Thanks to the Idle thumbs readers Slack channel, I got introduced to Friends at the table. Friends at the table is, and I quote, «an actual play podcast about critical worldbuilding, smart characterization, and fun interaction between good friends».
I’m a big fan of actual play podcasts. They are storytelling podcasts where a bunch of people, often actors, play a role playing game live in front of microphones and record everything that happens. And, oh boy, everything can happen. I understand they are not for everyone but since I started listening to live play podcasts, role playing games became a big part of my life. (Full disclosure: I co-hosted for a while the first actual podcast in Italy).
Live play podcast are a niche genre that has taken off in the last few years, between podcast and Twitch/YouTube streams. And wile I can’t say I heard or saw them all, I tried my fair share. And, let me tell you, Friends at the table is special. Austin Walker, the game master, decided to literally build Heiron — the world that Friends at the table is set in from scratch — throwing out of the window all the classic tropes and stereotypes of fantasy storytelling and methodically asking players to think critically and concretely about what they were portraying. Part of the merit goes to the system they were using, Dungeon World that encourages the game master to answer «I don’t know, what do you think?», but the length and the depths Austin takes the world buildings are unmatched in anything I ever heard.
I spent around 40 hours with the two groups that Austin guides in exploring and inventing Heiron, and it was the closes thing to being the Indiana Jones of the mind I ever did.
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