Technology - Why do you Hate Me

7000 miles 

In a little over a month, I'm going to be taking a loong flight with my daughter. From start to finish, our travels will take about 24 hours to traverse. I thought it would be nice to record an audio book for her. Something done in my own voice so she could listen during the more than 12 hours we'll spend in a darkened tube with wings. I told her my plan, and I let her select the book. She chose, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (sorry, it's the physical book is the American version).

So I started reading it today. I was 20 minutes into the recording, when suddenly, my mic dropped out. 

I didn't realize the mic had dropped. I was reading. So I kept reading and reading. Then I realized the gain visualizer wasn't moving.

I left the recording on, figuring I could edit and splice everything together. I unplugged the mic, plugged it back in. I jiggle wires, nothing got it going again.

I paused and unpaused the recording.

I stopped the recording. And suddenly. The mic started picking up again. 

I gave up.

Technical Difficulties

Let's recap the difficulties I have had with recording audio in this office.

1. Audio recorded with my phone is crap.
2. Audacity decided it doesn't want to load.
3. Zoom drops and picks up the mic randomly, throwing error messages like LA gang signs.
4. Mic suddenly cut, with not indication, while recording with Gamecaster.

I'm beginning to think that I'm not meant to work in an audio/visual medium.

I'm going to be honest. I have the desire to do it. But I lack the time and patience to constantly hunt down and put out the little fires and maintenance required. 

I just want to sit down in an afternoon to record 3 short episodes, slap them into a couple of platforms, and be done with it. But the issues of recording are making it more difficult than it is worth. I have barely touched the rules in a month because my free time has been spent getting the podcast listed, setting up YouTube, and trying to get the technical aspects running.

To the Future

Here's the deal, going forward.

1. There are a couple of episodes still scheduled to drop in December. They will be the last. At least for the time being.
2. Each week, I will be putting 1 day's free time into this blog. I can probably throw together 2 or 3 posts in that time.
3. Each week, I will be putting in 1 day's free time into the rules, setting, or other content.
4. This Blog may be migrated to another platform - due to Blogspot's limitations.
5. I'm looking to see what it takes to work with itch.io.

I am undecided about what to do with actual plays. I may write them up as narrative stories. I may pass them to my friend, Brent, who is an amateur novelist. I may just run them for my own purposes and let them drift into the aether.

Disappointment

To be honest, I'm disappointed that the whole podcast thing isn't working out. I never expected it to gain a following, but it was fun to create and throw it out into the world. Admittedly my radio demeanor is crap, but it was still fun run the solo play, and the recording schedule kept me on track.

Who knows? Maybe I'll get a better studio set up in the future.

Episode 8 - Down Time

 In this Episode I playtest the healing and extended activity loop. 

Story wise, Jaephing heals and the Blade Archivists attempt to figure out the artifacts.

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Play Games and Have Fun!

Episode 7 - Induction

 In this episode, Jaephing was taken to the Blade Archivists' lair.

There are about 15 members, and they convinced Jaephing to full commit to the group.

They then tried to figure out the artifacts they scored from the heist.

But Jaephing had his fingers crushed by the machine.

Skills

 Skills in Roll 4 saves are pretty straight forward.

Where background is triggered by the target, or location, or means of the action, skills are representative of the action itself.

There are 8 total skills.

6 of the skills are broad. For example, Move includes running, jumping, flying, as well as moving stealthily. The point is that the PC is Moving from point A to point B, and there might be a consequence for it.

2 of the skills are narrow; specifically, Skirmish and Attune. The reason is that these are the more powerful combat skills. And by giving a combat skill additional uses in a game, it begins to become overpowered.

Consider Dexterity in OGL games. It gives a boost to defense, is used in attacks with certain weapons, and it is used for fine and gross motor skills such as pick pockets and stealth respectively. For an adventure game, this gives a lot of power to Dexterity heavy PCs.

Character Creation

In character creation, the player can simply pick 2 skills they like, or roll d8 twice to generate 2 random skills.

Episode 6 - No Story 1

 This episode took a break from the story. 

Instead I talked about the design of the Roll 4 Saves.

Episode 5 - Fight at the Docks

 This episode picked up with Jaephing on duty.

To add a twist to our session, I through a new faction at the heist.

We randomly created a faction temporarily named the Low Nobles. A bunch of nobles that wish to secure artifacts to both hit the merchant class and to bolster their own position in the aristocracy.

This ended with a physical confrontation between the Blade Archivists and the Low Nobles had a brief dust up. During which, Jaephing handedly proved himself as the dove in, machete swinging.

Background Modifiers

I covered Roll 4 Saves' Backgrounds here. Looking it over will provide context for this post.

Background modifiers are setting specific addons to background. 

In a traditional fantasy game, these could be the PC race.

In an intrigue game, it might be a faction designation.

In a Pokemon, or Magic style game, it might be an elemental affinity.

In a real-world game,, it could be your nationality.

Examples can include:

• Academic - Orc
• Squalid - Brown Cloaks
• Noble - Grass Type
• Wild - Spanish

When either the base background or a modifier is triggered, the PC gains the bonus.

For example, an Orc gains bonuses when dealing with other Orcs, or taking action in an Orcish environment, or when using Orcish items.

Character Creation

Just like backgrounds, the player may pick what they like, or determine their modifier randomly.
I usually try to have about 10, but some setting may have more or less as appropriate.