By now most of you that plan on attending already have your GenCon badges, reservations, and plans. But if you are like me than you are still thumbing through the massive guide looking maximize your weekend. Lucky for you Oddfish Games has a few events that can help round out that GenCon calendar and make sure you get the most out of the greatest gaming weekend in the world.

Christina, this is the first time in a while Oddfish has offered events at GenCon? Why is now the perfect time to jump in and see what Oddfish Games has to offer?

[Kick to Christina]

Let’s walk through the GenCon schedule and give everyone a little preview of what to expect at the events?

BOOTH: 105

Rise And Shine: Sparking Creative Writing For Students
Wed at 3:00 pm EDT for 1 hr
JW : 101

Improvisational Horror: Unprepped and Unhinged
Call of Cthulhu, 7th Edition
Thu at 10:00 am EDT for 3 hr
Stadium : Meeting Room 7 : 6

Round Robin Horror: Collaborative GMing
Call of Cthulhu, 7th Edition
Thu at 2:00 pm EDT for 3 hr
Stadium : Meeting Room 7 : 6

Illuminated Campaigns & Adventures
Thu at 3:00 pm EDT for 1 hr
Stadium : Meeting Room 12

Create a Custom Scented Locket
Fri at 12:00 pm EDT for 1 hr
ICC : 210 : Front

Create a Custom Scent for Your Next Adventure
Fri at 1:00 pm EDT for 1 hr
ICC : 210 : Front

Improvisational Adventure: Unprepped and Unconstrained
Savage Worlds, Adventure Edition
Sat at 10:00 am EDT for 3 hr
Stadium : Meeting Room 7 : 3

Round Robin Adventure: Collaborative GMing
Savage Worlds, Adventure Edition
Sat at 2:00 pm EDT for 3 hr
Stadium : Meeting Room 7 : 3

The Oddfish Games booth will be at space 105 next to our friends at Piazo so make sure you stop bye and say hello and pick up some of our fantastic adventure scents as well as copies of Radiance, Luminous, and Shine. There will also likely be some cat plushies to go along with our “How to Roleplay with Your Cat” game. So stop by and say hi.

You Heard it Here Last

Welcome to You Heard it Here Last where we talk about news you’ve already heard.

Let’s talk business. In 2023 exports from Poland to the US reached the highest levels in history. 2% of all those exports…...was the video game Cyberpunk 2077.

What makes these numbers interesting is that the rollout of Cyberpunk 2077 was a massive failure and the Computer Gaming Industry in Poland took a hit. But today things have changed.

Christina, What’s up with Poland?

[Kick to Christina]

https://www.gamedeveloper.com/marketing/cyberpunk-2077-s-embattled-launch-was-felt-across-poland

https://www.trade.gov.pl/en/extended-topics/polish-gamedev-is-growing-in-strength/

We have more business news, this time in the TTRPG world.

Roll 20 has acquired Demiplane. For those of you not familiar, Roll20 is an online VTT for table top roleplaying, and Demiplane is an online tool that works with virtual table tops to provide rules for a large number of games that don’t start with D&D. That’s pretty interesting in and of itself.

But that's not even the most interesting part of it. Adam Bradford, the driving force behind first D&D Beyond and then Demiplane, opted not to go to Roll 20 and is now heading up development at Fantasy Grounds.

Christina, What’s all this then?

[Kick to Christina]

https://geektyrant.com/news/digital-ttrpg-giant-roll20-acquires-demiplane

https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/showthread.php?81600-SmiteWorks-hires-Adam-Bradford-as-Chief-Development-Officer-for-Fantasy-Grounds

Finally let’s talk Ennie Awards. The Ennie Awards are an annual fan-based celebration of excellence in tabletop roleplaying and they are awarded each year at GenCon. This year’s nominees have been announced and there are a lot of interesting stuff on it.

Christina, any of the nominees stand out to you or are there any that you are excited to see on the list of nominees?

[Kick to Christina]

https://ennie-awards.com/

https://ennie-awards.com/2024-nominees/

Well, there you have it, tune in next time for all the news you’ve already heard.

“Teamwork makes the dream work” was quoted by leadership expert John C. Maxwell in his book by the same name. The actual quote read:

“Teamwork makes the dream work, but a vision becomes a nightmare when the leader has a big dream and a bad team.”

What does this have to do with adventuring in our table top games?

Well, actually, everything.

A team is a group of individuals working together who collaborate on related tasks to achieve their common goal. Hearkening back to the beginnings of table top roleplaying games the character classes were designed to help build a basic team to solve the adventure.

How many of you have had this conversation

Ok, we’ve got Jerry as our fighter. He can keep the monsters off our back. Susan is playing the Wizard so magic is covered. Gwen is playing a thief to help with locks and traps…so…Steve, it looks like you get to play the cleric.

In this episode Mike, Christina and I are going to talk about teams and specifically building a good team from your players and characters to tell amazing stories.

Christina, have you ever had a bad team in a game?