System Mastery

https://systemmastery.files.wordpress.com/2015/03/system-mastery-39.mp3 System Mastery 39 – Witch Girls Adventures Witches!  Rustics!  Technomancers!  The Ugly One!  It’s Witch Girls Adventures, and it’s your chance to step into the stylish shoes of a 13-year old witch and go on way cool adventures, maybe even at the mall.  Shopping!  This game is aimed a little young, so we try to puzzle out what makes a good game for kids while we’re at it. Editor’s note:  Don’t forget to send in questions for the new show, Afterthought.  Let us know anything you want us to talk about at systemmastery@gmail.com!  Also, is this actually a fetish game?  Have we been fooled?  A lot of the internet seems to think so.

https://systemmastery.files.wordpress.com/2015/03/episode-38-stormbringer.mp3 Episode 38 – Stormbringer ELRIC!  Thy book is a thousand times more execrable than thou!  Though I have to admit I had this iconic piece of nerd power fantasy confused for the early part of my young life with the other one, Raistlin, this guy is apparently quite pedigreed.  The doomed albino of deficient blood and his evil runesword more or less dominate this book, much to our chagrin.  Can you save the ancient world of Melniboné and the young kingdoms?  Spoiler alert:  no. Let us know what you thought of Stormbringer in the comments!  Have a book you’d us to cover?  Let us know about that too.

https://systemmastery.files.wordpress.com/2015/02/episode-37-deliria.mp3 System Mastery 37 – Deliria During the 90s, a lot of the small-market games were about trying to fix one issue that the author had with basement-ready games from the 70s.  By 2002 a renaissance was required!  No longer were games just for mega-nerds programming Scorched Earth into their graphing calculators!  Now the games were for normal people, like baristas, ravers, hackers, and burners.  Nothing encapsulates this era of special-snowflake appreciation better than the fairy tale LARP enabler, Deliria.  Do you ever get the feeling that you’re special?  That there’s magic in the world?  That your eyes would really be grey flecked through with shards of gemlike amethyst if you had your way?  This is the game for you! Let us know what you thought of Deliria in the comments!  Have a book you’d us to cover?  Let us know about that too.  If you really love us, show your support over on our Patreon page and help us keep the mics hot! Edito

https://systemmastery.files.wordpress.com/2015/02/system-mastery-36.mp3 System Mastery  36 – Dungeons & Dragons We take a much needed break from endless reading of defunct gaming manuals, but that doesn’t mean we don’t seek to entertain!  This week, System Mastery brings you fresh coverage of the 2001 hit film, Dungeons & Dragons.  It has a Wayans, and a Riff-Raff, and more!  This film might be extremely terrible written, but at least it also has horrible visuals and unappealing acting! Let us know what you thought of Dungeons & Dragons in the comments!  Have a book you’d us to cover, or some gaming film we should watch?  Let us know about that too. Special thanks to our new friend Grant at Saving the Game, for sending us our next big project.  Check out his podcast when you’re all done here.

https://systemmastery.files.wordpress.com/2015/01/system-mastery-35.mp3 System Mastery 35 – Vanishing Point If you’ve read any Neil Gaiman or just been stuck in line at a convention behind steampunk people, you’re all set for Vanishing Point.  It’s a neat little RPG about visiting a planet shaped like a brain, populated by weirdos classified by insanities, and choked full of more British flavor than a steak and kidney pie. Let us know what you thought of Vanishing Point in the comments!  Have a book you’d us to cover?  Let us know about that too. Editor’s note:  Jon was basically dying of plague through this whole thing, you’ll just have to excuse the chair creaks and coughing.

https://systemmastery.files.wordpress.com/2015/01/systemmastery34.mp3 SystemMastery 34 – Fantasy Imperium This game was surprisingly difficult to find art for.  The cover is easy enough, since it’s got a famous story behind it, but apparently no one wanted to put any of the many boring knights or cheesecake witches inside the book on the internet.  We stuck some fairies on the homepage that get the point across pretty well.  Come along as we review Fantasy Imperium, an Interactive Storytelling Game.  How is that different from an RPG?  More charts, more pictures of swords, and more sweet, sweet sexism.  Enjoy! Were you somehow a fan of Fantasy Imperium?  Were you briefly hoping this was a review of Twilight Imperium or Palladium Fantasy?  Tell us!  Hell, tell us anything in the comments below.  If you really love us, show your support over on our Patreon page and help us keep the mics hot!

https://systemmastery.files.wordpress.com/2014/12/systemmastery33.mp3 SystemMastery 33 – Maid This week, we’re joined in studio (my living room) by a guest host!  Our friend Claire joins us because we just didn’t feel comfortable tackling this sexist minefield without her.  It’s Maid!  The RPG where you wear a frilly sex uniform and tee-hee your way through a day of almost-charming almost-sex that is almost always almost-rape. Let us know what you thought of Maid in the comments!  Have a book you’d us to cover?  Let us know about that too.  If you really love us, show your support over on our Patreon page and help us keep the mics hot.

https://systemmastery.files.wordpress.com/2014/12/systemmastery32.mp3 SystemMastery 32 – Darkurthe: Legends The least requested game of all time comes to System Mastery!  We discuss Darkurthe, a world of isolated city-states, deep racial convinctions, and clans, guilds, cults, and freeholds.  Play as humans, elves, dwarves, gross elves, mean dwarves, and anguls.  Check out a great spell system that is 100% spell creation!  I’m hyping this way more than it’s worth!

https://systemmastery.files.wordpress.com/2014/11/systemmastery31.mp3 SystemMastery 31 – Synnibarr 2 The final chapter in our saga of Synnibarr.  Impossible continents, insane monsters, and ludicrous facts about this maddening world.  This time around, we even try to tell you how you were supposed to play the game! Let us know what you thought of Synnibarr in the comments!  Have a book you’d us to cover?  Let us know about that too.

https://systemmastery.files.wordpress.com/2014/11/systemmastery30.mp3 SystemMastery 30 – The World of Synnibarr 1 The most requested title of all comes to System Mastery!  Biogladites (whatever that is), chameleon drakes, and I guess archers engage in insane adventure and deadly battle on a hollowed out Mars thousands of years from now and light years from here.  Sound engaging?  Well hang on because the rules system is so incredibly crufty and complicated that we barely even talked about it!  That’s right, this is our first two-part episode, so tune in and enjoy our attempt to wrap our brains around the ineffable works of mad genius Raven c.s. McCracken, and then join our battered shellshocked husks next week or so to do it again! Let us know what you thought of Synnibarr in the comments!  Have a book you’d us to cover?  Let us know about that too. Editor’s note:  A LOT of business travel and personal stuff led to the lateness of this post.  We apologize and are now back on our regular schedule!

https://systemmastery.files.wordpress.com/2014/10/system-mastery-special-edition-synnibarr.mp3 System Mastery Special Edition – Synnibarr Today, we bring you a little something special.  A dramatic reading of the brilliant beginning to the tale of The World of Synnibarr.  Tune in next week for our full review. Let us know what you thought of Synnibarr in the comments!  Have a book you’d us to cover?  Let us know about that too. Editor’s correction:  Business travel is keeping us from doing a full review on time.  Enjoy this tidbit in the interim.

https://systemmastery.files.wordpress.com/2014/10/systemmastery29.mp3 SystemMastery 29 – Dark Heresy Skulls for the Skull Throne!  We take a discerning look at Dark Heresy, one of many games set in the grim darkness of the dark grimness of the Warhammer 40k universe.  Will you be greasy scum, oily robot man, or festering, gibbering psychic?  The correct answer is probably psychic, but we’ll try to suss all that out in the review. Let us know what you thought of Dark Heresy in the comments!  Have a book you’d us to cover?  Let us know about that too.

https://systemmastery.files.wordpress.com/2014/09/systemmastery28.mp3 SystemMastery 28 – Spookshow This game is about ghost spies.  Get it?  It’s a double meaning on the word.  I’m not sure if you get it.  You see, spook is occasionally used as a derogatory term for someone who works in the intelligence industry, and is also sometimes used as a synonym for an intangible entity from beyond the grave.  In this game, you play as both, and then you try to have fun.  It’s complicated and boring, and so you will eventually say “Spooks…  How?” and that’s where the name comes from.  Now I think you get it. Let us know what you thought of Spookshow in the comments!  Have a book you’d us to cover?  Let us know about that too. If you clicked to here specifically because you thought there was a rad Gentleman Ghost game you’ve never heard of, sorry.  You’ve been duped.  There are no good google images at the right resolution for “Ghost Spy” so I just went with the coolest ghost in comics.

https://systemmastery.files.wordpress.com/2014/09/systemmastery27.mp3 SystemMastery 27 – Nexus Live Action Roleplaying Time to gather up 50 or so of your greatest friends and then slowly and painfully lose them over the course of a complex, sweaty, argumentative weekend!  We discuss our very first LARP with Nexus, a game of galactic intrigue, simple rules, bad puns and lots and lots of backrubs.  Can the Konathians enslave the Earth before the Inner Empire citizens discover their plot?  Will the space plague spread before people get bored and head to Wendy’s?  Listen in and we’ll find all this out! Let us know what you thought of Nexus in the comments!  Have a book you’d us to cover?  Let us know about that too. Editor’s correction:  The Myriads ARE his grandson, ya dick.

https://systemmastery.files.wordpress.com/2014/08/systemmastery26.mp3 System Mastery 26 – Car Wars Strap in, it’s going to be a dense, chart-heavy ride.  Steve Jackson’s Car Wars is heavy on near-future apocalyptic flavor, and equally heavy on complex movement and combat rules.  It’s a battle of cars, bikes, trucks, trikes, trars, trike-trucks, truck-trikes, and for some reason, helicopters on this 80s-charged episode. Let us know what you thought of Car Wars in the comments!  Have a book you’d us to cover?  Let us know about that too. Editor’s correction:  Upon research, we have determined that Steve Jackson does not look like a Bruce Vilanche type, but rather like the sort of guy that designs beige pebble-plastic 80s computers that can run Oregon Trail.  We remain convinced that he is a cool dude, however.

https://systemmastery.files.wordpress.com/2014/08/systemmastery25.mp3 SystemMastery 25 – D&D Set 1 Basic Rules We celebrate a year’s worth of RPG reviews with a return to a true classic.  The original Red Box D&D, complete with the white crayon for your dice and the $30 registration form for the 1981 RPGA.  Take to the dungeon as a fighter, a magic-user, or perhaps a halfling in one of the earliest iterations of the Dungeons & Dragons name. Let us know what you thought of D&D Basic in the comments!  Have a book you’d us to cover?  Let us know about that too.

https://systemmastery.files.wordpress.com/2014/07/systemmastery24.mp3 SystemMastery 24 – C°ntinuum: Roleplaying in the Yet It’s a time travel game!  More accurately, it’s a game about keeping meticulous detailed notes because the DM might check to see if you did at any second!  Join millions of other time travelers working and playing together, but try not to accidentally erase yourself from existence!  It’s shockingly easy to do, after all.  We review C°ntinuum – Roleplaying in the Yet, all the while wishing it was Roleplaying in the Yeti. Let us know what you thought of C°ntinuum in the comments!  Have a book you’d us to cover?  Let us know about that too. Editor’s correction:  For some reason, we spent the whole podcast thinking this game was called C°ntinuum – Adventures in the Yet.

https://systemmastery.files.wordpress.com/2014/07/systemmastery23.mp3 SystemMastery 23 – Star Wars RPG Our second look at West End Games takes us to a galaxy far, far away, where an antagonistic GM is expected to control the party with an iron (if capricious) fist.  We’ll discuss whether or not Boba Fett lives up to his hype, what the deal is with all that expanded universe stuff, and maybe even briefly talk about the actual RPG we’re ostensibly here for. As always, if you’ve got a suggestion for an RPG, let us know!  We’ve got a little list together and are reading into some of your great suggestions already!

https://systemmastery.files.wordpress.com/2014/07/systemmastery22.mp3 SystemMastery 22 – After the Bomb Wounded and battered from months of learning new systems, we take a brief respite to review something we knew already.  This week, we spend a lot of time talking about Bio-E, the difference between the rad animal men of yesteryear and today’s watered-down furries, and general Palladium shenanigans.

  https://systemmastery.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/systemmastery21.mp3 SystemMastery 21 – Nobilis Have you ever dreamed of being the god of something?  Perhaps the god of socks, or the god of internet memes, or the god of cabbage?  This odd, dense game may be as close as you can get to realize your weird boring dreams, internet friends!  Take a tour through the mind of Rebecca Bergstrom, aka Jenna Moran, aka the Writer clad in Ranunculus, aka the Auctor Errabundus, as we look into the crazy (but interesting) Nobilis!