RPG Psych
A podcast exploring the intersection of metacognition and tabletop gaming. Join educator Lucas Hutson and clinical therapist Josh Pate-Terry as they discuss tabletop role-playing games and bring some of their professional experience to help make our games better. Let's think about how we think at our game table.
B3 Rules Lawyering (adaptively)
Luke and Josh take a different approach to the rules lawyer. Sit back and listen as they discuss how to utilize a strong understanding of the rules as a force for good.
B2 Electric Boogaloo
It's time to start chippin' in choombs, Josh and Luke discuss digital tools in our digital world and how they affect our games. Make sure you are all chromed up as we dive into this electrifying episode of RPG Psych.
B1 Player Driven Story
Luke and Josh dive into the idea of player driven stories in your tabletop RPGs and making your players authors in their own stories while also doing your job for you, at least a little bit. Tune in and hear about conspiracy boards, radically accepting your player's crazy ideas, and real stories of transitioning from being an over-preparer to someone who rolls with an emerging story.
Season 2 Trailer
Season 2 of RPG Psych is coming!
A10: Understanding your PCs Psychology Part 1: Motivations and Values
Season 1 ends with a discussion on the motivations and values of the PCs! Get ready cause it's going to get clinical and anecdotal as Josh and Lucas dive in to this part one of PC Psychology.
A9 You start in a cliche...
Josh and Lucas turn on all the lights in the local pub to expose the ways you can use a cliche to benefit your players, turn it on its head or just riff on it. They also suggest ways of avoiding this well worn path.
A8 Using Mechanics
Lucas and Josh set the scene with mechanics. This is how we dress the stage for our players it's also our table's social contract. How many mechanics are too many though?
A7 Balancing Encounters
Josh and Lucas talk about balance in encounters. What is it? Do you need it? If you do what are the best ways to balance a game? All this and more !
A6 Player Buy-In
Join Luke and Josh as they explore some ideas to improve player and game master engagement. Let's move beyond the ideas of worldbuilding and get to how we can use the players and their stories to create a world that they want to immerse themselves into.
A5 Time Management and Taking Breaks
Josh and Lucas talking about why it's so important for you to give your creative mind a break, even when you'd love to be gaming. Not only that they discuss the dreaded time management and how to find the sweet spot for you and your games.
A4 Verisimilitude
Josh and Lucas tackle Verisimilitude. Should our games just be abstractions? How much truth is too much truth in the fantastic? Isn't that what mechanics are for? Josh and Lucas talk about the difference between feeling real and being realistic and more.
A3 Radical Acceptance
Josh and Lucas dive into accepting the world as it is and not how we wish it to be, even if it is a fantasy world. How do we equip ourselves as players and GMs to "roll" with it when things don't go our way?
A2 Safety Tools
What are safety tools for around the gaming table? How do we make sure that everyone feels safe with our stories and safe to share? Josh and Lucas dive into this topic, sharing tools and anecdotes, and since they play together Josh checks in on Lucas' safety at the table.
A1 Session Zero
In this first episode of RPG Psych Josh and Lucas talk about what Session Zero is, what makes a good one and, why do we as players and GM's need it.
