Thursday Knights, Live Broadcast of Actual Play

Steel_Wind · Apr 15, 2010

I'm interested in the hardware and software you use (and bandwidth pipe as well) to do this.

Is there a write-up somewhere -- and if there isn't -- I'd love to see one!

OverloadUT · Apr 15, 2010

Steel_Wind said:
I'm interested in the hardware and software you use (and bandwidth pipe as well) to do this.

Is there a write-up somewhere -- and if there isn't -- I'd love to see one!

There is a write-up in the FAQ! It details all of the hardware and software we use. As for the bandwidth, I currently have it tweaked to encode and upload at 1mbit/s. The quality seems pretty good at that rate.

Also,
Episode 11 Audio Recording Posted

The battle with Company Yargo and their impressive airship comes to a conclusion.

OverloadUT · Apr 16, 2010

We are now broadcasting live!

Steel_Wind · Apr 16, 2010

I caught over an hour of this last night. While the roleplaying of meeting the Giant/Half-giant ship from [Toril er...whatever the name of the mountain region was] did not exactly make for an electrifying televised gaming scene, I very much enjoyed the skill challenge which later developed when the party's ship had to escape from the Kraken.

I thought the use of an egg timer during the skill challenge was useful and your players seemed very involved and engaged. A fine skill challenge/encounter that seemed to play very well.

The skill challenge mechanic in 4E is one of its best innovations. Run poorly, it reduces a RPG game to roll playing at its worst; done properly, it is a mechnic that can be easily retrofitted on to 3.xx and Pathfinder -- and has been retrofitted on to Star Wars:SE with great results - and can produce roleplaying at its best. To praphrase Davis St. Hubbins: It's a fine line between clever and stupid.

All by way of saying, I congratulate you and your group on demonstrating how a well done skill challenge can be adapted to almost any situation with exciting and cinematic results.

F700 · Apr 17, 2010

I wasn't looking to give constructive criticism. I stated I did not find it entertaining.

Post mostly removed for extreme offensiveness.

Mod edit: It is okay to have a negative opinion of something. But we ask you to be at least civil and respectful in expressing it.

D'karr · Apr 17, 2010

F700 said:
I wasn't looking to give constructive criticism.

Very helpful, thanks for your insight...

Steel_Wind · Apr 17, 2010

F700 said:
I wasn't looking to give constructive criticism. I stated I did not find it entertaining.

(Quoted post removed.)

I have not read a more insulting and personal attack on ENWorld. Ever.

*PLONK*

catastrophic · Apr 17, 2010

The egg timer was a nice touch.

I think challenges work way better when real effort is put into their creation, beyond the basic framework of a challenge. A run-of-the-mill challenge is often pretty weak, but one like this makes for really fun play a lot of the time.

darjr · Apr 17, 2010

Hey guys, I really love the vids and the idea.

I am very interested in an edited version. The live video is very cool but I don't have time to watch the whole thing. Looks like you guys are having a great time.

OverloadUT · Apr 20, 2010

darjr said:
Hey guys, I really love the vids and the idea.

I am very interested in an edited version. The live video is very cool but I don't have time to watch the whole thing. Looks like you guys are having a great time.

If by edited you mean cut to be shorter, then I am sad to say that that will probably never happen. Planning for each session as well as publishing just the raw recordings already takes most of my free time each week. To actually cut up a recording to be "properly" edited would simply take time I do not have.

It's something I really wish I could do, and if I win the lottery and can quit my job, then you can be sure I will do it!

Steel_Wind said:
I very much enjoyed the skill challenge which later developed when the party's ship had to escape from the Kraken.

I thought the use of an egg timer during the skill challenge was useful and your players seemed very involved and engaged. A fine skill challenge/encounter that seemed to play very well.

Thank you! This was definitely my favorite encounter I have ever designed. While skill challenges have the potential to be very cool, I really don't like that they take an enormous amount of effort to design one that is interesting at all, especially compared to the ease of designing a combat encounter. I mean christ I had make this to figure out what to set all of the numbers to:
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/26620/D&D/ShipEaterMath.png

But at the end of the day this one went exactly as I hoped. It was extremely exciting to all of the players and MAN it came down to the wire in the end there.

egg timer

We use egg timers fairly often, and this was the first time I was so strict about it. I really wanted the whole fight to feel extremely hectic and hurried. The second reason for using the timer is the fact that despite my best efforts, at the end of the day the encounter still only had a small amount of tactics. The timer helped make those few tactics more interesting because they were rushed to choose them.