Thank you very much for checking us out!!!
Just listened to all three currently-available episodes and hope you don't mind a bit of feedback.
I am extremely appreciative of any feedback that might have to offer. Thanks for taking the time to write it. It helps a lot.
StructureIt took me a while (at least 20 mins or so into the episode) to settle into the pace of your conversational style. I felt that you both spoke quite quickly (for a podcast) and covered a lot of detail,
This has been the most common piece of feedback so far (guess we should do something about it! lol).
I think there are two reasons for this, one a little easier to fix than the other.
1) Editing - I ententionally edit out inhales, 'umms' and 'you-knows', as well as any significant amount of silent time. I think this might be making a bit too tight. The original thought was to keep this as conversational as possible and cutting out natural conversation breaks I think is working to defeat that purpose.
2) I tend to be long winded and an analyzer. When I first joined the forums here I got a welcome message from Ryan saying it was good to have me and that I was so interested in commenting but that in my initial burst of comments left 5 dissertations of comments and it might be a bit much and scare people off. I think for the podcast Barry and I will need to make sure we are including the audience a bit more in the conversation and that we are explaining what we are talking about.
Good feedback, thank you!
all of which was interjected by laughing, making funny voices, cutting one another off, etc. None of these bother me, but in sum they make it far easier to miss some of your comments and therefore the point of your podcasts.
We really wanted to capture us just talking. One of the reasons we started a podcast was because we were staying out way to late and angering our wives just yaking about this stuff. Crazy as it is, making a podcast means we can now say, 'we should save this for the podcast!' and actually cut down on how much we are talking about this stuff but still have an outlet.
I guess my point is that we wanted to have the jokes and what not in there to keep it how we have conversations as I find that is how I enjoy listening to podcasts (and one of the things I most enjoyed about 3.5 Sanctuary, and other podcasts was the interplay between the hosts).
We also don't want people to come away thinking 'if I don't build my character the way they want me to I am doing it wrong!" It's a game, we are having fun with it and learning all the time.
I will try and make sure the content isn't getting lost in there as well.
It was especially difficult when you were covering the firearms rules and classes/archetypes because there was a lot to absorb at a cracking pace, especially for someone who wasn't entirely familiar with the firearm rules.
Good point. We selected firearms (and eastern weapons, armor and the ninja and samurai in episode 4... to be released soon), because they were new. We thought people might be most interested in jumping in and grabbing something they weren't as familiar with because it had just come out.
I think that also works against us though in that we are covering stuff that people might not even have access to or have had time to go over... so it is completely new or foreign.
Out of curiosity though, did it make you want to play a gunslinger, one of the archetypes, or allow firearms in your campaign? Or did it scare you off of them?
I know that when we started both reading up on (really just breezing over and then learning while on mic, so we are learning with the audience) and then starting this episode, I was unsure about letting Firearms in my campaign and they didn't interest me much as a player... now I have done a 180 on both counts... would be interesting to hear if the same was true for listeners.
I had an easier go of it by the time I got to episode 3 on class dipping, though I suspect that the topic change also made a difference. Not being all that familiar with the firearm rules, but being at least conversant with the 1-2 level class dips, meant that I was able to keep up with and absorb the gist of your conversation a lot easier for ep3 vs eps 1+2.
Our initial thought was to do one episode on rules (new ones if we can help it so they can be added to games), and then one on some sort of concept around the rules rather than a ruleset itself, then back and forth. We'll see how that goes, but the firearms one went soooo long I had to split it up into two episodes.
We had discussions about making part II be episode #3 to keep that rhythm, but I decided to keep them together.
Summary
Overall, a good start with just a couple of things that made it a little difficult to absorb in this format, but that are also easily fixed. I'm looking forward to more.
Again, thank you so much for checking us out, and for taking all the time to write a very good and comprehensive set of feedback... I can't tell you how much that is appreciated.
Sean Mahoney
