Mastering Dungeons  By  cover art

Mastering Dungeons

By: Mastering Dungeons
  • Summary

  • RPG veterans and game designers Teos Abadía and Shawn Merwin look at the game and the hobby of D&D from a variety of viewpoints: reporting the news, understanding the business, reviewing the products, and illuminating the design. Whether you’re a fan, a player, a DM, or a designer, Shawn and Teos cover topics of interest to you!
    2024
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Episodes
  • Design an RPG Starting Adventure (MD 183)
    Mar 27 2024

    Episode 183 of Mastering Dungeons!

    Main topic:

    Designing an RPG Starting Adventure!

    Continuing the discussion of worldbuilding and village design, how do we start an adventure? We provide an approach to get the most out of your campaign and adventure starts!

    News: GaryCon Review, Remembering Jim Ward, Daggerheart Review!

    Contents 00:00 March Madness 01:42 GaryCon Review 05:52 Criticize Shadowdark? 14:45 Remembering Jim Ward 18:58 Stores Get D&D Early 21:07 Free Tsojcanth 22:38 MtG D&D Store Event 25:42 Infinite Staircase Reveals 28:28 Lego D&D Details 31:29 Tome of Beasts on Beyond 36:59 Surviving Strangehollow 37:46 Daggerheart Review 40:19 RPG Starting Adventure 41:52 Session 0 44:00 Character Connections 47:48 Fiasco Approach 52:10 Ashes of Athas Approach 54:03 Start with a Bang? 57:28 Find the Excitement 59:10 Intro Hook 01:01:46 Theory of Globs 01:07:32 Adventure Hooks 01:12:12 PC Impetus 01:15:33 Don't Give it All Away 01:19:39 Shout-Outs Thank you for listening! Get the full show notes with links on Patreon.

    Our intro and outro music is Metropolis Fanfare, provided royalty-free by Tabletop Audio (https://tabletopaudio.com) under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).

    MP3 file metadata populated with Online MP3 Podcast Chapter Editor, built by Dominik Peters. https://mp3chapters.github.io/ and customized for Mastering Dungeons by Vladimir Prenner from Croatia.

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    1 hr and 24 mins
  • Design an RPG Starting Village! (MD 182)
    Mar 20 2024

    Episode 182 of Mastering Dungeons!

    Main topic: Designing an RPG Starting Village!

    Continuing the discussion of worldbuilding, a great place to start is a village. What must a starting village contain and what isn’t needed? How do we make it relevant and interesting? We dig into the design and examples that have and haven’t worked for us.

    News: Critical Role launches Daggerheart, Hasbro CEO vs D&D on AI, Starforged Terrain!

    Contents 00:00 Podcasting for Relatives 01:39 Exhaustion vs HPs? 10:39 30-Minute D&D? 21:46 D&D Asks Do You Like Me 29:45 Hasbro CEO Says AI D&D Says No 39:02 CR Launches Daggerheart 41:59 Dwarven Forge Starforged 43:46 Surviving Strangehollow 44:20 Zweihander Reforged 44:44 Designing an RPG Starting Village 45:50 Two Issues to Avoid 46:37 Classic D&D Villages 50:08 Bottom-Up Technique 59:15 Safe Space or Hub 01:01:44 Launch Adventures 01:05:28 Key Elements 01:08:16 Tie to PC Goals 01:10:53 NPCs 01:15:05 Theme 01:16:58 History 01:21:33 Shout-Outs Thank you for listening! Get the full show notes with links on Patreon.

    Our intro and outro music is Metropolis Fanfare, provided royalty-free by Tabletop Audio (https://tabletopaudio.com) under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).

    MP3 file metadata populated with Online MP3 Podcast Chapter Editor, built by Dominik Peters. https://mp3chapters.github.io/ and customized for Mastering Dungeons by Vladimir Prenner from Croatia.

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    1 hr and 25 mins
  • Shadowdark Finale – GM Tips, Monsters, and Treasure (MD 181)
    Mar 13 2024

    Episode 181 of Mastering Dungeons!

    Main topic: Shadowdark GM Tips, Monsters, and Treasure!

    The finale of our Shadowdark series! We take a look the excellent advice, plus how the game provides monsters and treasure.

    News: Reviewing The Fallbacks, Adv League to Beyond, NASA RPG and Challenge, and more!

    Contents 00:00 Teos Has Seen Things 02:45 Emerald City Comic-Con 06:32 Adventure as User Guide? 15:16 Exhaustion Currency? 22:43 Modes of Play? 28:34 AL Moves to Beyond 31:33 Greasy Snitches 36:41 The Fallbacks review 41:08 NASA RPG 42:13 Steamforged and Kobold 43:33 SRD in Braille 45:00 Surviving Strangehollow 45:45 Shadowdark Finale 46:07 The Role of GM and Players 50:43 For Experienced GMs 54:29 Players not PCs 56:06 Core Ethos 01:00:09 Check DCs 01:05:15 Darkness and Modes of Play 01:08:30 Random Encounters 01:14:56 The Gauntlet 01:19:04 Awarding XP 01:22:35 Lots of Tables! 01:23:25 Monsters 01:25:06 Treasure 01:27:25 Final Thoughts 01:32:06 Shout-Outs Thank you for listening! Get the full show notes with links on Patreon.

    Our intro and outro music is Metropolis Fanfare, provided royalty-free by Tabletop Audio (https://tabletopaudio.com) under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).

    MP3 file metadata populated with Online MP3 Podcast Chapter Editor, built by Dominik Peters. https://mp3chapters.github.io/ and customized for Mastering Dungeons by Vladimir Prenner from Croatia.

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    1 hr and 36 mins

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