Tabletop RPG Survey

Please take the survey below. It asks how and why you play tabletop role-playing games, what other games you play, and how to get children more involved in the hobby. If you play TRPGs, the survey should take under 10 minutes. If you don’t play TRPGs, then you must love our extremely late movie reviews and will be able to complete the survey in a couple of minutes.

This survey is for a school paper I’m doing. The results of the survey will never be presented in any way that individuals will be able to be identified.

I would really appreciate it if you shared the survey with as many people as you can.

https://mcgillmgmt.qualtrics.com/SE/?SID=SV_dgmqjaiZHn2EHKl

Thanks,

Lyal

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Episode 129: Inspirations #2

The Idle Red Hands are still finding inspiration in everyday things like Jenga towers, X-Box games and bear gods. Join us for our second installment of Inspirations where we share game ideas we’ve gotten from outside of the TRPG world.

In this episode, we discuss  the novel Shardik, the video game Bastion, and the TRPG Dread. I think one of the hosts doesn’t quite get the concept of this series.

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Episode 128: (Re)Introductions

Well, hello again. Meet the Idle Red Hands for the second time. Even after two years, their stories on how they got started in gaming remain the same. From the drug-infested, Magic-playing ghettos of Philly to the cheese-eating, cheese-wearing wasteland of Wisconsin to the nuclear-fearing, sparkly-scarf-loving ground zero of West Germany, these three gamers found and fell in love with the hobby.

Listen for the answers to these questions:

Is Heroquest is an RPG?
Who was the “inspiration” for the Punisher?
How many stolen D&D products has Chris bought?

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Episode 127: Literature Lessons: Edgar Allen Poe

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary, – See more at: http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/15638#sthash.Xu6x4ORe.dpuf

Once upon a weeknight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,
 Over what Feat to choose for this RPG character I adore,
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a yapping,
As of some one rudely sapping, sapping energy galore.
“Tis Idle Red Hands,” I muttered, “flapping gums, those frightful bores –
Only this and nothing … (snore).”

Happy Halloween! For the last episode in our Month of Horror, we look at the American Gothic writer, Edgar Allen Poe.

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary, Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore— While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping, As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door— “‘Tis some visitor,” I muttered, “tapping at my chamber door— Only this and nothing more.” – See more at: http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/15638#sthash.Xu6x4ORe.dpuf
Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary, Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore— While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping, As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door— “‘Tis some visitor,” I muttered, “tapping at my chamber door— Only this and nothing more.” – See more at: http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/15638#sthash.Xu6x4ORe.dpuf
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Episode 126: Locales: Haunted Locations

GM: Just as you’re about to go into the bathroom stall, you feel a chill.
Player: Hanakosan is in there, right?
GM: Maybe. We’ll see.
Player: I go to the next stall.
GM: What? Uh, it’s occupied.
Player: I wait.
GM: You really need to go to the bathroom. Make a stamina check.
Player: Seriously? Man, I knew I should’ve taken the Steel Trap Sphincter Advantage.

In our second episode of our Month of Horror, we look at haunted locations, from houses to ships to bathroom stalls.

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Episode 125: Creature Feature: The Inquisition

In our first episode of our third annual Month of Horror, we look at the Inquisition. Sodomy, bigamy, heresy, and witch, uh, sorcery; this episode has it all. We discuss how to play an inquisitor as an antagonist (easy) and how to play them as a protagonist (not so easy).

Special guest appearances by one of Lyal’s cats and some of his dishes. He has since been brought in for questioning on suspicion of witchcraft.

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Episode 124: Conventions & Innovations

With Wayne back from Strategicon‘s Gateway 2013 and Lyal fresh off of reading books on the history of role-playing games, we decide to combine these for this episode’s topic. We look at the innovations that role-playing games brought to gaming and how these can be found in today’s convention games. Since we’re talk about conventions, we cover an eighties cartoon, zombies, neck beards, teenage girls (Wait. What?) and One Direction (Which convention did Wayne go to?).

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Episode 123: Cosmic Heroes

“In blackest day, in darkest night, may the force be with you.”
-Idle Red Hands

Go big or go home. This week we tackle a galactic sized topic with “Cosmic Heroes”. Marvel’s Nova Corps, D.C.’s Green Lantern Corps, the Jedi and other heroes – in spaaaaaaaace.

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Episode 122: Inspirations #1

In this first installment of a new series, we look at things that have given us at least one game idea. The three inspirations for this episode are Princess Mononoke, Saga of the Swamp Thing and Cloverfield.

We had considered opening these show notes with the lyrics to Chicago’s “You’re the Inspiration”, but we were worried that the song would get stuck in your head. ARGH! Too late!

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Episode 121: Locales: Myanmar

“Old cows like young grass.”
– Myanmar proverb

The proverb really has nothing to do with our episode, but, darn, Myanmar, you speak the truth.

In this installment of Locales, we discuss Myanmar the Golden Land. In true Idle Red Hands fashion, we don’t just Google it; we put a man on the ground. Lyal comes back from Myanmar to augment Chris’s and Wayne’s exhaustive research. Oh, Lyal gets all coy because his wife was in the room. Yes, he was talking about the sex industry. It really couldn’t be any clearer.

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