Dice Exploder

Transcripts available at diceexploder.comIt's the Dice Exploder 2025 year end bonanza! This year I'm joined by Lin Codega and Diogo Nogueira to go over a whole bunch of game mechanics that we think represent where rpgs were at in 2025 and where they might be going in the future.Further ReadingMythic Bastionland by Chris McDowallPraise the Hawkmoth King by Sage the AnagogueI want to fight my friends in the back of a moving truck by Seraphina Garcia RamirezTraffic Lights Are Communication Tools by Meguey BakerDaggerheartDraw SteelThe One Ring starter setSam Sorensen’s overview of Over/Under and one of Lin’s pieces on the aftermathApocalypse World 3e Kickstarter (now finished)SocialsRascal.newsWeird Games and Weirder PeopleLin and Diogo on Bluesky.Sam on Bluesky and itch.The Dice Exploder blog is at diceexploder.comOur logo was designed by sporgory, our ad music is Lilypads by Travis Tessmer, and our theme song is Sunset Bridge by Purely Grey.Join the Dice Exploder Discord to talk about the show!Dice Exploder on Patreon

Transcripts available at diceexploder.comMy new game Band-Aids & Bullet Holes is still on Kickstarter! Check it out today.In honor of BABH, this month on Dice Exploder I'm covering mechanics from other games that inspired it. In keeping with this show's increasingly loose definition of "mechanic," today I'm joined by Sam Roberts (Escape from Dino Island) to tackle one of this game's greatest influences: the 2014 Keanu Reeves movie John Wick.The first half of this ep is basically a movie podcast. We go deep on what makes John Wick tick (in brief: the first 30 minutes). But the back half we get into the extremely popular concept within indie rpgs of genre emulation: making games that evoke another piece of media or genre of media. What makes genre emulation work? What do we think most people get wrong when they attempt to do it? And is it even a worthy goal?Further ReadingBack Band-Aids & Bullet Holes on Kickstarter now!John Wick (2014)Escape from Dino Island by Sam Roberts and Sam TungSocialsSam Roberts on BlueskySam Dunnewold on Bluesky and itchThe Dice Exploder blog is at diceexploder.comJoin the Dice Exploder Discord to talk about the show!CreditsOur logo was designed by sporgory, our ad music is Lilypads by Travis Tessmer, and our theme song is Sunset Bridge by Purely Grey.This episode was edited by Em Acosta

Transcripts available at diceexploder.comToday is the launch of Band-Aids & Bullet Holes, my melodramatic action game of bloody revenge. It's a one shot, capsule game, box set, deckbuilder rpg. Check it out.In honor of BABH, this month on Dice Exploder I'm covering mechanics from other games that inspired it, starting today with the idea of character nonmonogamy. Traditionally in rpgs each player gets one main character. This is often true regardless of whether or not there's a GM: certain characters "belong" to each player. Not so in Band-Aids & Bullet Holes.But what does that look like? And what does it do to play? There's a lot of games that have played with other models, but to kick things off today we're digging into how it works in Jason Morningstar's Space Post, a game about delivering the mail in space, where main postman and space ship characters are passed around between players.And to do that I'm joined by Sidney Icarus, game design smarty, designer of Decaying Orbit, and former host of The Hard Move aka the podcast whose format I stole for Dice Exploder. Come on, let's get into it...Further ReadingBand-Aids & Bullet Holes on KickstarterSpace Post by Jason MorningstarBluebeard's BrideBand of BladesEveryone Is JohnArs MagicaSocialsSidney’s website, YouTube channel, and BlueskySam on Bluesky and itchThe Dice Exploder blog is at diceexploder.comOur logo was designed by sporgory, our theme song is Sunset Bridge by Purely Grey, and our ad music is Lilypads by Travis Tessmer.Join the Dice Exploder Discord to talk about the show!CreditsOur logo was designed by sporgory, our ad music is Lilypads by Travis Tessmer, and our theme song is Sunset Bridge by Purely Grey.This episode was edited by Em Acosta

Transcripts available at diceexploder.comMy first stand-alone print game, Band-Aids & Bullet Holes, goes live on Kickstarter next week on May 5th. I have a lot to say about it, and I'm gonna say a lot of it: May's going to be all episodes about mechanics from other people's games that inspired me in this design.Today I wanted to talk about Band-Aids & Bullet Holes straight up, but I didn't want you to just take it from me all the stuff I love about it, so I'm handing the show over once again to Lady Tabletop and Seraphina Garcia Ramirez. They're gonna tell you about Band-Aids & Bullet Holes through its core mechanic: take a marker, sharpie your character's core traits onto playing cards, then shuffle those up and flip them at each other, high card wins. As Sera says, somehow adding flavor to the classic card game War makes it so much better...Further ReadingBand-Aids & Bullet Holes on KickstarterSocialsSeraphina on Bluesky and itchLady Tabletop on Tumblr and itchThe Dice Exploder blog is at diceexploder.comOur logo was designed by sporgory, our theme song is Sunset Bridge by Purely Grey, and our ad music is Lilypads by Travis Tessmer.Join the Dice Exploder Discord to talk about the show!CreditsOur logo was designed by sporgory, our ad music is Lilypads by Travis Tessmer, and our theme song is Sunset Bridge by Purely Grey.This episode was edited by Em Acosta

Transcripts available at diceexploder.comFurther ReadingBand-Aids & Bullet Holes on KickstarterMobile Frame Zero: Firebrands by Meguey & Vincent BakerThe King Is Dead by Meguey & Vincent BakerStewpot: Tales from a Fantasy Tavern by Takuma OkadaSocialsViditya on Bluesky and itchSam on Bluesky and itchThe Dice Exploder blog is at diceexploder.comOur logo was designed by sporgory, our theme song is Sunset Bridge by Purely Grey, and our ad music is Lilypads by Travis Tessmer.Join the Dice Exploder Discord to talk about the show!CreditsOur logo was designed by sporgory, our ad music is Lilypads by Travis Tessmer, and our theme song is Sunset Bridge by Purely Grey.This episode was edited by Em Acosta.

Transcripts available at diceexploder.comI love pregens! But why do I love pregens? I dug into this a bunch on an episode last year with Aaron Lim about the characters in Last Train to Bremen: I love being given a clear goal and baseline temperament when I sit down to play so I can get into drama as fast as possible. But the game Lady Blackbird goes a step further. Each character has "Keys" which lay out not just character traits and goals, but the central dramatic questions and stakes each character's arc is likely to concern itself with. And that, more than anything else, is probably what I want from my pregens.Whitney Delaglio joins me to talk about Lady Blackbird's Keys (originally from The Shadow of Yesterday by Clinton R. Nixon). She's got her own game coming to Backerkit next month - The Old, The Cold, The Bold - which iterates on Keys. So today we get into not just how they work but how you can make them work for you.Further ReadingLady Blackbird by John HarperThe Shadow of Yesterday by Clinton R. NixonThe Old, The Cold, The Bold by Whitney Delaglio - second edition on Backerkit soon!SocialsWhitney on BlueskySam on Bluesky and itchThe Dice Exploder blog is at diceexploder.comOur logo was designed by sporgory, our theme song is Sunset Bridge by Purely Grey, and our ad music is Lilypads by Travis Tessmer.Join the Dice Exploder Discord to talk about the show!CreditsOur logo was designed by sporgory, our ad music is Lilypads by Travis Tessmer, and our theme song is Sunset Bridge by Purely Grey.

Transcripts available at diceexploder.comAustin Walker's new game Realis is on Kickstarter now, and it's been making splashes in the indie rpg scene since last year when the ashcan came out. The game's core mechanic, Sentences, feels like the exact kind of mechanic I love covering on this show. But where did it come from? I asked Austin to come talk to me about it and bring one of his influences, and he came back with another diceless, GM-less resolution mechanic: the token economy of weak, strong, and regular moves from Dream Askew / Dream Apart. So today we're completing Dice Exploder's accidental Dream Askew / Dream Apart trilogy (paired with the episodes on lures and setting elements from the past couple months) and then digging into what makes this system work and what Realis learned from it.Further ReadingRealis is on Kickstarter now!Follow Sam’s game Band-Aids & Bullet Holes on Kickstarter!Dream Askew / Dream Apart by Avery Alder and Benjamin RosenbaumSocialsAustin on BlueskySam on Bluesky and itchThe Dice Exploder blog is at diceexploder.comJoin the Dice Exploder Discord to talk about the show!CreditsOur logo was designed by sporgory, our ad music is Lilypads by Travis Tessmer, and our theme song is Sunset Bridge by Purely Grey.This episode was edited by Em Acosta

Transcripts available at diceexploder.comFollow Band-Aids & Bullet Holes on Kickstarter!The Awards are back! The rpg awards show with a bent towards indie games and the guaranteed worst SEO of all time is back for another around, and the current steward of The Awards - Nico MacDougall - is back on the show this week to talk through some of our favorite mechanics from the last batch of winners.If you want to get involved in The Awards, you can apply to be a judge through the end of April and you can submit your games during the month of May! This year's Awards will cover games published between June 1, 2024 and May 31, 2025.Further ReadingThe Awards 2026 - apply to be a judge today!Cloud Empress by WattBorder Riding by Stout Stoat PressThis Maze Will Be Big Enough To Call Home Someday by Anna Anne AnthropyStirring the Hornet's Nest at Het Thamsya by MunkaoSocialsNico on BlueskySam on Bluesky and itchThe Dice Exploder blog is at diceexploder.comOur logo was designed by sporgory, our theme song is Sunset Bridge by Purely Grey, and our ad music is Lilypads by Travis Tessmer.Join the Dice Exploder Discord to talk about the show!CreditsOur logo was designed by sporgory, our ad music is Lilypads by Travis Tessmer, and our theme song is Sunset Bridge by Purely Grey.

Transcripts available at diceexploder.comMy friend Tristan Zimmerman is currently crowdfunding Ballad Hunters, a GUMSHOE game, meaning it’s based on a core mechanic built for investigation games and gathering clues. That mechanic goes like this: “always give the players the clue.” Simple! And I think so astute as to what the actual fun part of investigation is in RPGs: it’s not “can we roll high enough to progress,” it’s “once we have all these clues, how do we put them together and what do we do with them?”Further ReadingBallad Hunters by Tristan Zimmerman, now on KickstarterGUMSHOE by Cat Tobin, a list of resources for and articles about GUMSHOEThe Rule Book: The Building Blocks of Games by Jaakko Stenros and Markus MontolaSocialsTristan on Bluesky.Molten Sulfur Blog, Nations & Cannons, and Shanty Hunters from TristanSam on Bluesky and itch.The Dice Exploder blog is at diceexploder.comOur logo was designed by sporgory, our theme song is Sunset Bridge by Purely Grey, and our ad music is Lilypads by Travis Tessmer.Join the Dice Exploder Discord to talk about the show!CreditsOur logo was designed by sporgory, our ad music is Lilypads by Travis Tessmer, and our theme song is Sunset Bridge by Purely Grey.This episode was edited by Em Acosta.

Transcripts available at diceexploder.comIf the thesis of last week’s episode was “hey the fiction of your game matters a lot and can even have mechanical effects,” how do you know how deeply to define that fiction? Maybe no one in indie games has recently faced that question on quite the scale of Tim Denee with Blades ‘68, an expansion to Blades in the Dark. I wanted to have him on to talk about when you completely reinvent the setting, how do you think about what parts of the fiction are important and need to be kept vs what parts should evolve and change?And to do that, we picked an old mechanic from Dungeon World that cuts to the heart of it: draw maps, leave blanks. But how detailed of maps, and how big of blanks?Further ReadingBlades 68 on BackerkitBlades in the Dark by John HarperDungeon WorldTim’s maps of DoskvolSocialsTim on Bluesky and olddog.gamesSam on Bluesky and itchThe Dice Exploder blog is at diceexploder.comOur logo was designed by sporgory, our theme song is Sunset Bridge by Purely Grey, and our ad music is Lilypads by Travis Tessmer.Join the Dice Exploder Discord to talk about the show!CreditsOur logo was designed by sporgory, our ad music is Lilypads by Travis Tessmer, and our theme song is Sunset Bridge by Purely Grey.This episode was edited by Em Acosta.

Transcripts available at diceexploder.comIn Blades in the Dark, you play as criminals in Doskvol a haunted city where the ghosts are such a problem that they built giant lightning barriers around the whole city to keep them out. That sentence alone already makes me want to get the game to the table, and we haven’t even gotten to the rules of Blades in the Dark yet.That’s the conversation I wanted to take a crack at today: rules are important, they can radically shape play, but the fiction a game brings is just as important. Doskvol’s lightning barriers mean you can’t just run away into the wilderness after you’ve committed some crimes, and that’s just as important for ratcheting up the tension and consequences of your campaign as the mechanic of devil’s bargains...Further ReadingBlades in the Dark by John HarperMythic Bastionland by Chris McDowallApocalypse World 3e/Burned Over by Meguey & Vincent BakerWanderhome by Jay DragonVincent Baker on How Apocalypse World Is Structured (like an onion)In Praise of Legwork by Sam Sorensen1d20 Diegetic Rules, 1d20 Hypo-Diegetic Rules by Sam SorensenThe Rule Book: The Building Blocks of Games by Jaakko Stenros and Markus MontolaSocialsNova on Bluesky. Nova’s blog, Playful Void.Sam on Bluesky and itch.The Dice Exploder blog is at diceexploder.comOur logo was designed by sporgory, our theme song is Sunset Bridge by Purely Grey, and our ad music is Lilypads by Travis Tessmer.Join the Dice Exploder Discord to talk about the show!CreditsOur logo was designed by sporgory, our ad music is Lilypads by Travis Tessmer, and our theme song is Sunset Bridge by Purely Grey.This episode was edited by Em Acosta.

Transcripts available at diceexploder.comThere's many ways to decide who has authority over what in an RPG. Traditional games have a bunch of players with one PC each and a GM responsible for everything else, while Dreams Askew / Dream Apart by Avery Alder and Ben Rosenbaum takes a very different approach: divide that "everything else" up into flavorful pieces, like "gossip & reputation" and "the wild forest" and give everyone a piece. That choice has become one of the backbones of Belonging Outside Belonging games (hacks of Dream Askew / Dream Apart), and today I'm joined by my good friend Kodi Gonzaga, a designer making just such a game, to break down exactly how it works at the table.Kodi's game Extra Ordinary is on Kickstarter now. Check it out!Further ReadingDream Askew / Dream Apart by Avery Alder and Benjamin RosenbaumSocialsExtra Ordinary on Kickstarter!Kodi on Bluesky.Sam on Bluesky and itch.The Dice Exploder blog is at diceexploder.comJoin the Dice Exploder Discord to talk about the show!Dice Exploder on PatreonCreditsOur logo was designed by sporgory, our ad music is Lilypads by Travis Tessmer, and our theme song is Sunset Bridge by Purely Grey.This episode was edited by Em Acosta.

Transcripts available at diceexploder.comMausritter is an old school dungeon crawling game where instead of playing as elves fighting dragons, you play as mice fleeing from owls. It’s not unlike any number of other old school games like Cairn or Into the Odd, but its inventory system is the only inventory system I’ve ever actually liked. Does it work differently than other games? At a raw numbers level, not really! But instead of a bunch of paper bookkeeping, Mausritter turns items into little cardboard squares like board game pieces that you put in a grid on your character sheet. That physicality makes all the difference.Further ReadingMausritter by Isaac WilliamsThe Lonely Oak by Victor LaneCairn by Yochai GalBlades in the Dark by John HarperQuinns Quest on youtube and patreon.SocialsQuinns on Bluesky.Sam on Bluesky and itch.The Dice Exploder blog is at diceexploder.comOur logo was designed by sporgory, our ad music is Lilypads by Travis Tessmer, and our theme song is Sunset Bridge by Purely Grey.Join the Dice Exploder Discord to talk about the show!Dice Exploder on Patreon

Transcripts available at diceexploder.comApocalypse World 3rd edition is on Kickstarter right now. In many ways, it hasn’t changed much. In many ways, it's a whole new apocalypse. So I thought it'd be fun to have on the Bakers and go through a playbook - the Brainer in 2e vs its equivalent the Brain-Picker in 3e - and ask them about every single change on the sheet, from updating the basic moves all the way down to a single name on a single picklist.Further ReadingApocalypse World: Burned Over 3e on Kickstarter and a preview of The Brain-PickerApocalypse World 2e handouts, including the BrainerDesigning a seduce or manipulate replacement on the Dice Exploder PatreonPreview the Bakers’ seduce or manipulate replacement on their PatreonSocialsMeguey and Vincent on Bluesky.The Baker House BlogSam on Bluesky and itch.The Dice Exploder blog is at diceexploder.comOur logo was designed by sporgory, our ad music is Lilypads by Travis Tessmer, and our theme song is Sunset Bridge by Purely Grey.Join the Dice Exploder Discord to talk about the show!Dice Exploder on Patreon

Transcripts available at diceexploder.comTo close out this miniseries on actual play, I wanted to feature a game that I think uses actual play as a game mechanic. Hear me out. Void 1680 AM is a solo playlist-building game in which you create a fictional radio broadcast. Except when you're done, you can send it to the game's creator (this week's cohost Ken Lowery), and he'll broadcast it out onto the real radio via the AM antenna in his garage (and on YouTube).Obviously it feels different to play the game knowing it's going to go out on air. But I think it feels different even just knowing that it could go out on air. And while most actual play feels first and foremost like an act of performance, Ken's broadcasts feel more like an extension of gameplay and an act of community building. How's it feel to be inside all that? Come take a listen.Further ReadingVoid 1680 AM by Ken LoweryVoid 1680 AM Community Broadcasts archives on YouTubeSam’s Void Community BroadcastChinese larp of Void on InstagramCharacters Without Stories featuring SamSocialsKen on Bluesky and itch. You can purchase physical copies from his imprint Bannerless Games.Sam on Bluesky and itchThe Dice Exploder blog is at diceexploder.comOur logo was designed by sporgory, our ad music is Lilypads by Travis Tessmer, and our theme song is Sunset Bridge by Purely Grey.Join the Dice Exploder Discord to talk about the show!Dice Exploder on Patreon

Transcripts available at diceexploder.comIn The Wildsea, you play as sailors on a sea of trees in a climate post-apocalypse where the climate won. And in the My First Dungeon mini series of this game, today's co-cohost Brian Flaherty took it on himself - along with co-player J Strautman - to write an original song, a “tree shanty,” that played on each episode.Today Brian and I, along with his Talk of the Table cohost and Wildsea GM Elliot Davis, break down one of those tree shanties: how it came to be, and how this moment blends together preproduction, production at the table, and post production in a bunch of compelling ways. We also get to see some lessons on display about how to pace a campaign and how when you know you can trust your fellow players, you can take more risky creative swings. Take a listen!Further ReadingThe Wildsea by Felix IsaacsMy First Dungeon: The Wildsea episode 5Talk of the Table podcastSocialsBrian on BlueskyElliot on Bluesky and his gamesSam on Bluesky and itchThe Dice Exploder blog is at diceexploder.comOur logo was designed by sporgory, our ad music is Lilypads by Travis Tessmer, and our theme song is Sunset Bridge by Purely Grey.Join the Dice Exploder Discord to talk about the show!Dice Exploder on Patreon

Transcripts are available at diceexploder.comBee and Barclay are the hosts of Tabletop Book Club, a podcast that is exactly what it sounds like. It’s a show with such fun energy, and of course good design talk. Because Barclay has a new belonging outside belonging game that's just come out - Begin Again, check the link below - today I'm talking with them about lures, maybe my favorite part of the belonging outside belonging engine, and specifically how they're implemented in Heave in the Dust...Further ReadingHeaven in the Dust by Luke JordanBegin Again by Barclay TravisDream Askew / Dream Apart by Avery Alder and Benjamin RosenbaumSocialsTabletop Book Club, Bee, and Barclay on BlueskySam on Bluesky and itchThe Dice Exploder blog is at diceexploder.comOur logo was designed by sporgory, our theme song is Sunset Bridge by Purely Grey, and our ad music is Lilypads by Travis Tessmer.Join the Dice Exploder Discord to talk about the show!CreditsOur logo was designed by sporgory, our ad music is Lilypads by Travis Tessmer, and our theme song is Sunset Bridge by Purely Grey.This episode was edited by Em Acosta.

Transcripts available at diceexploder.comLast summer a hot new game hit the indie rpg scene: You Will Die In This Place, a surreal and experimental... dungeon crawler? Technically? ...that seems to have more in common with House of Leaves than it does many roleplaying games. And for a couple weeks I saw so many discussions about this game that I eventually broke down and was like, do I need to do an emergency podcast about this?No. I did not. I was busy with a hundred other things. But past cohosts Merrilee Bufkin and Jay Dragon did. So I invited the two of them to take over the show for a special bonus episode where they talk all things, or at least some things, You Will Die In This Place. It’s a dense text. They get into House of Leaves, gender, autism, misogyny, the state of the games industry, and a ton more. Take a listen.Further ReadingYou Will Die In This Place by Elizabeth LittleYWDITP on GamefoundSocialsJay on Bluesky and Possum Creek Games on itch and Warehouse 23Merrilee on Bluesky and itchSam on Bluesky and itchThe Dice Exploder blog is at diceexploder.comOur logo was designed by sporgory, our ad music is Lilypads by Travis Tessmer, and our theme song is Sunset Bridge by Purely Grey.Join the Dice Exploder Discord to talk about the show!Dice Exploder on PatreonAP season "reading" list:My First Dungeon: Orbital Blues, session 1My First Dungeon: Wildsea, episode 5Maia's Game Room: Electric State, episode 5 - CW: sexual coercionLast Train to BrooklynVoid 1680 AM broadcasts

Transcripts available at diceexploder.comToday we’re wrapping up the Dice Exploder series on love, sex, and romance with Will That Be All? by Graham Walmsley, a game about the social relationships between the downstairs staff at Melton Hall, a fictional British estate, over the course of about a decade between the first and second world wars.It’s a lovely game about finding solace and community even as the world outside feel deeply uncertain - and that’s what Kim wanted to talk about: how setting, and in this case the spectre of war, can encourage and affect how not just romance but relationships of all kinds can play out in a game.Further ReadingWill That Be All? by Graham WhalmsleyBreaking the Ice, and The Romance Trilogy, by Emily Care BossRosenstrasse by Jessica Hammer and Moyra TurkingtonDownton AbbeySocialsK Lam on Bluesky and itchSam on Bluesky and itchThe Dice Exploder blog is at diceexploder.comOur logo was designed by sporgory, our ad music is Lilypads by Travis Tessmer, and our theme song is Sunset Bridge by Purely Grey.Join the Dice Exploder Discord to talk about the show!Dice Exploder on Patreon

Transcripts available at diceexploder.comIn this final episode hosted by Sharang and Alex, perhaps their climactic episode, they are turning up the heat on sex mechanics all the way to physical contact, both as a way to simulate sex acts through other kinds of physical touch... and through actual sex acts being used as game mechanics.This stuff is fascinating, I think much more broadly applicable than you might believe at first blush, and I think also very obviously under discussed in the way that all things sex and sexuality are under discussed. Let's get into it.Further ReadingThe Sleepover by Kat Jones & Julia B. EllingboeThis interview by Lizzie Stark with Emma Wieslander, who created Ars Amandi for the 2001 larp Between Heaven and SeaA Place to Fuck Each Other by Avery AlderKirigami Dominatrix Display Simulator by Aura BellePraise the Hawkmoth King by sage the anagogueVice & Violence by ScalliORKFUCK by SympatheticSapphicSapphicworld by Darling Demon GamesSocialsAlex on Bluesky and carrdSharang on Bluesky and itchSam on Bluesky and itchThe Dice Exploder blog is at diceexploder.comOur logo was designed by sporgory, our ad music is Lilypads by Travis Tessmer, and our theme song is Sunset Bridge by Purely Grey.Join the Dice Exploder Discord to talk about the show!Dice Exploder on Patreon