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Speaker 1: Hey, this is Annie, and you're listening to stuff I've

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Speaker 1: never told you. Today, I'm joined by someone whose voice

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Speaker 1: you might recognize, the one Tracy V. Wilson, co host

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Speaker 1: of the podcast Stuff You Missed in History Class. Thank

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Speaker 1: you so much for joining us. Tracy, thank you for

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Speaker 1: having me. I'm excited to be here. I'm so excited

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Speaker 1: to have you. And today we're talking about something we

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Speaker 1: both really enjoy. Tabletop gaming. That's true, it's gonna be

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Speaker 1: really fun and peek behind the scenes. I used to

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Speaker 1: produce and edit a show that Tracy and Holly hosted

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Speaker 1: previously called pop Stuff. Yes, were you? Were you our

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Speaker 1: producer when we did the episode that we did about

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Speaker 1: tabletop games way back then? I was. I was, so,

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Speaker 1: we're like coming full sir. Cool. Yeah, we had some

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Speaker 1: some shifts and who did what and I couldn't remember

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Speaker 1: exactly where that fell in the timeline. Yeah, yeah, I'm

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Speaker 1: pretty sure as the producer of the entire time of

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Speaker 1: that show. It was really fun to work on too.

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Speaker 1: It was it was a fun deal. It was. Today,

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Speaker 1: as I mentioned, we are talking about tabletop gaming, and

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Speaker 1: I think it would probably be a good thing to

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Speaker 1: start with a definition. Um when we say tabletop games,

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Speaker 1: what do we mean? What does that encompass? I think

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Speaker 1: it encompasses everything that's meant to be played around a table,

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Speaker 1: So it goes from card games to role playing games,

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Speaker 1: to board games, to anything that you would get in

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Speaker 1: a group and play around a table. I also know

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Speaker 1: that some people have kind of a more exclusive definition

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Speaker 1: than that, and they only want to include the ones

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Speaker 1: that they think are real games. That sounds very similar

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Speaker 1: to like the whole video game debate of like the

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Speaker 1: real exactly. Yeah, it has. Sometimes you will talk to

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Speaker 1: folks that they don't want to think that Clue is

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Speaker 1: a tabletop game because you can just buy that at

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Speaker 1: the regular toy store, and I think that's a silly argument.

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Speaker 1: I agree that is very silly. We are a big

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Speaker 1: tabletop game playing office here. Um we have a tabletop

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Speaker 1: gaming night once a month at work and a group

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Speaker 1: of us in office. As you've heard me mentioned before

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Speaker 1: on the show, I think we are in a Dungeons

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Speaker 1: and Dragons campaign and I'm about to dungeon master for

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Speaker 1: the first time. Very nervous, very excited. Both that is,

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Speaker 1: that's one of the things I'm envious about and not

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Speaker 1: not working locally to the rest of you, is that

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Speaker 1: that is the thing that I don't get to participate in. Yeah, well,

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Speaker 1: if you're ever like next time you're in town, we

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Speaker 1: should move the date and make it happen. Have Tracy's

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Speaker 1: sort of one shot expendable character showing up in the campaign.

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Speaker 1: We can make this happen Racy. Um. Yeah, and I

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Speaker 1: one thing I wanted to note here because we are

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Speaker 1: going to be looking at diversity and women in tabletop gaming,

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Speaker 1: but the crew that I play with is about even

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Speaker 1: in terms of male to female. In fact, I think

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Speaker 1: it's more female. Generally, we do get a you know,

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Speaker 1: one shot player come in sometimes it shifts the ratio,

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Speaker 1: but on on average it's even. It's even. Yeah. I

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Speaker 1: have three role playing games that I'm playing in right now.

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Speaker 1: None of them are playing every week, once every two weeks,

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Speaker 1: and the other two are usually once a month. And

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Speaker 1: one of the games sometimes I'm the only woman at

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Speaker 1: the table. It depends a little bit on who's available

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Speaker 1: that day. One of the others is about a fifty

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Speaker 1: fifty and my favorite of the games. Not to diss

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Speaker 1: any of the gms running these games, but my favorite

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Speaker 1: of the game has four players. Only one is a

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Speaker 1: man and the guy running the campaign as a man.

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Speaker 1: But the fact that the men are in the minority

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Speaker 1: is a nice change of pace in that world for me. Yeah. Um,

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Speaker 1: and I I'm pretty new to the whole thing. This

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Speaker 1: this campaign I'm playing with co workers is the first

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Speaker 1: time I've ever played, so I haven't experienced much outside

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Speaker 1: of that. I have played online since I started this

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Speaker 1: in person campaign, So that is an option that it's

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Speaker 1: a thing. Yeah. My husband runs several campaigns that he

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Speaker 1: does exclusively online, and he used to run a local

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Speaker 1: campaign that had mostly local people but a couple of

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Speaker 1: people who had moved out of state and they were

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Speaker 1: looped in on Google Hangout or Skype or something similar.

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Speaker 1: So that is a thing that can be done. There

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Speaker 1: whole tools to let people do that more efficiently and

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Speaker 1: have you know, little figurines on the screen of where

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Speaker 1: people's characters are and that kind of thing. Cool. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: we were doing it um on Google Hangouts and I

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Speaker 1: must slow typer and that was my biggest problem I

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Speaker 1: encountered was people would get there before me and I'd

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Speaker 1: have to retype something else. Um. But if if you

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Speaker 1: don't if you want to play and maybe doing it

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Speaker 1: in person isn't an option. That is something that you

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Speaker 1: could look into. Yeah, um, what is your history Tracy

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Speaker 1: and tabletop gaming? How did you get into it? Well,

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Speaker 1: when I was a kid, we had some of the

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Speaker 1: standard games that folks often have when their children at home,

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Speaker 1: like candy Land and Shoots and Ladders and that kind

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Speaker 1: of thing. But it was really my grandmother had two games.

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Speaker 1: They were Monopoly and Battleship. And so my brother and

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Speaker 1: my cousin and I we were the only three cousins

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Speaker 1: on that side of the family, and every time we

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Speaker 1: went to visit my grandmother, we would play one of

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Speaker 1: those games. Although normally, for some reason, it was me

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Speaker 1: and my cousin gagging up on my brother until he

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Speaker 1: would get so mad he would throw the board, which

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Speaker 1: is not a productive way to play a game. No,

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Speaker 1: it set the stage maybe for later rivalry, but that

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Speaker 1: was the real starting point. I kind of went on

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Speaker 1: a journey from there that that was not so much

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Speaker 1: about tormenting my brother just a little bit. Maybe sometimes. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I our work game night, we've banned Monopoly, and uh,

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Speaker 1: I remember distinctly as a child, I've never wont to

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Speaker 1: gave Monopoly ever, and I even cheated more than once

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Speaker 1: and still lost. Monopoly is one of the most maligned games,

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Speaker 1: I think, and one of the interesting things about it

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Speaker 1: is that it's based on a game called the Landlords Game,

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Speaker 1: which was developed by a woman who was developing this

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Speaker 1: game because she wanted to show the dangers of capitalism.

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Speaker 1: So it actually had two different sets of rules. One

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Speaker 1: set of rules was based on this proposed tax change

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Speaker 1: that was going to be way more equal in the

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Speaker 1: distribution of wealth, and the other was like the monopolists

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Speaker 1: rules set, and those rules made meant that, you know,

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Speaker 1: one person became really really rich and everybody else lost

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Speaker 1: their money, and the whole idea was to show everybody

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Speaker 1: that that was but you know, the danger of capitalism.

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Speaker 1: But when later on first someone stole her idea and

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Speaker 1: then bought her patent for a tiny amount of money,

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Speaker 1: they kept only the rules for the capitalists because it's

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Speaker 1: uh more fun. I guess to play that way. Her

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Speaker 1: name was Lizzie McGee. There's a whole story there. Yeah, um,

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Speaker 1: I want to play her version of Monopoly. Yeah. I

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Speaker 1: like the idea of having a version of Monopoly where

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Speaker 1: the whole purpose is that everyone winds up with enough money, right,

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Speaker 1: that's almost difficult for me to imagine. UM. I also

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Speaker 1: got into tabletop gaming when I was pretty young, although

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Speaker 1: similar to video games, which I also got into when

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Speaker 1: I was young, I didn't I wouldn't have called myself

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Speaker 1: a tabletop gamer until recently, even though it was something

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Speaker 1: I was doing. UM, I just didn't think of it

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Speaker 1: in that way. But when I was little, we had

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Speaker 1: a whole board game closet and I used to semi

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Speaker 1: look forward to um when the power would go out,

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Speaker 1: because it meant that my whole family would gather in

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Speaker 1: the living room and we would usually have a fire,

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Speaker 1: candles and we would play board games. And there was

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Speaker 1: something I loved about. There's no TV, no video games.

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Speaker 1: This is what we're gonna do, And it was one

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Speaker 1: of the rare times that we would do something together. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: I think that's one of the coolest things about most

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Speaker 1: of these games is that I only play them with

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Speaker 1: people I would also just hang out with. Like, I'm

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Speaker 1: not going to go play some sabletop games with people

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Speaker 1: who I actively dislike. Uh, It's it's all about spending

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Speaker 1: time together and actually having fun, which you're you're wanting

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Speaker 1: the power to go out story reminds me of and

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Speaker 1: and kind of going off of that. There are some

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Speaker 1: benefits of tabletop gaming. Um, it has a couple of

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Speaker 1: help benefits. It can be a therapeutic activity that is

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Speaker 1: beneficial for teens or children or adults to learn how

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Speaker 1: to socialize. I personally got into D and D last

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Speaker 1: year as a way to help manage my c PTSD,

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Speaker 1: and I also used it to help me figure out

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Speaker 1: the ending of the book I was writing. And I

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Speaker 1: absolutely figured out the ending right away after the first session.

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Speaker 1: I think because I was playing the main character of

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Speaker 1: the book and I knew what she would do right away. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: that's awesome. I didn't ever, I didn't get into gay

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Speaker 1: mean as a way to deal with my anxiety. But universally,

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Speaker 1: if I show up at game night and I am

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Speaker 1: just a ball of anxiety, I feel better by the end. Yeah. Sometimes,

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Speaker 1: I mean, sometimes it's just that when we are in

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Speaker 1: this fantasy world, there are predictable rules that govern the world,

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Speaker 1: and being there is kind of comforting. And then sometimes

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Speaker 1: it's more like I got to take out my aggression

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Speaker 1: by lighting some evil things on fire. Yeah, that surprisingly

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Speaker 1: does help release some aggression I've found. Yeah. Another thing

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Speaker 1: that it does is playing these games can help promote empathy.

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Speaker 1: It can help kids in the development of memory and

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Speaker 1: cognitive skills like problem solving. I would also say, especially

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Speaker 1: in role playing games, creativity, storytelling, teamwork, improvisation, adaptability, and confidence.

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Speaker 1: I can say confidence. That was a big one for

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Speaker 1: me playing D and D in the beginning, because I

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Speaker 1: was so nervous about it. Yeah, I guess my character

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Speaker 1: does this. But it's been like a year and a

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Speaker 1: half now, and my I'm very much more like she

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Speaker 1: throws a bomb at that person. Yeah. Yeah, that just

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Speaker 1: reminded me of hearing Temple grand In talk about UM.

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Speaker 1: Temple Grandon is an animal husbandry expert who was also autistic,

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Speaker 1: and she talked about one of the ways that she

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Speaker 1: really learned to interact with people was that she and

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Speaker 1: her family played games when she was little. UM that

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Speaker 1: involved a lot of rules and a lot of taking

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Speaker 1: turns and a lot of having sort of predictable actions

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Speaker 1: that we're supposed to happen, and that really helped her

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Speaker 1: learn ways to interact with other people. Yeah, Um, I

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Speaker 1: could see that. Another thing is if you're running the game,

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Speaker 1: which is sometimes called like GM gamemastering or d M.

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Speaker 1: In the case of D and D dungeon master, you

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Speaker 1: can add project management and organizational skills to the mix.

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Speaker 1: I can say, as I'm preparing to do this right

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Speaker 1: now so much, yes, and just trying to predict what

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Speaker 1: a group of very different people is going to do,

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Speaker 1: and then knowing in the back of my head that

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Speaker 1: really I can't predict it, try my best. Yeah, it

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Speaker 1: is like I feel like I'm running a project right now. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: One of the worst UM tabletop gaming experiences I've ever

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Speaker 1: had was way back in college where it was everybody's

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Speaker 1: early time, Like none of us had a lot of

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Speaker 1: experience either playing the game or running the game. It

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Speaker 1: was a whole group of very inexperienced people, but the

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Speaker 1: d M expected us to do something and we just

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Speaker 1: did not do that thing, and he was completely unprepared

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Speaker 1: for that eventuality, and then we all died, and then

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Speaker 1: everyone was mad at everyone, and just that we just

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Speaker 1: didn't play that again for a while. Yeah, I had

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Speaker 1: to take a step back. We had a similar experience

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Speaker 1: happened recently where UM we it was kind of like

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Speaker 1: the trolley car problem. We were faced with the fact

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Speaker 1: that either the entire party was going to die or

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Speaker 1: we were going to fail our mission, and the town

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Speaker 1: we were supposed to be saving, they were all going

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Speaker 1: to die, and uh, we chose to save ourselves. And

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Speaker 1: afterwards we kept kind of mentioning and passing. I can't

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Speaker 1: stop thinking about that village. And it's an imaginary village,

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Speaker 1: but you feel it, you get invested in it. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: We had a really similar thing in one of the

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Speaker 1: games that I'm playing, which is based on a system

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Speaker 1: called Fate, And in Fate, your characters have different aspects

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Speaker 1: and you figure out what they are kind of collaboratively,

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Speaker 1: and then you that your actions in the game a

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Speaker 1: lot of times are connected to them. And we are

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Speaker 1: in this sort of post apocalyptic world where we have

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Speaker 1: just had a series of we show up somewhere a

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Speaker 1: bad things happening. We fix the bad thing, but at

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Speaker 1: what cost. And there was one time when the options

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Speaker 1: were we fail at doing this, or we burn this

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Speaker 1: place down, and without hesitation, we were like, We're just

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Speaker 1: gonna have to burn it down. It's the only thing

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Speaker 1: that's gonna work. I think maybe, um, just in case

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Speaker 1: anyone listening is unsure of what is involved in playing

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Speaker 1: like D and d R role playing game. It's essentially

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Speaker 1: somebody designs a game or you can find pre design

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Speaker 1: games online, and then you all the players have a

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Speaker 1: character that they can role play. Some people don't like

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Speaker 1: the actual role playing bit, but you can act as

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Speaker 1: much as you want on there. And then you're in

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Speaker 1: a group and you sort of it's, I don't know,

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Speaker 1: like a board game, but you're the you're the pieces

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Speaker 1: moving around and talk with each other and um trying

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Speaker 1: to figure out what your character would do. And you

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Speaker 1: get missions save a town from a dragon that sometimes

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Speaker 1: you fail and the whole town gets burned. It's kind

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Speaker 1: of like when you're a kid and you are playing

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Speaker 1: Make believe when with your friends, but there's a structure

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Speaker 1: to kind of guide your collaborative make believe. Yes, yeah,

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Speaker 1: there there's a lot of UM rules, rule books. Uh,

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Speaker 1: there is some you know, calculation of of health points

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Speaker 1: and math involved UM And that's one thing which we'll

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Speaker 1: get into more later. But that's one thing that kept

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Speaker 1: me from it for a while is because I thought

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Speaker 1: it looked so complicated. Yeah, yeah, there are there can

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Speaker 1: be not necessarily, there can be many different types of

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Speaker 1: dice yeah, oh yeah. I asked for dice for my

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Speaker 1: mom last year for Christmas and she got me. I

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Speaker 1: must have hundreds of dice she got me way to

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Speaker 1: I'm very thankful, but it kind of cracks me up

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Speaker 1: every time. No shortage of dice choices. Nope. But if

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Speaker 1: we go back to the possible health benefits, why talking

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Speaker 1: about this matters at all? Another thing it can do

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Speaker 1: is reduce stress, sort of what we're talking about before,

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Speaker 1: unless you're playing something like Monopoly or I would add

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Speaker 1: risk a risk was a very stressful endeavor for me

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Speaker 1: and my siblings growing up. Yeah. Yeah. My husband likes

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Speaker 1: to play a game called Spirit Island, and I love

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Speaker 1: the idea of the game because a lot of games

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Speaker 1: have this setting where it's sort of like you're the

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Speaker 1: colonizers and the goal is to colonize this place, and

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Speaker 1: Spirit Island is the opposite, like you are the spirits

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Speaker 1: of this island and you're working with its indigenous inhabitants

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Speaker 1: to drive the colonizer's away. And I'm like, I'm on board.

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Speaker 1: I'm on board with that, but it's a game that

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Speaker 1: has so many layers of things going on that I'm

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Speaker 1: also like, this is a little more complex that I

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Speaker 1: want to spend my my fun time on. Yeah, And

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Speaker 1: that's something that I think people who aren't involved in

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Speaker 1: tabletop gaming might not realize that there are so many

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Speaker 1: options out there for you. And I have friends who

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Speaker 1: don't or haven't previously liked tabletop gaming because they're they

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Speaker 1: don't like competition, they're not competitive stresses them out. But

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Speaker 1: there are so many games that aren't that way. And um,

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Speaker 1: we're going to give some recommendations at the end, and

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Speaker 1: one of the ones that I'm going to recommend is

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Speaker 1: it's like more cooperative. Yeah, there's a whole genre of

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Speaker 1: cooperative games. And if people watch Parks and Wreck and

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Speaker 1: they've seen that episode about the Cones of dun Shire

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Speaker 1: and they think that's what all these games are like, Like,

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Speaker 1: there are games that are kind of like the Cones

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Speaker 1: of Dunshire. A lot of them are way more chill

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Speaker 1: and are more like an elegant but challenging, simple system. Right,

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Speaker 1: I forgot about the Cones of don't dun Shire. I

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Speaker 1: recently reminded of the thirty Rock version, which is like

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Speaker 1: colonizers of I don't know, but it's it's sellers of Catan. Yeah, yeah. Um,

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Speaker 1: a two thous and three study out of the New

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Speaker 1: England Journal of Medicine linked playing board games with decreased

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Speaker 1: risk of Alzheimer's and dementia. And I just wanted to

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Speaker 1: throw this in there in here because I thought it

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Speaker 1: was so interesting. Students at Gettysburg College use clue as

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Speaker 1: a way to practice creating an AI. Yeah, that's really cool.

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Speaker 1: While while we were getting ready for this episode, a

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Speaker 1: thing that I meant to mention earlier was that there's

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Speaker 1: also a study about mah jong and older people and

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Speaker 1: um like people in retirement communities and it helping both

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Speaker 1: with hand eye coordination and with basically having less stress

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Speaker 1: and more social activity, which I thought was really cool. Yeah. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: if we look at numbers, it seems that more and

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Speaker 1: more people are getting into tabletop gaming. If you look

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Speaker 1: at the hobby gaming market, which includes collectibles like Pokemon

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Speaker 1: cards and dice, board games, role playing games, and miniatures,

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Speaker 1: between sales doubled money wise, that's an increase from eight

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Speaker 1: hundred million to one point four billion. And I do

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Speaker 1: want to mention about miniatures here. So if you're playing

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Speaker 1: something like D and D, you can get these um miniatures.

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Speaker 1: They're little figurines and you can use that to represent

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Speaker 1: your character to move around, and that is another area

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Speaker 1: where he can be I've seen people do amazing artistic

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Speaker 1: creative stuff. I have my own little miniature. I've painted it.

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Speaker 1: It's not good, but I had fun doing it. I

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Speaker 1: have I have my one, uh, sort of adequately painted miniature.

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Speaker 1: My husband plays some games that are totally based in miniatures,

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Speaker 1: so he has these whole armies of painted miniatures. He

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Speaker 1: finds the painting part really relaxing, and he hasn't been

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Speaker 1: playing them as much recently. And I'm like, there's a

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Speaker 1: whole we have a whole shelf full of man's over here,

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Speaker 1: like you're gonna play with that? They're ready to go.

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Speaker 1: Um And because sort of a way I think to

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Speaker 1: to see the growth of tabletop gaming is through these

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Speaker 1: board game cafes and bars, which I have seen more

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Speaker 1: and more of. Um. There's gin Con, which is the

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Speaker 1: largest gaming convention in the United States. It's over fifty

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Speaker 1: years old and attendance broke records. I've never been, Have

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Speaker 1: you been, Tracy, I have not been. I have been

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Speaker 1: to other conventions that have tabletop gaming, like it's a

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Speaker 1: big component, but at about the same time that I

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Speaker 1: had enough interest and enough different types of games that

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Speaker 1: I wanted to go to an event just for that,

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Speaker 1: I also had become way less enamored with giant conventions

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Speaker 1: and a lot happier at smaller events. One of my favorite,

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Speaker 1: not even one of my my absolute favorite vacation every

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Speaker 1: year is that a bunch of friends rents a big

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Speaker 1: old house out in the poke knows and we go

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Speaker 1: out there for a long weekend and play a bunch

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Speaker 1: of games and like hang out and it's awesome. It's

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Speaker 1: like thirty five people, not thousand people, much more manageable crowdside.

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Speaker 1: And then also, if you just want to read a book,

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Speaker 1: nobody's going to bother you. It's fine, right you can.

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Speaker 1: You can step away more easily should you so desire.

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Speaker 1: If we look at the number of female tabletop gamers,

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Speaker 1: data is difficult to come by, we can safely assume

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Speaker 1: that more women are playing now than previously, as more

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Speaker 1: people are playing in general. At gen Con, over half

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Speaker 1: the speakers were women, and that's huge considering that only

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Speaker 1: one of the speakers was female. It's not enough, oh no,

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Speaker 1: And I bet some of you will remember this from

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Speaker 1: your social media feeds. A panel at gen Con called

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Speaker 1: writing Women Friendly Comics at first had no women on

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Speaker 1: the panel. Yeah. Yeah, since I know several game developers,

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Speaker 1: many of them are women, and they've been doing this

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Speaker 1: thing where they go and submit a bunch of panels

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Speaker 1: to conventions and they don't really announce that they are

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Speaker 1: submitting a whole bunch of panels that only have women

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Speaker 1: and non binary people on them, just sneaking in there.

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Speaker 1: And then people show up and it's a panel that

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Speaker 1: is all women and non binary folks, and they're like, oh,

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Speaker 1: this is awesome. This is a bunch of women, and

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Speaker 1: they're talking about something besides being women in this space, right,

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Speaker 1: because we can talk about other things. It's true, yes,

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Speaker 1: but that is at least in my head, and I

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Speaker 1: would guess a lot of people's heads. That's the stereotype.

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Speaker 1: If you think of a tabletop gamer, it's a youngish

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Speaker 1: white male. Yeah, And the conventions I have been to

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Speaker 1: are like, youngish white males are the largest demographic, like

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Speaker 1: not only demographic, but for sure the biggest one. And

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Speaker 1: there are a few informal surveys out there that suggest

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Speaker 1: people who identify as women make up only ten of

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Speaker 1: board game players and that the majority of the respondents

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Speaker 1: in these surveys UM are white. Yeah. I always wonder

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Speaker 1: sort of what we were talking about at the beginning

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Speaker 1: with video games is how people are defining what counts

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Speaker 1: as a board game player, because a lot of the

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Speaker 1: studies that suggest that men are overwhelmingly the people playing

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Speaker 1: video games are just disregarding the games that are most

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Speaker 1: popular among women. And so I kind of wonder if

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Speaker 1: if these definitions are including things like party games that

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Speaker 1: women might be playing more than they might be playing

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Speaker 1: you know, Settlers of Ten right there, and maybe so

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Speaker 1: maybe it might be a little closer. I mean, I know,

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Speaker 1: as kids, games are for everyone, and then it's it's

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Speaker 1: an adulthood that suddenly it seems like there is a

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00:24:02,440 --> 00:24:07,560
Speaker 1: world of specialty game stores that um have a largely

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Speaker 1: often male demographic. Yeah. And while I was looking into

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Speaker 1: the research for this episode there it's kind of a

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Speaker 1: new area of academic study. UM. But a lot of

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Speaker 1: people have been writing about it and are writing about it,

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Speaker 1: and from what I read, several women said, I know

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Speaker 1: that this is the stereotype, but that's not been my experience. UM.

403
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Speaker 1: I've always had women people of color playing in my group, Yeah,

404
00:24:40,359 --> 00:24:44,040
Speaker 1: which is interesting. Yeah, when it comes to the people

405
00:24:44,040 --> 00:24:46,960
Speaker 1: that I personally know and hang out with. UM. But

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00:24:47,040 --> 00:24:53,080
Speaker 1: it's not just an overwhelmingly male scene. It's it's when

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Speaker 1: I get into a gigantic group of people at something

408
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Speaker 1: like a convention, and I just I don't think that's

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Speaker 1: totally reflective of who's really playing games, right, And I

410
00:25:02,800 --> 00:25:07,239
Speaker 1: always think in surveys like the one we're discussing, a

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Speaker 1: lot of times they're self selecting who's right answer that survey,

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Speaker 1: it might more likely be this type of like white, young,

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Speaker 1: white male. UM. But we do have some more concrete

414
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Speaker 1: numbers on the development side. Selling board games in sixteen

415
00:25:23,040 --> 00:25:25,679
Speaker 1: were all designed by men, and the nineteen nominees for

416
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Speaker 1: Game of the Year awards between of those, none of

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Speaker 1: them identified as women. And you, Tracy, have put me

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Speaker 1: in touch with some amazing women in the space, and

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Speaker 1: we're going to do a whole follow up episode on

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Speaker 1: the development side of tabletop gaming. I'm very excited about that.

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Speaker 1: Those are some of my favorite people. I mean, I'm

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Speaker 1: just gonna go ahead and say thank you. Two of

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Speaker 1: them are people I talked to literally every day of

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Speaker 1: my life. Yes, so excited. UM, So so we'll we'll

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Speaker 1: come back to we'll follow up with that. UM. For me,

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Speaker 1: when I first got into tabletop gaming, especially something like

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Speaker 1: D and D, I was very intimidated by it. I

428
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Speaker 1: remember distinctly being at dragon Con a couple of years ago,

429
00:26:10,960 --> 00:26:13,720
Speaker 1: and UM, me and some new friends were discussing what

430
00:26:13,800 --> 00:26:16,720
Speaker 1: kind of games we enjoyed, and when these new friends

431
00:26:16,720 --> 00:26:19,639
Speaker 1: of mine, who were all men, asked if I liked

432
00:26:19,720 --> 00:26:22,480
Speaker 1: tabletop games like D and D. Before before he had

433
00:26:22,520 --> 00:26:25,959
Speaker 1: even finished asking the question, I was like frantically shaking

434
00:26:26,000 --> 00:26:30,119
Speaker 1: my head. Um. And I have looked back at that moment.

435
00:26:30,920 --> 00:26:33,119
Speaker 1: I tried to get to the bottom of why I

436
00:26:33,240 --> 00:26:35,600
Speaker 1: felt that way and why I felt so intimidated, And

437
00:26:35,640 --> 00:26:38,199
Speaker 1: I do think it's because I thought it was something

438
00:26:38,320 --> 00:26:43,280
Speaker 1: for mostly dudes who wouldn't have the patience to teach me,

439
00:26:44,359 --> 00:26:46,359
Speaker 1: who wouldn't want to play with me, who might be

440
00:26:46,440 --> 00:26:48,560
Speaker 1: sexist or me, and if I did play with them,

441
00:26:48,600 --> 00:26:50,440
Speaker 1: and then kind of expect me to just well, this

442
00:26:50,560 --> 00:26:54,120
Speaker 1: is the game, it's fun. Um. And like I said,

443
00:26:54,119 --> 00:26:56,600
Speaker 1: I also thought I'd be really complicated to get into

444
00:26:57,200 --> 00:27:00,200
Speaker 1: and it sort of stressed me out. The thought of

445
00:27:00,600 --> 00:27:03,680
Speaker 1: acting or improving even though I'm somebody who does that

446
00:27:03,760 --> 00:27:06,639
Speaker 1: like I act and I do improv. For some reason,

447
00:27:06,680 --> 00:27:08,960
Speaker 1: the idea of having to do it with a group

448
00:27:09,000 --> 00:27:12,280
Speaker 1: of people really made me nervous. But you don't have to.

449
00:27:12,760 --> 00:27:15,560
Speaker 1: That is one thing you can do that stuff, uh

450
00:27:15,600 --> 00:27:19,879
Speaker 1: to the level of your comfort, right right? Yeah. I

451
00:27:19,920 --> 00:27:24,240
Speaker 1: think I had a related but slightly different response to

452
00:27:24,320 --> 00:27:29,880
Speaker 1: the same, not exactly the same perception, because in my

453
00:27:30,160 --> 00:27:34,600
Speaker 1: college years in early twenties, my gaming life was sort

454
00:27:34,640 --> 00:27:39,280
Speaker 1: of rooted in some internalized misogyny because I had that

455
00:27:39,320 --> 00:27:41,360
Speaker 1: whole idea that a lot of things that were typically

456
00:27:41,400 --> 00:27:44,680
Speaker 1: feminine were bad and that there was some kind of

457
00:27:44,800 --> 00:27:48,720
Speaker 1: value in being in quotation marks not like the other girls.

458
00:27:48,840 --> 00:27:51,719
Speaker 1: So I was mostly hanging out with men, and I

459
00:27:51,760 --> 00:27:54,040
Speaker 1: was mostly hanging out with men because I sort of

460
00:27:54,080 --> 00:27:58,600
Speaker 1: felt like somehow women weren't as fun to hang out with.

461
00:27:58,640 --> 00:28:00,760
Speaker 1: All of this was incorrect. I'm used out onto like

462
00:28:00,840 --> 00:28:05,280
Speaker 1: some amazing friendships because of this like internal baggage, But

463
00:28:05,600 --> 00:28:08,000
Speaker 1: that meant that I was mostly hanging out with guys,

464
00:28:08,040 --> 00:28:10,040
Speaker 1: and I was mostly hanging out with guys who were

465
00:28:10,040 --> 00:28:14,719
Speaker 1: playing a very particular style of of board gaming and

466
00:28:14,720 --> 00:28:18,520
Speaker 1: and role playing games specifically, and it wasn't until I

467
00:28:18,560 --> 00:28:21,760
Speaker 1: got probably into my thirties that I was like, oh wait,

468
00:28:22,320 --> 00:28:25,679
Speaker 1: there is a whole world of games beyond that that

469
00:28:26,320 --> 00:28:30,160
Speaker 1: is more welcoming to more types of people than what

470
00:28:30,240 --> 00:28:33,520
Speaker 1: was back there before. And you know, then I also

471
00:28:33,600 --> 00:28:40,760
Speaker 1: started working on my whole internalized problem, you know, on

472
00:28:40,960 --> 00:28:43,719
Speaker 1: step at a time. I had a similar thing with

473
00:28:43,880 --> 00:28:46,280
Speaker 1: video games where I felt like it somehow made me

474
00:28:46,600 --> 00:28:49,400
Speaker 1: like I wore like a badge of honor that I

475
00:28:49,440 --> 00:28:53,520
Speaker 1: was playing these video games with with all men um.

476
00:28:53,600 --> 00:28:56,640
Speaker 1: But for me to get into the tabletop gaming, I

477
00:28:56,680 --> 00:28:59,080
Speaker 1: do owe a lot of people, some men, some women,

478
00:28:59,160 --> 00:29:02,000
Speaker 1: But it's sort of felt like it happened all at

479
00:29:02,040 --> 00:29:04,280
Speaker 1: once that everybody was telling me, You've got to play

480
00:29:04,320 --> 00:29:05,760
Speaker 1: this board game that I've never heard of, and you

481
00:29:05,800 --> 00:29:07,600
Speaker 1: gotta play this board game that I've never heard of.

482
00:29:08,000 --> 00:29:10,280
Speaker 1: I don't know if there was just some surge of

483
00:29:10,320 --> 00:29:14,960
Speaker 1: popularity somewhere, but I owe a lot of friends for

484
00:29:15,080 --> 00:29:18,320
Speaker 1: introducing me to all of these amazing games and and

485
00:29:18,400 --> 00:29:24,640
Speaker 1: sort of to this whole world that was yeah, yeah,

486
00:29:24,680 --> 00:29:26,719
Speaker 1: And you and I are not the only ones who

487
00:29:26,800 --> 00:29:30,880
Speaker 1: have felt that tabletop games were not for us. And

488
00:29:30,880 --> 00:29:33,040
Speaker 1: we'll get into some reasons why after a quick break

489
00:29:33,240 --> 00:29:45,200
Speaker 1: for word from our sponsor, m and we're back, Thank

490
00:29:45,200 --> 00:29:49,160
Speaker 1: you sponsor. Like a lot of our media, tabletop games

491
00:29:49,680 --> 00:29:54,560
Speaker 1: do not have the best track record with positive female

492
00:29:54,560 --> 00:30:00,000
Speaker 1: portrayals and providing diverse characters games that have a les

493
00:30:00,000 --> 00:30:03,880
Speaker 1: her amount of female characters if any. UM. We mentioned

494
00:30:03,920 --> 00:30:07,640
Speaker 1: in our episode around female action figures that Asboro gotten

495
00:30:07,760 --> 00:30:11,400
Speaker 1: some hot water for leaving the female character ray out

496
00:30:11,400 --> 00:30:13,600
Speaker 1: of the newest version of Star Wars Monopoly, and my

497
00:30:13,640 --> 00:30:17,680
Speaker 1: favorite part of that was their response, She'll be another games.

498
00:30:18,080 --> 00:30:20,640
Speaker 1: It's not a great answer. We'll put her in a

499
00:30:20,720 --> 00:30:24,200
Speaker 1: future game. She's not here now. And it was they

500
00:30:24,240 --> 00:30:29,120
Speaker 1: replaced her with a stormtrooper. It was a character. She's

501
00:30:29,160 --> 00:30:33,720
Speaker 1: a she's a big character for those that don't know. UM.

502
00:30:33,960 --> 00:30:35,960
Speaker 1: For her not to be included was a pretty big deal.

503
00:30:37,280 --> 00:30:41,880
Speaker 1: Perhaps there are female characters, but they are overly sexualized

504
00:30:42,080 --> 00:30:49,120
Speaker 1: or they are relegated to traditionally female less active roles. Yeah,

505
00:30:49,320 --> 00:30:52,680
Speaker 1: it's like you'll have a game that's based on cards

506
00:30:52,720 --> 00:30:55,680
Speaker 1: with characters drawn on them, and for some reason the

507
00:30:55,840 --> 00:30:59,600
Speaker 1: women are all teachers and secretaries. Right would that be?

508
00:31:00,120 --> 00:31:04,480
Speaker 1: I can't imagine or um. I always love the critique

509
00:31:04,520 --> 00:31:08,600
Speaker 1: of when armors so sexualized and clearly that's not going

510
00:31:08,640 --> 00:31:13,760
Speaker 1: to help you in the fighting situation. Um, it's kind

511
00:31:13,760 --> 00:31:16,120
Speaker 1: of a running joke, and yet we still continue to

512
00:31:16,160 --> 00:31:18,280
Speaker 1: see it. And I will say, I got no problem.

513
00:31:18,280 --> 00:31:20,040
Speaker 1: If you wanna, in a game like D and D

514
00:31:20,240 --> 00:31:22,560
Speaker 1: create a sexy character, I'm I'm all for it. But

515
00:31:22,640 --> 00:31:25,520
Speaker 1: if if that's like we're seeing this in the official

516
00:31:25,720 --> 00:31:32,080
Speaker 1: media of the game, then that is a problem. Instruction

517
00:31:32,120 --> 00:31:35,400
Speaker 1: manuals have been called out to for using he to

518
00:31:35,560 --> 00:31:39,640
Speaker 1: refer to all players. And this is improving, but slowly,

519
00:31:39,880 --> 00:31:42,640
Speaker 1: and we have come a long way, though, because some

520
00:31:42,680 --> 00:31:45,560
Speaker 1: of the first articles written by playtesters about D and

521
00:31:45,640 --> 00:31:48,320
Speaker 1: D in the seventies came with gems like this one.

522
00:31:49,080 --> 00:31:51,680
Speaker 1: There will be four major groups in which women may enter.

523
00:31:52,160 --> 00:31:56,040
Speaker 1: They may be fighters, magic users, thieves, and clerics. They

524
00:31:56,080 --> 00:31:57,960
Speaker 1: may progress to the level of men in the area

525
00:31:57,960 --> 00:32:01,520
Speaker 1: of magic and in some ways surpass men as thieves.

526
00:32:02,640 --> 00:32:05,960
Speaker 1: Elvin women may arise especially to high levels, and clerics

527
00:32:06,000 --> 00:32:09,280
Speaker 1: to the elves only as fighters are women clearly behind

528
00:32:09,320 --> 00:32:13,280
Speaker 1: men in all cases, but even they have attributes that

529
00:32:13,320 --> 00:32:16,280
Speaker 1: their male characters do not. And this article goes on

530
00:32:16,320 --> 00:32:20,200
Speaker 1: to say that female characters true strength lies with the

531
00:32:20,200 --> 00:32:24,200
Speaker 1: beauty part of their Christmas score. So D and D

532
00:32:24,320 --> 00:32:27,120
Speaker 1: your character has these six ability scores. One of them

533
00:32:27,160 --> 00:32:29,520
Speaker 1: is charrisma. As far as I know, the beauty thing

534
00:32:29,560 --> 00:32:35,080
Speaker 1: isn't there anymore. No. Well, and also now women don't

535
00:32:35,280 --> 00:32:39,640
Speaker 1: or female characters don't innately get one less strength because

536
00:32:39,680 --> 00:32:44,680
Speaker 1: they are female, right, which is a positive. But this,

537
00:32:44,680 --> 00:32:46,719
Speaker 1: this beauty part of the Christmas score that is no

538
00:32:46,800 --> 00:32:50,360
Speaker 1: longer with us, gave women female characters abilities such as

539
00:32:50,600 --> 00:32:57,360
Speaker 1: charm men, seduction, horrid beauty, and worship. Yeah, we don't

540
00:32:57,600 --> 00:33:01,880
Speaker 1: need that. No. There were also campaign settings. I mean,

541
00:33:01,880 --> 00:33:05,080
Speaker 1: you can still go and buy copies of old campaign

542
00:33:05,120 --> 00:33:07,560
Speaker 1: settings from earlier versions of D and D, and sometimes

543
00:33:07,560 --> 00:33:09,680
Speaker 1: there are guidelines on how to adapt them to the

544
00:33:09,720 --> 00:33:14,840
Speaker 1: newest rules system. And you can find some where it's like, okay,

545
00:33:14,880 --> 00:33:17,760
Speaker 1: all of the characters, who are all presumed to me

546
00:33:17,960 --> 00:33:20,840
Speaker 1: to be male, walk into this room where there is

547
00:33:21,440 --> 00:33:24,160
Speaker 1: a siren who is going to charm any but everybody,

548
00:33:24,200 --> 00:33:27,160
Speaker 1: and like it's now the bad The bad guy is

549
00:33:27,200 --> 00:33:29,880
Speaker 1: a woman, and the woman's power is that she's just

550
00:33:29,920 --> 00:33:37,880
Speaker 1: way too sexy. And oh yeah, the newest version did

551
00:33:37,920 --> 00:33:40,000
Speaker 1: come up as an example of a positive improvement when

552
00:33:40,040 --> 00:33:43,240
Speaker 1: I was researching this and that it suggests that players

553
00:33:43,240 --> 00:33:48,360
Speaker 1: should think outside of the binary box. Essentially, um, you

554
00:33:48,400 --> 00:33:52,440
Speaker 1: can be you can create whatever character you want to create. Um,

555
00:33:52,520 --> 00:33:54,560
Speaker 1: it doesn't have to be human, it could be all

556
00:33:54,640 --> 00:33:59,960
Speaker 1: kinds of things. In the kickstarter for one deck dungeon

557
00:34:00,000 --> 00:34:06,719
Speaker 1: and made dollars, it's starting goal was twenty dollars, so

558
00:34:07,760 --> 00:34:11,480
Speaker 1: way surpast that. End of note, all of the images

559
00:34:11,480 --> 00:34:17,000
Speaker 1: of playable characters were of strong, diverse women. But of

560
00:34:17,040 --> 00:34:19,560
Speaker 1: course not everyone was excited about this. Summer of virs

561
00:34:19,560 --> 00:34:22,239
Speaker 1: on Amazon called the game sexist or labeled it as

562
00:34:22,400 --> 00:34:28,680
Speaker 1: miss injury. It looks cool, yes, well, and we keep

563
00:34:28,680 --> 00:34:32,160
Speaker 1: seeing that same basic thing play out where uh, something

564
00:34:32,200 --> 00:34:35,680
Speaker 1: will come along that has an all female cast and

565
00:34:35,840 --> 00:34:39,239
Speaker 1: it will break box office records or become a best

566
00:34:39,280 --> 00:34:42,520
Speaker 1: seller or whatever, and then there will be this whole

567
00:34:42,600 --> 00:34:46,520
Speaker 1: conversation of can women really dominate at the box office?

568
00:34:47,440 --> 00:34:51,560
Speaker 1: Why we keep having this conversation? I know, I that

569
00:34:51,800 --> 00:34:54,920
Speaker 1: is a pet peeve of mine. Back to the tabletop

570
00:34:54,960 --> 00:34:58,720
Speaker 1: gaming pasco host Kristen and I went to this women

571
00:34:58,719 --> 00:35:01,640
Speaker 1: in Gaming event at the Museum of Design Atlanta a

572
00:35:01,680 --> 00:35:04,880
Speaker 1: couple of years ago. You can find the video online

573
00:35:04,920 --> 00:35:07,480
Speaker 1: on YouTube and it was one of my favorite. One

574
00:35:07,480 --> 00:35:10,160
Speaker 1: of my favorite parts of this whole exhibit was a

575
00:35:10,200 --> 00:35:14,319
Speaker 1: section on old board games and of the games that

576
00:35:14,400 --> 00:35:19,399
Speaker 1: included women, so many of them were women in domestic roles.

577
00:35:19,400 --> 00:35:22,440
Speaker 1: Are women trying to find a husband before the other players?

578
00:35:22,480 --> 00:35:24,920
Speaker 1: That was how you won as you found a husband first.

579
00:35:25,640 --> 00:35:28,760
Speaker 1: One in particular, featured all the jobs that a woman

580
00:35:28,840 --> 00:35:32,600
Speaker 1: could have in this board game's mind at the time,

581
00:35:32,640 --> 00:35:39,840
Speaker 1: and they were secretary, teacher, flight attendant, nurse, princess, or ballerina.

582
00:35:40,480 --> 00:35:45,920
Speaker 1: All right, then, yeah, nothing wrong with any of those occupations.

583
00:35:45,920 --> 00:35:50,960
Speaker 1: But I feel that women perhaps can do other types

584
00:35:51,000 --> 00:35:57,360
Speaker 1: of things. I think possibly like design games. Possibly. And

585
00:35:58,640 --> 00:36:01,080
Speaker 1: we've said it time and time again on this show,

586
00:36:01,160 --> 00:36:05,680
Speaker 1: but seeing yourself represented is important. That's not even just

587
00:36:05,719 --> 00:36:08,960
Speaker 1: me saying it. There have been studies that show that

588
00:36:09,080 --> 00:36:12,200
Speaker 1: bear that out. Um, not seeing yourself can lead to

589
00:36:12,320 --> 00:36:17,759
Speaker 1: feelings of disempowerment, invisibility, or insignificance on an individual level,

590
00:36:18,120 --> 00:36:20,879
Speaker 1: on a community level, and it can lead to decisions

591
00:36:20,920 --> 00:36:23,520
Speaker 1: made based on who we see or don't see on

592
00:36:23,560 --> 00:36:27,000
Speaker 1: a societal level, like people in power will make decisions

593
00:36:27,960 --> 00:36:33,200
Speaker 1: based on perceived like representation, how they think that must

594
00:36:33,239 --> 00:36:36,200
Speaker 1: be the truth in society. So if all you're seeing

595
00:36:36,800 --> 00:36:39,560
Speaker 1: our white men, then you're going to make decisions based

596
00:36:39,600 --> 00:36:41,600
Speaker 1: on the fact that there are way more white men

597
00:36:41,800 --> 00:36:47,040
Speaker 1: than there actually are. Yeah. Yeah, And plus think of

598
00:36:47,040 --> 00:36:50,160
Speaker 1: all the cool and diverse media that we're missing out on.

599
00:36:51,520 --> 00:36:54,279
Speaker 1: There's a lot of it. There is, there is, And

600
00:36:55,239 --> 00:36:57,799
Speaker 1: there was this study that you found Tracy looking into

601
00:36:57,920 --> 00:37:01,520
Speaker 1: gender and racial representation and when it comes to the

602
00:37:01,560 --> 00:37:05,040
Speaker 1: illustrators and designers of the top two hundred board games

603
00:37:05,080 --> 00:37:07,720
Speaker 1: as ranked by Board Game Geek. And it came out

604
00:37:08,480 --> 00:37:12,000
Speaker 1: like this month, December twenty so it's pretty recent. Yeah,

605
00:37:12,120 --> 00:37:15,399
Speaker 1: you and I had scheduled this recording and I saw it.

606
00:37:15,600 --> 00:37:18,360
Speaker 1: I saw people talking about it on Twitter and said, Okay,

607
00:37:18,520 --> 00:37:24,360
Speaker 1: need to bring this up for that episode. Excellent timing. Yeah,

608
00:37:24,680 --> 00:37:27,759
Speaker 1: And what it found is probably what you might expect.

609
00:37:28,040 --> 00:37:32,000
Speaker 1: The dime designers and illustrators were overwhelmingly white men of

610
00:37:32,040 --> 00:37:34,839
Speaker 1: these two hundred games, and that this was reflected in

611
00:37:34,880 --> 00:37:40,839
Speaker 1: the artwork, which disproportionately is of white men. The numbers

612
00:37:40,960 --> 00:37:42,879
Speaker 1: on this very depending on the source, but it also

613
00:37:42,880 --> 00:37:45,120
Speaker 1: found a majority of the players were also white men.

614
00:37:45,680 --> 00:37:48,640
Speaker 1: The author does acknowledge the limitation of this work and

615
00:37:48,680 --> 00:37:52,040
Speaker 1: calls for more research. But it's definitely worth checking out

616
00:37:52,080 --> 00:37:55,520
Speaker 1: if this is something that is at all of interest

617
00:37:55,640 --> 00:37:58,600
Speaker 1: to you. Yeah, because it's one of those things that's

618
00:37:58,680 --> 00:38:01,600
Speaker 1: drawing from board game geek as a resource. If you're

619
00:38:01,600 --> 00:38:04,640
Speaker 1: not familiar with that. It's sort of like if you

620
00:38:04,920 --> 00:38:08,000
Speaker 1: were trying to look at trends in movies based on

621
00:38:08,640 --> 00:38:12,600
Speaker 1: their where they were ranked on IMDb. Um, it's like

622
00:38:12,640 --> 00:38:14,480
Speaker 1: that would be sort of like a comparable thing. So

623
00:38:14,560 --> 00:38:16,279
Speaker 1: there are a whole lot of movies out in the

624
00:38:16,280 --> 00:38:18,480
Speaker 1: world that for whatever reason, are not up at the

625
00:38:18,520 --> 00:38:20,960
Speaker 1: top of IMDb. So it gets a little bit of

626
00:38:20,960 --> 00:38:27,240
Speaker 1: a skewed data set to start with, but still super interesting. Yeah,

627
00:38:28,520 --> 00:38:31,200
Speaker 1: and it it references a study that came out a

628
00:38:31,200 --> 00:38:34,520
Speaker 1: couple of years ago that found that board games are

629
00:38:34,560 --> 00:38:38,279
Speaker 1: more likely to feature a sheep on the cover than

630
00:38:38,440 --> 00:38:43,920
Speaker 1: a woman. And this study found that, at least according

631
00:38:44,000 --> 00:38:47,160
Speaker 1: to the data um the study author was looking at,

632
00:38:48,080 --> 00:38:51,200
Speaker 1: that is true, aliens and barnyard animals like sheep grace

633
00:38:51,280 --> 00:38:53,680
Speaker 1: the cover art of board games at a higher rate

634
00:38:53,960 --> 00:38:58,719
Speaker 1: than women do. Yeah, some of those games are great, Like,

635
00:38:58,840 --> 00:39:02,880
Speaker 1: no criticizing over those games as a thing, but it

636
00:39:03,000 --> 00:39:07,600
Speaker 1: is a pattern a little disturbing a little bit, just

637
00:39:07,640 --> 00:39:09,799
Speaker 1: a little bit. Something else I found a lot of

638
00:39:09,840 --> 00:39:12,960
Speaker 1: accounts of online but have never personally run into myself

639
00:39:13,719 --> 00:39:16,480
Speaker 1: is women running into a lot of misogyny when playing

640
00:39:16,600 --> 00:39:20,799
Speaker 1: an RPG game like D and D. Male players over

641
00:39:20,840 --> 00:39:25,160
Speaker 1: sexualizing the female character that the female player is playing.

642
00:39:25,200 --> 00:39:28,919
Speaker 1: Are are maybe themselves playing a female character and then

643
00:39:29,000 --> 00:39:32,000
Speaker 1: over sexualizing her or making her do stupid things things

644
00:39:32,040 --> 00:39:34,880
Speaker 1: like that. UM, And I know I do know people

645
00:39:34,920 --> 00:39:38,000
Speaker 1: personally who have lost friends over things like this. I've

646
00:39:38,040 --> 00:39:41,759
Speaker 1: never experienced it personally, but I do know people that have. UM.

647
00:39:41,800 --> 00:39:44,160
Speaker 1: There are a couple of bars in Atlanta that do

648
00:39:44,320 --> 00:39:47,200
Speaker 1: D and D nights where you can drop in and play,

649
00:39:47,400 --> 00:39:50,200
Speaker 1: and I've done it once, so it's more likely to

650
00:39:50,200 --> 00:39:53,440
Speaker 1: be strangers that you're playing with, and I had a

651
00:39:53,440 --> 00:39:56,280
Speaker 1: good time when I did it, but I generally avoid

652
00:39:56,320 --> 00:40:00,360
Speaker 1: them because I do have this suspicion that I would

653
00:40:00,440 --> 00:40:05,680
Speaker 1: run into something like that. Are people who will pick

654
00:40:05,800 --> 00:40:10,839
Speaker 1: fights over the rules or um. Like you said, it's

655
00:40:10,840 --> 00:40:13,239
Speaker 1: a fun thing, and I think with friends it's much

656
00:40:13,320 --> 00:40:17,600
Speaker 1: more relaxed. But I have noticed I've gone out of

657
00:40:17,640 --> 00:40:19,840
Speaker 1: my way to avoid going to them, even if I

658
00:40:19,840 --> 00:40:21,719
Speaker 1: think they I want to play, and I think they

659
00:40:21,760 --> 00:40:24,480
Speaker 1: could be fun, because I do have this fear that

660
00:40:24,520 --> 00:40:30,720
Speaker 1: I would run into this thing that we're describing right now. Yeah, yeah,

661
00:40:30,880 --> 00:40:33,960
Speaker 1: especially since I know so many women who developed games.

662
00:40:34,239 --> 00:40:37,040
Speaker 1: A lot of them go to game conventions all the

663
00:40:37,080 --> 00:40:39,200
Speaker 1: time and are running games for a ton of people

664
00:40:39,280 --> 00:40:42,560
Speaker 1: all the time because they're they're demonstrating their game, and

665
00:40:42,640 --> 00:40:46,000
Speaker 1: so I've heard a lot of stories about that kind

666
00:40:46,160 --> 00:40:50,600
Speaker 1: of you know, either comments that are inappropriate or sexualizing

667
00:40:51,320 --> 00:40:55,000
Speaker 1: encounters between characters in a game when that's not really necessary.

668
00:40:55,400 --> 00:40:59,320
Speaker 1: And I think because I play almost exclusively with people

669
00:40:59,320 --> 00:41:01,200
Speaker 1: that I'm already ends with and want to hang out with,

670
00:41:01,640 --> 00:41:04,920
Speaker 1: I don't really have that experience the thing that I

671
00:41:04,960 --> 00:41:07,759
Speaker 1: do have sometimes, even though, like most of the guys

672
00:41:07,800 --> 00:41:10,759
Speaker 1: I know, try really hard to be self aware and

673
00:41:10,800 --> 00:41:14,640
Speaker 1: to to not just steamroll over everyone in the room,

674
00:41:14,800 --> 00:41:19,080
Speaker 1: especially when I'm at a game where I'm either the

675
00:41:19,200 --> 00:41:21,680
Speaker 1: only woman at the table or there's only one other

676
00:41:21,719 --> 00:41:24,680
Speaker 1: woman at the table, sometimes it does feel like the

677
00:41:24,719 --> 00:41:30,080
Speaker 1: guys are dominating the situation. Um and and normally if

678
00:41:30,080 --> 00:41:33,800
Speaker 1: we're like, hey, guys, yeah, they're also here, we also

679
00:41:33,880 --> 00:41:35,960
Speaker 1: can help make the decision of what we're gonna do

680
00:41:36,040 --> 00:41:38,759
Speaker 1: against this monster. Uh, they'll be like, all right, So

681
00:41:38,840 --> 00:41:42,879
Speaker 1: that's the thing. It's a process though. Yeah, and that's

682
00:41:42,920 --> 00:41:45,920
Speaker 1: a good point because I have definitely encountered being talked

683
00:41:45,960 --> 00:41:49,880
Speaker 1: over interrupted by dudes when I'm playing UM, and I

684
00:41:49,960 --> 00:41:52,600
Speaker 1: think it is a combination of me not having the

685
00:41:52,640 --> 00:41:57,640
Speaker 1: confidence to speak up as loudly as they do, but

686
00:41:57,680 --> 00:42:00,520
Speaker 1: also yeah, just kind of a lack of awareness. But

687
00:42:00,640 --> 00:42:03,239
Speaker 1: I think if you're playing with someone who is new,

688
00:42:04,520 --> 00:42:06,600
Speaker 1: then maybe keep that in mind, especially if you're running

689
00:42:06,640 --> 00:42:11,640
Speaker 1: the game, just checking in to see maybe this person

690
00:42:11,719 --> 00:42:14,360
Speaker 1: just needs a little more encouragement or needs sort of

691
00:42:14,400 --> 00:42:18,600
Speaker 1: as a push, because I'm a quiet person in general,

692
00:42:18,800 --> 00:42:23,280
Speaker 1: and a lot of times I'm I'm happy to um

693
00:42:23,520 --> 00:42:28,400
Speaker 1: let other people be the loud ones. But at the

694
00:42:28,400 --> 00:42:32,640
Speaker 1: same time, if I am trying to say something, I

695
00:42:32,680 --> 00:42:38,560
Speaker 1: should like to be heard, right. Several articles I read

696
00:42:39,080 --> 00:42:42,760
Speaker 1: encouraged dungeon masters. So again, these folks that are running

697
00:42:42,760 --> 00:42:44,880
Speaker 1: the D and D campaigns to make sure that they

698
00:42:44,920 --> 00:42:48,080
Speaker 1: are putting female characters and positions of power in the

699
00:42:48,080 --> 00:42:50,640
Speaker 1: game that they're designing, instead of relegating them to things

700
00:42:50,760 --> 00:42:53,680
Speaker 1: like barmaid. I've also read plenty of accounts of female

701
00:42:53,840 --> 00:42:57,520
Speaker 1: d m s facing constant questioning by male players, which

702
00:42:57,680 --> 00:43:00,120
Speaker 1: does not surprise me at all. I've never seen it,

703
00:43:00,239 --> 00:43:07,480
Speaker 1: but I believe it completely. Similarly, several women I was

704
00:43:07,520 --> 00:43:09,880
Speaker 1: reading accounts about online with that they would go into

705
00:43:10,000 --> 00:43:13,400
Speaker 1: gaming stores and almost immediately would be asked if they

706
00:43:13,400 --> 00:43:15,600
Speaker 1: were shopping for their boyfriend, if they need any help,

707
00:43:15,640 --> 00:43:22,080
Speaker 1: the assumption that a woman couldn't possibly be there for herself. Yeah,

708
00:43:22,200 --> 00:43:24,120
Speaker 1: when I lived in Nashville, there was a place that

709
00:43:24,160 --> 00:43:28,080
Speaker 1: I went. There was a combination games, comics, and music store,

710
00:43:28,960 --> 00:43:31,080
Speaker 1: and the first few times that I went in there,

711
00:43:31,680 --> 00:43:34,200
Speaker 1: the assumption was that I was there for the music,

712
00:43:34,480 --> 00:43:37,120
Speaker 1: which sometimes I was there for the music, but I

713
00:43:37,160 --> 00:43:40,279
Speaker 1: was also there for the comics and the games. And

714
00:43:41,280 --> 00:43:43,400
Speaker 1: I remember and went walking in. I mean, this has

715
00:43:43,440 --> 00:43:46,160
Speaker 1: been well over a decade ago, so like, don't go

716
00:43:46,200 --> 00:43:48,760
Speaker 1: find that place and yell at them. But I remember

717
00:43:48,800 --> 00:43:50,759
Speaker 1: walking in at one point and somebody being like, the

718
00:43:50,840 --> 00:43:53,719
Speaker 1: music's over there, and I was there to pick up

719
00:43:53,800 --> 00:43:59,480
Speaker 1: my weekly pulls of my comic books. It's like, just

720
00:43:59,600 --> 00:44:06,839
Speaker 1: not no, um, I've I've definitely experienced that in the

721
00:44:06,840 --> 00:44:10,000
Speaker 1: realm of comics too, and I've spoke about on this

722
00:44:10,000 --> 00:44:12,040
Speaker 1: show before. But what really bothers me is once you

723
00:44:12,160 --> 00:44:16,359
Speaker 1: sort of passed this test and proved that, oh, yes,

724
00:44:16,440 --> 00:44:20,399
Speaker 1: I do read these things, then I almost always would

725
00:44:20,440 --> 00:44:30,160
Speaker 1: get asked out, is this your only seriads comic books? Ah?

726
00:44:30,320 --> 00:44:32,680
Speaker 1: Sometimes I would just start pretending like, no, this isn't

727
00:44:32,719 --> 00:44:39,000
Speaker 1: for being be left alone. Another thing we have to

728
00:44:39,040 --> 00:44:45,560
Speaker 1: talk about, unfortunately, is sexual harassment. In A Canadian tabletop

729
00:44:45,600 --> 00:44:48,360
Speaker 1: gamer named Emily Garland posted a piece on Tumbler called

730
00:44:48,560 --> 00:44:52,120
Speaker 1: tabletop Gaming has a white male terrorist problem. As you

731
00:44:52,120 --> 00:44:55,160
Speaker 1: can imagine from the title, it got a lot of attention.

732
00:44:56,120 --> 00:45:01,640
Speaker 1: I remember when this came out. Do you not remember it? Yeah? Well,

733
00:45:01,640 --> 00:45:03,799
Speaker 1: and I remember, in a good way a lot of

734
00:45:03,800 --> 00:45:08,320
Speaker 1: the men in my life passing it around amongst themselves, like, guys,

735
00:45:08,360 --> 00:45:11,280
Speaker 1: this is a problem that we need to proactively be handling.

736
00:45:11,400 --> 00:45:15,480
Speaker 1: So go on, Yeah, that's great, um, She wrote in

737
00:45:15,480 --> 00:45:19,920
Speaker 1: this Tumbler post, white male terrorism is the white underbelly

738
00:45:19,960 --> 00:45:22,480
Speaker 1: of the gaming community, meant to terrify and disrupt the

739
00:45:22,560 --> 00:45:25,280
Speaker 1: lives of those who threaten the status quo by race, gender,

740
00:45:25,360 --> 00:45:28,680
Speaker 1: or sexuality. And you can find the article online if

741
00:45:28,680 --> 00:45:30,960
Speaker 1: you want to read it. It's pretty upsetting, but it

742
00:45:31,080 --> 00:45:36,560
Speaker 1: is worth a read. She identifies three main concerns, sexual harassment,

743
00:45:36,880 --> 00:45:40,960
Speaker 1: exclusion of women who are vocal about marginalization and unfair treatment,

744
00:45:41,280 --> 00:45:44,120
Speaker 1: and a failure of the tabletop gaming industry as a

745
00:45:44,120 --> 00:45:47,960
Speaker 1: whole to speak out about things like gamer gates and

746
00:45:48,160 --> 00:45:50,960
Speaker 1: she won a sexual harassment lawsuit against a gaming store

747
00:45:50,960 --> 00:45:55,760
Speaker 1: that she worked in that same year. Yeah. Yeah, it's

748
00:45:55,920 --> 00:45:59,520
Speaker 1: not a pleasant read at all. It is not UM.

749
00:46:00,080 --> 00:46:04,240
Speaker 1: Definitely know that going in, but it's it's worth reading,

750
00:46:04,320 --> 00:46:06,960
Speaker 1: especially if you're somebody that is a part of the

751
00:46:07,000 --> 00:46:10,759
Speaker 1: tabletop gaming community. I would say check it out. And

752
00:46:12,360 --> 00:46:16,759
Speaker 1: something I saw in a lot of places that so

753
00:46:16,920 --> 00:46:20,440
Speaker 1: often the response to all of this everything we're talking about,

754
00:46:20,680 --> 00:46:25,240
Speaker 1: UM is but from people who don't want the community

755
00:46:25,239 --> 00:46:28,920
Speaker 1: to change. UM, go play something else if it bothers.

756
00:46:28,960 --> 00:46:34,759
Speaker 1: You don't make this fun hobby political. But it's about

757
00:46:34,840 --> 00:46:38,600
Speaker 1: making this fun hobby uh and beneficial activity more inclusive

758
00:46:38,719 --> 00:46:43,160
Speaker 1: and better for everybody. And in light of that, we

759
00:46:43,320 --> 00:46:47,839
Speaker 1: have some recommendations and resources for you. But first one

760
00:46:47,880 --> 00:46:54,640
Speaker 1: more quick break for word from our sponsor m H.

761
00:47:00,120 --> 00:47:03,120
Speaker 1: We're back, Thank you sponsor, and we're back with some

762
00:47:03,400 --> 00:47:07,960
Speaker 1: game recommendations. I've said it before, I'll say it again.

763
00:47:08,360 --> 00:47:11,319
Speaker 1: I love Pandemic and this is so good. It is

764
00:47:11,400 --> 00:47:14,719
Speaker 1: so good UM, and it's hard and I love it.

765
00:47:14,760 --> 00:47:16,640
Speaker 1: There's like eight ways to lose, an only one way

766
00:47:16,640 --> 00:47:19,200
Speaker 1: to win. And it's cooperative too, Like we were saying

767
00:47:19,200 --> 00:47:22,600
Speaker 1: in the beginning, Um, some people who don't like competition,

768
00:47:22,600 --> 00:47:24,719
Speaker 1: you are competing against the game. It's pretty tense. I'm

769
00:47:24,719 --> 00:47:27,080
Speaker 1: not gonna like sugarcoat it. But you aren't competing against

770
00:47:27,120 --> 00:47:30,440
Speaker 1: your friends, right. Your friends are working with you to

771
00:47:30,560 --> 00:47:35,160
Speaker 1: try to stop the illness. One thing I love about

772
00:47:35,200 --> 00:47:38,440
Speaker 1: this game is UM. A lot of times when I'll

773
00:47:38,480 --> 00:47:41,719
Speaker 1: have people over and we have all this entertainment available

774
00:47:41,719 --> 00:47:44,799
Speaker 1: to us, friends of mine who aren't that in two

775
00:47:44,800 --> 00:47:48,320
Speaker 1: tabletop gaming in general will request that we play Pandemic.

776
00:47:48,360 --> 00:47:53,120
Speaker 1: It is like a fun crowd pleaser. It has an

777
00:47:53,120 --> 00:47:56,640
Speaker 1: equal number of male the female characters who aren't sexualized.

778
00:47:56,719 --> 00:48:00,279
Speaker 1: They're dressed appropriately for their job. UM, and the jobs

779
00:48:00,280 --> 00:48:04,080
Speaker 1: are things like scientists and quarantine specialists. It's so fun.

780
00:48:04,719 --> 00:48:06,480
Speaker 1: You can play it with just two players too. That's

781
00:48:06,480 --> 00:48:09,799
Speaker 1: another thing I love about it. I have lost it spectacularly.

782
00:48:11,600 --> 00:48:14,719
Speaker 1: I have two by once. UM, like we were doing

783
00:48:14,840 --> 00:48:17,719
Speaker 1: fine UM, and I don't want to go too much

784
00:48:17,719 --> 00:48:20,560
Speaker 1: in the mechanics here, But basically we drew one card

785
00:48:20,680 --> 00:48:23,880
Speaker 1: and we went from fine too we lost. Yeah. I

786
00:48:23,920 --> 00:48:26,640
Speaker 1: think this was like three turns into the game and

787
00:48:26,680 --> 00:48:29,560
Speaker 1: we just had really bad luck and it was like this,

788
00:48:29,560 --> 00:48:33,160
Speaker 1: this outbreak has spread and the world is over. I think.

789
00:48:33,719 --> 00:48:35,160
Speaker 1: I think one of the mechanics is you have these

790
00:48:35,200 --> 00:48:39,359
Speaker 1: little black cubes that represent the the illness, and if

791
00:48:39,360 --> 00:48:43,279
Speaker 1: you run out of them, game over. And we ran

792
00:48:43,320 --> 00:48:48,520
Speaker 1: out of them and just an amazingly short amount of time. Yeah,

793
00:48:48,560 --> 00:48:52,320
Speaker 1: and I am have lost these like little tiny cubes,

794
00:48:52,320 --> 00:48:55,239
Speaker 1: and I've lost one in the game. The difficulty level

795
00:48:55,400 --> 00:48:57,719
Speaker 1: is such that it comes close enough that I made

796
00:48:57,760 --> 00:49:01,719
Speaker 1: a note saying I am missing one of these cubes one.

797
00:49:02,000 --> 00:49:05,560
Speaker 1: So if that's what it comes down to, I want

798
00:49:05,600 --> 00:49:08,080
Speaker 1: everyone to know that you have one cube that is

799
00:49:08,120 --> 00:49:13,759
Speaker 1: not there. Yeah, I gotta have a couple of caveats

800
00:49:13,800 --> 00:49:16,920
Speaker 1: with the one that I'm going to recommend next. Because

801
00:49:17,160 --> 00:49:21,440
Speaker 1: it is based on Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice, it's

802
00:49:21,480 --> 00:49:25,239
Speaker 1: called Marrying Mr Darcy. It's a card game since it

803
00:49:25,360 --> 00:49:28,040
Speaker 1: is based on Pride and Prejudice. All the characters are

804
00:49:28,040 --> 00:49:30,560
Speaker 1: white and the goal of the game is to marry

805
00:49:30,600 --> 00:49:34,239
Speaker 1: the right person, so like, let's just get that out

806
00:49:34,280 --> 00:49:38,000
Speaker 1: on the table. However, it has the same sense of

807
00:49:38,080 --> 00:49:42,360
Speaker 1: humor that Jane Austen's writing does, so the it's a

808
00:49:42,400 --> 00:49:47,200
Speaker 1: card game, and the cards have just these very rye

809
00:49:47,239 --> 00:49:51,880
Speaker 1: witty instructions of of what's going on in the game. Um,

810
00:49:52,080 --> 00:49:54,600
Speaker 1: you also do not have to get married in order

811
00:49:54,640 --> 00:49:58,560
Speaker 1: to win the game. It is completely possible to win

812
00:49:58,600 --> 00:50:03,919
Speaker 1: the game by not getting married, and it is it's

813
00:50:03,920 --> 00:50:07,200
Speaker 1: accessible to people even if they have no familiarity with

814
00:50:07,680 --> 00:50:11,640
Speaker 1: Jane Austen. So when I very first moved to Massachusetts,

815
00:50:12,120 --> 00:50:14,520
Speaker 1: my husband, who at that time was my boyfriend, had

816
00:50:14,520 --> 00:50:16,359
Speaker 1: gone out of town and I didn't really know many

817
00:50:16,440 --> 00:50:19,440
Speaker 1: people here very well yet, and this friend of his said,

818
00:50:19,840 --> 00:50:21,560
Speaker 1: come over and play games with us. And I was like,

819
00:50:21,560 --> 00:50:23,879
Speaker 1: I'm gonna take marrying Mr Darcy, because I thought when

820
00:50:23,880 --> 00:50:26,759
Speaker 1: he said us, he meant me and my wife, but

821
00:50:26,960 --> 00:50:31,280
Speaker 1: what he really meant was me and these two other dudes.

822
00:50:31,840 --> 00:50:35,680
Speaker 1: So it became me and these three dudes playing a

823
00:50:35,840 --> 00:50:39,560
Speaker 1: game based on pride and prejudice, and everybody had a

824
00:50:39,600 --> 00:50:44,840
Speaker 1: great time. So that sounds wonderful. It was great. My

825
00:50:44,880 --> 00:50:48,000
Speaker 1: friends would love that game for sure. Yeah, yeah, I

826
00:50:48,000 --> 00:50:51,680
Speaker 1: mean if if I totally get why, like people might

827
00:50:51,719 --> 00:50:53,600
Speaker 1: not be into the idea of playing a game where

828
00:50:53,600 --> 00:50:55,640
Speaker 1: all the characters are white and the goal is to

829
00:50:55,760 --> 00:50:57,799
Speaker 1: get married, Like I get like that might not be

830
00:50:57,920 --> 00:51:00,720
Speaker 1: for you. But if that's for you, and it's probably

831
00:51:00,719 --> 00:51:05,040
Speaker 1: really for you. I have another one that UM is

832
00:51:05,080 --> 00:51:08,319
Speaker 1: a lot more diverse in its representation, and it is

833
00:51:08,360 --> 00:51:12,120
Speaker 1: called The T Dragon Society Card Game, and it's based

834
00:51:12,160 --> 00:51:15,040
Speaker 1: on a graphic novel by Katie O'Neill that is called

835
00:51:15,040 --> 00:51:18,120
Speaker 1: The T Dragon Society. And that graphic novel is full

836
00:51:18,360 --> 00:51:21,960
Speaker 1: of LGBTQ characters and characters of color. And this is

837
00:51:21,960 --> 00:51:24,839
Speaker 1: another card game where your goal is to raise these

838
00:51:24,880 --> 00:51:28,400
Speaker 1: little T dragons. And the dragons are adorable, and the

839
00:51:28,560 --> 00:51:33,040
Speaker 1: art is adorable, and the characters the more humanoid characters.

840
00:51:33,080 --> 00:51:35,399
Speaker 1: One of them is not strictly human, but they are

841
00:51:35,400 --> 00:51:38,520
Speaker 1: also adorable. UM. And even if you're not playing with

842
00:51:38,560 --> 00:51:41,840
Speaker 1: little kids, I think the age range is ten and up. UM.

843
00:51:41,920 --> 00:51:44,799
Speaker 1: If if you are into the idea of taking care

844
00:51:44,960 --> 00:51:48,680
Speaker 1: of some adorable little dragons, you can be a room

845
00:51:48,960 --> 00:51:51,160
Speaker 1: for like a table full of adults, and it will

846
00:51:51,160 --> 00:51:56,240
Speaker 1: still be great. UM. One that my friends love UM

847
00:51:56,360 --> 00:51:59,680
Speaker 1: is called Dixit which I describe as apples apples but

848
00:51:59,719 --> 00:52:02,560
Speaker 1: with a full art. And again, this is this group

849
00:52:02,640 --> 00:52:05,359
Speaker 1: of friends particularly that loves it. They don't really like

850
00:52:05,640 --> 00:52:09,080
Speaker 1: tabletop games in general, they don't like the competitive aspect

851
00:52:09,080 --> 00:52:11,319
Speaker 1: of it, but they love this one and they love

852
00:52:11,320 --> 00:52:13,759
Speaker 1: the art of it. And it's really I find it

853
00:52:13,800 --> 00:52:17,520
Speaker 1: really funny because I get frustrated playing with them. I

854
00:52:17,520 --> 00:52:20,960
Speaker 1: I also get frustrated playing Apple sapples because I'm very

855
00:52:21,000 --> 00:52:26,000
Speaker 1: I'm very competitive, and I I'll get angry if I

856
00:52:26,040 --> 00:52:30,759
Speaker 1: can't see what you're seeing, Like, explain to me how

857
00:52:30,800 --> 00:52:35,319
Speaker 1: that represents being lost? Please? Yeum. But they all love it,

858
00:52:35,840 --> 00:52:39,880
Speaker 1: and both dixit and Apples to Apples can be really

859
00:52:39,920 --> 00:52:42,800
Speaker 1: interesting to play when you when you either know everyone

860
00:52:42,840 --> 00:52:45,279
Speaker 1: at the table really really well or when you don't

861
00:52:45,320 --> 00:52:47,719
Speaker 1: know everyone at the table really really well, because if

862
00:52:47,760 --> 00:52:50,000
Speaker 1: you know too people and you don't know everyone else,

863
00:52:50,040 --> 00:52:52,760
Speaker 1: then like you might know enough about how that person

864
00:52:52,840 --> 00:52:56,800
Speaker 1: thinks to to figure out what they're doing a lot

865
00:52:56,960 --> 00:53:01,040
Speaker 1: more easily. Yeah, it's one of this thing. I've known

866
00:53:01,080 --> 00:53:05,359
Speaker 1: this this group of friends since elementary school, and for

867
00:53:05,400 --> 00:53:08,239
Speaker 1: some reason, I can't get a beat on what they're

868
00:53:08,239 --> 00:53:11,279
Speaker 1: seeing when they're looking at these beautifully. The art is

869
00:53:11,320 --> 00:53:13,839
Speaker 1: really beautiful with that it is, it's beautiful and kind

870
00:53:13,880 --> 00:53:18,040
Speaker 1: of abstract. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I also love Betrayal at

871
00:53:18,040 --> 00:53:20,640
Speaker 1: the House in the Hill, which is a game where

872
00:53:20,680 --> 00:53:23,840
Speaker 1: your your group explores a haunted house together and about

873
00:53:23,840 --> 00:53:26,640
Speaker 1: halfway through you trigger a haunt, and depending on a

874
00:53:26,640 --> 00:53:31,000
Speaker 1: couple of circumstances, one of the players becomes a trader

875
00:53:31,040 --> 00:53:33,839
Speaker 1: and you're sort of working against that player and then

876
00:53:33,880 --> 00:53:38,319
Speaker 1: whatever demon, haunt, whatever it is that they're working with

877
00:53:38,520 --> 00:53:43,000
Speaker 1: um and there's something like sixty scenarios. So, Annie, do

878
00:53:43,120 --> 00:53:47,279
Speaker 1: you know about Betrayal Legacy? I do, but only a

879
00:53:47,320 --> 00:53:49,239
Speaker 1: little bit. Tell me about it. I can tell you

880
00:53:49,280 --> 00:53:52,280
Speaker 1: about it because I play tested that game. Did you really?

881
00:53:52,680 --> 00:53:56,080
Speaker 1: I did? I am listed in the credits. Oh my gosh,

882
00:53:56,480 --> 00:54:00,799
Speaker 1: I'm so excited. I am really sided to. I had

883
00:54:00,840 --> 00:54:03,919
Speaker 1: actually been like, should I talk about betrayal, talk about

884
00:54:03,920 --> 00:54:06,000
Speaker 1: Betrayal Legacy you and then you win and put it

885
00:54:06,040 --> 00:54:09,000
Speaker 1: on the list. I'm so excited. Okay, So what Annie

886
00:54:09,040 --> 00:54:12,920
Speaker 1: just said, Like, that's that's still the basic mechanics. You

887
00:54:12,960 --> 00:54:15,600
Speaker 1: have a haunted house that you're exploring, and something happens

888
00:54:15,600 --> 00:54:17,759
Speaker 1: that triggers a haunt, and somebody who is playing with

889
00:54:17,760 --> 00:54:22,000
Speaker 1: you becomes a trader, and the betrayal legacy works the

890
00:54:22,040 --> 00:54:24,480
Speaker 1: same way that other legacy games do, which is that

891
00:54:24,640 --> 00:54:28,359
Speaker 1: as you play, the game itself changes, so you might

892
00:54:28,560 --> 00:54:32,400
Speaker 1: have like the first time you play, this is made up.

893
00:54:32,440 --> 00:54:34,480
Speaker 1: I'm not spoiling anything in the game, but like the

894
00:54:34,520 --> 00:54:38,319
Speaker 1: first time you play, a particular character dies in a

895
00:54:38,360 --> 00:54:42,080
Speaker 1: particular room, Well, that room might now the next time

896
00:54:42,120 --> 00:54:44,840
Speaker 1: you play have something different about it because that happened

897
00:54:44,840 --> 00:54:47,640
Speaker 1: in that room the last time. And so it is

898
00:54:47,680 --> 00:54:52,279
Speaker 1: I think thirteen chapters. Each chapter takes place in a

899
00:54:52,280 --> 00:54:55,600
Speaker 1: different year, so you're in this haunted house through time,

900
00:54:56,080 --> 00:54:58,920
Speaker 1: and then once you get all through those Third Team

901
00:54:59,400 --> 00:55:02,040
Speaker 1: sort of found National Games, there is a freeplay mode

902
00:55:02,080 --> 00:55:04,719
Speaker 1: where you can play all of these other scenarios in

903
00:55:04,760 --> 00:55:08,279
Speaker 1: the same game. So, because it's a horror game, it

904
00:55:08,560 --> 00:55:11,040
Speaker 1: does have some, you know, some of the same horror

905
00:55:11,600 --> 00:55:14,840
Speaker 1: tropes that I think some people might not enjoy. Like

906
00:55:14,880 --> 00:55:16,640
Speaker 1: if you're not going to enjoy a game that has

907
00:55:16,680 --> 00:55:19,520
Speaker 1: a bunch of murder in it, then right, um, maybe

908
00:55:19,520 --> 00:55:21,680
Speaker 1: not this one for you. But if you are into

909
00:55:21,800 --> 00:55:25,680
Speaker 1: horror movies and horrors books and settings that are full

910
00:55:25,719 --> 00:55:28,799
Speaker 1: of ghosts and monsters and scary things, then yeah, I

911
00:55:28,880 --> 00:55:34,399
Speaker 1: highly recommend it. Yeah, I have to check out Legacy now.

912
00:55:34,680 --> 00:55:36,560
Speaker 1: I've been wanting to, but now I've got to. I'm

913
00:55:36,600 --> 00:55:40,680
Speaker 1: gonna add our rotation at game night here and it

914
00:55:41,000 --> 00:55:44,720
Speaker 1: that is the perfect launching point for our next section,

915
00:55:44,719 --> 00:55:50,080
Speaker 1: which is resources, because recently we did play Betrayal at

916
00:55:50,080 --> 00:55:52,719
Speaker 1: the House on the Hill and it's kind of a

917
00:55:52,800 --> 00:55:54,480
Speaker 1: rule here, and it also just kind of makes sense

918
00:55:54,480 --> 00:55:56,719
Speaker 1: that if it's your game, then you're the one that's

919
00:55:56,760 --> 00:56:00,640
Speaker 1: sort of explains it. Make sure it runs smoothly. It's

920
00:56:00,680 --> 00:56:04,480
Speaker 1: my game, um and people voted to play it, but

921
00:56:04,600 --> 00:56:07,040
Speaker 1: I hadn't played it in a while, so I wanted

922
00:56:07,040 --> 00:56:09,080
Speaker 1: to brush up on the rules. And one of the

923
00:56:09,080 --> 00:56:11,640
Speaker 1: first things I did was I got online and watched

924
00:56:11,760 --> 00:56:15,319
Speaker 1: the Tabletop with Will Wheaton episode on playing Betrayal at

925
00:56:15,320 --> 00:56:17,360
Speaker 1: the House on the Hill to refresh my memory. And

926
00:56:17,400 --> 00:56:20,319
Speaker 1: this is an online video series. I watch it on

927
00:56:20,360 --> 00:56:23,480
Speaker 1: YouTube where people play tabletop games a lot of times

928
00:56:23,480 --> 00:56:26,359
Speaker 1: their celebrities, and it sounds boring, I know, but it's

929
00:56:26,400 --> 00:56:29,360
Speaker 1: usually pretty entertaining and it's it's just good to see

930
00:56:29,400 --> 00:56:32,560
Speaker 1: people actually playing it because reading the instructions can feel

931
00:56:32,600 --> 00:56:34,560
Speaker 1: really dense, especially on a game like Betrayal at the

932
00:56:34,560 --> 00:56:37,440
Speaker 1: House on the Hill um and seeing it kind of

933
00:56:37,480 --> 00:56:40,960
Speaker 1: play out for me at least is very helpful. Yeah.

934
00:56:41,080 --> 00:56:44,520
Speaker 1: I have found that very helpful for seeing how the

935
00:56:44,560 --> 00:56:47,360
Speaker 1: game is played when there's not somebody experienced around to

936
00:56:47,400 --> 00:56:49,160
Speaker 1: tell you how the game is played, and then it

937
00:56:49,200 --> 00:56:53,279
Speaker 1: can be super entertaining. Sometimes the things that happen as

938
00:56:53,320 --> 00:56:57,960
Speaker 1: they are playing are hilarious. Yeah, I seem to recall

939
00:56:58,080 --> 00:57:01,680
Speaker 1: when they were playing a Ticket Toaster story I was

940
00:57:01,719 --> 00:57:07,040
Speaker 1: gonna tell's. I guess it's well known among the tabletop

941
00:57:07,160 --> 00:57:09,480
Speaker 1: but I remember it vividly as I think it's one

942
00:57:09,480 --> 00:57:11,440
Speaker 1: of those like this disaster happens in the middle of

943
00:57:11,480 --> 00:57:13,840
Speaker 1: the game, and then there is a slow motion replay

944
00:57:13,920 --> 00:57:19,400
Speaker 1: of the disaster. We'll go check out the episode on

945
00:57:19,800 --> 00:57:22,400
Speaker 1: Ticket to Ride if you want to find out what

946
00:57:22,440 --> 00:57:25,919
Speaker 1: that disaster was. On top of that, there's so many

947
00:57:25,960 --> 00:57:29,480
Speaker 1: things out There's so many things. There's podcast, Twitch channels,

948
00:57:29,640 --> 00:57:32,200
Speaker 1: YouTube shows. You've got Becca Scott over at the Twitch

949
00:57:32,280 --> 00:57:35,200
Speaker 1: channel Game the Game, Brittany Beau or Bibo over a game,

950
00:57:35,200 --> 00:57:38,720
Speaker 1: wire board game Breakfast on the YouTube channel the Dice Tower.

951
00:57:39,280 --> 00:57:41,760
Speaker 1: The amount of content out there on d and D

952
00:57:41,960 --> 00:57:48,560
Speaker 1: alone is staggering. So there are if you're intimidated or

953
00:57:48,640 --> 00:57:51,640
Speaker 1: you feel like you would just you you would feel

954
00:57:51,640 --> 00:57:57,080
Speaker 1: better if you had visual examples or just hearing people

955
00:57:57,120 --> 00:58:01,720
Speaker 1: talk about playing. There there's stuff for you out there. Yeah.

956
00:58:01,800 --> 00:58:05,840
Speaker 1: And if just watching or listening to someone's role playing

957
00:58:05,880 --> 00:58:10,520
Speaker 1: campaign sounds interesting to you, there are options for that too, Yes,

958
00:58:10,600 --> 00:58:13,120
Speaker 1: there are. I've thought about. I don't want to turn

959
00:58:13,120 --> 00:58:14,760
Speaker 1: it into work is a thing, but I thought about

960
00:58:14,760 --> 00:58:18,240
Speaker 1: recording our D n D sessions with our office campaign

961
00:58:18,280 --> 00:58:22,160
Speaker 1: just because Yeah, they are quite interest thought about. Yeah,

962
00:58:22,240 --> 00:58:26,760
Speaker 1: I've thought about pitching some kind of RPG podcast, And

963
00:58:27,040 --> 00:58:30,920
Speaker 1: because I have had too much other podcast work to do,

964
00:58:31,160 --> 00:58:34,920
Speaker 1: that's never been a thing that's come to fruition. I

965
00:58:34,920 --> 00:58:38,560
Speaker 1: would be so into that. Um. There's also Contesta, which

966
00:58:38,560 --> 00:58:42,000
Speaker 1: is a nonprofit founded in twelve to make the tabletop

967
00:58:42,000 --> 00:58:46,920
Speaker 1: gaming space for marginalized folks more diverse and providing a

968
00:58:46,960 --> 00:58:50,160
Speaker 1: space for them to run games. So if you're interested

969
00:58:50,200 --> 00:58:52,160
Speaker 1: in running a game, you can check them out or

970
00:58:52,280 --> 00:58:54,200
Speaker 1: getting involved in this at all. They have a lot

971
00:58:54,200 --> 00:58:59,120
Speaker 1: of opportunities around that. So I I feel like we're

972
00:58:59,120 --> 00:59:03,040
Speaker 1: about at the end of this exploration into tabletop gaming.

973
00:59:03,160 --> 00:59:06,640
Speaker 1: Think so, I think so to wrap things up there,

974
00:59:06,680 --> 00:59:09,800
Speaker 1: there's a lot of things going on in the world

975
00:59:09,800 --> 00:59:13,520
Speaker 1: of tabletop gaming, and there are clearly areas where the

976
00:59:13,600 --> 00:59:16,360
Speaker 1: industry can improve. And it makes me sad that people

977
00:59:16,360 --> 00:59:18,000
Speaker 1: have been turned away from something that can be so

978
00:59:18,160 --> 00:59:22,880
Speaker 1: fun and perhaps physically and mentally beneficial because they didn't

979
00:59:22,960 --> 00:59:28,480
Speaker 1: feel welcome. So I'm really hoping that that will change,

980
00:59:28,640 --> 00:59:33,480
Speaker 1: and that maybe maybe somebody listening to this who's been

981
00:59:33,520 --> 00:59:36,160
Speaker 1: interested in it but hasn't done it for one reason

982
00:59:36,240 --> 00:59:39,360
Speaker 1: or the other, maybe this episode has inspired you to

983
00:59:39,480 --> 00:59:42,640
Speaker 1: go check it out. Yeah, even if you are not

984
00:59:42,680 --> 00:59:45,360
Speaker 1: really into the idea of going to a gigantic convention

985
00:59:45,440 --> 00:59:48,760
Speaker 1: and spending the whole weekend there a lot of times

986
00:59:48,840 --> 00:59:51,880
Speaker 1: the people that actually developed these games are working on

987
00:59:51,960 --> 00:59:55,160
Speaker 1: the dealer's floor at booths like with their games to

988
00:59:55,240 --> 00:59:57,320
Speaker 1: personally show you how to play, or somebody that they

989
00:59:57,360 --> 00:59:59,440
Speaker 1: know really well is is going to personally show you

990
00:59:59,440 --> 01:00:02,000
Speaker 1: how to game play the game. So at least doing

991
01:00:02,040 --> 01:00:04,520
Speaker 1: a walk through and seeing what games are being played

992
01:00:04,560 --> 01:00:08,240
Speaker 1: and what looks fun can be really awesome. Yeah, Because

993
01:00:08,400 --> 01:00:11,480
Speaker 1: as we said, there are so many games out there,

994
01:00:12,160 --> 01:00:16,240
Speaker 1: all kinds of games that you may be unaware of

995
01:00:16,320 --> 01:00:20,959
Speaker 1: but there are options, options, options, and we will follow

996
01:00:21,120 --> 01:00:25,760
Speaker 1: up with an episode about the development aspect of gaming,

997
01:00:25,960 --> 01:00:29,919
Speaker 1: so look out for that UM In the meantime, thank

998
01:00:29,920 --> 01:00:32,680
Speaker 1: you so much Tracy for joining us. This has been

999
01:00:32,720 --> 01:00:35,760
Speaker 1: such a lovely conversation. Thank you. I've had a really

1000
01:00:35,800 --> 01:00:39,160
Speaker 1: good time. Yeah, I really want to play some games now.

1001
01:00:41,360 --> 01:00:45,400
Speaker 1: We got to go back to work though. Alas where

1002
01:00:45,440 --> 01:00:49,880
Speaker 1: can people find you, Tracy Well, I co host Stuff

1003
01:00:49,880 --> 01:00:53,400
Speaker 1: You Miss in History Class with Holly Fry and so

1004
01:00:53,600 --> 01:00:56,240
Speaker 1: the easiest way to get me is that the Stuff

1005
01:00:56,240 --> 01:00:59,480
Speaker 1: you Miss in History Class email, which is History podcast

1006
01:00:59,520 --> 01:01:02,440
Speaker 1: at how Stuff Works dot com. And then we're all

1007
01:01:02,440 --> 01:01:06,680
Speaker 1: over social media at ms in History. I'm also personally

1008
01:01:06,680 --> 01:01:09,760
Speaker 1: on Twitter, but I'm often not looking at my mentions.

1009
01:01:11,360 --> 01:01:14,600
Speaker 1: I'm the same. So yeah, sometimes I'll see that somebody

1010
01:01:14,600 --> 01:01:17,600
Speaker 1: has said something like asked me a question or said

1011
01:01:17,680 --> 01:01:20,440
Speaker 1: something nice, and I'm like, I did not that was

1012
01:01:20,480 --> 01:01:23,919
Speaker 1: a week ago. Whoops. Yeah. I really have to build

1013
01:01:23,960 --> 01:01:26,400
Speaker 1: myself up to go on social media. I do. I

1014
01:01:26,480 --> 01:01:28,480
Speaker 1: don't want that to cheer you from contacting me, but

1015
01:01:28,720 --> 01:01:33,040
Speaker 1: it's like a once a week here we go. I

1016
01:01:33,080 --> 01:01:35,200
Speaker 1: spend a lot of time just scrolling to the top

1017
01:01:35,240 --> 01:01:38,120
Speaker 1: of the Twitter feed and being like, what's happening right now? Okay,

1018
01:01:38,120 --> 01:01:44,120
Speaker 1: putting this away right. You can also email this show

1019
01:01:44,480 --> 01:01:47,360
Speaker 1: at mom Stuff at how stuff works dot com. You

1020
01:01:47,400 --> 01:01:50,640
Speaker 1: can find us on Twitter at mom Stuff Podcast and

1021
01:01:50,720 --> 01:01:53,680
Speaker 1: on Instagram at stuff Mo'm Never told you. Thanks as

1022
01:01:53,680 --> 01:01:56,600
Speaker 1: always to our producer Andrew Howard, and thanks to you

1023
01:01:56,680 --> 01:02:03,960
Speaker 1: for listening to pay for the wet for me.