Oh, look! Another blog post about podcasting… how original!
Regardless, I have been noticing some trends of late on my podcasting stats (yes, of course I keep track of how well my shows are doing), and those trends are a tad… disappointing. You see, when it comes to my solo Actual-Play podcast, “Ronin Roleplaying”, the best performances almost invariably turn out to be the shows very few people listen to!
Part of this is due to the games I am playing in those shows. For example, not that long ago I played the wonderful StitchPunk TTRPG “Threadbare” for a month, and I was really excited to see how people took to it. I felt the story was interesting, the characters were engaging, and one character in particular was such a joy to play that – even as just an NPC – I would love to play him again as an actual PC in the future.
It was just a blast to play, and I think my enthusiasm for the game really came out during the episodes that month. Alas, nobody seems to have listened, because it’s “Threadbare”, and why would they listen to someone solo roleplaying as a stuffed lion named Rufus?
Their loss, I guess, but it is disheartening, to say the least.
Meanwhile, when I play more mainstream games like “The Witcher” or “Old School Essentials”, I get more people listening during initial release, and discovering those shows later on, as well. This isn’t universally true, though. For example, my adventures in “Mörk Borg” came out just last month, and despite this game being wildly popular among indie tabletop roleplaying circles, I find not that many people picked up my little show.
I actually found that rather surprising, to be honest.
But anyway, that’s not the point. What matters here is that what I consider to be some of my finest roleplaying efforts are completely missed by the fans of actual-plays, because they happened to occur when I was playing more obscure titles. It actually makes me sad, because I’m over a year ahead on this show, and have recently finished some of my best solo roleplaying to date, and I just know that, based on current trends, no one will ever hear them.
NOTE – If you have never heard of the TTRPG “Barbarians of the Ruined Earth”, keep an eye out for it here a little less than a year from now. Best. Shows. Ever.
Anyway, I suppose I’ll stop whinging now. But this does make me want to switch things up after a few more seasons of what I’m doing, and try playing just a single, popular game, instead of our current format. Not sure what that might be, but I can figure something out.
