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Rainy Day Roleplaying

This is a subjective opinion, of course, but I think solo roleplaying is a rainy day sort of activity.

Obviously, you can do solo roleplaying whenever and wherever you like… that’s kind of the beauty of the hobby. It has zero limitations, although some locales and social situations might be more… awkward… than others. But on the whole, you can usually find a quiet, secluded place to break out your journal and dice for a bit of the ol’ solo roleplay, regardless of the season or weather.

Despite all this, I find it to be more of a rainy day affair for me. For example, in 2020, despite having copious amounts of free time at home due to the combined effects of Pandemic Lockdown and Recovering from Heart Surgery, I did the vast majority of my solo roleplaying in the Autumn and Winter, trailing off in the Spring. As for this summer, as well as last summer, I have done pretty much zero roleplaying – solo or otherwise.

Perhaps not so coincidentally, it was a very dry summer in 2020 and 2021. No rain – no roleplaying.

So I have lately been worrying that perhaps I have moved beyond solo roleplaying, lost my taste for it, after a fashion. But no, I still look forward to playing my tabletop roleplaying games, especially for my podcast, “Ronin Roleplaying”. But every time I plan to spend a weekend playing some game or other, something always seems to come up. Or I just find other things to do. Often I just fall asleep in my recliner, rather than break out the books and dice.

It does not help that things have been immensely stressful at work this summer, and I was of course still recovering from open heart surgery 12 months ago, and both of these situations didn’t exactly help with getting down to some tabletop roleplaying. But also, it has been beautiful outside, and My Lovely Brideâ„¢ and I, along with our two dogs, have been taking full advantage of this, whenever we can! Weekend drives through the countryside, to the beach, and so forth have really been more of a focus for us this summer… rightly so.

We still avoid others. We are both vaccinated, but we wear masks when we come into contact with other people. We are responsible, but we are also free to travel around our area, and so we have been doing exactly that, while we still can.

This, of course, doesn’t exactly work well with staying up all night roleplaying on my own. That said, the Autumn weather is just around the corner, and as such, I expect I will be breaking out the books and dice really damn soon!

Which is good, because I have a LOT of work to do.

You see, I had already recorded all of the shows for 2021 and 2022, and had been starting work on 2023 last Spring… then I changed my mind. I ended up not only scrapping the 2023 shows I had recorded, I scrapped all of my shows for 2022, as well! Why? Because I simply wasn’t satisfied with what I had made, even though the games I played were mostly a lot of fun. I just wasn’t satisfied with the format we were using.

So I consulted the listeners with a poll or two, got some feedback, and decided to change up the format, starting next season (2022). I’m not going into particulars here, but watch this space near the end of the year for more information on what is to come! Regardless, I think it will make for more enjoyable and consistent shows, with perhaps a bit more polish than we have right now.

I will say one thing about the changes coming to RR, though: While thus far I have generally played games I enjoy, or have been really looking forward to trying, in Season 2 and beyond, this is a Hard Rule. I won’t be playing games from my vast library, simply because I need to stretch out the content to cover ten seasons (as I had been doing thus far, planning shows through 2030). With Season 2 and beyond, I will only play games I am truly excited about, and if they turn out to suck, I will be trashing those shows and doing something different, instead.

In short, no more Bullshit games. Sorry, Palladium.

Also, I won’t be planning out seasons beyond the following year, and that will remain in flux, as needed. Currently I have a baseline idea what I’ll be playing for 2022, because I will start recording those shows “soonish”. Maybe next week, maybe next month… who knows? But soon, anyway. I expect l will have most of 2022 done by Christmas, or shortly after the holidays, but then again, I’m not locking myself into any timetables. It will be done when I say it is, and I’m happy with the final result. period.

Anyway, bring on the rain.

Scormus
I'm the editor, publisher, and primary "talent" here at Scormey.com.
https://scormey.com

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