← Critical Role & Sagas of Sundry
Critical Role & Sagas of Sundry
Building Your Own Campaign Setting w/ Johnny Stanton IV | Quests N’ Answers
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- [00:01]
Dan Casey
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- [01:01]
Johnny Stanton
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- [01:37]
Dan Casey
Welcome back to Question Answers everybody. I'm Dan Casey and today we're doing something a little bit different. Now usually this is the after show for our ongoing actual play TTRPG series Sagas of Sundry Goblin Mode. But today we're going to zoom out the lens a little bit. We're going to talk about the art and the interplay of role playing, storytelling, game design for tabletop role playing games. And joining me to help break down this unique craft from his perspective is my very special guest, pro athlete, pro role player and pro game designer, Johnny Stanton. Johnny, thank you so much for joining me today.
- [02:07]
Johnny Stanton
Thank you for having me to disappoint everybody who's hoping for the after show.
- [02:11]
Dan Casey
No, no, no, no.
- [02:12]
Johnny Stanton
This. I'm excited to be here. Thank you for having me.
- [02:14]
Dan Casey
This is a sweet relief from my usual blathering about what we just did on screen. So I'm very curious. You know, you are someone who is all over the world of tabletop role playing games, but I'm curious, how did you first start getting into this world? What was your entry point into the world of sitting down with pen and paper and dice?
- [02:32]
Johnny Stanton
Oh man, there's like two points in which you know there's everybody's introduction into Tabletop role playing game and then there's the introduction into like the performance side, which is a whole weird thing that like a handful of us get to do. And you know, it's with like media being so democratized and YouTube and podcasts, but anybody can make a show that they want to and it has the opportunity to blow up. You know, it's so, you know, it's so wide open to everybody. But my first introduction to tabletop role playing game was through a, a YouTube channel called Corridor Digital or more specifically their, their partner channel called Node in which they played a, I think a Pokemon version of D and D, which kind of introduced me to it. I was a fan of their channel and I'm like, I knew about Dungeons and Dragons, had no idea what it was actually like. I think probably that Pokemon game gave me a bad first impression, but it interested me enough to have to watch their other campaigns and it interest interested me enough to go to my local comic book shop where I was a regular on every Wednesday afternoon picking up new copies of issues and asking, hey, what's, you know, you guys are nerds. The only nerdy people that I know, where's the place to play D and D, you know, is this is it here. And they, they got me set up with a game that had just started like two weeks prior. And that, that game I played in for a good probably eight, eight, nine months. It was like newcomers coming in and out. And you know, it was my first. So it was very new for me as somebody who didn't get the opportunity to be a theater kid. And I'm living out my theater dreams now. But from that point I introduced it to some teammates when I was at unlv. I then got picked up by the Minnesota Vikings. And on my longest period of not playing Dungeons and Dragons, which was hard on my soul. But that's when I started getting into the world of actual D and D as media. Because you know, I'd seen it on YouTube that one time. I didn't know that there was critical role. I didn't know about the Adventure Zone. And this was back in like 2017 or so, 2016, 2017. So it was still kind of right there on the upswing of fifth edition and everybody kind of getting into it. But it was, it was a whirlwind and completely supplanted my nerd them for, for comic books. And now it's just tabletop role playing games and Dungeons and Dragons, which is fun as far as my introduction into, like, the world of performing for D and D, that was the first thing I ever did, was a show run by one of the creators of Pixel Circus, Kaylee Bray. She had. She DMed a game for me and a couple other people who I'm still friends with to this day in this. In this space. And that was during the pandemic in 2020. But things kind of really blew up for me when I wore my critical role shirt to the night of my. Of my one and only touchdown in the NFL, where I was wearing that jersey right above me.
- [05:27]
Dan Casey
Oh, amazing. That's awesome. I also, I just also love that, you know, I love that pathway into it because it is something that it's. It's a hobby that really taps into, I think, different passions for people. Whether you really invest on the writing side or you like performing, or you like this sense of communal storytelling. You know, it is. At the end of the day, it's a team building game. You're building this sense of camaraderie and telling a story together. So it makes sense that it would translate to the locker room and things like that and playing with your teammates as well.
- [05:57]
Johnny Stanton
It was such a great opportunity for me to, you know, when I am. When I joined the Browns, it was in the middle of the pandemic. I had signed in January of 2020, and we didn't get to go to spring ball that year because of everything going on. So it was really hard to develop relationships with guys on the team. You're trying to do it over computer screen as a new player on the team when everybody else already has their relationships. And it was. I think we started during maybe like, I think I brought it up to Miles the first time, which was like a big Miles Garrett, you know, last year's defensive player of the year, One of the best, you know, guys in the NFL. One of the best edge rushers in the NFL. And I brought it up to him saying because he was wearing a Stranger Things shirt at the facility, I'm like, hey, have you ever, you know, you ever tried playing the game that they play in Stranger Things, Dungeons and Dragons? He says, no, but I'd be down to try. So it was such a great opportunity to bring. To build relationships with guys on the team. And, you know, you're building it inside the building. But we didn't get that opportunity to really build it outside the building. And even inside, you know, you're supposed to be distancing, staying at least six feet away from people wearing masks. It was really, obviously it was a hard time for everybody to build relationships and, you know, within a football facility was no different. But getting to, getting to have that one piece away from football, where you got to connect with guys was, was really important and special to me. And it was really fun to, to have it become what it, what it was. And, you know, introducing Miles to the world of Dungeons and Dragons and introducing the world of Dungeons and Dragons and nerds and TTRPG to football and to Miles Garrett and to, you know, some of the coolest, coolest things that I love about both sides really got highlighted to people who had never experienced them before.
- [07:43]
Dan Casey
Yeah, I love that crossover. It sort of speaks to your experience as well of walking into your local comic book store and saying, like, hey, I want to play. How can they make this happen? You know, I think a lot of people sometimes there's this sense that they'll be gatekept out of a hobby like this or they might feel it's too intimidating to get into. You know, it's very cool that Miles was just down to clown, down to try it out, but how do you pitch a game like D and D or other TTRPGs to people that maybe are a little apprehensive about trying them?
- [08:12]
Johnny Stanton
It's such a. It's. It's the ever present problem of too many players, not enough DMs, I think is the biggest, the biggest hurdle to, to. To get. So I think a lot of people who are finding themselves at a, at a loss for people to play with are people who are experienced players but not experienced Dungeon Masters, and they're having trouble making that leap. And trust me, if you're a Dungeon Master, you're having no issue finding players for your game. You just end up being a magnet to people who know D and D and just make it, you know, I don't think as somebody, it's, it's. I was in a lucky position of having, of getting to. To have it be almost like a novelty as somebody who is in the NFL, who's a Dungeons and Dragons nerd. Um, so I got the opportunity to have people kind of respect that in a way a lot quicker than some other people might. But I think that people are also afraid of, of putting themselves out there in that way as somebody who is really nerdy. It's becoming less and less taboo, which I think is amazing. But the more people make it part of their, you know, not, don't make it your whole personality necessarily, but make it something that people can, can associate with You. And. And when they do see, like, oh, wait, that movie with Chris Pines on Netflix now Dungeons and Dragons, I think my buddy Johnny plays that maybe we can, you know, talk about at some point, and that just opens the door to further conversation and just kind of leaving little sprinkles as a trail into, you know, becoming obsessed.
- [09:47]
Dan Casey
Yeah. And look, to me, it's no nerdier or more impenetrable than people who also play fantasy football. You're building your party of beefy paladins to accomplish the goal of conquering your opponent each week. I. I really enjoy both, but I love that there's this way to just sort of break these barriers down, like, raise the port colors, lower the drawbridge. Everyone, come on in now. I. I definitely agree with you.
- [10:11]
Johnny Stanton
One, One thing when you mentioned fantasy football, which I think is. Is such an easy comparison, it's like, there's a lot of math involved. There's a lot of suspension of disbelief. There is, but I think the, The. The main, like, the biggest thing that I think is really analogous between the two is just this sense, the sense of community. And a fantasy football group, there's usually a group text involved. There is usually some way of meeting oftentimes in person like you would in a DND group when there's draft day and stuff. So. But oftentimes people, there's. There's not as many people starting groups as there are people being invited into groups. Right. And it's that same kind of thing of, do you want to join our done D and D table? Do you want to join our fantasy football group? And I think there's a lot of. There's a lot of comparisons there that you can make. And I don't think it's any scarier than asking somebody to be part of your fantasy football group, except there's a little bit. There's a few more funny voices involved.
- [11:05]
Dan Casey
Yeah, look, both are ultimately expensive hobbies. It depends on what fantasy football group you're in. There's still going to be funny voices, people clowning on you if you don't start the right people. But you mentioned something as well about. Your point was well taken about how there's a plethora of players, but there's never enough dms to go around. I'm curious for you, when did you first. The leap into being behind the screen and what was that experience like?
- [11:32]
Johnny Stanton
My first time Dungeon mastering was when I was in college, right after. It was my second group ever. It was. It was after I had been introduced at that Comic book shop with this new group. And I, my, My thought process was, this is a lot of fun. I love the idea of being able to tell the story in your own head and at. With the people at the table. But I want to do it with people that I'm. That I already have a relationship with, that I'm already close with. I'm building these friendships with the people at the comic book shop, but it's people that I'm seeing every other week. You know, it's a lot of times people are missing or, you know, I just, I don't know them necessarily. I'm not seeing them outside of that context for sure. I want to play it with people who I do know outside of that context and kind of build that relationship that already exists with them. So that's when I decided to ask what I saw as the three nerdiest guys on my football team at unlv. And they, they accepted and came over to my apartment and we played, I think in total, maybe like six sessions. So nothing crazy, but it was really just like my own reskin of the, of the Adventure Zone bureau, like balance season. Oh, amazing. I think that's, that's the, that's the best way of, of playing D and D as a new DM is you don't need to create your whole new world from scratch. Pick up a book when. Of which there are many, pick up sync when it comes out, or you can just reskin something you already have experienced. You know, experienced DMs already do that with their own game of like, oh, you know what? I really liked watching Get Out. I thought that was a super cool movie. I want to build my D and D, you know, story off of get out and like, kind of the mythology kind of behind it there. You know, everybody's inspired by, by different things. How much you take from that inspiration, I think is. Is what you learn as you become an experienced dm. But if you, if you, if you know that there is a story or a book that you really love that maybe isn't super mainstream and maybe the players at your table haven't experienced it. Try to make sure at first, but, but, you know, just rip it off. Like, no, you're not making money off of it, probably. There's no, there's no way of like, of having that be any, you know, morally gray. You're just at a D and D table, playing a D and D version of it.
- [13:45]
Dan Casey
No. Especially if you're trying to get people into this for the first time. What's the old saying, good artists borrow, great artists steal. In this case, you're paying homage. Something you love, something you know they'll love. And I think it's. I love that you adapted the first season of Adventure Zone because that in and of itself starts with, you know, D and D Starter Adventure, Lost Minds of Vandelver. It's the perfect entry point. So I love that. That's fantastic. What was that?
- [14:11]
Johnny Stanton
Yeah, I was going to say it was a fun experience of learning that that was completely a completely acceptable way of playing tabletop role playing games.
- [14:20]
Dan Casey
100%. 100%. And like that's, I think as well, a lot of people sometimes hesitate when they come to it. Either they feel like they have to build their world entirely from scratch or they have to buy the perfect module that'll fit their group's interests. But I really think you can split the difference between the two. You know, do you, in your experience over the years and we'll get into what you're in the process of creating and have created and will be coming out with. Do you find yourself drawn more towards full homebrew or do you like finding modules to run and then putting your own spin on them?
- [14:52]
Johnny Stanton
I think modules have, and not just because I'm biased, but I think modules are incredibly useful to learn from. I think it is, it is built to, to run as its own campaign. But the way that a module is written might not be the way that you play Dungeons and Dragons. You know, when I look through a book that WOTC produces that has, you know, a certain amount of adventures and maybe there, maybe each individual adventure is, is really well thought out. Thought out. But I've, in my experience there are some times where the, the adventures don't connect in a way that I want them to or I want to have a lot more player backstory play a role in the world. So what I ended up doing was I did a very similar thing in the Adventure Zone, which was I picked up Dragon of Icespire Peak and ran that for the first arc of the, of the adventure. And we went through like eight sessions with my wife and her two brothers playing different characters, going through Dragon of Icespire Peak, sprinkling in some backstory from their own, you know, from their own backstory in there. And then I said, okay, the rest of it is gone. This world is still the Sword coast and Faerun, but it's my own version of the Sword Coast. You're going to neverwinter, but it's my own version Neverwinter. I'm I'm using the names and you know, it's nothing crazy. Like I can, I can pick a different name. That's not a big deal. But it's a completely new world. Like my Waterdeep, which is like their whole second third arc is there. I went literal with the name. Like this is a city in the middle of a lake that is just a pillar going down into fantastic. I love that live in like this like cylindrical city. So yeah, just like There are many.
- [16:33]
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- [19:40]
Johnny Stanton
Don't feel like you need to if you're gonna take a step away from it and go into homebrew, you don't need to leap completely out of the lane and do your own whole own things. Like, I didn't feel like, oh, you know what, now that I'm telling my own story, it should really be its own world. No, it's, it's just, it's its own version of the Sword coast and kind of, I think of it as like, you know, the Ultimates version from Marvel Comics. This is like the, this isn't Earth 616. This is, you know, the ultimate version of what Sword coast looks like.
- [20:08]
Dan Casey
I love that because it is your own world. Every time you and your party sit down at the table to play, you know, you're always putting your spin on. It's never going to be exactly, literally as it happens on the page. Because any, any DM can attest that goes right out the window when a player has a bright idea. But yeah, no, I did that quite a bit.
- [20:26]
Johnny Stanton
DMs the best. It's, it's just like improv. The best. DMs listen and listen to their players and allow that to inform their own choices. I, when I was on Adventuring Academy with Brennan Lee Mulligan, we had this conversation about world building and how like people feel the pressure to create this whole new world, to create this sandbox effect that, that people can just play wherever they want if they Want to go to this one thing they can. They, you know, whatever draws them will be what they get to focus on. And I think that is, if that works for you, amazing. I don't work that way. I need to be able to know kind of the direction which people are going and then build the train tracks as they're building, as they're going along. It's not railroading if you're, if you're building the railroads, you know, 10ft in front of the train, you're, like, allowing it to be. Allowing the story to be told collaboratively. And you're, you're not. You're not telling a story to the, to the players as it's coming. You are letting their own decisions influence. Influence you and how the world is built around them.
- [21:28]
Dan Casey
I, I appreciate that approach to it because as a player, I am always aware of, or I try to be aware. I say, I'm sure DMs would disagree with me. I try to be aware of. There is a destination the DM wants us to go to because they've clearly put in a lot of prep work or the appearance of a lot of prep work into where this story should be going. So as fun as it is to be, you know, like murder, hobo, chaos, Gremlin, at the end of the day, you do want to tell this story together. So I always. I don't mind a bit of light railroading because, yeah, I'm trying to stay within the bounds of this world to make it feel real and get to the next exciting sequence in this story that we're telling together at the table.
- [22:11]
Johnny Stanton
Yeah, I, you know, I grew up playing video games and it influences a lot of my own storytelling now, especially in the building of sync. And I. I realized as I've gotten older and have had less and less time to be able to play video games, I am not somebody who goes crazy for the sandbox experience, goes crazy for something that is open world and you can get distracted by anything. I am one of the very few, probably 1% of people who just could not latch on to Breath of the Wild or Tears of the Kingdom just because the world is too open for me, that I feel like I need something to kind of guide me along. And I'm sure somebody's gonna say, oh, you're playing it wrong. Like, well, you know, whatever. It's just my own. My own opinion, I think I. My own personal view is that I like a guided experience. I don't need it to be, you know, doing exactly what you're being told. But, you know, a little bit of leeway to the left and to the right, I think is. Is important to me while it is going in a very intentional direction.
- [23:14]
Dan Casey
No, I get that 100%. I think. Sometimes I think that I want 100 plus hour open world experience, and then I find myself not never finishing it because it's. It's too, you know, the. It's like when you're looking at a diner menu and there are simply too many choices where you're just paralyzed by that indecision. When you really just want, you know, waffles and some eggs on the side and some bacon. That's. It's a simple choice. But I do realize the hypocrisy of.
- [23:39]
Johnny Stanton
What I just said, though, because I'm about 250 hours into Baldur's Gate, and I just decide, like, I'm just trying to do everything perfectly and going, you know, I'm in Act 3. I'm like, near the end of the story, but I'm like, I just want to get everything done, but it's like, it's different. It's not Assassin's Creed where I can or, you know, GTA that, right? I'm just like, oh, I want to do this and this and this. I don't like that kind of experience. I want to be able to finish one thing and then just keep going with it.
- [24:02]
Dan Casey
Well, that's. I also about Balers Gate. It is expansive, but it is finite. It's not like. It's not something where it's just like this. This one quest line keeps constantly regenerating, you know. And yes, I also went back after clearing the underdark to do the mountain pass because I didn't want to miss anything because I'm like, all right, I've got. I've got a kid at home. I want to make sure I get this in the first run because I don't know if I'll be guaranteed runs 2 through 12, but I definitely. I can definitely appreciate that. I'm a completionist when it comes to RPGs in particular, but if they're too expansive, sometimes it can be a bit daunting.
- [24:34]
Johnny Stanton
Turns you away from it for sure.
- [24:36]
Dan Casey
But since we're talking about game design, this is a natural pivot point. You're not only a fantastic GM and performer, but also now you are a game designer. Tell me about the impetus behind your company, Crimson Herald, and the first initiative you folks are undertaking. Taking with sync.
- [24:52]
Johnny Stanton
Yeah. So Crimson Herald was something I started to kind of Allow for some organization in developing what became Sync Adventures on the Call to Reach Sea. It is now a four way partnership between the three creators and Hit Point Press. I was blanking on it. Hit Point Press is our publisher and partner in the project. And originally in 2023 we were going through the process of. I had met, I'm good friends with my co writer Rick Escavius, have known him since 2018. After I got, you know, hurt with the Minnesota Vikings, Rick was in that first D and D group that I started playing D and D with again. And then in 2023 I got to meet Sam Rusk, who I had been very familiar with her art style and kind of creating that American traditional tattoo art. But what they call pop traditional kind of creating this, these bright colors and instilling this nerdy, you know, pop media style to it. And long story short, we end up deciding to work on something together. We decided to, to call it Treasures of Deep Grotto, which is, which turned into our one shot adventure that released as a on free RPG day in 2024. And this was a one shot that we were excited about. It was we wanted to build a dungeon. We wanted to build a dungeon crawler that included pirates and tattoos. That was our main thing. So we did, we did that. We developed a one shot and we play tested it a bunch. We had all of our friends play it. And then in developing it I thought, well, let's see what this could be. And we decided to go to PAX unplugged in 2023 and figure out, okay, is anybody interested in this? I set up like 15 meetings us over the course of three days to try to meet with publishers, see if anybody was interested, see who the best team to work with would be. And we very quickly realized that Hit Point Press would give us not only the best opportunity to succeed, but best opportunity for this book to be what we want it to be. And we set a time aside like next September was what our plan was to make this Kickstarter. And we ended up raising about $280,000 on Kickstarter and another 20 something on backer kit. So we can, you know, I think officially say over 300,000 on.
- [27:16]
Dan Casey
That's amazing.
- [27:18]
Johnny Stanton
And yeah, we're now in the trenches building it now because Treasures Deep Grotto was the very first thing that we built and it was a great framework to work within. We're building kind of like this bounce around the Cul Derech Sea island chain in which you are fighting warlocks trying to steal souls on behalf of their eldritch God Igathul. And you are a pirate trying to stop that from happening with, with some help along the way with some magic item tattoos, which is like a big part of our book. In fact, we in, in the development of this. We just, I think at this point I can, I can say with a good amount of confidence that we are all done with our magic item tattoos. We wanted to make 54 to make a full playing card deck plus two jokers.
- [28:06]
Dan Casey
Oh, that's very cool.
- [28:07]
Johnny Stanton
So our, we have 54 magic item tattoos done and they're gonna all end up in a playing card deck that some backers of the Kickstarter will be able to get their hands on. And if they're in, if you didn't back it at that level at Kickstarter, it's also super easy to just order that, that, that extra add on on backer kit now.
- [28:26]
Dan Casey
Amazing. And we'll put those links in the description below for people listening or watching this. I, I love that, the playing card deck idea. I always love a tactile tool that you can use to give to players because, you know, theater of the mind is wonderful, but when you can do something like that, that's unexpected. I think it just really. You can see the delight spread on their faces.
- [28:48]
Johnny Stanton
Yeah. No, it was when. One of the most fun things about developing a Kickstarter, there's a lot of fun things. There's a lot of things that are not fun at all. And one of the things that I thought was the most fun was trying to determine what like add on items would, would benefit the project. We don't want to just throw things in there. We don't want to have like 17 sets of dice. And that's your thing. That, that's amazing. But it's not like what we were excited to do. But one thing that we really wanted to do was have the, the choice of magic item tattoos be front and center. So we have temporary tattoos that you can like put on your own skin. You. We have, we actually had a, an add on in which you can, you can get a tattoo from Sam because Sam is a whole very cool artist and we actually just had our first backer who backed at that tier get her tattoo. So it was a four hour tattoo session with Sam that she flew out for and the art is super, super cool. We were sharing it in the, in the, in the sync discord over the last week or so and yeah, and the playing card deck was something that we decided, okay, we want like A deck of cards. There's also the magic item cards that some people do that Hit Point Press is honestly very, very good at. That's like one of their specialties is, is these, like, extra items and especially cards. But we decided that it would be really cool with the number of tattoos that we wanted to do to just. Let's not make two different card products. Let's make one. Let's make playing cards. This is something that you can use, you know, even outside of D and D. This is something you can pass out to players when they have that, that, that item. But this is also something you can just be playing poker with at your own home.
- [30:26]
Dan Casey
Hey, we love a multipurpose gaming accessory. That's fantastic. Now that's. I love this from a design perspective, but I'm curious as well. You know, going from, you know, designing like a home game, for example, what's been the biggest challenge or surprise when it came to designing a campaign setting and a module like Sync the most?
- [30:49]
Johnny Stanton
The almost unexpectedly hard part is making sure that everything feels really intentional. And like I mentioned earlier, you can pick up a WOTC book and, and pick out different adventures that maybe they don't. And this isn't to, you know, downplay what WOTC is able to do with making these books. They have incredible writers on it and. But a lot of times it's just. It's a lot of different writers without one, you know, not without. With one. One vision. But maybe the, the singular vision isn't as prioritized as making sure that, like, each individual adventure is really, really well done. One thing we wanted to do is that we really take pride in is that the creators of the book are just the three of us. It is one artist and two writers. And creating the singular vision for one is definitely hard, but especially hard when we are marketing our book. And one thing that we were really excited about was the fact that it is modular. We were looking at these, these books making their. Their book of like, you know, there's these companies making their books of one shots and. Which I think is incredible and super useful, especially when you're introducing people to Dungeons and Dragons. But what, what we wanted to do was, well, there's these books of one shot. Book of one shots. What if we were doing like a book of dungeons and you could just plug and play them into your game whether or not you're playing a pirate adventure? So we are definitely playing a pirate adventure. There's gonna be plenty of pirates in this, but there's also islands in which there is, like, this ice castle that you're trying to. To siege. There is a. There's an island of, like, a lot like a volcano in which you're, like, delving into the vault, into the volcano and fighting off lava monsters and such. So we want. What we're hoping to do is. The challenge came that came up was how much is it modular? How much are we telling a singular story? How much can we combine those two things while still, you know, not ramming our head up into a wall trying to figure out how to do it? So I think we're doing a very good job right now in developing this story. And, you know, we. We don't have the most amount of adventures. We have a handful of dungeons. I think at this point it's six. But we want each and. Each and every one of them to feel really intentional and like they are connected but can be played separately if that's what you want to do. If you are running into an area where you want an island of this ice castle with a sleeping white dragon, you can plug that into your own game, and then when that one is done, you're going off into the rest of your world. So, like I mentioned earlier, the modularity is something that I love in my own games and taking tools from. And I know I was speaking and speaking a lot on modularity of it of all, but I think, like I mentioned, the we are. We marketed it on the modularity of it, as well as the magic item tattoos and the artwork modularity, not just in adventure, but also in mechanics. And that's something that I feel like I am learning a lot about personally as a game designer, is that I love developing mechanics. And the sunken condition, the soul link mechanic that we have decided to bring into this and added a whole new condition to Dungeons and Dragons 5e is the sunken condition, in which your hit die now represents the tether to your own soul. And if you end up at zero hit points while having zero hit die left, which can happen not only through short rest, but also through different effects or different abilities that your magic items might have, your character is dead. There is no getting up from zero hit points. There is no revivify. Your character is dead. And what we're hoping is to really build up the tension and the dread of it all while having those fun items that you can use. Oh, I'm using an action to use my hit die to buff my weapon in some way or to give them disadvantage on a spell or all of the million ideas that we've had and tried to narrow them down into 54 for the magic item tattoos.
- [34:49]
Dan Casey
Well, I love that because I also, I'm a big fan of making player mortality and player death feel like a very real threat or very real possibility. You know, ever since playing a game of Cyberpunk 2020 back in the day and my character just getting turned into a Jackson Pollock painting, I was like, oh, holy cow. I didn't think that was possible. I thought I would just respawn. But no. And in D and D as well. It's just, you know, speaking of, you mentioned your talk with Brennan Lee Mulligan on Adventuring Academy. I loved your point about your thoughts about death saves and doing them as like a private thing between you and the dm. I love ways to ratchet up that tension and having a condition like this where it makes hit die important in a way that you might not think about beyond when you're leveling up your character and figuring out, okay, how many more hit points do I get? I like that it brings that mechanic back around.
- [35:40]
Johnny Stanton
It's a resource that I know at the beginning of 5e, Watsi was dissuading game designers to use that as a resource. But it's on everybody's character sheet and it's something that you really only think about maybe once a session or maybe once every couple sessions when you level up. It's. It's something that is, like I said, it's on everybody's character sheet. We wanted to. To use it in some way. I first experimented with it in the home game that I run for my wife and her brothers. I gave. I gave the barbarian an ax that you. That when you rage, you can pull some of your hit die like a pool from your pool of hit dye and use it as like a possible smite once per attack. And it's. It was super fun to like, have that, you know, be a super strong item and then maybe rein it back a little bit when. When designing the magic item tattoos or really invest into it, depending on the rarity, depending on how strong we want that to be. And then a lot of them have nothing to do with that because we know that we. We know that there are going to be plenty of people who want these tattoos. You know, the only tattoos that are on D and D beyond, for example, are ones that are. Came from Tasha's cauldron of everything. And we have, you know, no existing plans right now to working with. With WOTC on D and D beyond anything. I would love to, but I think that people are really wanting to have that character customization that isn't just a cool new sword or a cool new piece of armor. I think people want that, like, that, you know, body modification, you know, expressionism of themselves and yeah, there's just, there's just some really fun stuff there that we were really diving into.
- [37:18]
Dan Casey
Yeah. And I appreciate that as like a different way to equip your character and imbue your character with these traits that make them unique in these, you know, body expression. And like you mentioned, I think it's very cool that it's something that we don't, we haven't seen a lot of representation for. And I think it fits into so well with that sort of high seas piracy setting. Now you mentioned, you mentioned that you knew that you wanted to do piracy. What was the impetus behind that? How did you sort of land on like, okay, we want to do something that is a seafaring, swashbuckling setting.
- [37:48]
Johnny Stanton
It's the art. It's originally when, you know, it's become like apocrypha at this point. But it's all true of. When I first met Sam was at San Diego Comic Con 2023. She tattooed a displacer beast on my leg and we got to hang out myself. Rick ended up meeting her that weekend as well. And then I got to just hang out with her group a lot. And over the course of the weekend I asked Sam, have you ever worked on a, you know, a tabletop book or, you know, you know, some kind of module or anything? And she said no. And I said, well, man, that'd be really cool to do something together. Because at that point I didn't consider myself a game designer. I didn't, I still kind of don't. It's kind of, you know, the imposter syndrome of it all. But I, over the course of the weekend I asked her, well, if you were, if you were to work on a D and D or tabletop gaming book with like, you know, what kind of theme do you think would, would play in best to your artwork? And immediately she said, well, I think pirates feels really obvious because of pirates and tattoos. And even though they weren't necessarily, it's a, it's a little bit. Oh God, what's the word for. And it's a little bit anachronistic of this art style with pirates because they didn't, they didn't have these type of tattoos, but there was tattooing in that, you know, in like the golden age of piracy. And so she said, Tattoos or pirates would be awesome. But also I'm just a big nerd for dungeon crawlers and I think a dungeon crawler would be cool. So we decided, well, why not both? Like, we don't need dungeon crawlers to be in a medieval castle or underneath the pyramid or, you know, what have you. It's. It can. Dungeon crawler can be whatever you want it to be. So why not just make a pirate dungeon crawler? So that's where the idea for pirates came from. And I think we've done a really. I think we've done a good job and had a lot of fun with just rolling with that.
- [39:36]
Dan Casey
Well, it feels like it's coming at a very good cultural moment as well. I feel like, you know, the global explosion in popularity of One Piece over the last decade, in particular during Lockdown, my friend group and I, we played a lot of Sea of Thieves as this sense of sort of swashbuckling escapism. And it also really speaks to that sense of modularity and possibility you were talking about. Because what I love about both of those things, you know, I'm reading through One Piece now, reading the manga, is you never know what you're going to get when you land on one of these islands. And as you know, while you're providing this, all of these possibilities and opportunities in sync, it also gives you the scaffolding to build your own adventures on top of. And I really appreciate that as a player and as someone who would be sitting down to play with my home group, because I just love that. I love the setting that it offers because the high seas is. This connective tissue is exciting to me because it feels sort of underserved by the larger sort of tabletop landscape.
- [40:35]
Johnny Stanton
Yeah, I think two things. One is that One Piece and Sea of Thieves is absolutely something that we are taking inspiration from and even use at the very top of our Kickstarter page. Like for those of you who love One Piece and you know, Sea of Thieves or whatever, it really is like you said, the idea of going to an island and having it be, this isn't just a cookie cutter, you know, Caribbean themed pirate adventure. This is a pirate adventure in which, yeah, there is that inspiration, but also there is crazy different kinds of pirates and it's definitely more western inspired. There's a whole other side of piracy, especially in like the China Sea and like in Japan and all of that whole like history behind it all. That's something that we are super excited. Maybe Sync two, I don't know. Our adventure is going to go from, from third level to 10th level. But we don't, you know, based on the sales for, for, for through Kickstarter and when the book is actually available, this might be something where we can make a sink to. And it would be really cool to explore different, different tattoo styles, different historical versions or, you know, fantasy historical versions of piracy at like higher levels. So there's, there's some really fun stuff that we would love to be able to work on if people, if people are, are dying for it.
- [41:50]
Dan Casey
Yeah, well. Well, first of all, I love that idea. Second of all, please call it Or Swim for the second volume. So it makes the duology. No, I really dig that. I'm curious as well. You know, obviously this is perhaps the ultimate expression of, you know, all of the creative impulses when it comes to sitting down and building like a campaign. But for your home games, when you're sitting down to play with your friends or your family, do you have any homebrew rules or house rules that you like to bring to the table?
- [42:18]
Johnny Stanton
I do love the death saves rule of death saves being private to the player in the dm, you know, depending on how good your player's poker face is. I know that video that went, you know, that I ended up, that came from Adventuring Academy with Brendan ended up going way more viral than I expected. And a lot of people were commenting saying, oh, I already do this at my game or we do death saves where only the DM knows. And I think that's all great. Like do your own thing. Like, this is just something that I was excited about with games that I run home rules. And this isn't to say anything about necessarily in sync. This is just my own game is I enjoy crits being max damage plus the roll because it always sucks if you roll like a one on the damage roll and then it's like on the lower half of, of damage. Possibility of damage if it, if it wasn't a crit.
- [43:08]
Dan Casey
No, I dig that crits should feel like this cinematic, like larger than life moment. Yeah, I 100%.
- [43:14]
Johnny Stanton
I think crits should have a higher than normal, like minimum. At minimum it should be higher for sure than normal damage. I don't know. I don't, I don't adhere like to a ton of different home rules. I'm sure that, you know, when I got off this call, I'll think of you don't wake up dreaming of McDonald's fries.
- [43:36]
Unknown
You wake up dreaming of McDonald's hash browns.
- [43:39]
Dan Casey
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- [44:50]
Johnny Stanton
Yeah, I, I do love. Oh I remember what I was going to say earlier. One of the things that we, we know is something that is like wanted and people. There are so many people that are hoping for, for this in in Dungeons and Dragons is a rule for like sea battles and, and like ship to ship combat. That's not something that we are doing in sync this. That's something that we were. We wanted to pick our lane and just really push forward with it. And that's the magic item tattoos. That's the modular dungeons, that's the sunken condition. We, we decided that this isn't something that we're super excited about. This is something that people have already done. You know people ask like you know, or is there going to be C combat? No, but that's already that people do have done that before. People have made whole Kickstarters or mod modules about that. I think it was the people who, who created Pirate Borg. Their, their own 5e expansion has ship battles and stuff. So we, we would push people to them like let's you know, we don't need to do the thing that people have, have, have already done. We want to do what, what we're excited about, what hasn't been done before, which is. I think that there, I'm pretty sure there has not been any D and D supplement module, what have you, that uses American traditional tattoo art as its main art style or only art style. So that's, you know, to answer any possible comments or anything like, is there C Combat there, there? I'll give it like a. Not even a spoiler, but a hint that there is a version of C Combat that we are doing that is going to be a, a very cool NPC that I think is one of the things that we are the most excited about designing and developing is this whole. I don't even want to spoil it because it's, it's super fun. But there is a, a bad actor on the seas, a pirate, you might say, who, who is. Who's not necessarily looking for gold out there or souls for that matter.
- [46:44]
Dan Casey
A secret third resource hits third thing.
- [46:48]
Johnny Stanton
Yeah, that's.
- [46:49]
Dan Casey
I love that. No, it's. I can, I can appreciate that. And I like that you're not trying to be all things to all people. You're trying to do the thing that you folks are particularly passionate about. And that's also, that's what I love about, you know, any sort of home game is that you're able to sort of mix and match the modules, supplements, all the materials that you want to make it tailored to your experience. And that's, I think that's sort of the beauty of tabletop role playing games. It can be what you want. You can play exactly what's written on the page, or you can break it wide open, completely rebuild it and model it after whatever the hell floats your boat to keep it nautically themed. Here I'm curious as well. You know, we've talked a lot about D and D, but are there any other. And you're probably living in that space quite a bit with, with Sync. Are there any other role playing games or tabletop games that you were particularly fond of playing that you wish maybe got a bit more shine in the wider space?
- [47:43]
Johnny Stanton
I'm so disappointed I didn't get to do it this last Halloween. But my favorite thing to do on Halloween, or at least the spooky season, is to run either a game of Dread or a game of ten candles. Yes, Dread is the Jenga, you know, combat. Not combat, but Jenga mechanic game where if the tower falls during your turn, your character is Dead usually. And there's some really, really fun. Like there's nothing that ratchets up the tension more than waiting for the player to pull from that tower when it's on its last legs. It is some of the most fun playing role like role playing that I've ever experienced. And then Ten Candles is such a. It's to. To spoil it for people who haven't played. And it's not really a spoiler, it's a. It's a. What's it called? What is it? Dramatic horror or like, I forget exactly what they call it, but it's. Your character is going to die at the end. It's all about what you're able to do in the story. You're able to tell with your fellow players that that matters in the end. And it's. It's a really cool kind of through line between all games. And I think my favorite thing about it is the character creation side because you get to build your own character, but it's attributes are coming from other players when you start your game because you start the game creating those characters with the other people at your care at your table. So there's not a whole lot you need to come to the table with. It's just like a set of dice. And honestly, you don't even need to come with your own set of dice. The DM comes with the dice and there's a candle and some note cards. Like that's all you need to play. And then Kids on Bikes. I love Kids on Bikes. And I'm actually in the process. We just signed a contract that I'm working with Hunters Entertainment to develop its new supplement, Kids in Cleats. So they've done kids in, they've done kids on bikes, they've been kids on brooms. They are in the process of publishing kids in capes. And the next, the next project that they're going to be doing is Kids in Cleats, which obviously gets this whole youth and high school sports aspect to it all. I'm going to be working with Aabria Iyengar to develop her Rules of Scuppers from the Dimension 20 season in which they're, you know, they're playing like a Quidditch like game. So that's something that I'm super excited to really dive in headfirst on because I don't have enough fingers and enough pies, I guess.
- [50:05]
Dan Casey
Yes.
- [50:06]
Johnny Stanton
That I want to do.
- [50:07]
Dan Casey
I really never expected to love sports anime as much as I did, but I think there's a lot to love there and that a lot that would transfer over to a tabletop setting as well. So I think that's really exciting. Plus I love the team over at Hunters Entertainment, so that's very exciting to hear.
- [50:21]
Johnny Stanton
No, we're, we're really excited about that. We got to announce it at Pax Unplugged. This last year when I was, when I was running a panel called Athletes and Tabletop for Aabria, for Iffy Waterway and for Tank Tolman. We had a. So like a full crowd. It was super cool. And we ended the, the panel by announcing that with Knox Ignatius in the crowd and uh, it was who works with Hunters. So it was just a really cool experience of the panel going great and then getting to make this cool announcement with Aabria on the panel itself.
- [50:51]
Dan Casey
Yeah, best, best possible environment. You know, just like that's the freeze frame shot at the end of Philly.
- [50:56]
Johnny Stanton
The team, the city. The city that won the Super Bowl.
- [50:58]
Dan Casey
Oh man. Yes. Hell yeah. Go Birds. Sorry to any Chiefs fans watching this right now. We're going to wrap things up shortly. But I just want to ask you one final question. You know, we've talked a lot about running games, designing adventures, things like that. What's a piece of advice you would give to someone who's maybe prepping to run their first game or wants to shake things up in their existing game?
- [51:23]
Johnny Stanton
I think one, one thing that I love about all of the modules and the supplements that have come out is that really all of them are module in their modular in their own way. Not just in the adventure storytelling aspect of it all and not just in like the magic items or the, the spells and stuff that they bring to the table. It's. There is so much room in everybody's campaign for a complete left hand left turn and introducing like, you know, I think one thing that was super cool was in the finale or part of the finale of the most recent campaign of NADpod. This isn't spoiling anything but they, they end up bringing in a mechanic for like a big large scale battle that they pulled from an MCDM book, which I think was amazing. And it was. And it, it felt so evocative and the players picked it up immediately and there was no, there was no like second guessing themselves of like, is this the right thing to do? Or at least from, from a listener point of view. And I think it was one of the best things that they could have done was instilling something that is brand new. It's not just like a little mini game from, for like the carnival little session that you're doing, kind of a filler session. This isn't just like, you know, pulling in a spell or, again, a homebrew subclass or something. This is like, okay, I want. I want this to be D and D, but I want. Also want this to be D and D and blackjack. I want this to be D and D and dread maybe like pulling in the. The, you know, the Jenga Tower of it all. I think that there's so much. Like we. Like you mentioned earlier, there's no. There's. There. Everybody plays Dungeons and Dragons differently and there's. I don't think there's any wrong way to play Dungeons and Dragons as long as everybody's having fun. And I think if you're prioritizing storytelling and if that storytelling is best served by bringing in new mechanics that isn't even Dungeons and Dragons, then you're. You're hurting yourself if you're not doing that. So I think let your mind go wild. Allow different mechanics. It doesn't have to be dice. It can be Jenga blocks, It can be Lincoln Logs. I don't care. Like, it can be anything you want if you're able to develop some, some cool mechanics behind it, as long as they're well thought out. It's. It's. You know, I know every, every DM I know overthinks their sessions and stuff, so I can't imagine that bringing in a mechanic to. To your table is not going to be overthought as well. But, yeah, I think go wild. Like, there's, there's nothing cooler as a player than finding out that your DM put in all this work for something that isn't even Dungeons and Dragons and bring it to your D and D table. So that's, that's more of an experience dm, I think, tip than anything else. But that's what I would get. Would give is really branch out. There's so many other games that already have these mechanics behind it and there are some. So many games that are, you know, mahjong is what, like 5,000 years old or something? It's like pull from. Pull from anything, but use inspiration everywhere you find it from. And you don't have, you don't have to have game designer in your title. Like, like, unfortunately I do. I don't always feel like, like I mentioned earlier, I always feel weird when I say that that's my title. But yeah, you don't have to. You don't have to be a game designer to do game design in your own game.
- [54:36]
Dan Casey
I love that. And to sort of bring it back around to something you mentioned earlier is, you know, the Internet has democratized the way that we can access all of these amazing things that so many people have made, both just as a hobby, as a professional pursuit. There's a surfeit of so much amazing content and resources and ideas that you can take and apply to your home game, to something you're trying to produce for a mass audience, that it's a great time to be a player, it's a great time to be a dm. It's a great time to be a designer. So I really, I really appreciate that sort of mix and match approach and just being willing to go paint outside the lines a little bit there and.
- [55:15]
Johnny Stanton
Then listen to your players. Like if it, if it, if it was a swing and a miss, then it was a swing and a miss. You got other strikes that you can work with. You're fine.
- [55:21]
Dan Casey
Exactly, exactly. You know, third strike, they do put you in DM jail. That is how legally it has to work. That is the one rule that applies. Well, fantastic, Johnny, thank you so much for joining us today. Where can people find you online and where can they learn more about sync?
- [55:34]
Johnny Stanton
I'm not active on Twitter anymore. I pulled the plug on that. My account still there if you want to follow it. But I am at, at Johnny Stanton IV J O H N N Y S T A N T O N I v the 4th and I'm on Blue Sky. I'm on Instagram, I'm on TikTok, but not very active on Tik Tok. Not very good at that. But yeah, if you're, if you're interested in any of the stuff that I've been talking about, go check out syncrpg.com and that'll take you to the backer kit where you can pre order your own book, your own, your own copy of Sync Adventures on the call to.
- [56:06]
Dan Casey
Reach se fantastic folks. Go check that out. And if you want more talks with amazing people around the world of gaming or deep dives into stuff that we do here on Geek and Sundry, you can find us each and every day on YouTube.com geekandsundry or wherever fine podcasts are served. Thank you so much and we'll see you next time. Bye bye.
- [56:30]
Johnny Stanton
I'm Amy Nicholson, the film critic for the LA Times.
- [56:33]
Dan Casey
And I'm Paul Scheer, an actor, writer and director. You might know me from the league VP or my non eligible for Academy Award role in Twisters.
- [56:42]
Johnny Stanton
We love movies and we come at them from different perspectives.
- [56:46]
Dan Casey
Yeah, like Amy thinks that, you know, Joe Pesci was miscast in Goodfellas, and I don't. He's too old.
- [56:52]
Johnny Stanton
Let's not forget that Paul thinks that.
- [56:53]
Dan Casey
Dune 2 is overrated.
- [56:55]
Johnny Stanton
It is. Anyway, despite this, we come together to host Unspooled, a podcast where we talk about good movies, critical hits, fan favorites.
- [57:04]
Dan Casey
Must sees, and in case you missed.
- [57:05]
Johnny Stanton
Ems, we're talking the Home Alone from.
- [57:07]
Dan Casey
Grease to the Dark Knight.
- [57:09]
Johnny Stanton
We've done deep dives on popcorn flicks, we've talked about why Independence Day deserves a second look.
- [57:14]
Dan Casey
And we've talked about horror movies, some that you've never even heard of, like Ganja and Hess.
- [57:18]
Johnny Stanton
So if you love movies like we do, come along on our cinematic adventure.
- [57:21]
Dan Casey
Listen to Unspooled wherever you get your podcasts and don't forget to hit the follow button. Hi, this is Rob Benedict and I am Richard Speight.
- [57:38]
Johnny Stanton
We were both on a little show.
- [57:39]
Dan Casey
You might know, called Supernatural. It had a pretty good run, 15 seasons, 327 episodes. And though we have seen, of course, every episode many times, we figured, hey, now that we're wrapped, let's watch it all again. And we can't do that alone. So we're inviting the cast and crew that made the show along for the ride. We've got writers, producers, composers, directors, and we'll of course have some actors on as well, including some certain guys that played some certain pretty iconic brothers.
- [58:10]
Johnny Stanton
It was kind of a little bit of a left field choice in the best way possible. The note from Kripke was, he's great, we love him, but we're looking for like a really intelligent Duchovny type.
- [58:20]
Dan Casey
With 15 seasons to explore. It's going to be the road trip of several lifetimes. So please join us and subscribe to Supernatural then and now. Nothing is as it seems in liminal London. Hidden amongst everyday people are werewolves. You'll be the werewolf then. Yeah, Mags. Wizards.
- [58:45]
Johnny Stanton
Montgomery Archibald Barker at your bloody service.
- [58:50]
Dan Casey
And those cursed by the fey monarchs of the city. Declan Buchanan PI he has quite a large pair of antlers growing out of his forehead. Join the unlikely misfits of liminal London as they work to take down the powers that claim to rule the city.
- [59:08]
Johnny Stanton
I think the queen doesn't like you very much.
- [59:11]
Dan Casey
With incredible guest players like Johnny Chiadini. Say, there's sludge.
- [59:16]
Johnny Stanton
Yeah, Sludge. Yeah. I'm the sludge boy. F ing love Sludge boy. No, again, I'm not that sludge boy.
- [59:20]
Dan Casey
Grant, how it Isaac Newton didn't study in f ing Putney, did he? Who's Isaac?
- [59:25]
Johnny Stanton
Oh, my God.
- [59:26]
Dan Casey
And Sharmini Bundell. There's a magic community.
- [59:30]
Johnny Stanton
There is. Yay. I'm in a magic community.
- [59:33]
Dan Casey
Go to realmspod.com or search realms of peril and glory wherever you listen to podcasts to find this mysteriously magical actual play series.