It was our great pleasure to sit down with Fred Hicks of Evil Hat and Jim Butcher, author of The Dresden Files.  It’s a rare treat when Fred and Jim, longtime friends, are actually on the same side of the mic together. Troll, Kevin, and Jen talk with them about their gaming history, their friendship, and what dealing with the Dresden Files has taught them about themselves and their friendship. Enjoy.

Relevant Links

• Fred Hicks’  blog
• Evil Hat
• Jim Butcher
• Dresden Files RPG
• Jim’s Livejournal
• (More Notes coming soon!)

Crunchy Bits!

• Intro music from “The Wizard” by  of Idle Thumbs
• Outro music is dedicated to Jen’s PC in our DFRPG run: Danny, and his almost-girlfriend, Valerie. “Don’t Try” by Marian Call.

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Kevin, Jen, CJ, and Troll discuss their experiences with the Dresden Files RPG. All in all, we had a very positive time with this game.  We discuss our reactions to Aspects, the Fudge Dice, City and Character Creation, and how faithful the game is to the Dresdenverse.

Relevant Links

• Evil Hat
• Dresden Files RPG
• Jim Butcher
• Letter Jacket
• Perry, IA
• FUDGE
• D&D 3.5
• Urban Dictionary
• 4DFate probabilities
• Lighting Lad
• Cosmic Boy
• Shadowrun
• Twilight
• Smallville & it’s RPG
• Silverado
• Weapons of the Gods
• Ptolus
• Mutants and Masterminds
• Arcana Evolved
• Burning Empires
• Yojimbo
• Fringe
• X-files
• Eureka
• Diaspora
• Starblazer Adventures
• Flash Gordon
• Traveller
• Kurt Vonnegut
• Dean Koontz
• In A Wicked Age
• Penny for My Thoughts
• H.P. Lovecraft
• White Wolf
• LARP Episode
• Mage: The Awakening
• RPG Geek Thanks for the Nomination!

Crunchy Bits!

• Intro music from “The Wizard” by  of Idle Thumbs
• Outro Music “Magic Carpet Ride” by Steppenwolf remixed by Fatboy Slim

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Things come to a head in the exciting conclusion to our run through the Dresden Files RPG. A small note on the sound quality: about 45 minutes in the AC kicks on, which was accompanied by a very annoying rattle. I used noise reduction to eliminate most of it, but as a result the remainder of the episode sounds just a tad tinny. Sorry if this is bothersome, but trust me, it was better than the rattle!

Relevant Links

• Dresden Files RPG
• LARP episode
• Metagaming episode
• Archon
• Absinthe
• Luke Meyers
• Tony Mast
• Ron Jeremy
• Arlington Cemetary
• Billy the Werewolf (Spoilers!)
• Electroshock Therapy
• The Mind/Body Split
• Retrograde Amnesia (The “Pro-something” Kevin was thinking of was actually Prosopagnosia, aka “Face Blindness”)
• Farraday Cage
• St. Elmo’s Fire
• Blackstaff (Spoilers!)

Crunchy Bits!

• Dresden Files Actual Play Session 5: 2 hours
• Intro music from “The Wizard” by  of Idle Thumbs
• Outro music “Itsy Bitsy Spider” by The Boogers.

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Tensions build as Kevin’s Warden Sebastian goes on the offensive and directly accuses the ancient wizard Dick Cheney of breaking the Laws of Magic. From there, things spiral out of control and the PC’s find themselves beset from all sides!

Relevant Links

• Windows 98
• Picture of Troll
• Weapons of the Gods
• Adelei Niska
• Cowl (Spoilers!)
• Cheney’s Vs. Google Earth
• Green Lantern
• ““
• Skull and Bones
• Bizarro
• Coast to Coast
• I think the word Troll was looking for was “Adipocere“
• Cherokee
• Sioux
• BDU
• US Military Formal Wear
• Shillelagh
• Mini Cooper
• ’63 Mustang (They didn’t make Mustangs in ’63. Oops!)
• Gremlin

Crunchy Bits!

• Intro music from “The Wizard” by  of Idle Thumbs
• Outro song is “I Put a Spell on You” covered by Marilyn Manson, originally by Screamin’ Jay Hawkins.

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Regular play begins in earnest! We cover a lot of basic ground this session: The Sight, Soul Gazing, a social conflict, and a few compels. The PC’s investigate a mysteriously exploding brothel and are manipulated by seen and unseen forces!

Relevant Links

• Dresden Files RPG Homepage
• Mutants and Masterminds
• Burning Empires
• The Crusades
• Dick Cheney
• Fallout 3
• The Smithsonian
• Dolley Madison
• The Archive (spoilers!)
• ’77 Dodge Charger
• Crocodile Tears
• Schadenfreude
• ““
• Burning Wheel
• In A Wicked Age
• Phlogiston
• Futurama
• Ghostrock

Crunchy Bits

• Intro music from “The Wizard” by  of Idle Thumbs
• Outro Music “I’m Your Late Night Evening Prostitute” by Tom Waits

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Session 2 of our run through the Dresden Files RPG covers most of character creation. There was a lot of explaining and brainstorming going on, so we didn’t manage to make it through the whole process, but what’s left (skills, mostly) is going to be done off-mic. Check out what wacky characters we came up with for our urban fantasy version of DC!

Relevant Links

(coming soon!)

Crunchy Bits!

• Intro music from “The Wizard” by of Idle Thumbs
• Outro Music “Black Magic Woman” by Carlos Santana.

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After a month and a half of cons, vacations, natural disasters and technical difficulties, we finally get a chance to sit down and play us some Dresden Files RPG by Evil Hat. This first session is our second try at city creation. The first time we decided on Anchorage, AK, and this time around we go a very different direction with Washington, D.C. A few changes have happened since our last run though a game. We got Jen back on the show as a regular, we lost Dan due to Real Life (aka. work schedule conflicts, but he’ll still be doing the Comics Cast) and for this game we’ve got the return of Troll, whom you may remember from our Dread Halloween Special.

Relevant Links

• Dresden Files RPG
• Evil Hat
• Dresden Files TV Show
• Dresden Files Books, comic, and audiobooks, and short stories
• Jim Butcher’s Home Page
• Fables
• Dexter
• Burn Notice
• Miami Vice
• A-Team
• Deadlands
• Nightwatch
• Deadwood
• Spoine
• Yakov Smirnoff
• H.P. Lovecraft
• Freakanomics
• Roe vs. Wade lowering crime
• The Library of Alexandria
• The Centurion (Dr. Who)
• Gilgamesh
• Dolley Madison
• Indiana Jones
• Emeritus
• Ley Lines
• George Washington (7 Feet Tall…)
• Rifts
• Pierre Charles L’Enfant
• Chowda!
• Cheney and Google Maps
• Roanoke
• Sir Richard Grenville
• Hopping Vampires
• Legion of Superheroes

Crunchy Bits

• Intro music from “The Wizard” by of Idle Thumbs
• Outro Music “The Man With the Hex” by The Atomic Fireballs

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Due to some lucky circumstances, I managed to land an interview earlier this week with Ryan Macklin and Lenny Balsera. This was a serendipitous event, as Evil Hat had just released their official press release announcing the release date and info about the Dresden Files RPG. I sit down with these two and BS about the challenges of creating a game from the Dresden Files license, then we dive into some of the nitty gritty about how FATE was used to create the world of Harry Dresden.

Relevant Links

• Dresden Files RPG
• Evil Hat
• Lenny’s Blog
• Ryan’s Blog
• The Sunless Citadel
• Duke Nukem Forever
• Urban Fantasy
• Perdido Street Station
• Endgame Oakland
• Swashbucklers of the 7 Skies
• Ptolus
• Chris Hanrahan’s Blog
• Scribd
• bittorrent
• GURPS
• Hero
• D20
• Starblazer Adventures
• Diaspora
• Spirit of the Century
• Jared Sorenson’s 3 Questions
• The Wire
• Clark and Amanda Valentine
• Caine  (Kung Fu)
• Las Vegas: The Strip, Sumerlin, Henderson
• Steve Wynn
• Burning Empires
• The Bracelet Problem
• Mage (The Awakening and the older Ascension)
• In Nomine
• In Nomine Fate Fan Conversion
• Robert Bohl (and our interview with him)

Crunchy Bits!

• Intro and Outro music provided by .

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