I seem to have developed a problem with solo tabletop roleplaying games. Which is to say, I like playing them. A lot. Like way too much.
Pretty much every weekend.
Without fail.
And I’m recording every single session for “Ronin Roleplaying”.
I think I’ve stated before that I’m a bit ahead on my shows for RR, right? I’ve noted that I have finalized every episode through Season One (2020-2021), and I am working on Season Two (2022), correct? Yeah, for a weekly podcast, that’s a lot of recording already in the can, and ready to go.
The problem is, at my current level of recording for RR (which I’ve significantly slowed down at this moment, due entirely to the following problem), I could very well have every show through Season Five (2025) done this year. Yes, you read that correctly. That still works out to producing 2-3 months worth of content for the podcast for every actual month.
That simply won’t do. Especially when I am getting new games every single month now, and have dozens I’m itching to play! So, with that in mind, what am I to do?
Well, I have an idea, that might just solve the problem.
I’m thinking of increasing my output on RR. No, seriously… hear me out: What if, just if, I were to start putting out this podcast twice each week?
Now then, this wouldn’t actually kick in until Season Two (next year) at the earliest, as I have Season One completed. But this would solve the problem of producing “too many shows!” while still allowing me to solo roleplay as much as I want each month. Here’s how it might work:
During Season One, I recorded two months worth of shows in a single weekend, one month one one night, the second on the other night. This allowed me to get so fantastically far ahead on the podcast, simply by playing casually over a few months!
Using this new, twice-weekly format, we would do eight to ten sessions for each game, changing each game being played monthly. This would allow me to play thirteen (one each month, plus the Halloween special) different RPGs each season, up from the nine (bi-monthly games in 2021, the Halloween special, plus the Preview episode, and the “Feng Shui 2” shows in 2020) I’m doing in Season One.
So, if I were to make this change, you would get twice as much RR content each week, which I see as a net positive. Plus, more games each season, which is also a net positive!
What I really like about this idea of twice-weekly shows is that I could slow down just a bit, only solo roleplaying every other week, giving me a week in-between recordings to look over the next game, and prepare myself for it. This would mean continuing to produce two months worth of shows each month, while enjoying more content, and keeping things varied.
Changing up shows like this would be weird, though, and I’m not sure how to make it work right yet. If the month changed mid-week, would I start a new adventure, in a new game, at the end of a given week? Or play the old game into the start of the new month, just so the adventure went through the full, climactic week? I’m leaning towards the former idea, but not even sure if this would work at all.
I wrote up a spec-sheet for this plan, and compared it to what I already have plotted out for the podcast. What I found was rather interesting, actually. While via the new plan, I only have enough RPGs for seven seasons worth of RR at this time, as opposed to the ten seasons plotted out on my current podcast plan, the new plan allows me to break out a bunch of games in my digital-only library. Yes, I had been planning to only play games I have in physical form for the podcast, because I just prefer using actual books when I play. But by moving to monthly changes for the podcast, I can have a much greater variety of games played, which keeps things fresh and lively… or at least it should, anyway.
Unfortunately, this does come at a cost. I had been planning to move to switching games every three months in 2022, which meant playing less games per season, but allowing for more in-depth play with each game. In fact, I had already recorded the shows for the first quarter of Season 2, before pondering this plan. So I now have 13 episodes of “Ronin Roleplaying”, where I enjoyed the fantastic horror anthology game, “D13 RPG”… and I may have to scrap them all, because they weren’t recorded with twice-weekly episodes and monthly game changes in mind!
Then again… OH NO! I have to play another weekend of “D13 RPG”, to record new episodes in their place?! What will I ever do?!?
Sorry for the sarcasm, it just sort of slipped out.
