career. Tyler has somehow avoided MMORPGs almost entirely, making him the ideal person to ask why the undead paladin has a ghost horse and why the wizard can apparently commit crimes against game balance. This time, we're digging into the new Dungeons & Dragons World of Warcraft collaboration, starting with the classes, specializations, Warcraft mechanics, and the important philosophical question: if you beat an enemy like a piñata, will soul fragments fall out?

    Welcome to Azeroth. Please check your Hunter's Mark at the door.

    Show Notes

    World of Warcraft and Dungeons & Dragons have been borrowing ideas from each other for decades, so an official D&D World of Warcraft crossover feels both extremely strange and somehow inevitable. Ash takes the lead as our resident Warcraft lore expert while Randall and Tyler attempt to determine how much Azeroth you can stuff into D&D 5e before the rules begin making distressed noises.

    The book adapts World of Warcraft classes, specializations, spells, mechanics, and character concepts into Dungeons & Dragons 5e. It also makes one thing very clear: these options are primarily designed to exist together inside a World of Warcraft campaign. Mixing them freely with normal D&D character options may require a serious conversation with your DM, particularly once Tyler starts discovering combinations that probably should not be allowed anywhere near an unsuspecting campaign.

    We begin with the Death Knight, essentially Warcraft's undead champion translated through the Paladin. Blood, Frost, and Unholy specializations return, along with Runic Smite, Death Coil, rune forging, undead steeds, Death Grip, and enough necrotic damage to make your local cleric uncomfortable. Unholy looks particularly strong, while Frost continues the proud World of Warcraft tradition of giving people something to complain about.

    Next comes the Demon Hunter, built from the Ranger chassis and fueled by soul fragments, spectral sight, war glaives, demonic magic, and the time-honored Illidari tradition of solving demon problems by becoming alarmingly demon-adjacent yourself. The conversion captures much of the mobility and aggressive playstyle of the World of Warcraft Demon Hunter, although some abilities work very differently once translated into tabletop mechanics.

    Evokers bring Warcraft's draconic spellcasting into D&D through the Sorcerer, including a large collection of new spells, breath weapons, healing magic, and abilities inspired by the Dracthyr. It is one of the clearer examples of the Dungeons and Dragons World of Warcraft collaboration trying to reproduce not just the name of a class, but the way that class feels in the MMO.

    Hunters are Rangers, which is probably the least surprising sentence in this entire episode. Beast Mastery focuses on improving your animal companion, Marksmanship emphasizes ranged combat, and Survival exists for people who looked at a perfectly good bow and decided they would rather run directly toward the monster. The pet mechanics include some genuinely useful abilities, including companions that can maintain powerful buffs and support their Ranger in combat.

    And then we reach Mage. Warcraft Mage specializations map fairly cleanly onto Wizard concepts: Arcane, Fire, and Frost. The problem is that some of the new Mage feats are much more exciting than the subclass recommendations. Fingers of Frost, Frost Nova, Hot Streak, and similar abilities begin producing combinations that range from powerful to the sort of thing that makes a DM slowly close the book and stare at the player across the table.

    The result is an adaptation that frequently captures World of Warcraft flavor extremely well, even when the mechanical translation gets strange. Longtime WoW players will recognize abilities, class identities, terminology, and even old strategies buried inside the mechanics. D&D players unfamiliar with Warcraft get the added entertainment of listening to Ash explain decades of MMO lore while Randall and Tyler repeatedly ask variations of, "Wait, people actually did this?"

    This is only the beginning of the RPGBOT.Podcast Dungeons & Dragons World of Warcraft review. The book includes numerous classes, fifteen playable species, professions, factions, setting material, and adventures, giving us far too much Azeroth for a single episode.

    Key Takeaways

    • The Dungeons & Dragons World of Warcraft collaboration adapts WoW classes, specializations, spells, and MMO mechanics into D&D 5e rather than simply reskinning standard fantasy options.
    • The book appears designed primarily for dedicated World of Warcraft D&D campaigns. Bringing individual options into a normal D&D game could create unexpected balance problems.
    • Death Knight uses the Paladin as its foundation, with Blood, Frost, and Unholy specializations, rune mechanics, necrotic abilities, undead flavor, and classic Warcraft spells such as Death Grip.
    • Demon Hunter is based on the Ranger and introduces soul fragments, spectral sight, war glaives, demonic abilities, and mechanics inspired by the highly mobile World of Warcraft class.
    • Evoker translates the Dracthyr spellcaster into D&D through the Sorcerer, including breath abilities, healing options, and numerous new World of Warcraft spells.
    • Hunter is essentially a Warcraft-flavored Ranger, with Beast Mastery, Marksmanship, and Survival specializations plus expanded animal companion mechanics.
    • Mage looks straightforward at first, but its feats create some of the most potentially explosive mechanical combinations discussed in the episode.
    • Warcraft veterans will recognize a surprising amount of MMO design philosophy in the tabletop mechanics, including tanks, DPS roles, specialization choices, iconic abilities, and occasionally iconic cheese strategies.
    • Some conversions favor World of Warcraft flavor over strict D&D mechanical balance, which is probably exactly why groups should treat the book as its own ecosystem instead of an unrestricted toolbox.
    • This episode only scratches the surface. Future discussion still has additional classes, fifteen species, professions, factions, Azeroth setting material, and adventures to cover.

    Welcome to the RPGBOT Podcast. If you love Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, and tabletop RPGs, this is the podcast for you.

    Support the show for free: Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any podcast app. It helps new listeners find the best RPG podcast for D&D and Pathfinder players.

    Level up your experience: Join us on Patreon to unlock ad-free access to RPGBOT.net and the RPGBOT Podcast, chat with us and the community on the RPGBOT Discord, and jump into live-streamed RPG podcast recordings.

    Support while you shop: Use our Amazon affiliate link at https://amzn.to/3NwElxQ and help us keep building tools and guides for the RPG community.

    Meet the Hosts

    Tyler Kamstra – Master of mechanics, seeing the Pathfinder action economy like Neo in the Matrix.

    Randall James – Lore buff and technologist, always ready to debate which Lord of the Rings edition reigns supreme.

    Ash Ely – Resident cynic, chaos agent, and AI's worst nightmare, bringing pure table-flipping RPG podcast energy.

    Join the RPGBOT team where fantasy roleplaying meets real strategy, sarcasm, and community chaos.

    How to Find Us:

    In-depth articles, guides, handbooks, reviews, news on Tabletop Role Playing at RPGBOT.net

  5. PROJECT_LAMORDIA REVIEW - Frankenstein Had Better Workplace Safety Standards

    47 Min.Staffel 6 · Folge 134

    What happens when you take Frankenstein, replace the lightning with artificial intelligence, and let a morally bankrupt tech CEO run the whole operation? You get Project Lamordia, where death is optional …

    Shownotes
    What happens when you take Frankenstein, replace the lightning with artificial intelligence, and let a morally bankrupt tech CEO run the whole operation? You get Project Lamordia, where death is optional, workplace safety is a suggestion, and HR has probably been uploaded into a murder robot. This week, Ash, Tyler, and Randall dive into D&D's latest experiment in corporate horror, complete with mad scientists, stolen brains, and employees who really should have read their contracts. Turns out the scariest thing in Ravenloft isn't the monsters. It's upper management. Show Notes

    Frankenstein meets Resident Evil in Project Lamordia, a new D&D 5e horror supplement that reimagines Ravenloft's classic Domain of Dread as a technological nightmare. Ash, Tyler, and Randall explore this modern gothic horror setting, where Victra Mordenheim runs a sinister research corporation, artificial intelligence replaces necromancy, and scientific progress comes with a disturbing body count.

    The crew breaks down the supplement's three short adventures, terrifying new monsters, character backgrounds, and the Lamordian Survivors system, which turns ordinary people into exceptionally disposable horror protagonists. They discuss the influence of SCP Foundation, Control, and Resident Evil, why traditional D&D struggles with survival horror, and whether Project Lamordia delivers enough content to justify its price. Plus, creepy robot dogs, brains in jars, and the horrifying realization that even death won't get you out of your employment contract.

    Key Takeaways

    • Project Lamordia transforms Ravenloft's Frankenstein-inspired Domain of Dread into a modern D&D technological horror setting.

    • Victra Mordenheim leads Mordenheim Kinetics, where artificial intelligence, neural transfers, and unethical experimentation have replaced traditional necromancy.

    • Lamordian Survivors offer a low-powered alternative to standard D&D characters, emphasizing vulnerability, roleplaying, and survival horror.

    • Three short adventures, Sanctuary, Deep Freeze, and Neural Tuning, explore different horrors within the research facility.

    • Ten monsters, four backgrounds, returning Dark Gift feats, and customizable technological enhancements provide options for horror campaigns.

    • The unsettling creature designs and artwork are among the supplement's strongest features.

    • The hosts appreciate the fresh approach to D&D horror but find the adventures brief and question the $14.99 price.

    • Project Lamordia shows promise as a modern gothic horror setting, especially if future releases expand its world and adventures.

    Welcome to the RPGBOT Podcast. If you love Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, and tabletop RPGs, this is the podcast for you.

    Support the show for free: Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any podcast app. It helps new listeners find the best RPG podcast for D&D and Pathfinder players.

    Level up your experience: Join us on Patreon to unlock ad-free access to RPGBOT.net and the RPGBOT Podcast, chat with us and the community on the RPGBOT Discord, and jump into live-streamed RPG podcast recordings.

    Support while you shop: Use our Amazon affiliate link at https://amzn.to/3NwElxQ and help us keep building tools and guides for the RPG community.

    Meet the Hosts

    Tyler Kamstra – Master of mechanics, seeing the Pathfinder action economy like Neo in the Matrix.

    Randall James – Lore buff and technologist, always ready to debate which Lord of the Rings edition reigns supreme.

    Ash Ely – Resident cynic, chaos agent, and AI's worst nightmare, bringing pure table-flipping RPG podcast energy.

    Join the RPGBOT team where fantasy roleplaying meets real strategy, sarcasm, and community chaos.

    How to Find Us:

    In-depth articles, guides, handbooks, reviews, news on Tabletop Role Playing at RPGBOT.net

  6. 2024 D&D PHB Character Creation (Remastered): What if I told you there were 3-ish types of feats?

    1 Std. 2 Min.Staffel 6 · Folge 133

    Creating a D&D character used to be simple. Pick a race, choose a class, roll some dice, and invent a tragic backstory involving dead parents. But the 2024 Player's Handbook has other plans. Now your background …

    Shownotes
    Creating a D&D character used to be simple. Pick a race, choose a class, roll some dice, and invent a tragic backstory involving dead parents. But the 2024 Player's Handbook has other plans. Now your background determines your ability scores, everyone gets feats, and apparently there are three-ish types of feats because counting to four was too complicated. Tyler, Randall, and Ash dig into the new character creation rules, question some questionable decisions, and discover that building a character might require more planning than an actual adventuring career. At least your parents can still be dead. Show Notes

    The 2024 D&D Player's Handbook changes how characters are built, and some of those changes are bigger than they look. Tyler, Randall, and Ash break down the new D&D 5e character creation rules, including class selection, subclasses, species, backgrounds, ability scores, and feats. Backgrounds now determine starting ability score increases and provide an Origin Feat, making them essential to character optimization. We examine the new feat categories, including Origin Feats, General Feats, Epic Boons, and the awkwardly classified Fighting Styles. There are also changes to familiar favorites like Lucky, along with new possibilities for D&D 2024 character builds. We wrap up with practical advice for Dungeon Masters on creating memorable NPCs without building a full character sheet for every shopkeeper, guard, and unfortunate stranger the party decides to murder.

    Key Takeaways

    • D&D 2024 character creation starts with class, followed by origin, ability scores, alignment, and character details.

    • All classes now select subclasses at level 3, and the PHB includes class complexity ratings.

    • Backgrounds provide ability score increases, skills, a tool proficiency, equipment, and an Origin Feat.

    • Background restrictions create new challenges for character optimization and roleplaying flexibility.

    • Feats fall into three main groups: Origin Feats, General Feats, and Epic Boons. Fighting Styles are technically feats, too.

    • General Feats often include ability score increases, while Epic Boons expand high-level character options.

    • The Lucky feat has been revised, changing a longtime optimization favorite.

    • DMs can save time by reskinning monster stat blocks instead of building NPCs as player characters.

    • Personality traits, ideals, bonds, and flaws can make memorable NPCs without excessive preparation.

    Welcome to the RPGBOT Podcast. If you love Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, and tabletop RPGs, this is the podcast for you.

    Support the show for free: Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any podcast app. It helps new listeners find the best RPG podcast for D&D and Pathfinder players.

    Level up your experience: Join us on Patreon to unlock ad-free access to RPGBOT.net and the RPGBOT Podcast, chat with us and the community on the RPGBOT Discord, and jump into live-streamed RPG podcast recordings.

    Support while you shop: Use our Amazon affiliate link at https://amzn.to/3NwElxQ and help us keep building tools and guides for the RPG community.

    Meet the Hosts

    • Tyler Kamstra – Master of mechanics, seeing the Pathfinder action economy like Neo in the Matrix.

    • Randall James – Lore buff and technologist, always ready to debate which Lord of the Rings edition reigns supreme.

    • Ash Ely – Resident cynic, chaos agent, and AI's worst nightmare, bringing pure table-flipping RPG podcast energy.

    Join the RPGBOT team where fantasy roleplaying meets real strategy, sarcasm, and community chaos.

    How to Find Us:

    In-depth articles, guides, handbooks, reviews, news on Tabletop Role Playing at RPGBOT.net

    Tyler Kamstra Ash Ely Randall James Producer Dan

  7. HOW TO PLAY SHADOWDARK 1 - CONCEPTS AND THEMES: I can promise you two things, there will be shadows, it will be dark.

    58 Min.Staffel 6 · Folge 132

    What happens when you take old-school D&D, remove darkvision, put your torches on a real-world timer, and make every spell a potential disaster? You get Shadowdark, a game where poor planning kills you, good …

    Shownotes

    What happens when you take old-school D&D, remove darkvision, put your torches on a real-world timer, and make every spell a potential disaster? You get Shadowdark, a game where poor planning kills you, good planning might save you, and your biggest enemy is a one-hour countdown. This week, Tyler, Randall, and Ash explore a dungeon crawler where treasure earns XP, inventory space is precious, and running away is a perfectly respectable life choice. Bring a torch. Bring a spare. And whatever you do, don't let Tyler near the nickels.

    Show Notes

    Welcome to Part 1 of our Shadowdark RPG How to Play series! Tyler, Randall, and Ash explore the concepts, themes, and core mechanics of Kelsey Dionne's old-school fantasy RPG. Inspired by classic Dungeons & Dragons and the OSR movement, Shadowdark trades heroic power fantasies for deadly dungeon crawls, random encounters, and survival horror.

    We break down Shadowdark's rules-light d20 system, real-time torch mechanics, treasure-based leveling, character progression, combat, and unpredictable spellcasting. With limited inventory slots, no darkvision, and danger around every corner, surviving takes more than a good dice roll. It takes planning, resource management, and knowing when to run.

    If you've ever wondered how to play Shadowdark, what makes it different from D&D 5e, or why anyone would voluntarily crawl into a monster-filled dungeon with two torches and a dream, we've got you covered.

    Key Takeaways

    • Shadowdark brings old-school D&D dungeon crawling back with streamlined rules, deadly encounters, and an emphasis on player ingenuity.
    • Light is survival. Torches last one hour of real time, nobody gets darkvision, and running out of light can be fatal.
    • Combat is fast and dangerous. Simple initiative, limited actions, and low hit points make every decision matter.
    • Treasure earns experience points. Find valuable loot, survive the trip home, and level up.
    • Character creation and advancement embrace randomness. Optimization takes a back seat to clever play and luck.
    • Magic has consequences. Every spell requires a casting check, failures can lock out spells until rest, and critical failures can be nasty.
    • Inventory management matters. Torches, armor, weapons, and supplies compete for precious gear slots.
    • Not every monster needs to die. Negotiation, stealth, retreat, and choosing your battles can keep the party alive.
    • Shadowdark's level-zero gauntlet lets players discover their characters by surviving a brutal introductory adventure.

    Welcome to the RPGBOT Podcast. If you love Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, and tabletop RPGs, this is the podcast for you.

    Support the show for free: Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any podcast app. It helps new listeners find the best RPG podcast for D&D and Pathfinder players.

    Level up your experience: Join us on Patreon to unlock ad-free access to RPGBOT.net and the RPGBOT Podcast, chat with us and the community on the RPGBOT Discord, and jump into live-streamed RPG podcast recordings.

    Support while you shop: Use our Amazon affiliate link at https://amzn.to/3NwElxQ and help us keep building tools and guides for the RPG community.

    Meet the Hosts

    • Tyler Kamstra – Master of mechanics, seeing the Pathfinder action economy like Neo in the Matrix.

    • Randall James – Lore buff and technologist, always ready to debate which Lord of the Rings edition reigns supreme.

    • Ash Ely – Resident cynic, chaos agent, and AI's worst nightmare, bringing pure table-flipping RPG podcast energy.

    Join the RPGBOT team where fantasy roleplaying meets real strategy, sarcasm, and community chaos.

    How to Find Us:

    In-depth articles, guides, handbooks, reviews, news on Tabletop Role Playing at RPGBOT.net

    Tyler Kamstra Ash Ely Randall James Producer Dan

  8. NUMENERA HOW TO PLAY - AP FINALE: I just wanna see the machine do the big shiny explosions

    1 Std. 3 Min.Staffel 6 · Folge 131

    The fate of La Gorge hangs in the balance. An army is approaching, the ancient defenses are broken, and the only thing standing between civilization and total destruction is a guy who can't roll above a five, a …

    Shownotes

    The fate of La Gorge hangs in the balance. An army is approaching, the ancient defenses are broken, and the only thing standing between civilization and total destruction is a guy who can't roll above a five, a robot obsessed with harvesting brains, and Ash hitting things until they stop moving. What could possibly go wrong?

    In the explosive finale of our Numenera actual play, we discover that saving the world requires teamwork, ancient technology, and occasionally remembering that you have abilities other than hitting things with a stick.

    Show Notes

    Our Numenera actual play reaches its chaotic conclusion as Randall James guides Tyler Kamstra and Ash Ely through the final defense of La Gorge. With an enemy force closing in, Dob and Marty must stop a biocircuitry-harvesting robot, salvage ancient technology, and repair massive defensive turrets before their home becomes another forgotten ruin of the Ninth World.

    Between terrible dice rolls, clever cypher use, player intrusions, and some spectacularly questionable engineering, our heroes discover that the Cypher System rewards creative problem-solving just as much as combat. Assuming Tyler's dice cooperate.

    We wrap up our Numenera How to Play series with a discussion of the game's mechanics, crafting and salvage systems, community building, and GM intrusions. Is Numenera worth playing? We have thoughts, a few complaints, and a newfound appreciation for giant gravity cannons.

    Key Takeaways

    • The Numenera actual play finale puts teamwork, resource management, and creative problem-solving to the test.
    • Cyphers and player intrusions offer alternatives to combat, especially when hitting a heavily armored robot accomplishes almost nothing.
    • Salvaging ancient technology and repairing defensive systems highlight Numenera's crafting and exploration mechanics.
    • The Numenera Destiny community-building rules add meaningful stakes to protecting settlements like La Gorge.
    • GM intrusions keep the Cypher System unpredictable, and the hosts agree they could have used more of them.
    • Numenera's Ninth World setting earns praise, although the hosts have mixed feelings about some of the game mechanics.
    • The Cypher System offers accessible, flexible gameplay that rewards creativity over complicated number crunching.

    Welcome to the RPGBOT Podcast. If you love Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, and tabletop RPGs, this is the podcast for you.

    Support the show for free: Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any podcast app. It helps new listeners find the best RPG podcast for D&D and Pathfinder players.

    Level up your experience: Join us on Patreon to unlock ad-free access to RPGBOT.net and the RPGBOT Podcast, chat with us and the community on the RPGBOT Discord, and jump into live-streamed RPG podcast recordings.

    Support while you shop: Use our Amazon affiliate link at https://amzn.to/3NwElxQ and help us keep building tools and guides for the RPG community.

    Meet the Hosts

    • Tyler Kamstra – Master of mechanics, seeing the Pathfinder action economy like Neo in the Matrix.

    • Randall James – Lore buff and technologist, always ready to debate which Lord of the Rings edition reigns supreme.

    • Ash Ely – Resident cynic, chaos agent, and AI's worst nightmare, bringing pure table-flipping RPG podcast energy.

    Join the RPGBOT team where fantasy roleplaying meets real strategy, sarcasm, and community chaos.

    How to Find Us:

    In-depth articles, guides, handbooks, reviews, news on Tabletop Role Playing at RPGBOT.net

    Tyler Kamstra Ash Ely Randall James Producer Dan

  9. 2024 D&D PHB WEAPON MASTERY BREAKDOWN (Remastered): If you attack something, you're going to do damage

    1 Std. 10 Min.Staffel 6 · Folge 130

    For years, martial characters in D&D have had one job: hit things until they stop moving. Wizards rewrite reality, clerics summon divine power, and fighters get to swing a sword. Again. Well, the 2024 D&D …

    Shownotes

    For years, martial characters in D&D have had one job: hit things until they stop moving. Wizards rewrite reality, clerics summon divine power, and fighters get to swing a sword. Again. Well, the 2024 D&D Player's Handbook finally gives martial characters something interesting to do with all that stabbing. Weapon Mastery lets you cleave through enemies, knock them down, shove them around, and even deal damage when you miss. Tyler, Randall, and Ash break down the new mechanics, the best combinations, and why your fighter might soon be carrying enough weapons to open a sporting goods store. Because apparently, hitting things wasn't complicated enough.

    Show Notes

    The 2024 D&D Player's Handbook introduces Weapon Mastery, giving martial characters new ways to control the battlefield, improve damage, and make combat more interesting. But are these new D&D 5e combat mechanics balanced?

    Tyler, Randall, and Ash break down all eight Weapon Mastery properties: Cleave, Graze, Nick, Push, Sap, Slow, Topple, and Vex. We explore how each works, which weapons benefit, and the best Weapon Mastery combinations for fighters, barbarians, rogues, paladins, and rangers.

    We also dig into two-weapon fighting, action economy, battlefield control, and some potentially ridiculous character builds. Do the 2024 D&D weapon rules finally close the martial-caster gap, or have we just given fighters more creative ways to annoy the DM?

    Key Takeaways

    • Weapon Mastery gives martial classes more tactical choices in D&D 2024 combat.

    • Cleave attacks a second nearby enemy, while Graze deals damage even when an attack misses.

    • Nick improves two-weapon fighting by moving the extra Light weapon attack into the Attack action.

    • Push, Slow, and Topple create powerful battlefield control combinations, although balance is a concern.

    • Sap makes enemies less effective, while Vex helps set up advantage and Rogue Sneak Attacks.

    • Fighters gain more flexibility by switching between weapons and mastery effects.

    • Weapon Mastery improves martial character builds, but it doesn't completely solve the martial-caster imbalance.

    Welcome to the RPGBOT Podcast. If you love Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, and tabletop RPGs, this is the podcast for you.

    Support the show for free: Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any podcast app. It helps new listeners find the best RPG podcast for D&D and Pathfinder players.

    Level up your experience: Join us on Patreon to unlock ad-free access to RPGBOT.net and the RPGBOT Podcast, chat with us and the community on the RPGBOT Discord, and jump into live-streamed RPG podcast recordings.

    Support while you shop: Use our Amazon affiliate link at https://amzn.to/3NwElxQ and help us keep building tools and guides for the RPG community.

    Meet the Hosts

    • Tyler Kamstra – Master of mechanics, seeing the Pathfinder action economy like Neo in the Matrix.

    • Randall James – Lore buff and technologist, always ready to debate which Lord of the Rings edition reigns supreme.

    • Ash Ely – Resident cynic, chaos agent, and AI's worst nightmare, bringing pure table-flipping RPG podcast energy.

    Join the RPGBOT team where fantasy roleplaying meets real strategy, sarcasm, and community chaos.

    How to Find Us:

    In-depth articles, guides, handbooks, reviews, news on Tabletop Role Playing at RPGBOT.net

    Tyler Kamstra Ash Ely Randall James Producer Dan

  10. NUMENERA HOW TO PLAY - ACTUAL PLAY PT2: Pay attention, kids. Sometimes weird traditions are good.

    58 Min.Staffel 6 · Folge 129

    Last time, we opened a door that had been sealed for thousands of years, murdered a dinosaur, adopted its baby, and turned a crank we probably shouldn't have touched. Now the village is flooding, the ancient …

    Shownotes

    Last time, we opened a door that had been sealed for thousands of years, murdered a dinosaur, adopted its baby, and turned a crank we probably shouldn't have touched. Now the village is flooding, the ancient machinery is waking up, and our only hope is building weapons from whatever junk we can find. Oh, and Tyler wants to dismantle a horse for spare parts. Welcome back to Numenera, where saving the world requires a little engineering, a lot of questionable judgment, and apparently a working knowledge of French grammar

    Show Notes

    Our Numenera actual play continues, and La Gorge is having a very bad day. Randall returns as GM while Tyler and Ash discover that waking an ancient machine is easy. Figuring out what it does is another matter.

    With the village transformed and an approaching scourge threatening everyone, Dob and Marty must venture deeper into the Ninth World's forgotten technology to repair ancient defensive turrets. First, they'll need to find some rare iotum, survive their own decisions, and convince a talking rectangle to give them directions.

    Along the way, we explore Cypher System recovery rolls, one-use cyphers, GM intrusions, Numenera Destiny crafting, and the surprisingly entertaining business of salvaging ancient technology. There's even a gravity-warping escape from angry lizard birds.

    It's another chaotic RPGBOT.Quickstart adventure where clever ideas beat combat, nobody can pronounce turret, and one bad repair job might dismantle the village's best chance of survival.

    Key Takeaways

    • Numenera recovery rolls restore points to Might, Speed, and Intellect pools, with recovery taking progressively longer throughout the day.

    • Cyphers encourage creative problem-solving. A gravity-changing device turns a dangerous encounter into an easy escape.

    • Numenera Destiny crafting and salvaging mechanics make finding iotum such as quantium and monopole essential to repairing ancient technology.

    • GM intrusions turn success into new complications, including an automated machine threatening to dismantle the very defenses the characters need.

    • Character abilities, Effort, and skills give players multiple ways to overcome difficult tasks without relying entirely on lucky dice rolls.

    • The Ninth World rewards exploration, improvisation, and figuring out ancient technology that nobody fully understands.

    • Experience points can purchase character advancement or specialized benefits that help solve immediate problems.

    Welcome to the RPGBOT Podcast. If you love Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, and tabletop RPGs, this is the podcast for you.

    Support the show for free: Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any podcast app. It helps new listeners find the best RPG podcast for D&D and Pathfinder players.

    Level up your experience: Join us on Patreon to unlock ad-free access to RPGBOT.net and the RPGBOT Podcast, chat with us and the community on the RPGBOT Discord, and jump into live-streamed RPG podcast recordings.

    Support while you shop: Use our Amazon affiliate link at https://amzn.to/3NwElxQ and help us keep building tools and guides for the RPG community.

    Meet the Hosts

    • Tyler Kamstra – Master of mechanics, seeing the Pathfinder action economy like Neo in the Matrix.

    • Randall James – Lore buff and technologist, always ready to debate which Lord of the Rings edition reigns supreme.

    • Ash Ely – Resident cynic, chaos agent, and AI's worst nightmare, bringing pure table-flipping RPG podcast energy.

    Join the RPGBOT team where fantasy roleplaying meets real strategy, sarcasm, and community chaos.

    How to Find Us:

    In-depth articles, guides, handbooks, reviews, news on Tabletop Role Playing at RPGBOT.net

    Tyler Kamstra Ash Ely Randall James Producer Dan

  11. NUMENERA HOW TO PLAY: Actual Play 1 - I don't know what horses do, but they seem shifty...

    1 Std. 7 Min.Staffel 6 · Folge 128

    What happens when a mysterious cowboy rides out of a deadly desert, introduces himself, and immediately falls off his horse? Naturally, you trust his god, open a door that's been locked for thousands of years …

    Shownotes

    What happens when a mysterious cowboy rides out of a deadly desert, introduces himself, and immediately falls off his horse? Naturally, you trust his god, open a door that's been locked for thousands of years, and discover your entire village might be living inside a dead monster. Welcome to Numenera, where the birds are terrifying, the technology is incomprehensible, and Tyler can't roll above a five when it matters. At least Ash gets a pet dinosaur. Things are going great.

    Show Notes

    It's time to put Numenera to the test! In Part 1 of our RPGBOT.Quickstart Numenera actual play, Randall takes the GM's chair while Tyler and Ash explore the Ninth World using the Cypher System.

    Their adventure begins in the isolated village of La Gorge, where a wounded stranger arrives with warnings of an approaching scourge. A mysterious goddess reveals that the village hides an ancient secret, sending our heroes through a long-sealed door to awaken something that might save their home.

    Inside, they encounter prehistoric nightmares, adopt an unexpected companion, and explore forgotten technology while learning Numenera combat, character abilities, GM intrusions, and the game's unique crafting and salvaging mechanics. Along the way, they discover that ancient technology is considerably harder to operate when nobody remembers what a hydroelectric dam is.

    It's a hands-on introduction to playing Numenera, complete with terrible dice rolls, questionable decisions, and a talking brick that demands professional certification.

    Key Takeaways

    • Numenera actual play demonstrates how the Cypher System handles combat, skill checks, Effort, Edge, and difficulty adjustments.

    • GM intrusions add unexpected complications and reward players with experience points.

    • Numenera character abilities encourage teamwork, creative problem-solving, and unconventional approaches to danger.

    • Crafting and salvaging iotum are central to Numenera Destiny, even when the dice refuse to cooperate.

    • The Ninth World blends ancient technology, bizarre creatures, and science-fiction mysteries into a setting built for exploration.

    • Player choices turn a dangerous encounter into an unlikely friendship with a baby reptilian bird named Korra.

    • Numenera's straightforward mechanics make it accessible to new players without sacrificing depth or flexibility.

    Welcome to the RPGBOT Podcast. If you love Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, and tabletop RPGs, this is the podcast for you.

    Support the show for free: Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any podcast app. It helps new listeners find the best RPG podcast for D&D and Pathfinder players.

    Level up your experience: Join us on Patreon to unlock ad-free access to RPGBOT.net and the RPGBOT Podcast, chat with us and the community on the RPGBOT Discord, and jump into live-streamed RPG podcast recordings.

    Support while you shop: Use our Amazon affiliate link at https://amzn.to/3NwElxQ and help us keep building tools and guides for the RPG community.

    Meet the Hosts

    • Tyler Kamstra – Master of mechanics, seeing the Pathfinder action economy like Neo in the Matrix.

    • Randall James – Lore buff and technologist, always ready to debate which Lord of the Rings edition reigns supreme.

    • Ash Ely – Resident cynic, chaos agent, and AI's worst nightmare, bringing pure table-flipping RPG podcast energy.

    Join the RPGBOT team where fantasy roleplaying meets real strategy, sarcasm, and community chaos.

    How to Find Us:

    In-depth articles, guides, handbooks, reviews, news on Tabletop Role Playing at RPGBOT.net

    Tyler Kamstra Ash Ely Randall James Producer Dan

  12. HOW TO GM ROMANCE (Remastered) w/ Sebastian Yūe and Friday Strout - Building Meaningful Relationships in TTRPGs

    42 Min.Staffel 6 · Folge 127

    You've slain dragons, defeated liches, and saved the kingdom. But now an NPC is flirting with you, and suddenly everyone at the table is making death saves against awkwardness. Romance in D&D can be terrifying …

    Shownotes

    You've slain dragons, defeated liches, and saved the kingdom. But now an NPC is flirting with you, and suddenly everyone at the table is making death saves against awkwardness. Romance in D&D can be terrifying, especially when the GM's idea of flirting involves a Persuasion check and prolonged eye contact. Fortunately, Sebastian Yūe and Friday Strout are here to help us navigate love, relationships, and the delicate art of making imaginary people kiss without making real people uncomfortable. Roll for initiative. No, wait. Roll for chemistry.

    Show Notes

    Love is in the air, and the GM is sweating. In this episode of the RPGBOT.Podcast, Tyler and Randall welcome Sebastian Yūe and Friday Strout to discuss how to GM romance in tabletop RPGs without turning your campaign into an RPG horror story.

    From flirting with NPCs to building meaningful character relationships, we explore consent, player boundaries, and practical romance mechanics for D&D and other TTRPGs. Our guests also introduce How to GM Romance, their guide to creating believable romantic storylines, tracking relationships, and giving characters something worth fighting for beyond treasure and experience points.

    Because sometimes the hardest encounter isn't the dragon. It's asking someone out.

    Key Takeaways

    • Consent comes first. Establish boundaries, expectations, and safety tools before introducing romance.
    • Romance is more than flirting. Meaningful relationships create opportunities for character development and storytelling.
    • Communication prevents awkwardness. Check what players want from romantic encounters and respect their comfort levels.
    • Mechanics can help. Relationship trackers and memorable moments give romantic storylines structure without overwhelming roleplay.
    • NPC relationships matter. Believable romantic interests need personalities, motivations, and agency.
    • Romance should fit the table. Whether playful, dramatic, or intimate, relationships work best when everyone is comfortable and invested.
    • How to GM Romance offers system-flexible advice and tools to help GMs approach romantic storytelling with confidence.

    Welcome to the RPGBOT Podcast. If you love Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, and tabletop RPGs, this is the podcast for you.

    Support the show for free: Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any podcast app. It helps new listeners find the best RPG podcast for D&D and Pathfinder players.

    Level up your experience: Join us on Patreon to unlock ad-free access to RPGBOT.net and the RPGBOT Podcast, chat with us and the community on the RPGBOT Discord, and jump into live-streamed RPG podcast recordings.

    Support while you shop: Use our Amazon affiliate link at https://amzn.to/3NwElxQ and help us keep building tools and guides for the RPG community.

    Meet the Hosts

    • Tyler Kamstra – Master of mechanics, seeing the Pathfinder action economy like Neo in the Matrix.

    • Randall James – Lore buff and technologist, always ready to debate which Lord of the Rings edition reigns supreme.

    • Ash Ely – Resident cynic, chaos agent, and AI's worst nightmare, bringing pure table-flipping RPG podcast energy.

    Join the RPGBOT team where fantasy roleplaying meets real strategy, sarcasm, and community chaos.

    How to Find Us:

    In-depth articles, guides, handbooks, reviews, news on Tabletop Role Playing at RPGBOT.net

    Tyler Kamstra Ash Ely Randall James Producer Dan

  13. NUMENERA HOW TO PLAY - CHARACTER ADVANCEMENT, CRAFTING AND COMMUNITIES: Someones Gonna Find a Tape Measure and Change Society

    53 Min.Staffel 6 · Folge 126

    So you've survived character creation in Numenera. Congratulations! Now it's time to level up, rummage through ancient garbage, and build a giant murder robot that might eventually decide you're the problem …

    Shownotes

    So you've survived character creation in Numenera. Congratulations! Now it's time to level up, rummage through ancient garbage, and build a giant murder robot that might eventually decide you're the problem. What could possibly go wrong? In this episode, we're spending XP, scavenging the ruins of forgotten civilizations, and exploring the joys of community development. Because nothing says heroic adventure quite like spending six months building a machine that might explode, or thirty years constructing a castle. Welcome to the Ninth World, where yesterday's trash is tomorrow's technology, and apparently nobody can agree on how to pronounce a two-by-four.

    Show Notes

    In Part 3 of our How to Play Numenera series, Randall, Tyler, and Ash tackle character advancement, salvaging, crafting, and community building in Monte Cook Games' science-fantasy tabletop RPG.

    We start with Numenera character advancement, explaining how experience points improve abilities, Edge, Effort, and skills as characters progress through six tiers. Then we dig into the Numenera Destiny crafting system, where ancient technology becomes raw materials for everything from useful cyphers to heavily armed automatons that may eventually turn against their creators. Fun!

    Along the way, we explore salvaging iotum, collecting parts, crafting plans, equipment depletion, and the questionable wisdom of building a war machine with trust issues. Finally, we look at community-building mechanics and how players can turn their adventures into something bigger than another pile of mysterious artifacts.

    Whether you're learning the Cypher System, planning your next Numenera campaign, or just want to build a robot with swords for hands, this episode has you covered.

    Key Takeaways

    • Numenera character advancement uses XP to improve stat Pools, Edge, Effort, and skills. Four advancements, costing 16 XP total, move a character to the next tier.
    • GM intrusions provide experience points while introducing complications that keep the story moving.
    • Salvaging ancient technology provides ordinary parts and valuable iotum needed for Numenera crafting.
    • Crafting plans determine required materials, difficulty, and construction time. Larger projects can take months, years, or even decades.
    • Automatons, cyphers, artifacts, vehicles, and installations offer powerful options, but depletion and repair costs can make them risky investments.
    • Community-building rules let characters develop settlements, construct defenses, and influence the Ninth World beyond individual adventures.
    • Exploration, salvaging, crafting, and settlement development create a rewarding gameplay loop that gives characters a reason to venture into dangerous ruins.

    Welcome to the RPGBOT Podcast. If you love Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, and tabletop RPGs, this is the podcast for you.

    Support the show for free: Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any podcast app. It helps new listeners find the best RPG podcast for D&D and Pathfinder players.

    Level up your experience: Join us on Patreon to unlock ad-free access to RPGBOT.net and the RPGBOT Podcast, chat with us and the community on the RPGBOT Discord, and jump into live-streamed RPG podcast recordings.

    Support while you shop: Use our Amazon affiliate link at https://amzn.to/3NwElxQ and help us keep building tools and guides for the RPG community.

    Meet the Hosts

    • Tyler Kamstra – Master of mechanics, seeing the Pathfinder action economy like Neo in the Matrix.

    • Randall James – Lore buff and technologist, always ready to debate which Lord of the Rings edition reigns supreme.

    • Ash Ely – Resident cynic, chaos agent, and AI's worst nightmare, bringing pure table-flipping RPG podcast energy.

    Join the RPGBOT team where fantasy roleplaying meets real strategy, sarcasm, and community chaos.

    How to Find Us:

    In-depth articles, guides, handbooks, reviews, news on Tabletop Role Playing at RPGBOT.net

    Tyler Kamstra Ash Ely Randall James Producer Dan

  14. NUMENERA HOW TO PLAY - CHARACTER CREATION: Pick a Type. Pick a Focus. Panic.

    55 Min.Staffel 6 · Folge 125

    Welcome to Numenera, where ancient technology is magic, character creation is an adventure, and Tyler is already looking for something dangerous to invent. This time, Randall walks us through building …

    Shownotes

    Welcome to Numenera, where ancient technology is magic, character creation is an adventure, and Tyler is already looking for something dangerous to invent. This time, Randall walks us through building characters in the Ninth World, where your personality, abilities, and questionable life choices all become part of your character sheet. Ash wants a loyal adventurer. Tyler wants a reckless inventor. Randall just wants everyone to understand the rules before somebody accidentally destroys civilization. Again.

    Show Notes

    In part two of our RPGBOT.Quickstart How to Play Numenera series, Randall guides Tyler and Ash through Numenera character creation using the Cypher System and the Discovery and Destiny rulebooks. We're building characters for the Ninth World, a science-fantasy setting where ancient technology powers extraordinary abilities, and understanding what you're doing is entirely optional.

    We break down the three essential parts of building a Numenera character: Type, Descriptor, and Focus. Your Type determines your core abilities and role in the party. Your Descriptor adds personality traits, mechanical benefits, and limitations. Your Focus defines what makes your character unique, providing specialized abilities and connections to other characters.

    Along the way, we explore the six Numenera character types, compare character-building options, and explain how Might, Speed, Intellect, Effort, and Edge shape gameplay. We also examine how character backgrounds, starting abilities, and advancement work together to create memorable characters without getting buried in complicated rules.

    Tyler builds a Risk-Taking Wright Who Builds Tomorrow, an inventive tinkerer with more curiosity than caution. Ash creates a Loyal Jack Who Explores Yesterday, a versatile adventurer drawn to lost civilizations and ancient mysteries. Together, they demonstrate how Numenera's flexible character creation system turns a simple concept into a fully realized character with abilities, motivations, and roleplaying opportunities.

    We also dig into GM intrusions, special dice results, and character connections, showing how the Cypher System encourages creative decisions and unexpected consequences.

    Whether you're new to Numenera, learning the Cypher System, or looking for a character creation guide that doesn't require a spreadsheet and a minor existential crisis, we've got you covered.

    Key Takeaways
    • Numenera character creation follows a simple formula: Descriptor + Type + Focus, creating a distinct character concept with mechanical and narrative depth.
    • Character Types define your primary abilities and playstyle. Discovery introduces the Glaive, Nano, and Jack, while Destiny adds the Arkus, Wright, and Delve.
    • Descriptors shape personality and provide mechanical benefits, limitations, and roleplaying opportunities.
    • Foci define your character's signature abilities, unlock new features as you advance, and establish connections with other characters.
    • Might, Speed, and Intellect form the foundation of Cypher System mechanics, while Effort and Edge influence how effectively characters handle challenges.
    • Character backgrounds and connections help players establish motivations, relationships, and reasons for adventuring together.
    • GM intrusions and special dice results introduce narrative twists that reward creative gameplay and occasionally punish spectacularly bad decisions.
    • Numenera's character-building system encourages players to start with a concept and let the mechanics support it, rather than forcing a character into a predetermined class.

  15. SECRET ROLLS (Remastered) - In Case You're Not Good at Lying to Your Players…

    58 Min.Staffel 6 · Folge 124

    Today on the RPGBOT.Podcast, we're talking about secret rolls, the wonderful tabletop RPG mechanic where the GM rolls your dice for you and then refuses to tell you what happened. Pathfinder 2e actually built …

    Shownotes

    Today on the RPGBOT.Podcast, we're talking about secret rolls, the wonderful tabletop RPG mechanic where the GM rolls your dice for you and then refuses to tell you what happened. Pathfinder 2e actually built rules for this. Dungeons & Dragons 5e mostly hands the problem to the DM and quietly backs out of the room.So grab your dice, hand them to the GM, and try not to look nervous. Apparently, not knowing whether you succeeded is a feature.

    Show Notes

    Sometimes knowing what you rolled is almost as dangerous as failing the roll. In this episode of the RPGBOT.Podcast, we dig into secret rolls in tabletop RPGs and why hiding the result of a check can completely change the way players experience a game. Pathfinder 2e secret checks provide a formal system for keeping certain results hidden, while D&D 5e leaves Dungeon Masters with considerably more improvising to do.

    The problem starts with metagaming. A player rolls a 3 on an Insight check, gets told that an NPC seems trustworthy, and suddenly everyone at the table knows exactly how trustworthy that NPC probably isn't. Even when players try to separate player knowledge from character knowledge, ignoring a terrible die roll sitting in front of you is easier said than done. Secret dice rolls remove that information entirely.

    We look at how secret rolls work particularly well for knowledge checks, Perception, Insight, Deception, hiding, sneaking, and social encounters. If the player doesn't know whether they succeeded, failed, or critically failed, information from the GM becomes part of the world instead of an obvious reflection of the number on the die.

    Pathfinder 2e takes this idea especially seriously. The GM can make a secret check using the character's modifier, determine the degree of success, and describe only what the character knows. A successful Recall Knowledge check might reveal something useful. A critical failure might produce convincing misinformation. Either way, the player has to decide what to do without first checking the d20 for permission to believe the GM.

    We also talk about one of the simplest tools available to a D&D 5e DM when secret checks aren't being used: sometimes a failed Insight check doesn't need to produce false information. The NPC can simply be hard to read. That keeps a bad roll from becoming a giant flashing METAGAME HERE sign over the conversation.

    Secret rolls can also make exploration more interesting. Searching for traps, sneaking past enemies, or trying to determine whether something dangerous noticed you becomes considerably more tense when nobody knows exactly how successful the attempt was. And yes, some players absolutely hate this.

    There is something deeply comforting about seeing your own dice roll. Taking that information away requires trust between the players and GM. But when everyone buys into it, secret checks can create suspense, uncertainty, and some wonderfully uncomfortable moments where the players have to make decisions using what their characters actually know.

    We also wander into encounter design and homebrew campaign advice, because this is the RPGBOT.Podcast and staying completely on topic would apparently violate some kind of contractual obligation. Random tables, interesting terrain, multiple monsters, and unexpected complications can all help turn otherwise straightforward encounters into memorable tabletop RPG sessions.

    So whether you're running Pathfinder 2e secret rolls, experimenting with hidden D&D 5e ability checks, trying to reduce metagaming at your table, or simply looking for better Dungeon Master techniques, there is one important lesson: Sometimes the most interesting die roll is the one the players never see.

    Key Takeaways

    • Secret rolls help reduce metagaming by keeping players from knowing whether their characters succeeded or failed.
    • Pathfinder 2e has formal secret check mechanics that work especially well with Recall Knowledge, Perception, Deception, stealth, and other checks where knowing the die result could influence player behavior.
    • D&D 5e secret rolls are less formally defined, but DMs can still use hidden checks or carefully limit the information provided after failed rolls.
    • A failed Insight check does not always need to mean believing the opposite of the truth. Sometimes the best answer is simply that the NPC is difficult to read.
    • Knowledge checks become more interesting when players cannot immediately judge the reliability of the information based on their die result.
    • Critical failures can create believable misinformation, particularly in Pathfinder 2e, adding uncertainty without requiring players to intentionally ignore information they already know.
    • Secret Perception checks can make traps, hidden creatures, exploration, and investigation considerably more suspenseful.
    • Secret Stealth and Sneak checks create tension because players may not know whether an enemy has detected them until something actually happens.
    • Social encounters benefit from uncertainty. Hidden Insight and Deception checks allow conversations to feel more like interactions with characters and less like comparing numbers.
    • Secret rolls require trust. Players need confidence that the GM is applying the rules fairly when the dice are hidden.
    • Good encounter design goes beyond monster statistics. Multiple enemies, terrain, environmental complications, and unexpected problems can make encounters far more memorable.
    • Random tables can be excellent tools for homebrew campaign inspiration when you need locations, encounters, complications, or ideas you would not have invented on your own.
    • Whether you're playing Dungeons & Dragons 5e or Pathfinder 2e, secret rolls can create suspense by forcing players to act on character knowledge rather than the number sitting on the die.
    • And most importantly, when the GM rolls something behind the screen, smiles, and says, "Everything seems fine," everything is absolutely, definitely fine.

    Welcome to the RPGBOT Podcast. If you love Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, and tabletop RPGs, this is the podcast for you.

    Support the show for free: Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any podcast app. It helps new listeners find the best RPG podcast for D&D and Pathfinder players.

    Level up your experience: Join us on Patreon to unlock ad-free access to RPGBOT.net and the RPGBOT Podcast, chat with us and the community on the RPGBOT Discord, and jump into live-streamed RPG podcast recordings.

    Support while you shop: Use our Amazon affiliate link at https://amzn.to/3NwElxQ and help us keep building tools and guides for the RPG community.

    Meet the Hosts

    • Tyler Kamstra – Master of mechanics, seeing the Pathfinder action economy like Neo in the Matrix.

    • Randall James – Lore buff and technologist, always ready to debate which Lord of the Rings edition reigns supreme.

    • Ash Ely – Resident cynic, chaos agent, and AI's worst nightmare, bringing pure table-flipping RPG podcast energy.

    Join the RPGBOT team where fantasy roleplaying meets real strategy, sarcasm, and community chaos.

    How to Find Us:

    In-depth articles, guides, handbooks, reviews, news on Tabletop Role Playing at RPGBOT.net

    Tyler Kamstra Ash Ely Randall James Producer Dan

  16. STARFINDER 2E TECH CORE Pt 2 - There are EMOJI Spells...Like What?

    56 Min.Staffel 6 · Folge 123

    In Part I of our Starfinder 2e Tech Core review, we covered the new ancestries, the Mechanic, cybernetics, Junkomancers, armed starfish, and hoverboard shields. Now we get to the Technomancer, emoji magic …

    Shownotes

    In Part I of our Starfinder 2e Tech Core review, we covered the new ancestries, the Mechanic, cybernetics, Junkomancers, armed starfish, and hoverboard shields.

    Now we get to the Technomancer, emoji magic, weaponized guitars, giant robots, streamer builds, and finally, after a very long wait, actual Starfinder 2e starship combat.

    The Technomancer is a prepared caster built around programming languages, Spell Cache, Overclock, and Jailbreak. Its programming language acts like a subclass, with options such as DPS++, FORTRN, Servo Shell, and Viper pushing the class toward weapons, defense, minions, or spell gems. The result feels less like a wizard in space and more like a caster constantly modifying systems, improving gear, and cycling through a very satisfying overclock loop.

    Tech Core's new spells are pure Starfinder. There are junk spells, starship spells, Summon Giant Robot, and an entire collection of emoji magic. You can blind enemies with emojis, create slippery pools with a crying face, summon emoji weapons, or spam someone so badly they take mental damage. There's also Kill -9, which turns a Linux command into a devastating high-level spell.

    The equipment gets just as weird. Chordpocalypse is an electric guitar that doubles as a weapon. The Magical Mixtape gives you the perfect soundtrack for the moment. Laserdiscs have become weapons because nobody remembers what they were for. And streamer-focused gear can literally let you ask chat for help.

    Then we finally arrive at the main event: Starfinder 2e starship combat.

    Tech Core introduces full tactical starship rules, including ship construction, sensor maps, headings, shields, hull points, battle stations, system damage, weapons, upgrades, and expansion bays. Starship encounters are designed to involve more than ships trading shots, with boarding actions, hazards, repairs, and internal emergencies all potentially happening at the same time.

    Ships come in three main frames: the durable Bulwark, the balanced Explorer, and the fast Skirmisher. They level with the party, and battle stations give individual characters meaningful jobs aboard the ship. Gunnery handles weapons, generators support shields, pilots maneuver, magic conduits give casters access to starship spells, and scanners can identify enemy systems so the crew can target and disable them.

    One of the biggest design choices is that starships do not have normal credit costs. The GM introduces them through the story, and the ship improves automatically as the party levels. That keeps the focus on customization and adventure instead of turning the campaign into Space Mortgage Simulator.

    Between the Technomancer, new spells and gear, and finally a complete starship system, Part II makes Tech Core feel like the book that fully unlocks the technological side of Starfinder 2e.

    And Ash finally has his starship rules.

    Welcome to the RPGBOT Podcast. If you love Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, and tabletop RPGs, this is the podcast for you.

    Support the show for free: Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any podcast app. It helps new listeners find the best RPG podcast for D&D and Pathfinder players.

    Level up your experience: Join us on Patreon to unlock ad-free access to RPGBOT.net and the RPGBOT Podcast, chat with us and the community on the RPGBOT Discord, and jump into live-streamed RPG podcast recordings.

    Support while you shop: Use our Amazon affiliate link at https://amzn.to/3NwElxQ and help us keep building tools and guides for the RPG community.

    Meet the Hosts

    • Tyler Kamstra – Master of mechanics, seeing the Pathfinder action economy like Neo in the Matrix.

    • Randall James – Lore buff and technologist, always ready to debate which Lord of the Rings edition reigns supreme.

    • Ash Ely – Resident cynic, chaos agent, and AI's worst nightmare, bringing pure table-flipping RPG podcast energy.

    Join the RPGBOT team where fantasy roleplaying meets real strategy, sarcasm, and community chaos.

    How to Find Us:

    In-depth articles, guides, handbooks, reviews, news on Tabletop Role Playing at RPGBOT.net

    Tyler Kamstra Ash Ely Randall James Producer Dan

  17. STARFINDER 2E TECH CORE - So many nerdy classes man. Like, just nerds!

    54 Min.Staffel 6 · Folge 122

    Starfinder 2e Tech Core is here, and apparently the answer to "How much weird science fiction nonsense can Paizo fit into one book?" is "Yes." Starfinder 2e: Tech Core (affiliate link) Show Notes In Part 1 of …

    Shownotes

    Starfinder 2e Tech Core is here, and apparently the answer to "How much weird science fiction nonsense can Paizo fit into one book?" is "Yes."

    Show Notes

    In Part 1 of our Starfinder 2e Tech Core review, we dig into the player-facing side of the book, starting with new ancestries, moving into the Mechanic class, and then wandering through a pile of new archetypes, companions, augments, grenades, junk magic, and deeply questionable robot design choices.

    The new ancestries immediately establish the tone. Living Holograms can be advertisements, mascots, emojis, or full cartoon characters with stretchy arms, which means your next Starfinder character can technically be a homicidal cereal mascot. We also get SROs, fully customizable sentient robots, Virthani, who are basically humans after somebody turned every slider up, and the Cyborg versatile heritage for anyone who looked at their biological body and decided they could improve it with more hardware.

    Then we get to the Mechanic, which Ash immediately declares to be the "Chad Inventor." The Mechanic revolves around an exocortex and lets players choose between a drone, mine, or turret setup. Each option changes how the class plays, while the Modify ability lets Mechanics temporarily improve weapons, equipment, and their technological creations without burning through a limited daily resource.

    The class also gets one of the most useful pieces of adventuring technology imaginable: the custom rig. It can hold and integrate multiple toolkits, giving the Mechanic a portable collection of hacking, crafting, infiltration, and repair tools without requiring them to carry half a hardware store on their back.

    From there, we explore Tech Core's new archetypes.

    The Augmented archetype is for anyone who believes the appropriate number of cybernetic implants is "more." Grenadier does exactly what the name suggests, although disposable explosives can get expensive fast. Junkomancer turns garbage into magical resources and is described as less of a school of magic and more of a vibe, which may be the most Starfinder sentence ever written.

    Nanocyte returns from Starfinder 1e as an archetype rather than a full class, allowing characters to control clouds of nanobots that can create cover, attack enemies, repair objects, and generally solve problems through aggressive applications of microscopic technology.

    Pharmacologist gives you the ability to manufacture medical consumables and literally shoot medicine into people with syringe guns, because apparently Starfinder decided healing needed more firearms.

    Shield Ace makes you better at shields. It exists.

    Vehicle Pilot, meanwhile, lets characters lean heavily into hoverboards and other vehicles, including the extremely important ability to use a hoverboard as a shield because sometimes game design achieves perfection.

    We also take a quick look at Starfinder 2e robot companions and animal companions, including a robot that appears to be a railgun with legs, thumbs, and a knife for reasons nobody can adequately explain.

    And this is only Part 1.

    Key Takeaways

    • Starfinder 2e Tech Core functions as a major core expansion, adding new ancestries, classes, archetypes, equipment, technology, and GM options.
    • Living Holograms might be the most ridiculous new ancestry in the book, with options ranging from advertisements and mascots to cartoon characters with twenty-foot stretchy arms.
    • SROs let players build highly customizable robot characters with modular upgrades, movement options, sensors, and physical modifications.
    • Virthani are highly adaptable humanoids with strong sci-fi utility and excellent support for characters built around augmentations.
    • The Cyborg versatile heritage dramatically increases a character's capacity for implants and opens the door to extremely augmentation-heavy builds.
    • The Mechanic is one of Tech Core's standout additions, offering three major playstyles through drones, mines, and turrets.
    • Modify gives the Mechanic repeatable, short-duration upgrades without relying on a limited daily resource.
    • The Mechanic's custom rig provides portable access to multiple toolkits and reinforces the class's identity as Starfinder's dedicated technology specialist.
    • The Augmented archetype is built around getting more mileage out of cybernetic implants and increasing augmentation capacity.
    • Grenadier improves thrown explosives and works well with Soldier abilities, but disposable grenades may create an ongoing equipment cost problem.
    • Junkomancer turns battlefield trash and scrap into magical resources, equipment, ammunition, and temporary upgrades.
    • Nanocyte returns as an archetype rather than a full Starfinder 2e class, using swarms of nanobots for offense, defense, repair, and utility.
    • Pharmacologist lets characters create medical consumables and deliver medicine or poison through syringe weapons.
    • Shield Ace is mechanically solid for defensive builds, even if nobody on the podcast appeared especially excited about it.
    • Vehicle Pilot becomes much more interesting in campaigns where vehicles actually matter, especially once hoverboards start doubling as shields.
    • Robot companions use mechanics similar to animal companions, allowing characters to customize robotic allies with different chassis and upgrades.
    • Tech Core embraces Starfinder's mixture of serious mechanics and complete nonsense, which is how we ended up discussing murderous holographic mascots, rocket fists, healing land mines, syringe guns, armed starfish, and robot railguns with knives.

    Welcome to the RPGBOT Podcast. If you love Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, and tabletop RPGs, this is the podcast for you.

    Support the show for free: Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any podcast app. It helps new listeners find the best RPG podcast for D&D and Pathfinder players.

    Level up your experience: Join us on Patreon to unlock ad-free access to RPGBOT.net and the RPGBOT Podcast, chat with us and the community on the RPGBOT Discord, and jump into live-streamed RPG podcast recordings.

    Support while you shop: Use our Amazon affiliate link at https://amzn.to/3NwElxQ and help us keep building tools and guides for the RPG community.

    Meet the Hosts

    • Tyler Kamstra – Master of mechanics, seeing the Pathfinder action economy like Neo in the Matrix.

    • Randall James – Lore buff and technologist, always ready to debate which Lord of the Rings edition reigns supreme.

    • Ash Ely – Resident cynic, chaos agent, and AI's worst nightmare, bringing pure table-flipping RPG podcast energy.

    Join the RPGBOT team where fantasy roleplaying meets real strategy, sarcasm, and community chaos.

    How to Find Us:

    In-depth articles, guides, handbooks, reviews, news on Tabletop Role Playing at RPGBOT.net

    Tyler Kamstra Ash Ely Randall James Producer Dan

  18. DnD 2024 PHB CHARACTER CREATION REMASTERED - What if I told you there were three-ish types of feats?

    1 Std. 2 Min.

    Creating a D&D character used to be simple. Pick a race, choose a class, roll some dice, and invent a tragic backstory involving dead parents. But the 2024 Player's Handbook has other plans. Now your background …

    Shownotes

    Creating a D&D character used to be simple. Pick a race, choose a class, roll some dice, and invent a tragic backstory involving dead parents. But the 2024 Player's Handbook has other plans. Now your background determines your ability scores, everyone gets feats, and apparently there are three-ish types of feats because counting to four was too complicated. Tyler, Randall, and Ash dig into the new character creation rules, question some questionable decisions, and discover that building a character might require more planning than an actual adventuring career. At least your parents can still be dead.

    Show Notes

    The 2024 D&D Player's Handbook changes how characters are built, and some of those changes are bigger than they look. Tyler, Randall, and Ash break down the new D&D 5e character creation rules, including class selection, subclasses, species, backgrounds, ability scores, and feats. Backgrounds now determine starting ability score increases and provide an Origin Feat, making them essential to character optimization. We examine the new feat categories, including Origin Feats, General Feats, Epic Boons, and the awkwardly classified Fighting Styles. There are also changes to familiar favorites like Lucky, along with new possibilities for D&D 2024 character builds. We wrap up with practical advice for Dungeon Masters on creating memorable NPCs without building a full character sheet for every shopkeeper, guard, and unfortunate stranger the party decides to murder.

    Key Takeaways

    • D&D 2024 character creation starts with class, followed by origin, ability scores, alignment, and character details.
    • All classes now select subclasses at level 3, and the PHB includes class complexity ratings.
    • Backgrounds provide ability score increases, skills, a tool proficiency, equipment, and an Origin Feat.
    • Background restrictions create new challenges for character optimization and roleplaying flexibility.
    • Feats fall into three main groups: Origin Feats, General Feats, and Epic Boons. Fighting Styles are technically feats, too.
    • General Feats often include ability score increases, while Epic Boons expand high-level character options.
    • The Lucky feat has been revised, changing a longtime optimization favorite.
    • DMs can save time by reskinning monster stat blocks instead of building NPCs as player characters.
    • Personality traits, ideals, bonds, and flaws can make memorable NPCs without excessive preparation.

    Welcome to the RPGBOT Podcast. If you love Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, and tabletop RPGs, this is the podcast for you.

    Support the show for free: Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any podcast app. It helps new listeners find the best RPG podcast for D&D and Pathfinder players.

    Level up your experience: Join us on Patreon to unlock ad-free access to RPGBOT.net and the RPGBOT Podcast, chat with us and the community on the RPGBOT Discord, and jump into live-streamed RPG podcast recordings.

    Support while you shop: Use our Amazon affiliate link at https://amzn.to/3NwElxQ and help us keep building tools and guides for the RPG community.

    Meet the Hosts

    • Tyler Kamstra – Master of mechanics, seeing the Pathfinder action economy like Neo in the Matrix.

    • Randall James – Lore buff and technologist, always ready to debate which Lord of the Rings edition reigns supreme.

    • Ash Ely – Resident cynic, chaos agent, and AI's worst nightmare, bringing pure table-flipping RPG podcast energy.

    Join the RPGBOT team where fantasy roleplaying meets real strategy, sarcasm, and community chaos.

    How to Find Us:

    In-depth articles, guides, handbooks, reviews, news on Tabletop Role Playing at RPGBOT.net

    Tyler Kamstra Ash Ely Randall James Producer Dan

  19. THE PLANE OF MECHANUS (Remastered) - Where everything is lawful and orderly and predictable

    1 Std. 4 Min.Staffel 6 · Folge 121

    Welcome to Mechanus, the only plane in the D&D multiverse where showing up five minutes early is considered dangerously chaotic. Everything is perfectly balanced. Everything runs on schedule. The gears are the …

    Shownotes

    Welcome to Mechanus, the only plane in the D&D multiverse where showing up five minutes early is considered dangerously chaotic. Everything is perfectly balanced. Everything runs on schedule. The gears are the size of countries. The locals are geometrically ranked bureaucrats. And somewhere, a Modron is absolutely furious because you filled out Form 27-B instead of Form 27-B-1. This week, we visit the Plane of Mechanus, where free will is suspicious, average damage is mandatory, and the Great Modron March makes your company's mandatory team-building retreat look spontaneous. Please remain orderly. Primus is watching.

    Links

    Show Notes

    This week on the RPGBOT.Podcast, we travel to Mechanus, D&D's Plane of Absolute Law, where enormous interlocking gears turn endlessly through the cosmos and literally everything has its proper place. If you've ever looked at the Dungeons & Dragons Outer Planes and wondered what would happen if someone turned cosmic bureaucracy into a geographic location, Mechanus has an answer.

    We start with the plane itself. Mechanus is built from colossal gears, some the size of countries, rotating together with perfect precision. The gears can be inhabited on both sides, because apparently gravity understands organizational structure here too. The plane sits firmly on the lawful side of the D&D cosmology, connecting conceptually and geographically with places like Arcadia, Acheron, the Outlands, and Sigil.

    Then we get to the Modrons, which is where Mechanus goes from strange to wonderfully ridiculous. Modrons exist within a rigid hierarchy governed by Primus, the supreme authority of Mechanus. Their rank determines their shape, duties, authority, and even which other Modrons they're capable of communicating with. Nobody skips the chain of command because, in Mechanus, the chain of command appears to be an actual fundamental law of reality. Even death is organized. When a Modron dies, another is promoted to replace it, the vacancy moves down through the hierarchy, and eventually Primus creates a replacement at the bottom. Somewhere in there is the most terrifying employee succession plan ever written.

    We also dig into some of the optional rules for running adventures on the Plane of Mechanus in D&D 5e. The Law of Averages removes some of the randomness from damage rolls, while Imposing Order can gradually push visitors toward lawful neutral alignment. It's a wonderfully thematic way to show that Mechanus isn't just a strange place you visit. The plane itself wants you to start alphabetizing your spell components.

    From there, things get bigger and stranger. We talk about Formians, the Gate Town of Automata, the power and influence of Primus, connections to Asmodeus and his Ruby Rod, and one of the greatest pieces of Modron lore in Dungeons & Dragons: the Great Modron March.

    Every 289 years, enormous numbers of Modrons leave Mechanus and march through the Outer Planes for reasons that make perfect sense to them and almost nobody else. It's part pilgrimage, part cosmic census, part military parade, and part multiversal traffic problem. We also compare Mechanus with Pathfinder's Axis, explore how law and order are represented differently across tabletop RPG cosmologies, and look at what Dungeon Masters can actually do with Mechanus in a Planescape campaign. Because beneath the jokes about bureaucracy, geometry, and extremely committed clockwork people, Mechanus is genuinely useful. It gives DMs a setting where predictability itself becomes strange, where conformity can become an environmental hazard, and where breaking the rules may be the most dangerous thing the characters can do.

    So grab your paperwork, calculate your average damage in advance, and please keep all arms, legs, and chaotic alignments inside the gear at all times.

    Key Takeaways
    • Mechanus is the D&D Plane of Absolute Law, built from enormous interconnected gears operating with perfect precision.
    • The environment itself reflects order, balance, symmetry, predictability, and rigid structure.
    • Modrons are organized into a strict hierarchy under Primus, with each rank assigned specific responsibilities and authority.
    • Modron communication follows the hierarchy, making their entire society one enormous supernatural organizational chart.
    • When Modrons die, replacements move through the hierarchy so that the system remains properly populated.
    • The Law of Averages optional rule makes Mechanus mechanically predictable by replacing random damage rolls with average results.
    • Imposing Order allows the plane itself to influence visitors toward lawful neutral behavior and alignment.
    • Automata is the appropriately bureaucratic Gate Town associated with Mechanus.
    • Formians add another highly organized civilization to the plane and provide alternatives to running every Mechanus adventure around Modrons.
    • The Great Modron March takes place every 289 years and sends Modrons marching across the Outer Planes on one of D&D's strangest recurring planar events.
    • Pathfinder's Axis provides an interesting comparison for how another major fantasy RPG approaches a plane devoted to cosmic law.
    • Mechanus works particularly well for Planescape adventures involving bureaucracy, cosmic mysteries, inevitability, philosophical conflicts, and characters who absolutely refuse to follow instructions.
    • The best thing about the Plane of Mechanus may be the contradiction at its heart: a completely predictable world can become deeply weird the moment unpredictable adventurers arrive.

    Welcome to the RPGBOT Podcast. If you love Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, and tabletop RPGs, this is the podcast for you.

    Support the show for free: Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any podcast app. It helps new listeners find the best RPG podcast for D&D and Pathfinder players.

    Level up your experience: Join us on Patreon to unlock ad-free access to RPGBOT.net and the RPGBOT Podcast, chat with us and the community on the RPGBOT Discord, and jump into live-streamed RPG podcast recordings.

    Support while you shop: Use our Amazon affiliate link at https://amzn.to/3NwElxQ and help us keep building tools and guides for the RPG community.

    Meet the Hosts

    • Tyler Kamstra – Master of mechanics, seeing the Pathfinder action economy like Neo in the Matrix.

    • Randall James – Lore buff and technologist, always ready to debate which Lord of the Rings edition reigns supreme.

    • Ash Ely – Resident cynic, chaos agent, and AI's worst nightmare, bringing pure table-flipping RPG podcast energy.

    Join the RPGBOT team where fantasy roleplaying meets real strategy, sarcasm, and community chaos.

    How to Find Us:

    In-depth articles, guides, handbooks, reviews, news on Tabletop Role Playing at RPGBOT.net

    Tyler Kamstra Ash Ely Randall James Producer Dan

  20. NUMENERA HOW TO PLAY - CONCEPTS AND THEMES: Pitter Patter, Let's Get Going

    56 Min.Staffel 6 · Folge 120

    Welcome to the Ninth World, where civilization has ended eight times, nobody understands how anything works, and sufficiently advanced technology is mostly an excuse to point at a laser pistol and yell …

    Shownotes

    Welcome to the Ninth World, where civilization has ended eight times, nobody understands how anything works, and sufficiently advanced technology is mostly an excuse to point at a laser pistol and yell, "Magic!"

    In this first part of our How to Play Numenera series, Randall attempts to explain a billion years of lost civilizations, Ash discovers that physics are apparently optional, and Tyler starts asking the dangerous questions about Edge. Before long, we have ancient nanotechnology, mysterious artifacts, cyphers that might explode if you hoard them, stat pools that double as hit points, and a GM who can literally bribe you with XP to make your life more interesting.

    Also, we say "moist" far too many times while explaining a d20 mechanic. We regret nothing. Well, some of us regret quite a lot.

    Show Notes

    We're kicking off our How to Play Numenera series with a tour of the Ninth World and the Cypher System mechanics that make this wonderfully strange science fantasy RPG work.

    Randall walks Ash and Tyler through the Numenera setting, a version of Earth roughly a billion years in the future after eight unimaginably advanced civilizations have risen and disappeared. Their technology is everywhere, but the people of the Ninth World understand so little of it that ancient machinery might as well be magic. That gives Numenera its central science fantasy theme: sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

    We dig into the Steadfast, the Beyond, and the increasingly strange places beyond civilization, along with the remnants left behind by previous worlds. Those remnants include reusable artifacts, one-use cyphers, mysterious oddities, and massive ancient structures that the characters may have absolutely no idea how to operate. Sometimes the players know they have discovered an elevator. Their characters definitely do not.

    From there, we get into how to play Numenera and the Cypher System core mechanics. Tasks have difficulty levels from 0 to 10, with the target number determined by multiplying the difficulty by three. Instead of piling bonuses onto a d20 roll, characters make challenges easier through training, specialization, assets, and Effort.

    Effort introduces one of Numenera's most interesting resource-management decisions. Might, Speed, and Intellect are not simply ability scores. They are pools that power abilities, fuel Effort, and absorb damage. Spend too aggressively and you may discover that the resource you just used to succeed is also the thing keeping your character alive.

    Then there's Edge, which reduces the cost of spending points from those pools. Naturally, Tyler immediately begins investigating whether enough Edge will allow him to achieve his ultimate character build: the Edge Lord.

    We also explore one of the signature Cypher System RPG mechanics, GM intrusions. The GM can offer XP to introduce an unexpected complication, while players can spend XP to reject intrusions, reroll critical checks, create temporary skills, trigger player intrusions, or advance their characters. The goal is not simply to punish players. A good GM intrusion makes the story more interesting, creates new opportunities, and occasionally puts something cool behind the wall that just collapsed on you.

    By the end, we've covered the Numenera setting, cyphers and artifacts, task difficulty, Effort, Edge, stat pools, XP, GM intrusions, player intrusions, and the basics of character advancement. It's a surprisingly streamlined system hiding underneath one of the strangest tabletop RPG settings we've explored.

    Key Takeaways

    • Numenera takes place on Earth roughly one billion years in the future, after eight previous civilizations have risen and disappeared.
    • The Ninth World mixes science fiction and fantasy by treating incomprehensibly advanced technology like magic.
    • Numenera includes artifacts, one-use cyphers, oddities, and enormous remnants of ancient civilizations.
    • The Cypher System uses a d20, but characters generally reduce task difficulty instead of adding large numerical bonuses to rolls.
    • Task difficulty ranges from 0 to 10, with the target number equal to the difficulty multiplied by three.
    • Training, specialization, assets, and Effort can ease difficult tasks and bring otherwise impossible rolls within reach.
    • Might, Speed, and Intellect are resource pools used for abilities and Effort, but they also function as your character's health.
    • Damage normally reduces Might first, followed by Speed and then Intellect. If all three pools reach zero, things have gone very badly.
    • Edge reduces the cost of spending points from a stat pool and becomes increasingly powerful as characters advance.
    • In the Cypher System, the GM generally does not roll dice. Players make both offensive and defensive rolls.
    • GM intrusions let the GM introduce complications in exchange for XP, turning unexpected problems into part of the game's advancement economy.
    • XP can be spent on rerolls, player intrusions, temporary skills, and permanent character advancement, creating a constant choice between helping yourself now or saving for later.
    • Numenera encourages creativity over strict simulation. Sometimes the explanation really is, "Ancient technology did it."
    • Most importantly, never tell the RPGBOT Discord you are trying to keep the math "moist." They cannot be trusted with that information.

    Welcome to the RPGBOT Podcast. If you love Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, and tabletop RPGs, this is the podcast for you.

    Support the show for free: Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any podcast app. It helps new listeners find the best RPG podcast for D&D and Pathfinder players.

    Level up your experience: Join us on Patreon to unlock ad-free access to RPGBOT.net and the RPGBOT Podcast, chat with us and the community on the RPGBOT Discord, and jump into live-streamed RPG podcast recordings.

    Support while you shop: Use our Amazon affiliate link at https://amzn.to/3NwElxQ and help us keep building tools and guides for the RPG community.

    Meet the Hosts

    • Tyler Kamstra – Master of mechanics, seeing the Pathfinder action economy like Neo in the Matrix.

    • Randall James – Lore buff and technologist, always ready to debate which Lord of the Rings edition reigns supreme.

    • Ash Ely – Resident cynic, chaos agent, and AI's worst nightmare, bringing pure table-flipping RPG podcast energy.

    Join the RPGBOT team where fantasy roleplaying meets real strategy, sarcasm, and community chaos.

    How to Find Us:

    In-depth articles, guides, handbooks, reviews, news on Tabletop Role Playing at RPGBOT.net

    Tyler Kamstra Ash Ely Randall James Producer Dan

  21. UNDERDARK OPTIONS 2 UA - It's magical radiation. Everybody knows that, Ash.

    1 Std. 9 Min.Staffel 6 · Folge 119

    Welcome back to the Underdark, where the mushrooms are telepathic, the fish can invent gods, and magical radiation apparently has the terrifying power to give you a headache and ruin your wine. This week …

    Shownotes

    Welcome back to the Underdark, where the mushrooms are telepathic, the fish can invent gods, and magical radiation apparently has the terrifying power to give you a headache and ruin your wine. This week, Unearthed Arcana Underdark Options 2 gives us a Freedom Cleric that desperately wants you to move around, a Spores Druid that has discovered the tactical value of exploding zombies, and a Faerzress Sorcerer built around creating a 40-foot cube of mild inconvenience. We also get playable Driders, almost-Mind-Flayers, god-making fish people, communal mushroom skills, and several moments where Ash seriously considers personally redesigning the Sorcerer. So grab your darkvision, protect the cheese from magical radiation, and try not to stand too close to the zombies. We're going back underground.

    Show Notes

    Unearthed Arcana Underdark Options 2 takes us back below the surface for another batch of D&D 5e playtest subclasses and playable Underdark species. This time we're looking at the Freedom Domain Cleric, Circle of Spores Druid, Faerzress Sorcery Sorcerer, Deep Imaskari, Drider, Illithidkin, Kuo-toa, and Myconid.

    The Freedom Domain Cleric starts with a promising idea: a high-Dexterity cleric built around mobility, escaping restraints, breaking debilitating conditions, and helping allies get out of trouble. Invoke Liberty can remove conditions and reposition the party without provoking opportunity attacks, while Unencumbered Grace turns the Cleric into something resembling a shield-carrying monk. Unfortunately, the later features lean heavily on difficult terrain, movement bonuses, and Dexterity checks, leaving us wondering when the subclass is supposed to get its next interesting button to push.

    Then we get the revised Circle of Spores Druid, and things get significantly better. Wizards addresses several long-standing complaints about the D&D Circle of Spores by improving its action economy and making Symbiotic Entity a bonus action. Halo of Spores now provides value whether the enemy succeeds or fails its save, and Fungal Body remains delightfully creepy.

    But Explosive Burst is where things get wonderfully ridiculous. As written, an undead creature you created explodes when it dies. That wording potentially includes creatures created with Animate Dead, which immediately inspires the completely reasonable strategy of surrounding an enemy with injured zombies and starting a fungal chain reaction. Is that probably getting rewritten before publication? Yes. Is exploding an army of disposable zombies extremely funny? Also yes.

    Unfortunately, the Faerzress Sorcery Sorcerer brings the mood crashing back down. The subclass revolves around creating areas of Faerzress that interfere with divination, long-distance teleportation, and a handful of other magical effects. The problem is that most enemies simply do not care. Instead of dangerous magical radiation, the subclass frequently feels like it has created a large zone where somebody might have trouble scrying on you.

    There are pieces worth saving. The concept of an Underdark radiation Sorcerer has potential, and the discussion quickly turns toward mutations, crystal growths, radiant damage, exhaustion, and other mechanics that could make Faerzress actually feel hazardous. As presented, though, the subclass spends a lot of time solving problems that rarely appear in combat.

    The playable species in Unearthed Arcana Underdark Options 2 fare considerably better. Deep Imaskari blend human traits with Faerzress mutations and radiant abilities. Driders finally offer the opportunity to crawl across ceilings as a giant spider person. Illithidkin provide telepathy, psychic resistance, and a collection of appropriately Mind-Flayer-adjacent abilities.

    Kuo-toa may be the standout simply because Deific Manifestation is wonderfully strange. Their familiar can borrow actions, reactions, or traits from other familiar options, opening the door to creations like weapon-wielding weasels and other tiny violations of common sense. It feels exactly like the sort of bizarre mechanical playground Kuo-toa deserve.

    Finally, the Myconid gives D&D players a playable mushroom creature with telepathy and Skill Meld, allowing a group to share a skill or tool proficiency after a long rest. Sharing Stealth, Perception, or another useful proficiency with the whole party is mechanically interesting and perfectly fits the communal Myconid fantasy, even if letting Myconids speak normally raises some questions.

    By the end, our feelings on this D&D Unearthed Arcana are all over the Underdark. Circle of Spores feels close to ready, especially once Explosive Burst gets clarified. The Freedom Domain Cleric has a worthwhile theme but needs more interesting features. Faerzress Sorcery needs considerably more work, but magical radiation, mutations, crystals, and Underdark corruption could still become a fantastic Sorcerer concept.

    The ideas are here. Some of them just need to be dug up, dusted off, and exposed to slightly more dangerous radiation.

    Key Takeaways

    • The Freedom Domain Cleric has a strong concept built around mobility, condition removal, and escaping restraints, but several later abilities feel too passive or situational.
    • Invoke Liberty is the highlight of the Freedom Cleric and could provide useful party repositioning in addition to condition removal.
    • Circle of Spores Druid gets meaningful D&D 2024 improvements, particularly the bonus-action Symbiotic Entity and revised Halo of Spores.
    • Explosive Burst could potentially create hilarious zombie chain reactions unless its wording is narrowed to Fungal Infestation zombies.
    • The revised Circle of Spores is the subclass the hosts felt was closest to being ready for publication.
    • Faerzress Sorcery struggles because its central zone interferes with abilities that many D&D monsters and encounters never use.
    • The Faerzress Sorcerer concept could be much stronger if it leaned into magical radiation, mutation, radiant damage, crystals, poisoning, or exhaustion.
    • Deep Imaskari, Drider, Illithidkin, Kuo-toa, and Myconid add some genuinely unusual playable Underdark species options.
    • Kuo-toa Deific Manifestation offers particularly entertaining familiar customization and plenty of room for player creativity.
    • Myconid Skill Meld lets characters temporarily share skill or tool proficiencies, reinforcing the species' communal identity.
    • Underdark Options 2 has several strong themes, but the episode's recurring message is simple: keep the concepts, improve the execution, and please make magical radiation more threatening than spoiled wine.

    Welcome to the RPGBOT Podcast. If you love Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, and tabletop RPGs, this is the podcast for you.

    Support the show for free: Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any podcast app. It helps new listeners find the best RPG podcast for D&D and Pathfinder players.

    Level up your experience: Join us on Patreon to unlock ad-free access to RPGBOT.net and the RPGBOT Podcast, chat with us and the community on the RPGBOT Discord, and jump into live-streamed RPG podcast recordings.

    Support while you shop: Use our Amazon affiliate link at https://amzn.to/3NwElxQ and help us keep building tools and guides for the RPG community.

    Meet the Hosts

    • Tyler Kamstra – Master of mechanics, seeing the Pathfinder action economy like Neo in the Matrix.

    • Randall James – Lore buff and technologist, always ready to debate which Lord of the Rings edition reigns supreme.

    • Ash Ely – Resident cynic, chaos agent, and AI's worst nightmare, bringing pure table-flipping RPG podcast energy.

    Join the RPGBOT team where fantasy roleplaying meets real strategy, sarcasm, and community chaos.

    How to Find Us:

    In-depth articles, guides, handbooks, reviews, news on Tabletop Role Playing at RPGBOT.net

    Tyler Kamstra Ash Ely Randall James Producer Dan

  22. DnD 2014 WIZARDS featuring TREANTMONK - Levels 8 - 20 (Remastered)

    1 Std. 4 Min.Staffel 6 · Folge 118

    Last time, we built Wizards who could survive long enough to become dangerous. That was apparently a mistake. Treantmonk is back as we take our 2014 D&D 5e Wizard builds from level 8 all the way to 20, where …

    Shownotes

    Last time, we built Wizards who could survive long enough to become dangerous.

    That was apparently a mistake.

    Treantmonk is back as we take our 2014 D&D 5e Wizard builds from level 8 all the way to 20, where spell selection stops being a question of how to win a fight and becomes a question of how creatively we would like to ruin reality.

    Tyler is operating his floating spellbook like a magical Predator drone. Ash has discovered Bigby's Hand and immediately found exactly the wrong way to describe it. Randall continues turning Magic Missile into a personal philosophy. And Chris is here trying to explain responsible Wizard optimization while the rest of us draft spells specifically to hurt each other's feelings.

    By the time we reach ninth-level spells, Wish almost goes undrafted.

    That sentence alone should tell you how this episode goes.

    Welcome back to the RPGBOT.Podcast. We made it to level 20, nobody died, and reality is now more of a suggestion than a rule.

    Show Notes

    Treantmonk returns for Part 2 and the conclusion of our 2014 D&D 5e Wizard optimization builds, picking up at level 8 and taking our Wizards all the way to level 20.

    At this point, the training wheels are gone. Fifth-level spells bring Wall of Force, Bigby's Hand, Wall of Stone, and increasingly aggressive spell drafting. By sixth level, the choices get even nastier, and picking the right spell becomes almost as important as making sure someone else doesn't get it first. Contingency gets selected partly because it is useful and partly because denying Tyler something he wants is apparently a valid optimization strategy.

    That pretty much sets the tone for the rest of the episode.

    As our D&D 5e Wizard builds move into the high levels, each character leans harder into their particular brand of nonsense. Ash embraces illusions, confusion, and magical hands. Randall continues finding ways to make Magic Missile everybody else's problem. Treantmonk builds around control, restraint, and smart high-level Wizard spell selection. Tyler keeps sending his Manifest Mind into places he absolutely does not intend to visit personally.

    Then we reach seventh, eighth, and ninth-level Wizard spells, where things get properly ridiculous. Maze, Sunburst, Demiplane, Foresight, Shapechange, Power Word Kill, Meteor Swarm, and Wish all enter the conversation as the builds start moving from battlefield control into reality control. And somehow Wish almost doesn't get picked.

    We also get into one of the most interesting parts of high-level 5e Wizard optimization: Spell Mastery. Unlimited access to carefully chosen first and second-level spells opens up some disgusting combinations, especially when Shield, Web, Tasha's Mind Whip, Vortex Warp, Phantasmal Force, and other low-level favorites no longer need spell slots.

    Finally, we hit level 20 and Signature Spells, where everyone chooses their third-level favorites and collectively realizes that the Wizard's actual capstone might not feel nearly as exciting as what they received two levels earlier.

    After two episodes of ability scores, feats, subclasses, Wizard spell selection, optimization, and increasingly questionable tactical decisions, our Treantmonk Wizard builds are complete. The Wizards have reached level 20. The spellbooks are full.The laws of physics have filed a formal complaint.

    Key Takeaways
    • High-level Wizard optimization is less about dealing more damage and more about having exactly the right tool when everything goes wrong.
    • Spell selection gets increasingly competitive as the builds advance. There are plenty of good Wizard spells, but everyone starts wanting the same exceptional ones.
    • Wall of Force remains exactly the kind of spell an optimized Wizard hates leaving on the table. If nobody else takes it, somebody eventually has to.
    • Sixth-level spells show just how different optimized Wizards can become. Mental Prison, Contingency, Mass Suggestion, Disintegrate, and other options push each build further into its own playstyle.
    • High-level D&D 5e Wizards stop merely controlling encounters and start controlling circumstances. Maze, Demiplane, Shapechange, Foresight, Wish, and similar spells fundamentally change what the party can accomplish.
    • Wish is incredibly powerful, but the discussion with Treantmonk highlights the practical problem with having nearly every lower-level spell available on demand: you still need to remember those spells exist when you actually need them.
    • Spell Mastery may be one of the strongest pieces of the entire Wizard class. Turning excellent first and second-level Wizard spells into effectively unlimited resources creates some absurd possibilities.
    • Shield becomes even more ridiculous when you can cast it without spending spell slots, especially if Randall is nearby with Magic Missile and bad intentions.
    • At level 20, Signature Spells are useful, but after getting Spell Mastery at level 18 they do not exactly feel like the grand finale of becoming one of the most powerful spellcasters in Dungeons & Dragons.
    • The biggest lesson from the complete Treantmonk Wizard build is that there is no single correct way to optimize a 2014 D&D 5e Wizard. Control, illusions, damage, summons, utility, mobility, and general magical nonsense can all work if the spell choices support the character you actually want to play.
    • And if all else fails, become a Wizard with a remote-controlled spellbook, hide around a corner, and make the dungeon somebody else's problem.

    Welcome to the RPGBOT Podcast. If you love Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, and tabletop RPGs, this is the podcast for you.

    Support the show for free: Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any podcast app. It helps new listeners find the best RPG podcast for D&D and Pathfinder players.

    Level up your experience: Join us on Patreon to unlock ad-free access to RPGBOT.net and the RPGBOT Podcast, chat with us and the community on the RPGBOT Discord, and jump into live-streamed RPG podcast recordings.

    Support while you shop: Use our Amazon affiliate link at https://amzn.to/3NwElxQ and help us keep building tools and guides for the RPG community.

    Meet the Hosts

    • Tyler Kamstra – Master of mechanics, seeing the Pathfinder action economy like Neo in the Matrix.

    • Randall James – Lore buff and technologist, always ready to debate which Lord of the Rings edition reigns supreme.

    • Ash Ely – Resident cynic, chaos agent, and AI's worst nightmare, bringing pure table-flipping RPG podcast energy.

    Join the RPGBOT team where fantasy roleplaying meets real strategy, sarcasm, and community chaos.

    How to Find Us:

    In-depth articles, guides, handbooks, reviews, news on Tabletop Role Playing at RPGBOT.net

    Tyler Kamstra Ash Ely Randall James Producer Dan

  23. DEADFALL: ARCANA UNLEASHED - Seize the Means of Undead Production

    1 Std. 6 Min.Staffel 6 · Folge 117

    Welcome to Thay, where the dress code is red, the government is run by homicidal wizards, and your spy agency's severance package is either magical memory loss or death. Arcana Unleashed: Deadfall takes D&D 5e …

    Shownotes

    Welcome to Thay, where the dress code is red, the government is run by homicidal wizards, and your spy agency's severance package is either magical memory loss or death.

    Arcana Unleashed: Deadfall takes D&D 5e from cloak-and-dagger espionage to rebel wizards, pirates, demon-powered skeletons, legendary magic items, and eventually a full-scale assault on Szass Tam's evil wizard lair. Along the way, we discover that the real secret to saving Faerûn is apparently making friends with pirates, hoarding magic items, and knowing when not to punch the lich who can cast Finger of Death whenever he feels like it.

    Also, there's a dragon turtle named Bitey.

    Obviously, this is serious espionage.

    Show Notes

    We're wrapping up our Arcana Unleashed review with Deadfall, a high-level D&D 5e adventure that drops characters into Thay for an espionage campaign involving Red Wizards, political scheming, undead armies, absurd amounts of magic, and the small problem of Szass Tam attempting to take control of everything again.

    Before the spying begins, we dig into Thay itself, including the Zulkirs, Red Wizard society, Szass Tam's long history of being spectacularly evil, and why living in Thay mostly involves keeping your head down and desperately pretending you didn't see anything. Deadfall also offers advice for running a D&D espionage adventure, complete with secret identities, codenames, magical disguises, compromised covers, hidden bases, and consequences when the party inevitably decides subtlety is for NPCs.

    Once the campaign gets moving, Deadfall becomes a rapid-fire series of covert missions. The party hunts spies, blackmails messengers, recruits dissident Red Wizards, collects increasingly ridiculous magic items, befriends pirates, meets a dragon turtle named Bitey, and watches their earlier choices come back in meaningful ways. The adventure even accounts for the traditional player solution of murdering someone important to the plot, which earns it considerable respect from the group.

    The campaign moves quickly from level 11 to level 20, giving characters access to legendary equipment and some genuinely dangerous high-level D&D encounters. The final stretch turns the spy thriller into a full assault on Szass Tam's stronghold, culminating in a brutal boss fight involving powerful undead, demons, environmental effects, necrotic damage, and consequences tied directly to allies the characters helped or ignored earlier in the campaign.

    We also talk about why Deadfall works surprisingly well as more than a single adventure. Its missions can be pulled apart and used as D&D one-shots, adapted into an anthology-style campaign, or mined by Dungeon Masters looking for a useful Thay campaign setting reference. There are a few missed opportunities, particularly with some disappointing monster design, but the amount of usable material, meaningful player choice, high-level treasure, and contingency planning left us pleasantly surprised.

    If you're looking for an Arcana Unleashed Deadfall review, a D&D 5e high-level adventure, ideas for running an espionage campaign in Dungeons and Dragons, or an excuse to send level 20 characters after Szass Tam and the Red Wizards of Thay, there's a lot here worth stealing.

    Preferably before the players steal it first.

    Key Takeaways

    • Deadfall is a level 11 to 20 D&D 5e espionage adventure set in Thay, centered on stopping Szass Tam and his latest extremely reasonable plan for world domination.
    • Thay gets enough background material that the book can double as a useful Red Wizards of Thay campaign reference for Dungeon Masters.
    • The espionage mechanics include disguises, codenames, secrecy, compromised identities, hidden bases, and ways to recover after blowing your cover.
    • Player choices matter. Allies, side missions, failures, and earlier decisions can significantly change later encounters and even the difficulty of the final battle.
    • The adventure anticipates players going off-script surprisingly well, including what happens when important NPCs die or the party chooses violence over diplomacy.
    • Deadfall hands out a huge amount of high-level D&D magic items, including very rare, legendary, and even artifact-level equipment.
    • The adventure's monster design occasionally disappoints, especially when flavorful concepts turn out to use fairly ordinary existing stat blocks.
    • The campaign moves extremely quickly through high-level play, making the proposed session count ambitious for groups that like exploring every corner.
    • The final Szass Tam encounter actually feels dangerous, with multiple enemies, nasty environmental effects, and consequences based on what the characters accomplished earlier.
    • Deadfall can work as a complete campaign, a collection of connected D&D one-shots, or a source of missions and ideas for a homebrew espionage adventure.
    • Most importantly, make friends with the pirates. Seriously. Make friends with the pirates.

    Welcome to the RPGBOT Podcast. If you love Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, and tabletop RPGs, this is the podcast for you.

    Support the show for free: Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any podcast app. It helps new listeners find the best RPG podcast for D&D and Pathfinder players.

    Level up your experience: Join us on Patreon to unlock ad-free access to RPGBOT.net and the RPGBOT Podcast, chat with us and the community on the RPGBOT Discord, and jump into live-streamed RPG podcast recordings.

    Support while you shop: Use our Amazon affiliate link at https://amzn.to/3NwElxQ and help us keep building tools and guides for the RPG community.

    Meet the Hosts

    • Tyler Kamstra – Master of mechanics, seeing the Pathfinder action economy like Neo in the Matrix.

    • Randall James – Lore buff and technologist, always ready to debate which Lord of the Rings edition reigns supreme.

    • Ash Ely – Resident cynic, chaos agent, and AI's worst nightmare, bringing pure table-flipping RPG podcast energy.

    Join the RPGBOT team where fantasy roleplaying meets real strategy, sarcasm, and community chaos.

    How to Find Us:

    In-depth articles, guides, handbooks, reviews, news on Tabletop Role Playing at RPGBOT.net

    Tyler Kamstra Ash Ely Randall James Producer Dan

  24. ARCANA UNLEASHED Part 3 - Everything was fine until Tyler read the rules..

    1 Std. 18 Min.Staffel 6 · Folge 116

    We survived the subclasses. We survived the wizard subclasses. Now Arcana Unleashed Part 3 asks the truly dangerous questions: What if every wizard got a Pokémon? What if every magical faction agreed that the …

    Shownotes

    We survived the subclasses. We survived the wizard subclasses. Now Arcana Unleashed Part 3 asks the truly dangerous questions: What if every wizard got a Pokémon? What if every magical faction agreed that the Ninth Quill sucks? And what if an invisible imp could carry your entire adventuring party through a wall while you relax inside a genie lamp like the world's most heavily armed first-class passengers?

    This week, we're digging into the rest of Arcana Unleashed, including new backgrounds, feats, spells, magical factions, evolving magic items, monsters, and a dungeon puzzle whose greatest challenge is apparently identifying which end of a snake has the head.

    Welcome aboard Infernal Air. Please keep your arms, legs, and extraplanar vessels inside the familiar at all times.

    Show Notes

    We've covered the Arcana Unleashed subclasses. We've given Tyler an entire episode of wizard content. Now it's time to dig through everything else Wizards of the Coast packed into the book, and there is a lot more here than we expected.

    We start with the new Arcana Unleashed backgrounds and origin feats, where the results range from flavorful-but-forgettable to options that could seriously change how characters are built. Familiar Friend immediately gets our attention, especially once the rest of the familiar feats enter the picture. Arcane Warrior opens wizard cantrips to characters with Fighting Styles, while the new school-specific Adept feats offer spellcasters ways to steal spells and tricks from outside their usual class options.

    Then things get weird.

    Battle Familiar might be one of the strongest new D&D 2024 spells in Arcana Unleashed. It looks suspiciously like Summon Beast, except it does not require concentration, which means there is very little reason not to have one running whenever possible. Add familiar feats, Conjurer interactions, Necromancer options, and Pact of the Chain nonsense, and suddenly your adorable magical pet is an active participant in breaking the action economy.

    We also discover that Otherworldly Familiar lets a familiar move through walls, which naturally leads to an invisible imp carrying a Genie Warlock's vessel, and potentially the entire party, directly through the dungeon. Congratulations. You have invented Infernal Air and apparently solved dungeon crawling.

    The new Arcana Unleashed spells keep the chaos going. Detonation inspires the return of bag-of-rats logic, Mordenkainen's Lucubration provides an expensive way to trade higher-level spell slots for lower-level ones, and Summon Dinosaur requires very little explanation because sometimes the spell name is already doing all the work.

    Beyond character options, Arcana Unleashed includes advice for building magic-heavy campaign settings, creating magical traditions, defining society's relationship with magic, and using group patrons. The magical faction system expands that idea with organizations tied to each school of magic, complete with goals, renown rewards, relationships, player options, and Bastion facilities.

    Some are noble. Some are creepy. The Crucible Keepers apparently treat magical disasters like sporting events. The Bringers of the Cosmic Dawn have decided transmutation needed more body horror. The Covenant of the Grave gives necromancy a surprisingly thoughtful treatment. And nearly everybody hates the Ninth Quill because, as it turns out, being an organized magical crime syndicate is not a great way to make friends.

    We also dig into the new D&D evolving magic item rules. There are several premade examples, a simple system for upgrading items into higher-rarity versions, and a more flexible framework for adding new powers as an item grows. The concept is useful, particularly for DMs building long-term rewards, even if we wish the book gave us a lot more material to work with.

    Arcana Unleashed also brings back creatures like the baelnorn, introduces archmages themed around the schools of magic, and includes the level 1 adventure Tomb of the Shadow Serpents. Venger has apparently created a multiversal dungeon-based recruitment program where surviving a few traps and assembling three pieces of a snake qualifies you for employment in an evil organization.

    Which explains a lot about Venger's career.

    By the end of our Arcana Unleashed Part 3 review, the mechanics remain the strongest part of the book. The feats offer some genuinely interesting character-building options, the familiar material could have a major impact on D&D 5e character optimization, and the spells contain several standouts. The magical factions and worldbuilding material provide useful starting points for DMs, while the evolving magic item system feels like a good idea that we wish had been given more room to grow.

    And Battle Familiar probably needs concentration.

    Seriously.

    Key Takeaways

    • Arcana Unleashed adds ten backgrounds and origin feats, with Familiar Friend standing out because it dramatically improves familiar survivability and unlocks the book's additional familiar feats.
    • Arcane Warrior gives Fighters, Paladins, Rangers, and other characters with Fighting Styles access to wizard cantrips, opening up plenty of new D&D 2024 character build options.
    • The school-specific Adept feats provide new spells and magical abilities, effectively offering lightweight versions of the eight schools of magic to characters outside the Wizard class.
    • Battle Familiar is one of the biggest mechanical standouts in the book. Its lack of concentration creates extremely powerful interactions with familiars, summoners, Conjurer Wizards, Necromancer Wizards, and Pact of the Chain Warlocks.
    • The Arcana Unleashed magical factions give DMs ready-made organizations for Abjuration, Conjuration, Divination, Enchantment, Evocation, Illusion, Necromancy, and Transmutation, complete with renown rewards and faction-specific Bastion facilities.
    • The new evolving magic item rules provide a solid framework for D&D campaigns where weapons, armor, wands, and other magical equipment grow alongside their owners, although the system could use more examples and options.
    • Tomb of the Shadow Serpents is a simple level 1 dungeon crawl built around Venger recruiting adventurers for future schemes. The loot is surprisingly generous, the encounters are straightforward, and the snake puzzle may be the greatest threat ever posed to player overthinking.
    • Overall, Arcana Unleashed Part 3 reinforces the book's biggest strength: mechanics. The feats, spells, familiar options, and character customization tools are much stronger than the lighter worldbuilding material, and several options look likely to become significant parts of the D&D 5e 2024 optimization landscape.

    Welcome to the RPGBOT Podcast. If you love Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, and tabletop RPGs, this is the podcast for you.

    Support the show for free: Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any podcast app. It helps new listeners find the best RPG podcast for D&D and Pathfinder players.

    Level up your experience: Join us on Patreon to unlock ad-free access to RPGBOT.net and the RPGBOT Podcast, chat with us and the community on the RPGBOT Discord, and jump into live-streamed RPG podcast recordings.

    Support while you shop: Use our Amazon affiliate link at https://amzn.to/3NwElxQ and help us keep building tools and guides for the RPG community.

    Meet the Hosts

    • Tyler Kamstra – Master of mechanics, seeing the Pathfinder action economy like Neo in the Matrix.

    • Randall James – Lore buff and technologist, always ready to debate which Lord of the Rings edition reigns supreme.

    • Ash Ely – Resident cynic, chaos agent, and AI's worst nightmare, bringing pure table-flipping RPG podcast energy.

    Join the RPGBOT team where fantasy roleplaying meets real strategy, sarcasm, and community chaos.

    How to Find Us:

    In-depth articles, guides, handbooks, reviews, news on Tabletop Role Playing at RPGBOT.net

    Tyler Kamstra Ash Ely Randall James Producer Dan

  25. 2014 DnD 5e WIZARDS Levels 1 - 7 with Treantmonk! (Remastered)

    51 Min.Staffel 6 · Folge 115

    Treantmonk joins us to talk about Wizards, which means we're about to spend an unreasonable amount of time discussing concentration saves, initiative bonuses, spell selection, and why standing anywhere near the …

    Shownotes

    Treantmonk joins us to talk about Wizards, which means we're about to spend an unreasonable amount of time discussing concentration saves, initiative bonuses, spell selection, and why standing anywhere near the enemy is a terrible lifestyle choice.

    We're taking the 2014 Wizard from levels 1 through 7, starting with a fragile academic who can be killed by an aggressively thrown sandwich and ending with a battlefield-control monster who can Web half the room, Fireball the other half, and still have enough magic left over to argue about which subclass is best.

    Along the way, we discover the Muscle Wizard, question why Medicine is still a skill, turn a spellbook into an arcane Predator drone, and once again prove that the strongest Wizard strategy is simple:

    Go first. Stay far away. Don't lose concentration.

    Easy.

    Show Notes

    Treantmonk joins Tyler, Ash, and Randall as we start building the 2014 D&D 5e Wizard from levels 1 through 7.

    We kick things off with ability scores, skills, defenses, and the eternal Wizard question: how much effort should you put into not immediately dying? That leads naturally into armor dips, Constitution saves, initiative, and why keeping concentration is often more important than squeezing out a little more damage.

    Then we get into subclasses. War Magic gets plenty of attention for its defensive tools and initiative bonus, Divination continues being Divination, Illusion gives Ash plenty to work with, and Order of Scribes eventually lets Tyler use his spellbook like a magical surveillance drone. Transmutation is also discussed. We'll leave it at that.

    Then comes the real Wizard experience: picking spells.

    Shield, Mage Armor, Find Familiar, Absorb Elements, and Magic Missile get us started before the gloves come off and everyone starts fighting over Web. From there we hit Fireball, Hypnotic Pattern, Slow, Fear, Counterspell, Tiny Hut, Summon Undead, Arcane Eye, Sickening Radiance, Greater Invisibility, Banishment, Polymorph, and enough other spells to remind everyone why building a Wizard takes three hours and a spreadsheet.

    By the end, one thing is very clear: Wizards don't need to solve every problem with damage.

    But they absolutely can.

    Key Takeaways
    • The Wizard's biggest class feature is still its spell list. Your subclass matters, but your spell choices matter more.
    • Protect your concentration. Positioning, Constitution saves, Shield, Absorb Elements, and simply refusing to stand next to angry monsters will keep your best spells running.
    • Going first is incredibly powerful. War Magic gets a lot of love because dropping battlefield control before the enemy gets moving can completely change a fight.
    • The classic Wizard staples are classics for a reason. Shield, Find Familiar, Mage Armor, Absorb Elements, Magic Missile, and rituals give you a ridiculous amount of mileage at low levels.
    • Web is excellent. Everyone knows Web is excellent. This becomes a problem when multiple people are drafting spells and everybody wants Web.
    • Third-level spells are where the Wizard really starts showing off. Fireball is Fireball, but Slow, Hypnotic Pattern, Fear, Counterspell, and other control options can be even more important depending on the fight.
    • Don't build around a single saving throw or status effect. Having multiple ways to attack a problem keeps you useful when monsters inevitably refuse to cooperate with your favorite spell.
    • Utility spells are a huge part of what makes Wizards so good. Scouting, teleportation, rituals, summons, battlefield control, and information gathering often solve problems before initiative is even rolled.
    • Order of Scribes gets wonderfully weird once Manifest Mind enters the picture. Your floating spellbook can scout and act as the point of origin for your spells, turning your Wizard into a magical drone operator.
    • And remember: dealing damage is technically a form of support if the thing threatening your party is no longer alive.

    Welcome to the RPGBOT Podcast. If you love Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, and tabletop RPGs, this is the podcast for you.

    Support the show for free: Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any podcast app. It helps new listeners find the best RPG podcast for D&D and Pathfinder players.

    Level up your experience: Join us on Patreon to unlock ad-free access to RPGBOT.net and the RPGBOT Podcast, chat with us and the community on the RPGBOT Discord, and jump into live-streamed RPG podcast recordings.

    Support while you shop: Use our Amazon affiliate link at https://amzn.to/3NwElxQ and help us keep building tools and guides for the RPG community.

    Meet the Hosts

    • Tyler Kamstra – Master of mechanics, seeing the Pathfinder action economy like Neo in the Matrix.

    • Randall James – Lore buff and technologist, always ready to debate which Lord of the Rings edition reigns supreme.

    • Ash Ely – Resident cynic, chaos agent, and AI's worst nightmare, bringing pure table-flipping RPG podcast energy.

    Join the RPGBOT team where fantasy roleplaying meets real strategy, sarcasm, and community chaos.

    How to Find Us:

    In-depth articles, guides, handbooks, reviews, news on Tabletop Role Playing at RPGBOT.net

    Tyler Kamstra Ash Ely Randall James Producer Dan

  26. ARCANA UNLEASHED Part 2 - Necromancer's Finally Get Nice Things

    59 Min.Staffel 6 · Folge 114

    Four Wizards walk into Arcana Unleashed. One teleports around insisting that swapping places is exciting. One looks like somebody's tiefling dad going through a stage-magic phase. One brings an army of …

    Shownotes

    Four Wizards walk into Arcana Unleashed. One teleports around insisting that swapping places is exciting. One looks like somebody's tiefling dad going through a stage-magic phase. One brings an army of disposable skeletons specifically so he can blow them up. And the last one turns into a T-Rex and starts casting Disintegrate. Somehow, this is still a more functional party than most adventuring groups we've played in.

    Welcome back to Arcana Unleashed, where today's lesson is simple: Wizards apparently needed more things to do.

    Show Notes

    Part Two of our Arcana Unleashed review is all Wizards, all the time, and Tyler finally gets his moment.

    We start with the Conjurer, which continues its identity crisis between "master summoner" and "person who is really, really enthusiastic about Misty Step." Benign Transposition and its upgrades make teleportation useful, especially once Randall figures out how to combine swapping places with summoned monsters. But the real excitement comes later, when Durable Summons, Focused Conjuration, and Splintered Summons finally let the subclass lean into what everyone actually came here for: putting more creatures on the battlefield.

    Then we meet the Enchanter, whose artwork immediately gets described as a middle-aged tiefling dad who took up stage magic during a midlife crisis. The subclass gets better social skills, a much more playable version of Hypnotic Gaze, and some frustratingly limited spell-twinning. Things improve considerably at higher levels, especially when Alter Memories turns magical manipulation into full-on fantasy Men in Black nonsense.

    Necromancer is where things get wonderfully irresponsible. Undead familiars can finally contribute, Animate Dead gets stronger, summoned undead become tougher and hit harder, and eventually your disposable corpse army becomes a collection of walking necrotic grenades. Tyler tries repeatedly to explain the mathematical shortcomings of undead attack bonuses while Ash tries repeatedly to enjoy himself despite Tyler's best efforts.

    Finally, the Transmuter arrives with the traditional Transmuter's Stone, some questionable attempts to make Alter Self exciting, and a substantially improved Empowered Transmutation. Things really come alive with Shapeshifter, which lets the Wizard Polymorph themselves while keeping their mental abilities and continuing to cast qualifying Transmutation spells.

    Which leads to the discovery nobody knew they needed:

    T-Rex. Casting. Disintegrate.

    Key Takeaways
    • Conjurer is much better when it remembers that people choosing Conjurer probably want to summon things, not just teleport slightly differently.
    • Enchanter has some weak spots, but Instinctive Charm and Alter Memories offer genuinely fun tools for manipulation, infiltration, and absolutely horrifying roleplay possibilities.
    • Necromancer may be the standout of the bunch. Stronger undead, useful familiars, better Animate Dead support, and exploding minions finally deliver the "commander of the dead" fantasy.
    • Transmuter still has an unhealthy emotional attachment to its rock, but Empowered Transmutation and Shapeshifter give the subclass some genuinely exciting options.
    • The most important rules discovery of the episode is that turning into a T-Rex apparently does not prevent you from solving problems with high-level Wizard magic.
    • Tyler likes Wizards. Ash would like Tyler to stop explaining why the things Ash likes aren't as good as Ash thinks they are.

    Welcome to the RPGBOT Podcast. If you love Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, and tabletop RPGs, this is the podcast for you.

    Support the show for free: Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any podcast app. It helps new listeners find the best RPG podcast for D&D and Pathfinder players.

    Level up your experience: Join us on Patreon to unlock ad-free access to RPGBOT.net and the RPGBOT Podcast, chat with us and the community on the RPGBOT Discord, and jump into live-streamed RPG podcast recordings.

    Support while you shop: Use our Amazon affiliate link at https://amzn.to/3NwElxQ and help us keep building tools and guides for the RPG community.

    Meet the Hosts

    • Tyler Kamstra – Master of mechanics, seeing the Pathfinder action economy like Neo in the Matrix.

    • Randall James – Lore buff and technologist, always ready to debate which Lord of the Rings edition reigns supreme.

    • Ash Ely – Resident cynic, chaos agent, and AI's worst nightmare, bringing pure table-flipping RPG podcast energy.

    Join the RPGBOT team where fantasy roleplaying meets real strategy, sarcasm, and community chaos.

    How to Find Us:

    In-depth articles, guides, handbooks, reviews, news on Tabletop Role Playing at RPGBOT.net

    Tyler Kamstra Ash Ely Randall James Producer Dan

  27. D&D ARCANA UNLEASHED Part 1 - The Best Arcane Archer Ever Is Still an Arcane Archer

    1 Std. 2 Min.Staffel 6 · Folge 113

    Arcana Unleashed is here, bringing new subclasses, spells, feats, magic items, and—most importantly—fresh opportunities for Tyler to find loopholes Wizards of the Coast absolutely did not intend. In Part 1, we …

    Shownotes

    Arcana Unleashed is here, bringing new subclasses, spells, feats, magic items, and—most importantly—fresh opportunities for Tyler to find loopholes Wizards of the Coast absolutely did not intend. In Part 1, we discover that Clerics can apparently wizard better than Wizards, the Arcane Archer has finally been upgraded from "why?" to "okay, I guess," Monks can punch people and cast spells at the same time, and Warlocks can carry around the fading remains of a dead god like a supernatural emotional-support animal. Also, somewhere at Wizards of the Coast, an editor just felt a disturbance in the Force because Tyler realized you can shoot a magical darkness arrow into someone's shield.

    Show Notes

    We kick off our review of Arcana Unleashed, the new setting-agnostic collection of character options, rules, spells, magic items, factions, monsters, and other magical nonsense for D&D. The book isn't quite Tasha's-sized, but there's plenty here to keep us busy—which is why this review is absolutely becoming a series.

    Part 1 is all about subclasses, starting with the Arcana Domain Cleric. The old "what if my Cleric wanted to be a Wizard?" concept finally feels like it knows what it wants to be. Great Wizard spells, a nasty saving-throw penalty through Channel Divinity, and eventually access to high-level Wizard spells make this an extremely strong hybrid. Tyler immediately starts planning for Contingency and Wish, because of course he does.

    Then we revisit everyone's favorite subclass to forget exists: the Arcane Archer. It is unquestionably better than the 2014 version, which unfortunately clears a bar located somewhere beneath the basement. More Arcane Shot uses, better utility ammunition, and some genuinely cool later-level abilities help, but the subclass still struggles to generate much excitement. We also spend far too long discovering that Darkening Ammunition can apparently stick to any "solid surface," which means shields, possibly whales, and whatever other nonsense your table is willing to litigate.

    The Warrior of Mystic Arts Monk fares much better. Mechanically, it's essentially the Monk answer to the Eldritch Knight: punch things, cast Sorcerer spells, and eventually do both with increasingly ridiculous efficiency. The old Tattooed Warrior concept may have been more flavorful, but the finished version is clean, effective, and potentially terrifying once its spellcasting and Monk abilities start feeding into each other.

    Finally, we meet the Vestige Patron Warlock, where your patron is also your pet because apparently the traditional Warlock power dynamic wasn't complicated enough. Your Vestige can shift between Celestial, Fiend, and Undead forms, bringing different abilities along with it, and eventually gets some impressive summoning upgrades. Ash begins thoroughly uninterested and ends up won over almost entirely by the possibility of worshipping the forgotten god of toads. Which, frankly, is the strongest possible argument for the subclass.

    We wrap things up before reaching the Wizard subclasses, mostly because making Tyler wait another episode to talk about Wizards is funny.

    Stuff for the Show Notes Key Takeaways
    • Arcana Domain Cleric is excellent. It finally delivers the Cleric/Wizard hybrid fantasy without feeling like somebody stapled a spellbook onto a holy symbol.
    • Arcane Archer is substantially improved, but "best Arcane Archer ever" still isn't the ringing endorsement Wizards probably hoped for.
    • Darkening Ammunition should never have included the phrase "solid surface" anywhere Tyler Kamstra could see it.
    • Warrior of Mystic Arts trades some of the Tattooed Warrior's flavor for straightforward mechanics, but those mechanics are very, very good.
    • Spellcasting plus Monk action economy gets increasingly ridiculous at higher levels, and everybody seems fine with that.
    • Vestige Patron is mechanically solid, narratively weird, and significantly better once you realize your patron can be the forgotten god of toads.
    • The subclasses covered so far are generally simple, approachable, and effective without introducing a pile of unnecessary new systems.
    • Wizards are next, assuming Ash eventually stops tormenting Tyler and allows him to talk about them.

    Welcome to the RPGBOT Podcast. If you love Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, and tabletop RPGs, this is the podcast for you.

    Support the show for free: Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any podcast app. It helps new listeners find the best RPG podcast for D&D and Pathfinder players.

    Level up your experience: Join us on Patreon to unlock ad-free access to RPGBOT.net and the RPGBOT Podcast, chat with us and the community on the RPGBOT Discord, and jump into live-streamed RPG podcast recordings.

    Support while you shop: Use our Amazon affiliate link at https://amzn.to/3NwElxQ and help us keep building tools and guides for the RPG community.

    Meet the Hosts

    • Tyler Kamstra – Master of mechanics, seeing the Pathfinder action economy like Neo in the Matrix.

    • Randall James – Lore buff and technologist, always ready to debate which Lord of the Rings edition reigns supreme.

    • Ash Ely – Resident cynic, chaos agent, and AI's worst nightmare, bringing pure table-flipping RPG podcast energy.

    Join the RPGBOT team where fantasy roleplaying meets real strategy, sarcasm, and community chaos.

    How to Find Us:

    In-depth articles, guides, handbooks, reviews, news on Tabletop Role Playing at RPGBOT.net

    Tyler Kamstra Ash Ely Randall James Producer Dan

  28. 2014 DnD 5e BARBARIANS Levels 5 - 20 (Remastered): Woohoo! Smash, smash, smashy smash!

    52 Min.Staffel 6 · Folge 112

    At level 5, the Barbarian unlocks a revolutionary new combat technique: hitting the problem twice. From there, things escalate exactly as responsible game design intended. Randall gambles his way through Wild …

    Shownotes

    At level 5, the Barbarian unlocks a revolutionary new combat technique: hitting the problem twice. From there, things escalate exactly as responsible game design intended. Randall gambles his way through Wild Magic, Tyler perfects the ancient martial art of being an unbearable pain in the ass, and Ash becomes a house-sized fairy with tiny butterfly wings, a returning elemental pike, and enough reach to poke somebody from the next county. Then Brutal Critical shows up and somehow the math becomes angrier than the Barbarian. Grab your greataxe, start screaming, and remember: if smashing something once didn't work, the rules now officially support smashing it again.

    Show Notes

    We're back with the second half of our 2014 D&D 5e Barbarian builds, taking Randall's Path of Wild Magic, Ash's Path of the Giant, and Tyler's Path of the Ancestral Guardian from level 5 all the way to 20.

    Extra Attack immediately delivers exactly what everyone came for: more smash. From there, the builds start developing very different personalities. Randall embraces the chaos of Wild Magic and Great Weapon Master, Tyler becomes increasingly obnoxious to anything trying to hurt his friends, and Ash discovers that being a flying, increasingly enormous fairy with a throwable elemental pike is every bit as ridiculous as it sounds.

    We dig into Instinctive Pounce, subclass features, feat choices, Relentless Rage, Persistent Rage, and the glorious absurdity of Primal Champion. We also spend a healthy amount of time asking why Brutal Critical is supposed to be exciting when critical hits refuse to happen on command.

    By the end, we have battlefield control, flying giants, magical gambling, angry ancestors, Polearm Master shenanigans, and Barbarians who are extremely difficult to kill. Basically, the class gets tougher, weirder, and significantly better at solving problems with repeated applications of a large weapon.

    Key Takeaways
    • Level 5 is huge. Extra Attack effectively doubles the Barbarian's basic offense, while Fast Movement helps get the angry person into smashing distance faster.
    • Instinctive Pounce is an excellent quality-of-life feature, letting you Rage and immediately move toward whatever has made the poor decision to exist nearby.
    • Ash's Giant Barbarian becomes increasingly ridiculous. Elemental Cleaver turns his pike into a returning elemental weapon, and later features let his flying fairy become enormous, extend his reach, and attack enemies from extremely inconvenient places.
    • Randall's Wild Magic Barbarian is built around controlled chaos. Bolstering Magic helps attacks and ability checks, while later features let him reroll Wild Magic effects and improve his odds of getting something useful.
    • Tyler's Ancestral Guardian becomes an excellent defender. Spirit Shield reduces damage to allies, and Vengeful Ancestors eventually makes enemies regret hurting anyone except Tyler.
    • Brutal Critical is the problem child. The crew likes the fantasy of gigantic Barbarian crits but argues that the feature arrives too rarely and scales too poorly to carry high-level damage.
    • Polearm Master, Great Weapon Master, and eventually Sentinel turn the builds into increasingly nasty melee threats, particularly when combined with Reckless Attack and extended reach.
    • Relentless Rage keeps Barbarians standing after hitting zero hit points, Persistent Rage finally makes Rage easier to maintain, and Primal Champion delivers a genuinely satisfying capstone with massive Strength and Constitution boosts.
    • The overall verdict: Barbarians remain wonderfully straightforward at their core, but the subclasses are doing a lot of the heavy lifting at higher levels. Fortunately, sometimes all you really need is Rage, Reckless Attack, and another opportunity to smash something.

    Welcome to the RPGBOT Podcast. If you love Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, and tabletop RPGs, this is the podcast for you.

    Support the show for free: Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any podcast app. It helps new listeners find the best RPG podcast for D&D and Pathfinder players.

    Level up your experience: Join us on Patreon to unlock ad-free access to RPGBOT.net and the RPGBOT Podcast, chat with us and the community on the RPGBOT Discord, and jump into live-streamed RPG podcast recordings.

    Support while you shop: Use our Amazon affiliate link at https://amzn.to/3NwElxQ and help us keep building tools and guides for the RPG community.

    Meet the Hosts

    • Tyler Kamstra – Master of mechanics, seeing the Pathfinder action economy like Neo in the Matrix.

    • Randall James – Lore buff and technologist, always ready to debate which Lord of the Rings edition reigns supreme.

    • Ash Ely – Resident cynic, chaos agent, and AI's worst nightmare, bringing pure table-flipping RPG podcast energy.

    Join the RPGBOT team where fantasy roleplaying meets real strategy, sarcasm, and community chaos.

    How to Find Us:

    In-depth articles, guides, handbooks, reviews, news on Tabletop Role Playing at RPGBOT.net

    Tyler Kamstra Ash Ely Randall Jamesd Producer Dan

  29. CREATURES SHARING SPACES

    1 Std. 10 Min.Staffel 6 · Folge 111

    Most RPG rules questions start with something reasonable, like Can I jump over this pit? or Does fireball set the curtains on fire? This one starts with a much more dangerous question: How many adventurers can …

    Shownotes

    Most RPG rules questions start with something reasonable, like Can I jump over this pit? or Does fireball set the curtains on fire? This one starts with a much more dangerous question: How many adventurers can we cram into one five-foot square before the rules collapse? Tyler digs into decades of D&D and Pathfinder rules looking for an answer, while Ash does increasingly questionable celebrity impressions, Randall weaponizes every edge case he can find, and Tyler's cats provide live demonstrations of why personal space is apparently optional.

    Show Notes

    This week, we're getting uncomfortably close as we dig into the surprisingly complicated rules for creatures sharing spaces. Can you walk through an ally? What about an enemy? Can a tiny creature just hang out in your square? What happens if somebody gets shoved into someone else? And, most importantly, can another player give you a piggyback ride and technically become your mount?

    We trace the rules from D&D 3.5 through 2014 and 2024 D&D 5e before arriving at Pathfinder 2e, comparing how each system handles movement, size differences, prone creatures, incapacitated creatures, forced movement, swarms, and all the weird situations where two creatures wind up occupying the same chunk of battlefield.

    Along the way, Tyler discovers that some rules are clearer than expected and others become significantly worse the longer you stare at them. Pathfinder 2e earns some praise for actually explaining what happens when creatures accidentally collide, while 2024 5e raises uncomfortable questions about exactly who falls prone and when. Meanwhile, Ash turns rules text into an excuse for a parade of impressions, Randall threatens the Grand Canyon with rules exploits, and the cats continue proving that tiny creatures respect neither game mechanics nor boundaries.

    Key Takeaways

    • D&D 3.5 was surprisingly explicit about moving through allies, enemies, helpless creatures, and creatures of dramatically different sizes.

    • 2014 5e simplifies those rules considerably, but that simplicity creates some strange gaps when creatures accidentally or forcibly end up sharing a space.

    • 2024 5e improves several things, especially interactions with Tiny and incapacitated creatures, but its rule about creatures falling prone when a turn ends while sharing a space creates a whole new argument about what exactly end a turn means.

    • Pathfinder 2e gives the GM a clear answer when creatures accidentally occupy the same square: somebody gets moved, somebody may fall prone, and the GM decides how the mess gets resolved.

    • Pathfinder 2e also handles willing creatures, unwilling creatures, prone creatures, Tiny creatures, objects, and forced movement with much more specific rules. Tumble Through exists for a reason.

    • Forced movement in Pathfinder cannot simply put a creature somewhere it cannot normally occupy, which immediately kills several wonderfully stupid launching-people-into-the-air strategies.

    • Swarms are the exception everyone should remember. They want to share your space because getting directly on top of you is how they ruin your day.

    • The ultimate lesson is that creatures sharing spaces is one of those rules nobody thinks about until it happens. Then everyone stops the game, opens three rulebooks, and discovers they've been doing it differently for years.

    Welcome to the RPGBOT Podcast. If you love Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, and tabletop RPGs, this is the podcast for you.

    Support the show for free: Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any podcast app. It helps new listeners find the best RPG podcast for D&D and Pathfinder players.

    Level up your experience: Join us on Patreon to unlock ad-free access to RPGBOT.net and the RPGBOT Podcast, chat with us and the community on the RPGBOT Discord, and jump into live-streamed RPG podcast recordings.

    Support while you shop: Use our Amazon affiliate link at https://amzn.to/3NwElxQ and help us keep building tools and guides for the RPG community.

    Meet the Hosts

    • Tyler Kamstra – Master of mechanics, seeing the Pathfinder action economy like Neo in the Matrix.

    • Randall James – Lore buff and technologist, always ready to debate which Lord of the Rings edition reigns supreme.

    • Ash Ely – Resident cynic, chaos agent, and AI's worst nightmare, bringing pure table-flipping RPG podcast energy.

    Join the RPGBOT team where fantasy roleplaying meets real strategy, sarcasm, and community chaos.

    How to Find Us:

    In-depth articles, guides, handbooks, reviews, news on Tabletop Role Playing at RPGBOT.net

    Tyler Kamstra Ash Ely Randall James Producer Dan

  30. UNEARTHED ARCANA: UNDERDARK OPTIONS - We're unenlightened!!!

    1 Std. 21 Min.Staffel 6 · Folge 110

    Welcome to the Underdark, where the sun doesn't shine, everyone wants to murder you, and Wizards of the Coast has apparently decided what this place really needed was more light. Sorry, Unlight. Totally …

    Shownotes

    Welcome to the Underdark, where the sun doesn't shine, everyone wants to murder you, and Wizards of the Coast has apparently decided what this place really needed was more light. Sorry, Unlight. Totally different. We've got a glowing Barbarian who can't turn off the high beams, a Rogue whose subclass starts working sometime around retirement age, a Wizard with healing powers and questionable workplace safety practices, and finally a perfectly reasonable solution to all of these problems: put a tadpole in your skull and become a Mind Flayer. Somehow, that's the part we liked.

    Show Notes

    This week, we head underground to dig through the latest Unearthed Arcana: Underdark Options, featuring three new subclasses, a Ceremorphosis feat path, and the Mind Blast spell.

    First up is the Path of Unlight Barbarian, a character who rages so hard they become a walking lantern. There are some genuinely useful ideas here, including radiant retaliation, blindsight, and the ability to make enemies glow, but the damage numbers struggle to keep up and several abilities feel strangely dependent on fighting invisible creatures. Worse, your Barbarian apparently has no dimmer switch, so raging in the Underdark turns you into a thirty-foot beacon advertising free adventurers to every monster nearby.

    Then we meet the House Agent Rogue, built around charm, betrayal, and stabbing people who thought you were their friend. The fantasy is great. The mechanics are considerably less cooperative. Several of the subclass's signature abilities depend on creatures being friendly or charmed, but the tools needed to make that happen reliably either arrive far too late or don't interact with the rules the way the subclass seems to expect. By level 17, the House Agent can finally do much of what we wanted it to do at level 3. That is one hell of an onboarding process.

    The Imaskari wizard fares better mechanically. It can convert elemental damage to radiant damage, spend Hit Dice to hand out temporary hit points, heal allies, remove conditions, and eventually curse enemies with Unlight until they explode. There are some strong ideas here, particularly the bonus-action healing and restoration options, but the subclass feels like several different concepts sharing an apartment because none of them could afford rent alone.

    And then somebody finally releases the tadpoles.

    The Path of Ceremorphosis is easily the most interesting material in the UA. It lets characters gradually embrace Illithid abilities through a feat tree, picking up Psionic Energy Dice, telepathy, defensive abilities, tentacles, and eventually full Ceremorphosis. At the end of the path, you can become an aberration, gain Mind Flayer abilities, and choose between eating brains or spellcasting.

    Choose spellcasting.

    Mind Blast alone makes the decision pretty easy. A massive cone, an Intelligence save, psychic damage, and the stunned condition is an incredibly nasty combination. With Psionic Energy Dice potentially letting a high-level character use it repeatedly without spending normal spell slots, this is also the part most likely to receive a visit from the balance hammer before publication.

    Overall, Underdark Options is a mixed bag. The Barbarian looks salvageable with better scaling and stronger flavor. The Rogue probably needs to go back to the drawing board. The Wizard works, but doesn't inspire much excitement. Ceremorphosis, however, feels like exactly the kind of weird, dangerous character option the Underdark should be giving us.

    The Underdark is full of Drow assassins, Illithids, Umber Hulks, ancient civilizations, horrific monsters, political intrigue, poisons, spiders, and things with entirely too many tentacles. There is plenty of material here.

    We're just still trying to figure out why everyone is so excited about Unlight.

    Key Takeaways
    • Path of Unlight Barbarian has some solid ideas, but weak damage scaling and mandatory glowing hold it back.
    • The subclass's reliance on blindsight and revealing invisible enemies can become very campaign-dependent.
    • House Agent Rogue has a fantastic betrayal fantasy, but its mechanics don't reliably support that fantasy.
    • Several important House Agent abilities arrive far too late, with some of the subclass finally functioning properly around level 17.
    • The Imaskari wizard is probably the strongest of the three subclasses mechanically, especially as a secondary healer.
    • Spending Hit Dice for bonus-action healing and condition removal gives the Wizard some excellent action economy.
    • Unlight still feels underdeveloped as a concept. The hosts wanted something stranger and more distinctly Underdark.
    • Ceremorphosis is the highlight of the UA and continues the promising idea of character paths built through feat trees.
    • Some Ceremorphosis options are niche, especially the tentacle and brain-eating mechanics.
    • Mind Blast is extremely powerful thanks to its large area, Intelligence save, and ability to stun.
    • Repeated Mind Blasts fueled by Psionic Energy Dice look strong enough that they may need adjustment.
    • The hosts generally liked the villainous path concept and want to see more options built around it.
    • Final verdict: mixed bag. The subclasses need work, but becoming a Mind Flayer is apparently a perfectly reasonable career move.

    Welcome to the RPGBOT Podcast. If you love Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, and tabletop RPGs, this is the podcast for you.

    Support the show for free: Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any podcast app. It helps new listeners find the best RPG podcast for D&D and Pathfinder players.

    Level up your experience: Join us on Patreon to unlock ad-free access to RPGBOT.net and the RPGBOT Podcast, chat with us and the community on the RPGBOT Discord, and jump into live-streamed RPG podcast recordings.

    Support while you shop: Use our Amazon affiliate link at https://amzn.to/3NwElxQ and help us keep building tools and guides for the RPG community.

    Meet the Hosts

    • Tyler Kamstra – Master of mechanics, seeing the Pathfinder action economy like Neo in the Matrix.

    • Randall James – Lore buff and technologist, always ready to debate which Lord of the Rings edition reigns supreme.

    • Ash Ely – Resident cynic, chaos agent, and AI's worst nightmare, bringing pure table-flipping RPG podcast energy.

    Join the RPGBOT team where fantasy roleplaying meets real strategy, sarcasm, and community chaos.

    How to Find Us:

    In-depth articles, guides, handbooks, reviews, news on Tabletop Role Playing at RPGBOT.net

    Tyler Kamstra Ash Ely Randall James Producer Dan

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