UK GAMES EXPO 2022 – GROGPOD extra

Summary

The GROGNARD Files Podcast

Episode: UK GAMES EXPO 2022 – GROGPOD extra
Release Date: June 14, 2022
Host: Dirk the Dice
Guest/Co-host: Blithe

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Episode Overview

In this special episode, Dirk the Dice and Blithe share their experiences returning to the UK Games Expo 2022 after two years away due to COVID. The episode is a warm, rambly conversation exploring the games they played and ran, the quirky moments, the atmosphere of the convention, and the enduring appeal of tabletop RPGs—both old-school and new. The tone is jovial and nostalgic, full of dry British humor and affectionate banter.

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UK Games Expo: Setting the Scene

Timestamps: [00:16]-[04:34]

• Dirk introduces the return to UK Games Expo after the COVID hiatus, describing it as "a gaming bubble, surrounded by friends and strangers who became friends" [00:16].
• The Expo is described as the UK's biggest gaming convention and currently the third largest in the world, featuring 37,000 visitors this year [02:14].
• Blithe notes the event’s "worlds within worlds"—with different game groups, LARPs, historical reenactors (Vikings and Romans), and varied sub-communities all mingling: "There’s an odd. Worlds within worlds, isn’t it?" [03:01].
• Anecdotes include a crowd of Vikings (in costume) passing through security and causing confusion [03:57].

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The Expo’s Opening Game: “Find Dirk’s Belt”

Timestamps: [04:34]-[09:51]

• The episode’s first notable tangent: Dirk arriving in Birmingham beltless, having to "clutch [his] trousers" while traversing Manchester Piccadilly [06:33].
• A lengthy, comedic detour about missing the Platinum Jubilee ("Platty Jeebs") celebrations entirely while ensconced in gaming at the expo—a metaphor for how immersive and separate conventions feel [07:29].
• Notable quip:
  • Dirk: “God Save the Queen sandwich, which is deep fried goujons in a bun to celebrate the auspicious occasion of our Head of State being in place. It was, you know, essentially a fish finger sandwich.” [07:53]
• They riff on royal memorabilia, paper plates with people's faces, and baffling 1950s-style outfits for royal children—"like kids who've traveled in time" [09:31].

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Friday: First Game – RuneQuest at the Expo

Timestamps: [09:51]-[17:38]

• Dirk and Blithe play RuneQuest together—rare for both to be players and not GMs at a con.
• Observations about the difference between UKGE and curated conventions (like Grog Meat): unknown group chemistry, introductions, and table dynamics [10:40].
• This game avoided combat; instead, players transported a saga/performance from one clan to another, negotiating differences in knowledge about the setting, RuneQuest rules, and Glorantha’s lore [12:28].
• Insight about convention play: “There is that spotlight moment where they go, ‘Right, what are you going to do?’... Even if it’s ‘I’m just going to hit him with my sword,’ you get to roll a dice and you get to do something, don’t you?” – Blithe [13:35]
• The scenario is a classic "McGuffin hunt," but the McGuffin is a story/saga, not an object, leading to debates about making things up vs. honoring tradition and truth—showcasing both the freedom and the constraints of Glorantha as a setting [17:16].
• Memorable moment: Blithe’s trickster character uses magic to make a long-suffering NPC laugh uncontrollably at his own exile, adding levity and mischief to the session [16:13].

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Saturday Morning: Dungeon Crawl Classics & Traveller

Dungeon Crawl Classics (DCC) – Blithe
Timestamps: [17:57]-[22:05]

• First time playing DCC, not a funnel, but 3rd level—and a surprisingly large table with eight players due to a ticketing snafu.
• Blithe enjoys the chaos and gonzo tone, especially the DCC spellcasting table’s wacky results.
  • Blithe: "I rolled a 19... my scorching rare spell resulted in magma appearing from the Earth's core... I ended up doing 128 points damage to the boss monster and killed it. That was very satisfying." [19:52]
• “At the very end... the Elven wizard, her ears shriveled up, got backfire and her ears fell off.” [21:10]
• Conclusion: Inspired to run DCC in the future—"It's a lot of fun...I enjoyed it. I think I need to run some at some point." [22:05]

Traveller – Dirk
Timestamps: [22:05]-[26:46]

• Dirk leans into Traveller at conventions for its toolkit nature—every GM spins the Imperium their own way.
• The GM was TV’s “ghost hunting superstar CJ Roma,” running a detailed, atmospheric extraction mission featuring zombie-adjacent nanobot AIs [23:40].
• Notable quote:
  • “...the AI had taken over the planet...with active nano robots...to do a resurrection program...I thought that was a really good idea." – Dirk [25:03]
• Memorable NPC: A young player as a trigger-happy Vargr, delightfully in-character—“If you’ve got an 11-year-old player and you’re playing Traveller, then giving them the Vargr is the absolutely right thing to do.” – Blithe [26:16]

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Saturday Afternoon: Old-School Essentials & Conan 2d20

Old-School Essentials (OSE) – Blithe
Timestamps: [29:05]-[32:38]

• Blithe plays the classic "Around the Bend" scenario, shrunk down to traverse a wizard's drain, fighting oversized insects.
• Notable focus: Inter-generational play—a younger woman joining a table of old friends, feeling a bit "intimidated," but ultimately included and surprised by the deadliness of old-school play when a character is killed on a single roll [30:42].
• “In Neil's game... someone was killed, a character was killed...She said she played fifth edition and in fifth edition it was notoriously hard to die, isn't it? But in Neil's game, Julian was eaten by [a] troll and it was just on one roll. That's it. You're dead. You're dead. Look at her face. She's like what's halfway through the game? And he's dead.” [32:26]

Conan 2d20 – Dirk
Timestamps: [33:01]-[37:14]

• Dirk plays Conan 2d20 in person to prepare for running it the next day. The table is full of Robert E. Howard fans, including a “terrifying” Stygian sorcerer.
• Their GM pauses to comment on sensitivity and the racial tropes of Howard’s stories, helping anchor the game in its literary roots, and creating an inclusive but atmospheric vibe [34:41].
• They note how the 2d20 system shines at the table, much more tactile and less clunky than online play: “It just feels a bit more exciting [with] the exchange of momentum points, doom points, and the fortune points” [35:48].

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Reflections on the Con Lottery

Timestamps: [37:14]-[40:37]

• Both express satisfaction with this year’s games, which bucked the usual "50/50 lottery" of convention signups.
• Blithe: “This year is probably my best year.” [38:48]
• They discuss how tolerance and expectation management help—Dirk suggests Blithe is “more tolerant,” which Blithe denies, laughing, but admits “you learn, I suppose, don’t you?” [39:01].
• War stories about less successful games—particularly being the odd one out in a group of heavy-drinking friends [39:32].

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Sunday Morning: Running Convention Games

Timestamps: [40:37]-[47:25]

Logistics & Preparation

• They muse about the classic mistake of scheduling games for 9 AM and the Premier Inn’s "reluctant" poached egg service [40:50].
• Both ran games, opting for simplicity and reliable fun over complexity.

Into the Odd (Blithe runs)

• Advocates choosing “simple systems” for conventions, so the session can focus on the scenario and player creativity instead of rules management [43:09].
• Decided NOT to use pregenerated characters (pregens), letting players make characters at the table—a breeze for this minimalist system.
• Delightful moment: A player rolls a mutation—“a hive of bees inside him,” which he uses for espionage. “That was just great...unexpected” [46:00].

Conan 2d20 w/ Kull Supplement (Dirk runs)

• Dirk’s prep: Cut and paste a scenario hook from the Kull supplement submitted by listener Helena Nash, who then asked to watch his table. Stress!
• His adventure: “The palace has been hit by some kind of secret slumber that’s causing everybody to go to sleep… Kull has sealed the palace…they have to find these items because they learn that...sleep is an entity…a wizard has captured sleep” [49:23].
• Notable moment: Helena Nash, the author of the scenario hook, sits on the fringe “judging” Dirk as he riffs off her idea. Her feedback: Dirk’s scenario was like “doing a summary of a film that doesn’t exist in the Radio Times” [53:01].

Insight on 2d20 and Simpler Systems

• Both reflect on how "difficult-looking" modern systems often become straightforward with a little practice, echoing the journey they went through with Savage Worlds [51:50].

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The Sordid Business of Buying Stuff

Timestamps: [53:45]-[60:33]

• The trade hall is both exhilarating and overwhelming—Dirk arrives intending to buy the new Masks of Nyarlathotep box set, prodded by a spontaneous chat with Mike Mason from Chaosium.
  • “I knew I could see it...unfolding in slow motion in front of me. I thought, he's gonna buy it, isn't he?” – Blithe [55:27]
• Blithe is the “reluctant shopper,” more likely to buy some dice after two hours of wandering. He notes that the internet has dulled the wow factor of trade halls—now seeking the element of surprise in something he didn’t know existed [57:34].
• Both regret missing out on "Orbital Blues," which sold out before Dirk acted on impulse [58:07].
• Dirk’s main purchases: Cults of Cthulhu (with some confusion about proving his identity as “Dirk the Dice”), and the long-awaited new edition of Masks [59:08 & 59:56].

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Social Side and Closing Thoughts

Timestamps: [61:03]-[64:06]

• Both agree the real highlight is the social dimension—reconnecting after two years, catching up on gaming and non-gaming life, and just enjoying the vibe.
• Post-lockdown, simply being there was a joy: “Sometimes with these things there’s a sense of I’m happy to be here. I’m just happy to be. Yes.” [62:03]
• Both found a more spontaneous, laid-back approach made for a more enjoyable convention.
  • “You could say I was a belts and braces man before and now I don’t even have a belt.” – Dirk [64:03]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Dirk: “I was clutching my trousers because it felt like, you know, any moment...they may go.” [06:33]
• Blithe: “It did that sort of inclusiveness...goes to show how gaming kind of brings people together.” [32:41]
• Dirk: “Sometimes the case, isn’t it, with systems that initially you can be a little bit uncertain about them...But then possibly more straightforward than they appear to be at first glance, aren’t they?” [51:50]
• Blithe: “Because in Neil’s game...someone was killed...and it was just on one roll. That’s it. You’re dead. You’re dead. Look at her face. She’s like what’s halfway through the game? And he’s dead.” [32:26]
• Dirk (on trade halls): “You know my algorithm. You know my algorithm, how it works. So you can predict it.” [55:27]
• Blithe (on buying habits): “We have this joke, don’t we, that I...I'll go around the Trade hall for two hours and then buy some dice, which it is what happened.” [56:34]

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Summary Table of Key Segments (Approximate)

| Segment | Start Time | End Time | Content | |---------------------------------|------------|------------|--------------------------------------------------------------| | Arrival & Expo Atmosphere | 00:16 | 04:34 | Expo description, return after COVID, pockets of wonder | | Belt Antics & Platty Jeebs | 04:34 | 09:51 | Dirk’s belt saga, missing the Jubilee, lighthearted banter | | Friday: RuneQuest | 09:51 | 17:38 | Game dynamics, scenario structure, Glorantha lore, trickster | | Saturday AM: DCC & Traveller | 17:57 | 26:46 | DCC chaos, Traveller’s open narrative, standout moments | | Saturday PM: OSE & Conan 2d20 | 29:05 | 37:14 | Old-school play, generational mix, Conan system reflection | | Con Lottery Reflections | 37:14 | 40:37 | Mixed experiences, learning tolerance | | Sunday: Running Games | 40:37 | 47:25 | Into the Odd prep, simple systems, boxed Kull Conan game | | Shopping/Trade Hall Tales | 53:45 | 60:33 | Buying habits, Dirk’s impulsiveness, trade hall psychology | | Socials/Wrap-up | 61:03 | 64:06 | Reconnecting post-lockdown, laid-back con attitude |

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Final Thoughts

The episode offers a conversational, reflective deep dive into con culture, GMing and playing at big events, and the enduring pleasures (and foibles) of the British RPG scene—complete with in-jokes, accidental Wetherspoons visits, lost belts, and much talk of dice. With a perfect blend of irreverence and genuine RPG insight, Dirk and Blithe perfectly capture the spirit and camaraderie of UK Games Expo.

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For further engagement: The GROGNARD Files continues to run online book clubs and scenario playthroughs, and Dirk appears on other RPG podcasts, including Frankenstein's RPG and The Smart Party. Reach out via social media to join their (always humorous) gaming community.

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Transcript

[Dirk the Dice]

Have you seen me, Dice Bag?

[Blithe]

The Grognard Files?

[Dirk the Dice]

Hello, my name is Dirt the Dice, the host of the Grognard Files podcast where we talk bobbins about tabletop RPGs from back in the day. And today we take a break in our normal schedule and format to give you something a little extra if you want it. After the SARS CoV2 hiatus, we returned to UK Games Expo 2022. It was 10 days ago, but now seems like a lifetime. It was good to be back, taking a break from the daily grind and immersing ourselves in a gaming bubble, surrounded by friends and strangers who became friends. It's such a happy place to be. I was milling around and bumped into listener Robert Compton and his partner. They were about to spend a day in a LARP at the End of the World dressed up as a hen party. They had feather boas and everything. It's that kind of event. Little pockets of wonder taking place in the nooks and crannies all over the NEC in Birmingham. What follows is a fairly detailed discussion of the games we played and the stuff we bought to give you a flavour of our experience of the weekend. I hope it's not too indulgent. I'll be back at the end with some parish notices. Until then, ramblers, let's get rambling. Hello, Blythe. Welcome to the Zoom of role playing.

[Blithe]

RUMBLING hello, Dirk.

[Dirk the Dice]

This time last week we were there, weren't we?

[Blithe]

Uk, yeah.

[Dirk the Dice]

What were we doing this time last week? Were we standing up, trying to eat a burrito without getting it on our toes? So that's what we're going to do in this 40 minutes or so, we're just going to look back over UK Games Expo, our experiences, what we played and the stuff we bought. UK Games Expo, for people who don't know what it is, it's the biggest convention that's held in Birmingham every year. It's the biggest in the UK, third biggest in the world, I think, after Gencon and Essen. 37,000 individual visitors this time. It did run last year, but it was reduced numbers, so we haven't been for two years. It's regular in our calendar since we come back into role playing, isn't it? We enjoy going there every. Every year.

[Blithe]

Yeah, it's good. And it's always odd when you say it's the second, the third biggest in the world because we only see a little bit of it, don't we? We only see our bit because we go for the role playing games which are in the Hilton Hotel and the trade hall. Wander around the trade hall, which we might talk about later. But there is that element of other stuff going on, isn't the big. Big card game tournaments and all sorts of things like that, but don't involve ourselves in that. So there's an odd. Worlds within worlds, isn't it?

[Dirk the Dice]

Export and there's like other pockets of things going on, isn't it? Because there's the Viking people who live in tents on the outside of it, oblivious to everything else that's going on. They just seem to be enjoying themselves. Playing nine man's Morris.

[Blithe]

Yeah. Viking encampment. Yeah. Just have. Doing their own thing as Vikings. There were some Romans as well. I spotted some Romans. I don't know whether they were in the Viking camp. I don't know what's going on there. Historically inaccurate, I would suggest.

[Dirk the Dice]

But there was a point during the weekend where they came towards us enraged, didn't they? They were in en masse, sending off the security thing beeping and hollowing away, leaving the security personnel unsure what to do. They were just. Yeah, they were doubled up laughing as these Vikings hit the hole, armed to the teeth with swords and everything. What could they do? What could they do? Can we see your bag?

[Blithe]

Well, that's that exactly. What can you do? Are you carrying any weapons? Yes. Then a shield. And I've got chair mail on. Yeah.

[Dirk the Dice]

So with this one, we decided that we would play more games, didn't we?

[Blithe]

I have a very strict policy on conventions where I always run one game and then play the rest of it. Whereas you, you've ended up running three on the bounds, haven't you, and things like that in the past, I think you enjoyed, but I think you might have lived to regret it. Yeah.

[Dirk the Dice]

This time though, it was you who signed up to play again first, wasn't it?

[Blithe]

You.

[Dirk the Dice]

You put yours in first. And I was unsure whether I was gonna actually submit again to run. But it was only because you did it. I did it, so don't blame me. Yeah, I enjoyed. Well, we'll have a chat about that and what we did to prepare for it, but let's just have a look at the games that we played. So we played together first, didn't we?

[Blithe]

I mean, although before we, before we do that, before we do that, can we talk about the. The opening game of Expo, which was Find Dirk's Belt? What there was a game of Find Dirk about, wasn't there? Let's. Let's not gloss over this experience that we had that I was. You've Been on holiday the week before. I think this is your excuse. But I didn't even know you can do this, really. And you. I was there on the train, wasn't I? Got there nice and early. I'm sat on the train at Manchester and there was another 20 minutes or so before it set off and I get a message to say, I'm on my way, but my speed, my speed may be impeded by the fact I am not wearing a belt. I have lost my belt and have to hold my trousers up as I'm moving across Manchester Piccadilly. And I thought, you lose a belt. My belt's always on. Some trousers, it's always on some jeans, it's always on something, isn't it? But you'd lost your belt and you got on the train looking slightly put out by the fact that your trousers may fall down any minute. You know, any one false move did.

[Dirk the Dice]

Feel like that because I. I had a trolley bag and I was also carrying hand luggage and I was, as you said, clutching my trousers because it felt like, you know, any moment as I was waddling across Manchester Piccadilly, that they may go. But fortunately, when we arrived in Birmingham, we managed to queue up at next for a bit too long, I thought, to get a belt.

[Blithe]

It was a surprisingly long queue, wasn't it? And, yeah, we had to go to first stop was next to buy a belt. Stood there in next thinking, I didn't think I'd be here. We were to Expo.

[Dirk the Dice]

I was that long in the queue. I was contemplating buying a T shirt with a corgi on because it was the Platty Jeebs weekend, wasn't it, where everybody had to have open displays of affection for royal family. So it coincided with that.

[Blithe]

That was one of the nicest, nicest things about Expo, wasn't it, that? The. The Platydubes, as you call it. We completely missed it. We completely missed it. It was like it was not happening when we were in Expo. It was like that was not happening when I got home on this. There was all stuff on the news about all this stuff that had been going on, street parties and concert. I thought I'd known about any of this. Brilliant. Absolutely brilliant.

[Dirk the Dice]

I did have a cod Save the Queen sandwich, which is deep fried goujons in a bun to celebrate the auspicious occasion of our Head of State being in place.

[Blithe]

It was, you know, essentially a fish finger sandwich.

[Dirk the Dice]

God save the Queen. God save the Queen.

[Blithe]

Yeah, yeah. God save the Queen.

[Dirk the Dice]

Yeah, we missed it. Although we did very well We.

[Blithe]

Yeah, we did, yeah.

[Dirk the Dice]

We've missed. I always think, when it's those occasions, so that Kate is sitting there looking upon all those. The throng of people wearing ninja plastic bowler hats and bunting. It's paid, ain't it, for her mum and dad. Because that's. They're in the line of selling party tat.

[Blithe]

That's. Yeah, they do. Don't they sell. Yeah, yeah. His. His mum. His mum wears a silly hat crown and. And her mum sells silly hat. It's a marriage made in heaven, isn't it, really? But you're right, yeah. There's a. There's a symbiotic relationship there, isn't it, that. Yeah. Every time there's a royal wedding and we start a royal wedding, isn't it? When she married Prince William, her family would have made a fortune off the little party poppers and the Union Jack flags. Yeah, absolutely. It's brilliant, isn't it? Fantastic.

[Dirk the Dice]

And paper plates with the daughter's face on it.

[Blithe]

Yeah, that's weird. Paper plates with a daughter's face on it. But they're in the business of selling those plates.

[Dirk the Dice]

The kids stole the show, though, didn't they? Those little kids, they stole the show.

[Blithe]

All dressed like little, little people from the 1950s, all in little suits and strange. Strange shorts. Weird. Like kids who've traveled in time. Don't they, like, come from the 1950s? Whose kid dresses like that now? Which kid do you see that age dressed like their dress? No. Nobody? No.

[Dirk the Dice]

Anyway, let's not get diverted by the Midwich cuckoos. Let's get back to gaming. The first game we played when we arrived and we, we. We cut it a bit fine. We always do this, don't we? We forget the distance between the train station and the Hilton. So we have to dash, head down, can't stop and chat. We need to get to this place and we got to Runequest and I think it's the first time I played Runequest at a convention without me running it. I. I've run Runquest a couple of times, but that's frustrating.

[Blithe]

I think it. I think it is. I think it is for me as well, actually thinking about it. Yeah, I don't think I've played at a convention.

[Dirk the Dice]

I always. I always find. I always forget with UK Games Expo, that's slightly different from the curated ones that we normally go to, you know, like Grog meat or Owlbear. You turn up and you realize that you don't know anybody. So you got that initial thing around the table where Everybody has to establish what level of interest and involvement everybody has in that particular game and in role playing in general.

[Blithe]

You're right. And that was the intro. I think that was something we talked about after that game. We both said, oh, that was a, that was a reminder of how this kind of convention works. Because as you say with Grog Meat and Elbear and some of the others, you know, often they set up through Warhorns. You know your players are. And even if you don't know some of the players, you know that you don't know them in advance, if that makes sense. So at least you know you don't know. And you might know some of them. And also they know you. And also with Warhol, there's potential to message them, isn't there, and tell them things before you get there, which is really good. Whereas at Expo, yeah, it's more your old school, sit down at a table, wander to the table and go, oh, is this room quest? And they go, yeah, there you go. And you me your ticket, don't you. And you sit down and you think, all right, okay, don't know these people I know might know a few of them, but, but not all of them. Certainly it says the game starts, people are sort of, you can see a maneuvering to establish what they know about the game, what they don't know about the game, what they know about the setting, what they know about the rules. So called experts, don't you? And then you get people who know nothing. Yeah, it's an odd, it was an odd reminder that, I mean, we knew that before we got there. Reinforced it with us, I think, didn't it? But, oh, I know you, you know me, I know anybody else.

[Dirk the Dice]

It's fair to say that it was a scenario that we ultimately avoided any conflict. So we didn't really engage in any physical combat. There was a couple of occasions where we had to talk our way out of situations. But it wasn't that kind of game, was it? It wasn't that kind of scenario. Kind of scenario that was set up where we had to mem a performance and take it from one place to another. So that, that was the, that was the setup. So it was good. It's really a good, good idea. But it did depend on. You didn't have the normal term based approach so that everybody could have input and because everybody was in different places with it and there were people who were experts on the setting. And it struck me again how important that setting is to that game working. And the other thing is that there's somebody on the table who didn't know anything about the setting, was incredibly curious.

[Blithe]

About it and, and also it made me realize how I am a mid ranking Glorantha fan. That was an odd experience where there's one guy who clearly was an expert on Glantha and liked to express his expertise quite a bit round the table, shall we say, put it politely. And then there was someone who knew nothing. And I realized I'm somewhere in the middle here. I know quite a bit about Glorantha, but I don't know as much as this guy. I don't know some of the real detail on things and the cultural detail. I'm somewhere in the middle. But I agree with you because the other games are played on Saturday were very much more traditional, turn based, fighty, dungeon bash kind of games. You're right, that sense of turns does involve everybody. You know, once you get into a fight combat and people go, right, it's your turn, what are you doing? Even if you feel a bit shy or a bit squeezed out of a game or you don't quite know what to do, there is that spotlight moment where they go, right, what are you going to do? Even if it's, I'm going to just hit him with my sword. You get to roll a dice and you get to do something, don't you? Whereas as you said, a more kind of discursive game is tricky, trickier to play. Tricky to run as well, I would think.

[Dirk the Dice]

Yeah, difficult to run with six players as well because that's the other thing that struck me just on that first game that I become so used to the rhythms of online play, of just playing for two hours. So four hours seemed like a long time to play. And also playing with six around the table, there's a lot of overhead, isn't there, to that experience?

[Blithe]

Just one, you know, five players is probably a lot more manageable than six. Four players is probably a great deal more manageable than five. But one, one extra player is enough to make it a little bit trickier a lot. One extra player or it's only one extra, it can make it a lot trickier.

[Dirk the Dice]

And talk about trickier. You made straight for the trickster.

[Blithe]

They go through the pre gens and you immediately go, I want to play that one, I want to play that one. But other people are kind of looking at them and you're thinking, I want to play that one. Don't take that one, I want to play that one. What would you like? What would you like to play the pre gens. What would you like to play? And you immediately. I'll play that one. Grab it.

[Dirk the Dice]

There was a great moment, wasn't there, where this guy endured decades of pain and anguish at the hands of our tribe. So we turned up and you decided that he was. You'd cast a spell to make him laugh uncontrollably.

[Blithe]

And part of that spell was to poke fun at him. Make him laugh. Even though I was poking fun at his 30 years of tormented exile, he couldn't stop laughing about it, even though afterwards he was quite cross at me for doing that. That was quite, quite good fun. It was a good. It was a good scenario because in some ways you could say it was a traditional kind of McGuffin Hunt, wasn't it? It was traditional. Go. Go out from the clan and find X and bring it back. We need to. Need to find this and bring it back to secure. Help secure this marriage between two. Two rival clans. But I thought was interesting about it because it was a story. It was an unusual McGuffin, wasn't it? Because it wasn't a thing. It was a story. You had to find, of course, the temptation. It was a saga. And also because the temptation is immediately players start to think, just make this up. What are the risks of us if we don't achieve what we have to achieve? We could make it up, couldn't we? Unlike some McGuffin Hunt did put you in the position of. It doesn't. Maybe it doesn't have to be that accurate, this story. You know, we weren't bold enough to just think to say we've got it and make it up. Because that might have fallen foul of us, but.

[Dirk the Dice]

And we all have different attitudes to it. So although that idea of making something up was muted because of my character being a agent of truth one Carmine.

[Blithe]

Yeah.

[Dirk the Dice]

I resisted that also, I was offending the rest of the tribe because I was keen to write down this saga. And of course, that was against the traditions of.

[Blithe]

Yeah, the oral traditions. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, it was good.

[Dirk the Dice]

It was a pity we didn't meet those trolls on the way and bash them over the head. But apart from that, it was a.

[Blithe]

Fight with the trolls would have been good. Yeah.

[Dirk the Dice]

So on the Saturday, what did you play Saturday morning?

[Blithe]

Saturday morning, I played for the first time Dungeon Crawl classics to see. As I think I said in a previous podcast, I've got the rules. I've never played it before. Got the rules. I've read the rules and I've thought, I like this I like the sound of this. But of course, as we always say, play is the thing. I have to say, it didn't disappoint. I think part of their sales pitch is to say this is gonna be traditional gonzo style Dungeon Bash.

[Dirk the Dice]

Was it a funnel type thing? Did you have multiple.

[Blithe]

No, it wasn't a funnel one. It. We were third. We were third level and of course it was a bit. I tell you what's peculiar about it. When I got there, there was six players. When I got there, I had a ticket and a ticket done it properly. I sat down, I got there and there were six players there already. And they looked at me like I was mad. I said, oh, I'm on this. And then another guy turned up. So we ended up with eight players and everyone had tickets. I heard about a few. A few instances of that where a few games, even though it's all computerized and you buy tickets, there was a few games that were over subscribed. So I nearly didn't get a game because fortunately the guy running it had eight pregens and I did hear of a few, few people saying that, that they'd been oversubscribed and people had turned up and they'd have to turn away because they had five pre gens and five players. And then the sixth or seventh one had turned up and they'd been sent away. So it was. It was a close run thing. And Eli didn't get Dungeon Crawl Classics.

[Dirk the Dice]

Eight players. Eight players. We're just saying that six players felt like a lot. Eight players. Could the game cope with.

[Blithe]

Did cope with it, yeah. But there was. There was a bit of. You had to wind the pace down. I think, I think at first it might. The first half hour start is a bit frustrating, but eventually I think we all got into the pace of it and thought, well, okay, the guy's got to manage eight players here, so let's just. Let's just take it easy, you know.

[Dirk the Dice]

Drop it down a gear.

[Blithe]

Drop it down a gear. Yeah, yeah. But it's a lot of fun. It is a lot of fun. And I played the Wizard. I managed to get the Wizard. One guy, one of the players went for Cleric over. He went for Cleric. He had like first dips. He went for Cleric. What. What if I'd taken it to one side afterwards and I went a word with him? Anyway, there you go. But yeah, I got, I got the wizard and it was a lot of fun. At the very end I managed to, as one of the players said, you've won the game for us here where we the big boss monster. I cast a spell. And in Dungeon Crawl classics, as a wizard or a cleric, you roll a D20 and add your skill bonuses and you look on a table, don't you? It's full of tables for all the spells. But you can burn strength. As a wizard, you can burn strength. You get it back eventually. But. So I burnt 10 points of strength. I had strength 15. Quite a chunky wizard. I burnt 10 points of strength. I got a plus 4 bonus for my level and I rolled the D20 and I rolled a 19. So in the end, my scorching rare spell resulted in magma appearing from the Earth's core. All the other players suffered a D12 damage from the fire, which I don't think they appreciated. And I ended up doing 128 points damage to the boss monster and killed it. And that was very satisfying. I thought this is a great. He's won me over this game now because there's a wizard. It's a lot of fun. A bit chaotic because you kept Spells can backfire. The. The Elven wizard, her ears shriveled up, got backfire and her ears fell off. Which is probably a thing of great shame for an elf, isn't it? But it was a lot. It was a lot of fun. Even say is veganzo. You have to take it in the right spirit. But I do. I think those elements of it in play make it a very interesting kind of enjoyable experience for players because you can do things. You're not just at the mercy of a role. The D20. You can argument things and give yourself a better chance and all those sort of things. It's a lot of fun, you know, a lot of fun. I enjoyed it. I think I need to. I need to run some at some point. Yeah.

[Dirk the Dice]

Yeah. Excellent. I played a Traveler. I always seem to go for travel in conventions. What I like about it is that even though the travel universe is well stored, isn't it Every. Everybody is aware of it. I always find that each individual GM and players have their own interpretation on how to deliver it. So I played it a couple of times this year, Traveler. But the way that the GM has pitched it. So the way that you pitch it and the world of the Imperium is completely different than, for example played with Ralph Playman earlier this year. And his version of the Imperium was very different. It is. The tone of it was different. I think comes back to what we were saying in our earlier episodes about Traveler is that the. The tone isn't implicit, is it? It's very. It's because it's such a toolkit approach. Even with the additional developments and the different information that you're given about the Imperium, everybody has their own take on it.

[Blithe]

Yeah, I agree. Yeah, I agree. I think that's. That's very true. Yeah, that's in some ways that you could argue that's one of the frustrations of Traveller. But it's also once you get your head around that, it's one of the benefits of it, isn't it? Once you get head around the fact that it's a little bit more open in terms of how you want to put your own spin on it. That's kind of. That's kind of a good thing.

[Dirk the Dice]

Just going back to what we were saying earlier. We didn't. I didn't know who I was playing with. It was actually television's ghost hunting superstar CJ Roma, who was the referee run the game. Very relaxed style, lot of detail. Really felt like the world existed. So we were doing a simple extraction of a crashed starship that was on a hostile planet and we had to recover this archaeological dig crew that had crashed there and we just had to recover them. And it was good set of pre generated characters. It was one of those situations where I was the only player who didn't know. It was like a group of friends who booked it and I was the plus one if you like. But I was the. He distributed the pre gens pretty well because I was the veteran brigadier who, you know, was just seeing this as a military mission whereas the others had a bit more skin in the game. And so we're working together more. I spent it in the stateroom.

[Blithe]

No ghost hunting involved in it. It was. There was no ghost.

[Dirk the Dice]

No, no, no ghost hunting.

[Blithe]

Even though it was a ghostbuster.

[Dirk the Dice]

I. I've recently appeared on what were the smart party. Do you talk about zombies? But there was a good zombie concept in this where the AI had taken up the. The. The residual AI had taken over the planet. Most of the planet had died. However, there were these active nano robots that once released was going to do a resurrection program to. And get the population that had been killed in warfare to reanimate and start rebuilding the planet on behalf of the AI. I thought that was a really good idea. Good idea. That was just like a. A side issue to the. To the thing and, and because it was a good use of the places. A young lad of 11 who played the Varga, the impetuous Varga who's quite trigger happy. Ended up shooting our target who was supposed to be extracting. And it was great because it just fitted in perfectly with what we're doing.

[Blithe]

I think if you've. I think, I think if you've got an 11 year old player and you're playing Traveler, then giving them the Varga is the absolutely the right thing to do, isn't it? Yeah. Bad dog. He played, he played, he played it really well.

[Dirk the Dice]

You know, when we went down in the raft, he was sticking his head out of the window, that kind of thing.

[Blithe]

Stick his head out the window and drooling. Get his head in.

[Dirk the Dice]

It's a really, really enjoyable game. Really enjoyed it. And was this the point where we ended up in Wetherspoons by accident?

[Blithe]

I think that. No, that was late. That was Saturday. Late Saturday afternoon after our second game on the Saturday. Yeah. We ended up another Wetherspoons accident. Didn't we edit that out? Don't. Don't admit to that. That's terrible. Wasn't it? Well, I think what we did, we. It was. We're jumping ahead now, but on the Saturday, I think after our second game we decided because we're old men, we wanted to sit down, didn't we? I think as well it started to rain a bit and the food, the food bit outside. Whilst you could take your food into the hotel, you had to queue up, you had to cope in the rain. I think we looked at it and thought, oh, I have to keep up in the rain, it's gonna get really wet. So we decided and got really wet. Walk into the nec. This is a bit cheaper, really. By the time we'd. Yeah, you think about it, that was a bit of a daft move. But when we got there, the only place serving food was the. Was the. It was a pub, wasn't it? Was a kebab, wasn't it? Yeah. Appeared to us to be a bar. And we got inside, looked up at.

[Dirk the Dice]

The signage and it was spoons. Wearing the spoons.

[Blithe]

Oh, no. You know, it's good, it's good sometimes to go back to these places just to confirm your suspicions because it was dreadful. So, you know, you know, at least you can speak with some authority again, can't. You know, I'm not being in a Wetherspoon for years and years and years. Why not? Because they're dreadful. People might go, oh, they're all right now. Oh no, they're good, they're okay now. No, they're not. We've been in one. It probably be a Good thing every three or four years to go into one. Just to reaffirm the fact that. Yes, yeah, yeah. This is a dreadful chicken burger. That they've run out of decent beer. Fantastic. Yeah. One for another four years.

[Dirk the Dice]

It wasn't just the spoons that run out of decent beer. Also the hotel did, didn't it?

[Blithe]

No. Pale.

[Dirk the Dice]

Hell no.

[Blithe]

That's like. That's not the first time. That's not the first time. It always runs out of.

[Dirk the Dice]

Yeah.

[Blithe]

Decent. It always got lots of lager left but. But no, none of the real beer.

[Dirk the Dice]

I was drinking Stella Artois last time I drank Stellar Artois Travis were in the charts. I jumped ahead a bit then. What was your game in Saturday Afternoon?

[Blithe]

Saturday afternoon I played in the old Benson's old school Essentials around the Bend. The, the Imagine tournament scenario that you run before. I've never played it. I do remember reading it but I read this scenario, I mean you know, 30 odd years ago could really remember it. So that was fine. Where the one where you shrunk you, you, you half arc thieves and you get captured by a wizard and he shrinks you and in order to gain your freedom he sends you down his plug hole to find.

[Dirk the Dice]

Yeah, he's dropped his contact lens down.

[Blithe]

It something like he's a magical lens. He's dropped it down. So you have to go down the direct. Round the bend. It's the drain. You go down the drain. And of course you know the spiders and the beetles and the worms and the slugs are all monstrous sizes so you have to deal with all that and it was, it was a lot of fun. Again going back to what I was saying about the RuneQuest game. It was old school turn based adventuring so it was good because everyone got a go talking about this thing with this theme that we've developed about being on games with people you don't know. I knew everybody and everyone knew everyone but there was a young woman, I would say possibly late teens, early 20s and she was playing and I remember thinking, oh, this is a bit intimidating, isn't it? For her? I mean not that we were like. To think we were all very nice, you know, we weren't. We weren't awful but. But it is intimidating, isn't it to sit down and she must have thought oh these, these old fellas all know each other, don't they? They all know each other. They're all like on first name terms immediately and you know, oh dear, she must have been quite something for her.

[Dirk the Dice]

They're on day release from the nursing home.

[Blithe]

Yeah, yeah. They're probably, probably part of coach party. Come in for the day. Yeah.

[Dirk the Dice]

And having the location.

[Blithe]

Enjoy your game. Enjoy. Enjoy your games. But we'll leave at 6. Yeah. Kind of, kind of, kind of old men who'd wander into Wetherspoons unwittingly and found themselves in it. You know, failure check for traps, pub traps. Failed the role. Oh no. We've wandered into a weather spoon. But again Neil did a great job. He was involved and the turn based thing whooped because it brought her into the game. It brought her in and I think she enjoyed, she said at the end I really enjoyed it and what was interesting was she was going around expo, she said I've got a contract to play different games. She got into role playing through fifth edition, I think which is, you know, a lot of people get into it. You know, a lot of our generation got into role playing, role playing through D and D. So it's not a bad thing. But she decided she was going to play an old school game. She played some Call of Cthulhu, she played some other games and she was really enjoying exploring other systems and she was quite shocked that in Neil's game, and it had to be Neil's game, didn't it, that someone was killed, a character was killed because she said she played fifth edition and in fifth edition it was notoriously hard to die, isn't it? And then people get resurrected, all that kind of malarkey. But in Neil's game, Julian was eaten by troll and it was just on one roll. It was just one roll. That's it. You're dead. You're dead. Look at her face. She's like what's halfway through the game? And he's dead.

[Dirk the Dice]

Yeah.

[Blithe]

But then Julian, Julian then became the gamer's master's assistant and rolled for the monsters and then I think enjoyed that trying to kill the rest of us.

[Dirk the Dice]

Well that's a good idea, isn't it? That's a good idea.

[Blithe]

It's a good idea. But it was, it was a nice experience actually because it was, it did that sort of inclusiveness about goes to show how gaming kind of brings people together and can be.

[Dirk the Dice]

And it's good, it's good for you all fellas to get out into blanket off your needs and.

[Blithe]

Yeah, yeah, nice, nice to get out, isn't it? Yeah. Roll some dice. Yeah.

[Dirk the Dice]

I, and, and the Saturday afternoon I played Conan 2 D20 and I was running a game on the Sunday and I did it deliberately. I picked to play Conan so I could make sure that I had a good understanding of the rules because I played it quite a bit online. But I always think the game. These games did so much different online than the table experience. And I played with Remy, who's one of the demonstrators almost. I think he's got a character in the rule book because he's so connected with it. Massive Robert E. Howard fan, and he has a good understanding of how to keep the game running over the table. And there were three other players and they all had a really good knowledge of Robert E. Howard. There was a guy who was playing Stygian Sorcerer from set. He scared the life out of me. He played. He played it so well. He was terrifying. It was a really good game. Very, very atmospheric and what I enjoyed about it. Remy occasionally, like, stepped aside to give a bit of commentary about the. Because he. I think he was a sensitivity reader on the original rule book and he was able, because of his heritage, to comment on some of the. The cultural elements of Howard and some of the racism because it was about the cannibal cult and, you know, the implicit racism in that. And he was using the literature to show how this is literature. So as long as you're true to the literature, that. That. That's fine, as long as you have this understanding. So I. I enjoyed that element of it that he was referring back to how I would use these tropes and how they had appeared in the stories to help you feel comfortable about the game and being part of that. I thought it ran really well, and it was really good to see the tokens going across the table.

[Blithe]

Have you.

[Dirk the Dice]

Have you played two D20 at the table or have you just done it online?

[Blithe]

No, no, no. I've only ever played it online. And I agree with you. That is the interesting thing, isn't it, with games around a table, how they are not completely different, but they run in a different way. You know, sometimes they can be. They can be a bit more cumbersome around a table, but sometimes they can be a lot slicker and a lot quicker round the table.

[Dirk the Dice]

I think in the case of 2D20, it's definitely slicker across the table because you're not fiddling around trying to find which button to press. And it lacks the excitement, I think, of rolling the dice and seeing your successes and the exchange of momentum points, doom points, and the fortune points. When it's done physically, it just feels a bit more exciting. And around that table, I never seen so many 20s rolled in that in those four hours we rolled a lot of 20s. And in 2D20, that's a bad thing to happen.

[Blithe]

A bad thing?

[Dirk the Dice]

Yeah. Yeah, because that's a complication or it gives the games master more doom.

[Blithe]

And that's interesting as well because when you play things on roll 20 or online, the number of times that things like that happen and everyone starts to query the. The dice roller, don't they? This is. Isn't random. This can't be random. What are the chances of that? Only the other night I was down at my friend's playing, you know, my friend and his son. I was playing Carla cthulhu and I rolled 398s on the banks. If that happened on roll 20, you go, get out, get out. This is broken. But it can happen. It can happen. That's kind of almost like a random. Yeah.

[Dirk the Dice]

So just before we move on to the games that we run, overall, I thought that the games were really good that I participated in. And it is a bit of a lottery, isn't it? When you enter into particularly Expo, you never quite know what you've signed up for and how that's going to work. I learned some new things from the. All of the games masters I played with and the players as well. The. The way that some of the players engaged. I learned a lot from it, that experience and I always enjoy that. I think I scored all right.

[Blithe]

I think I did all the games I played. Really. I enjoyed particularly Dungeon Crawl classics and the Round the Bend scenario. Really enjoyed. I had a good time. Because I have had mixed experiences at Expo. I think that lottery element can sometimes land you in a game that. Well, it's not bad. It's not what you want. It's not what you want. As we were saying, because it might be people who approach the game or approach role playing differently. It can be an experience where you think it's not really. For me, this. I have had. I have had a few games that I've played at Expo like that. I think I once said it's probably in the past it's been a 50, 50 thing where I've had some fantastic games, but I've also had games where I thought it'd be rude. It'd be rude to leave halfway through. But to be honest, it's not for me, partly because the players might play in a different way. But this, this year, I would say that was not the case. This year is probably my best year.

[Dirk the Dice]

I'm gonna. I'm gonna put some forward here. Blighty, I think you've become more tolerant as well. Got a bit more patience.

[Blithe]

Do you think I've become more tolerant?

[Dirk the Dice]

Yeah, I do, I do.

[Blithe]

Do you think it was always my problem then, that what you suggested? What, suggested that? Possibly. Yeah, possibly. I suppose. You do learn, I think. Yeah, you're right. You. You learn, I suppose, don't you? I mean, as we've just been discussing, you go to something like export and the more you go to these things, the more you think, well, all right, brace yourself, because it may. It will probably be a bit like this was perhaps those earlier years, you know, it's. It's not like that. Although, to be fair, I think it was my second year, that it was the worst one for that. There's a bit of potluck to it. It's players, it's people who have a very different approach to role playing. I remember one game of D and D that was like on the Friday night where all the other players were friends and they'd all had quite a bit to drink. And you find yourself in a situation where you think you're all a bit. You've all quite. You've got quite a bit to drink here and you all know each other and this is hard work as a fellow player. This is hard work. Yeah, you know, this is difficult. This is difficult. And it's not really what I was expecting from this game, you know, it's not what I expect from a game, you know. Yeah. And, yeah, people. I've had a drink when we. I've had a drink when we play. Some people drink, that's fine, you know, it's all right. But they were. They were roaring drunk, really. One of those where you think, oh, God almighty, it's not me, it's them. Them. Most definitely.

[Dirk the Dice]

A games master prepares. Okay, let's look at the games that we ran Sunday morning. Why did we pick Sunday morning and why did. We started at 9 o'? Clock?

[Blithe]

I mean, yeah, I know that is stupid. It was stupid, that, wasn't it? But when I put my game forward, I think in the past on Sunday morning, I've played games at 9 o' clock and I just went for 9 o', clock as if it was like conforming to some weird rule I've written for myself. But I didn't have to, did I let you. I think in the past might be wrong here, but I think in the past they've had designated slots, haven't they? Whereas this year did let you pick your slots. So we could have gone for 9, 30 or even 10 o', clock, couldn't we? It should have been far better.

[Dirk the Dice]

I was walloping down a vegan sausage and pork check at the Premier Inn, which is always difficult because it's. They're made to order, aren't they? The premiere. If you don't want tepid mushrooms and a grilled tomato. If you've got anything beyond that, you have to order it, don't you? And they kind of look at you. It's kind of reluctant.

[Blithe]

They offer it here in the hope you'll say no. But we said yes. And there's that disappointment on the face like, yeah, would you like, you know, scrambled egg on the buffet? The scrambled egg. Would you like a different kind of egg? Would you like fried egg or a poached egg maybe? Well, yeah, like I'll have a couple of poached eggs, please. The look on her face. Oh God. Really? Oh, no. We have to offer that. We're not supposed to accept. Supposed to say no, it's fine.

[Dirk the Dice]

You're supposed to have that cold packing material that we have on the bench over. Yeah. Anyway, yeah, so we actually got. Got that down, rush across town. Luckily my trousers were in position because.

[Blithe]

I bought the belt secured trousers. At this stage it was fine. No trouser issues? No belt issues.

[Dirk the Dice]

Yeah, we got there. Okay, so what did you run?

[Blithe]

I ran some into the odd.

[Dirk the Dice]

Okay, and how did that go?

[Blithe]

Yeah, very well, I think, as far as I could tell.

[Dirk the Dice]

Take us through the design process. Imagine you are an open university and there's a group of students out there who want to learn how to prepare and put this forward.

[Blithe]

Yes. And I'm there in a tweed jacket with, with elbow pads like a. The open universe should say, yeah, Professor. Days gone by.

[Dirk the Dice]

So why into the Odd?

[Blithe]

I have a view on convention games that I, I earn out on the side of simplicity. I'm very reluctant to run complicated systems. When I say complicated, not necessarily really complicated, but systems with lots of moving parts and lots of bits and pieces to them. I'm reluctant because I've had experiences at convention games which have gone fine, but in my mind as a games master, it wears me out a bit worrying about the rules. And realize that the three, four hour session just becomes about really managing people's understanding of rules because they've never played it before. So I went for into the Odd because into the Odd is a very, very simple system. It's very, very simple, very easy. That proved a wise decision because I found the whole session very relaxing to run. You could get into the scenario and what the players wanted to do without worrying too much about the mechanics. And also, the players understood the rules from the. They never played it before, but they understood how it worked. And that is a massive advantage, I think, with the convention games, because you do get people who've never played it before. They might be familiar with it, but they've not played it before. They might have heard of it, but it's new to them. And I found that was. Was great, really, you know, by the end of it, I wasn't worn out really. Sometimes the end of a game, when you've run a game at convention, I feel a bit worn out because I've. 50% of my brain is managing people's understanding the rules, where people are going, right, okay, what, what skill do I use here? So do I. Can I argument that? What do I. How do I argument it again? So would it be this, would it be that? And you think, oh, these are reasonable questions to ask if you've never played again. But from a purely selfish perspective, it detracts a bit from my enjoyment of running it and it becomes a case of rules management rather than enjoying the scenario and enjoying the interaction of the players and enjoying the ideas that the players come up with. So into the Odd is a perfect game for that because it is such a simple game and it was also one of those games where you could generate the character. I didn't have pregens. They generated characters at the table because it's very easy to generate characters. Yeah.

[Dirk the Dice]

The day before, the day before the Runequest game, the players were reflecting upon the pre gens and they said, oh, so it's always a terrible idea to roll characters at the table. It just slows things down and it's much better to have pre gens. So you didn't have pre gens, did you?

[Blithe]

I didn't have pregens, but I would say it depends on the game, doesn't it? There are some games where it would be a terrible idea, Runequest being one of them because it takes you three hours to generate a character.

[Dirk the Dice]

There you go. Yeah, you've got a character. It's a great character. Okay, that's it.

[Blithe]

Thank you.

[Dirk the Dice]

Thank you for turning.

[Blithe]

It's now time to finish. Thanks for showing up. No, I agree. That is true of some games. Yeah, absolutely. You don't want to get bogged down in character creation for an hour. But into the Odd, it's just so, so easy, really. It's 3, 3D6 strength, dexterity, willpower, roll some hit points, roll on a few tables for equipment and they were playing mutants, so I used one of the extra tables. The olive mutations just gives you the mutation. It doesn't. It doesn't tell you much. It doesn't give you rules for the mutations. So one of the characters had a weird mutation where he had a swarm of insects living within his body. And that's. That's all it says. That is all it says by the insect doesn't specify what they can do. And. And he. He had a. He said it was a bee. Hive of bees inside him and he used them as spies to infiltrate places to go in and report back to him. He claimed he had a psychic link with his bees. And that. That was just great. That was great. It was a surprise for me. Unexpected because they were generated at the table and using players using things in inventive ways. All that kind of stuff is really, really good and I really enjoyed it. You know, I would run it again at a convention because it works so well, so easy.

[Dirk the Dice]

Yeah, I did a Conan 2 D20, but I used Cull the Coal supplement. I love the course. I love Coal. And bit of a different hero to have you. Have you read any of the cool stories?

[Blithe]

Yeah, a long time ago. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Dirk the Dice]

So it's a. There's only short stories and some portrait and some fragments of stuff that survive. It's really the first swords and Sorcerer hero and he's a bit different than Conan. The way I described it at the table was if Conan punched a camel, he'd knock it over and think no more of it. Whereas Core would be contemplating the existential crisis that could be set upon him through punching a camel and the repercussions and consequences of. Of his actions. So in that sense it's much more. More cocky. And I think I submitted my game late and because of that I just went into the supplement. I cut and paste the palace of Cinnabar Dreams, which is a. An adventure hook, a story hook, just a paragraph describing something that's happened at court. I cut and paste it, submitted it to UK Games Expo, it got it accepted. I thought, I don't know what's going to happen in this, but I quite like the setup of it. That the palace has been hit by some kind of secret slumber that's causing everybody to go to sleep, who have traveled from the east on a recent adventure and call a sealed the palace and to prevent this blight from escaping and affecting the rest of the place. And he's. He's reluctantly encouraged people to do something about. To play characters and the Player character was playing members of Cole's Court and characters from the actual short stories. But I made a mistake, though. I made a mistake. Because you know what happened, don't you?

[Blithe]

I do know what happened, yeah.

[Dirk the Dice]

Cut and paste it. A person of this parish who listens to the podcast, Helena Nash, contacted me and said, oh, I wrote that. I wrote that adventure hook. Can I come and see what happens? Are you doing? I've got an idea of what happens, but it'd be good to see what you do with it. Well, there you go. That's a challenge.

[Blithe]

Do you feel like saying, you know the idea you've got, Helen, could you tell me what that idea is? Because I've got an idea yet.

[Dirk the Dice]

I did.

[Blithe]

I did.

[Dirk the Dice]

So in my. In my version, the slumber had come in a box, obviously, because I always have a box. In my convention game, a box will appear at some point. If you put a box in, it gives people something to do and a bit of excitement, a bit of mystery. You get that boxing. And when they open up the boxes, they find these items and these items go missing. And during the course of the adventure, got to try and find these items because they learn that. That sleep, it just. Just in the same way that darkness doesn't exist in the world of coal due to the absence of light, it's a thing in itself. So is sleep. Sleep is a. An entity. And this wizard has captured sleep so that he could increase his wisdom by reading and getting the world's knowledge so he didn't have to go to sleep. So he's trapped it in this box and inadvertently, the.

[Blithe]

The.

[Dirk the Dice]

The court has released this thing into the palace and they have to find these items in order to slow down their vision so they can actually see it. So it's a bit of flatline as meets. The thing was my pitch, it worked very well. It was quite exciting. And two D20 works really well. With a bit more practice and a bit more use of it, it could be my new Savage Worlds.

[Blithe]

Yeah. Sometimes the case, isn't it, with systems that initially you. You can be a little bit uncertain about them, as we were with Savage Worlds. And I think we worry 2d20. At first, he's a bit uncertain about it because they're not. They're not that straightforward. But then possibly more straightforward than they appear to be at first. At first glance, aren't they?

[Dirk the Dice]

Yeah.

[Blithe]

You know, I find that with 2D20, it seems more complicated than it is. Yes. Yeah. You know, and Savage World is a bit like that Savage World. Can appear more complicated than it is at first. People are a bit puzzled about raises and wounds and all that kind of thing, but once you get your head around it, you think, oh, this is quite. Quite straightforward, really.

[Dirk the Dice]

Yeah. So Helena, for part of it, sat in the fringes judging me, and I think I passed. I think I passed. I think I did all right.

[Blithe]

Yeah. I think I saw her in the tread hole and told her to ask her whether she tried to put you off to give you a hard stare when you were doing it wrong. You're doing it wrong, isn't it? What I was. This is what I imagined. You're doing it wrong.

[Dirk the Dice]

The way she described it was. The scenario was just like doing a summary of a film that doesn't exist in the Radio Times. So just writing there.

[Blithe]

Yeah, yeah. Thursday. This is what. This is a film. Yeah. It's a good way of thinking about it, actually, isn't it? Yeah. Good way of thinking about pitches for conventions, isn't it, that?

[Dirk the Dice]

Yeah, yeah.

[Blithe]

Yeah.

[Dirk the Dice]

It's probably the strongest pitch I've ever submitted because I cut and paste it from someone else because someone else wrote it.

[Blithe]

Ever. Good.

[Dirk the Dice]

Right, before we leave, we should talk about the sordid business of buying. Buying stuff. Because the Expo is a trade show and we did go in the trade hall a couple of times, met lots of people, which was very nice. I was on a bit of a bender. Wasn't on a bit of a supermarket sweep. I went there with the intention of buying stuff.

[Blithe]

You always have, aren't you? You're very different like that. You are very. You're quite impulsive with things, and I am very much. I'm very. I'm looking.

[Dirk the Dice]

I was very considered. I was very considered.

[Blithe]

You weren't you weren't you? By your standards? You were very considered, which is not very considerable.

[Dirk the Dice]

I mean, I. I totally entered that room intending to buy Master Niaflatep, which I've already played and already have, but.

[Blithe]

Yeah, no, of course, yeah, of course, yeah. You know where. Hoodwinked into buying that, were you? I could see that was a fascinating moment, that actually where I could see your impulsiveness laid bare. Laid bare where you were talking to Mike Mason and you were looking at massive anathletep and you were saying, is it any different? Because. And he was. He was suggesting that it was a bit different. And, you know, I thought. I thought, here we go. He's gonna buy it. I was ahead of times. I knew you were gonna buy that before you did and before Matt Mason did. I'VE known you for a long time. And I knew I could see it. It's just unfolding in slow motion in front of me. I thought, he's gonna buy it, isn't he? I thought, he's not gonna buy. He's gonna buy.

[Dirk the Dice]

You know, my algorithm. You know, my algorithm, how it works. So you can predict it. Yeah, well, you know, when we came out of Deep Freeze, that was the first campaign we played. It took us three years. And I still have a bit of a nostalgic affection towards it. And it does look like a beautifully well produced couple of books. And you get the screen as well. Always get the screen, as you said.

[Blithe]

Always get the screen.

[Dirk the Dice]

Yeah, it was. It was very alluring. And then my message said something, but I wrote about Pear Soap in this version and that clinched it for some reason.

[Blithe]

I don't know why.

[Dirk the Dice]

That was a moment I said, oh, yeah, I'll get it.

[Blithe]

Yeah, I could. I knew you were gonna buy. And. And the thing is, I didn't intervene. I didn't intervene. I thought it seemed rude to Intervene. Intervene. Touch. Don't. Don't buy it. I just let you buy it. It probably puts me in a worse light than you. There we go.

[Dirk the Dice]

So at some point we'll have to rediscover that.

[Blithe]

Yeah. The trade holes are always odd, I think. Odd for me, because what I do. And I've done this every year that I've been to Expo, I. You have. We have this joke, don't we, that I. I'll go around the Trade hall for two hours and then buy some dice, which it is what happened. That is what happened again about some more Dungeon Crow Classics dice, because they were only 15 quid and they're 25 quid. No. So I bought some more of them. But it's that strange experience where in. In days gone by, if you turn the clock back 30 years, if we'd have gone to that kind of Trade Hall 30 years ago, before the advent of the Internet, we would probably need St. John's Ambulance to pick us up off the floor, wouldn't we? If you walked into that room, all that gaming stuff there and huge trade hall. But now it's not. It isn't like that, because you. You can go to the Modiphius stand, you can go to the Free League stand and KSCM and all great stuff. It's all great stuff. But you do know it exists anyway, don't you? Through the Internet? You know it exists, yeah. Yeah. And it's available to purchase online and A lot of it. The stuff I want I have purchased online anywhere. What I look for in a trade hall is something that's gonna surprise me. I'm blindsided. Something where I'm gonna go, oh, look at this, look at this. This is interesting. Never seen this before. This looks fascinating, you know, and that's. That's what I look for. And it is. I think it's hard to find that. It's hard to find that.

[Dirk the Dice]

And do you know, I. It only happened once whilst I was there and it was that Orbital Blues, you know, the. The cowboy bebop type. Yeah, it looks really good. I mean, the design of it is really good. I was looking at it, I got distracted. I think somebo joined and we started chatting and I got distracted. Oh, I'll come back to it later. It was sold out. See, that's why you should act on your impulse and just get it straight away.

[Blithe]

Yeah, you should. Yeah, yeah. But that is probably an example, isn't it? That. That's something that. Yeah, I have. I've heard about that. You can buy it online, you can order it, but it's just on that. On the edge of. Of being mainstream. So it does surprise you where you see it and go, oh, I have heard about this. Oh, oh, right. I'll have a look at it, you know, and flick through it and that kind of thing. Yeah, which is the kind of thing I look for. Expo, you know. Yeah. Something. Something surprising. But it's. But it's a slog to find it, isn't it? Because there's a lot of stuff in there and a lot of stuff that you have to wade through before you find.

[Dirk the Dice]

Yeah, My main purchases came from Klcm. I. Earlier, before I bought masks, I asked Paul Fricker to put aside a copy of Cults of Cthulhu, the New Sinister Secrets of the Cthulhu Cult by Chris Lucky and Mike Mason put one aside for me. Very kind of him because I wasn't able to get there and I. I was giving it and I went to pay for it and was asked for id. Like, are you dirt the dice? Because person collected passport. Well, he said it was David Scott and he didn't know who I was. And he said, it'll be on you. It'll be on your bank card, won't it? Well, I don't have dirt the dice on my bank card.

[Blithe]

You have to Dirk T D Mr. DT dice on his bank card.

[Dirk the Dice]

Thankfully, he accepted my T shirt as a proof that I was who I was. I said it Was if only it was so easy to prove your identity.

[Blithe]

He slipped a bit that his rigor has slipped somewhat, hasn't it? Asking for id. Asking for ID at the level of bank card and then eventually accepting a T shirt. Your T shirt as I do. I mean I'm glad he did and everything but. But there's some slippage there isn't in.

[Dirk the Dice]

The rigor that he's basically.

[Blithe]

You go for a very rigorous position. Idaho police. Sir. Bank card, passport photo, driving license are acceptable. 2 About this T shirt. Oh, all right then. There you go. I'll do. I'm gonna try that. This is the bank and I need id. Passport control. You go bro. Overseas. I passport control now. I forgot my passport but I'm wearing this T shirt. Can I come in?

[Dirk the Dice]

I'm sure it'd be acceptable. Good. No, it was great to catch up with people and see them after the desert of the last two years and good to see people and chat to them and find out what they've been up to and talk about non gaming stuff as well. So that was.

[Blithe]

That was overall a good social experience, isn't it as well. There is that to it. You know not really talked about that but the. The social side of it's great as well, isn't it?

[Dirk the Dice]

Yeah.

[Blithe]

Side of the game. Yeah. Meeting people. Yeah. Yeah.

[Dirk the Dice]

So yeah, it was good and I think. Do you know, I think part of the enjoyment of it was I wasn't. I'd managed my expectations a lot better because it was only really the week before that I started thinking oh I'm going to Expo next week. And I think there were little surprises. Yeah. Yeah.

[Blithe]

I suppose as well. After the recent unpleasantness and lockdown there was a. There was sometimes. Sometimes with these things there's a sense of I'm happy to be here. I'm just happy to be. Yes. Yeah. You know, happy to be here and enjoy this in a. In a relatively normal way, I suppose.

[Dirk the Dice]

Yeah. I tend to as well over anticipate and over prepare for these things. Things and think through them too much. It was nice for it to be a bit more spontaneous and just take it as it came.

[Blithe]

Yeah, yeah, I'd agree with that. Yeah. Yeah. Didn't think about it too much before going. And even the game around was. Wasn't improvised. Come on. I don't do improvisation but it was more lightweight than other things. I've run Expo in some ways. Some ways Sunday morning is not a bad time because I wouldn't say people's expectations are lower. That's not the right. But people are after I. Because I've whenever I played on a Sunday morning what I'm after is a more relaxing. Yeah. Easy going kind of game. Yes. You know with a couple of decent tea breaks and that, that, that's what happened in my is relaxed and. Yeah, that's okay, you know.

[Dirk the Dice]

Yeah. Yeah. And you know this spirit of you. I, I didn't always for the game I run on Sunday morning I have the similar approach. You know it was. It was a scenario about sleep so we took it. You know I did have a timer actually I did set a timer for the actor weight co op within 90 minutes. So I put a timer in the middle of the. I think I paused it for tea breaks but they managed to wake up call, you'd be glad to know with 44 seconds to go.

[Blithe]

That's a relief.

[Dirk the Dice]

Yeah, it was good. It's exciting. Yeah. No, I'm good. I think I'm going to say that more relaxed approach in future. You could say I was a belts and braces man before and now I don't even have a belt.

[Blithe]

Doesn't even have a belt.

[Dirk the Dice]

See you blinder. It was really good to meet up and play with great people again at Expo. I really enjoyed it. I've got a couple of things to tell you about. The book club is back after an Expo break with a double bill of films to watch. Gilliam's Jabberwocky and Brazil. It's on the first Sunday in July. The first Sunday in August will feature the Miskatonic Repository scenario Full Fathom five. Drop me a line if you'd like to take part. Finally, I've appeared on a couple of podcasts of note. The second season of Frankenstein's RPG is constructing a science fiction RPG from all the good bits of others. I'm on the panel putting forward my recommendations Investigations, Magic and Psionics. It's good fun to be part of it. I hope it's fun to listen to as well. I've also appeared as Stunt Baz on what Would the Smart Party Do Podcast Rambling and shambling about zombies and how to use them in your games. I rather boldly put forward the idea that GoldenEye is responsible for the modern zombie. There you go. Let's see if that floats. That's it then. The end of the Expo special for another year. While I was there, I had a sandwich with Stephen Brotherstone from Scarred for Life and we talked some more about Games of Liverpool and the treasure trap story that I hope to tell you sometime it was a really expensive cheese sandwich. Probably the most I've ever spent on cheese and pickle in one go. I'm looking forward to bringing the second part of our Scarred for Life episode very soon. Until then, adios, amigos. So much they failed to take a breath.

[Blithe]

And even when the kids were starving.

[Dirk the Dice]

They all thought the Queen was charming. The people who grinned themselves to death smile so much they failed to take a breath. And even when the kids were starving.

[Blithe]

They thought the Queen was charming.