PODCAST · leisure
Save Vs Rant
by Save Vs Rant
Save Vs Rant is an everyman tabletop gaming podcast with your hosts John and Jeremy (and featuring the music of Timmy Skittles). In it, we tackle broad topics such as powergaming and character death, as well as specific topics such game mechanics, design features and even the occasional rant regarding a specific game.
Episodes
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S03E13 – Warhammer: Part 1
Today on Save Vs. Rant, we’re going to talk about Warhammer, the most popular fantasy wargame franchise of all time. Our episode today focuses on the hobby aspect of the game – the world created for the game, the miniatures and other aspects that don’t directly relate to the rules of the game.…
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S03E12 – Metagaming
Today’s episode is about the game behind (and beyond) the game – the metagame! It’s hard to imagine what a game without a metagame would even look like, and yet so frequently we only speak of “metagaming” pejoratively. Today, we’ll be discussing what the metagame is and how you can view it with...
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S03E11 – 2 Player Games
Today on Save Vs. Rant, we’ll be discussing two player games – tabletop duels! These games let you focus exclusively on the other player, be they an ally or nemesis, and make for very personal gaming experiences! A quick rundown of the games we discussed this episode: Fog of Love is one of our...
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S03E10 – DMing 103
Today on Save Vs. Rant, we’re discussing ways to improve as a DM. In this episode, we present tools, strategies and techniques that will help you grow and improve as a DM, ultimately resulting in a better experience for both you and your players. I’ve joked before that DMing is a subtle form of...
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S03E09 – Castle Greyhawk
Oh, shucks! Today we’re talking about one of the worst official D&D modules ever published: Castle Greyhawk. An enduring part of TSR’s post-Gygax legacy and an enormous letdown and slap in the face to everyone who gave a single flying frick about the legacy of the setting or the lore of one of…
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S03E08 – Pathfinder 2nd Edition
A little more than a year ago, we posted our look at the playtest version of Pathfinder 2nd Edition. Now that the full final version is out, we’re pleased to give you our first impressions of the new edition of the now iconic successor to D&D 3rd Edition, and one of my favorite roleplaying games....
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S03E07 – Dungeon in a Box
Today on Save Vs. Rant, we are giving our review of Dungeon in a Box, a monthly service that sends you everything you need to run a brief adventure that combines with 11 others in a series to create a coherent campaign for D&D 5th Edition. Happy Labor Day! …it’s still technically Monday, so let…
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S03E06 – Tales from Gen Con
Today on Save vs. Rant, we chronicle Jeremy’s annual vacation to Gen Con, North America’s largest game convention and a perennial favorite destination of ours. For four days every year, the latest and greatest in gaming can be found in one large complex in the heart of downtown Indianapolis. Join...
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S03E05 – Genres of RPGs
Today’s episode deals with the various genres of RPGs, where possible giving examples of games set in those genres. Join us for our discussion of the themes and ideas underlying the games we play. Also, welcome back from GenCon, to all those who attended the convention! As an excellent example of...
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S03E04 – Setting Spotlight: The Forgotten Realms
Today we will be discussing a classic setting that dates back to the origins of Dungeons and Dragons – the Forgotten Realms, fantasy writer Ed Greenwood’s personal setting originally created when he was but a lad. While it is not our favorite setting here at Save Vs. Rant, it is an integral part…
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S03E03 – Boxed Text
Today, we’re discussing boxed text, text meant to be read aloud. Named for the early gaming convention of enclosing it in a box (a convention adopted due in part to printing limitations), read-aloud text can serve as a useful summary of the settings and plots of adventures. First thing’s first…
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S03E02 – Subsystems, Minigames and Mechanics
Today’s episode is about the small portable parts of RPGs – mechanics (the individual rules that can be separated out), the subsystems (expansions to existing mechanics within a game) and the minigames (games within a game). Understanding what they are and what the overall effect of them together...
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S03E01 – Player Archetypes
Today on Save Vs. Rant, we’re going to talk about the kinds of people who play RPGs. No, this isn’t a dissection of gaming culture (although we may yet rant about that), but a discussion of the different motivations people have for playing RPGs. We also touch briefly on the classification of RPGs...
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S02E26 – Spires of Xin-Shalast
Today on our season finale of Save Vs. Rant, we’ll be discussing Spires of Xin-Shalast, the final module in the Rise of the Runelords Adventure path. This marks the end of our second season and the end of our examination of Paizo’s first Adventure Path set in the Pathfinder Campaign Setting.…
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S02E25 – Sins of the Saviors
Today on Save Vs. Rant, we’ll be talking about the penultimate module in the Rise of the Runelords Adventure Path: Sins of the Saviors, a module that focuses on the player character’s first true challenge to the peerless Runelord Karzoug. Every module can’t be the best, and we at Save Vs. Rant...
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S02E24 – Fortress of the Stone Giants
Continuing our ongoing examination of the Rise of the Runelords Adventure Path by Paizo Publishing, the next installment for us to examine is Fortress of the Stone Giants, a combination civic defense / dungeon crawl adventure. Join us as we continue our discussion of what works, what doesn’t…
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S02E23 – The Hook Mountain Massacre
Today on Save Vs. Rant, we’re continuing our series on the Rise of the Runelords Adventure Path by Paizo Publishing with the third module in the series – The Hook Mountain Massacre. Ogres and their kin, Stone Giants, townsfolk in peril and yet another ghost story await! For those paying…
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S02E22 – The Skinsaw Murders
Today on Save Vs. Rant, we are continuing our look at the Rise of the Runelords Adventure Path with Part 2: The Skinsaw Murders. Gruesome murders, a haunted house and a vicious cult. Join us as we delve deeper into this adventure path! Note: There is some content in this module that may be...
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S02E21 – Burnt Offerings
Today on Save Vs. Rant, we’re discussing the first module of Rise of the Runelords, the first adventure in Pathfinder’s Adventure Path series set in the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Setting. Why would we review an Adventure Path from 2007 (re-released in 2012)? Not only because of the insight it...
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S02E20 – Miniatures
Welcome back to Save Vs. Rant! Today’s episode is all about miniatures, in the context not only of their own hobby, but as part of board gaming and roleplaying games. Miniatures are a phenomenal part of gaming! Take it from us, everyone loves miniatures! Along with artistic images, they are one…
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S02E19 – Rule of Cool
Today’s episode of Save Vs. Rant is about making one time exceptions for the awesome things that happen in your RPGs as a way of rewarding creativity by your players and generally promoting a more interesting game. Join us as we discuss this more or less universal gaming phenomenon! Almost every...
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S02E18 – RPG Economics
Today’s episode is all about the economics of RPGs – how gold coins work, what the labor market of a fantasy world looks like and how games like Pathfinder RPG approach macro-scale economics within their game worlds. We at Save Vs Rant really do understand that RPGs aren’t economic simulators. We...
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S02E17 – NPC Construction
Today’s Save Vs. Rant is about the design philosophy of NPCs in RPGs. While every game system has its own guidelines and rules for the design of characters (some unifying the systems for PCs and NPCs, some treating the two completely different), the basic philosophy behind designing NPCs remains...
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S02E16 – The Game Crafter
Do you aspire to be a tabletop game designer? In this episode, we will be discussing our experience with The Game Crafter, a company that provides print on demand services for game designers, allowing both prototype testing and even storefront shopping for games without necessitating a full print...
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S02E15 – Board Games WTF
Today’s episode of Save Vs. Rant is focused on bizarre board games – those that evoke a perplexity or, perhaps, intrigue. The qualifying factors for this discussion are not whether the game is good or bad or anything particular in between, but just how strange a given game is. How unique its...
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S02E14 – RPG WTF
Today’s episode of Save Vs. Rant is brought to you by all the designers who choose to take risks and create something truly unusual and unique. Where’s the Fruit? Who’s the Foreman? What the Fudge? Why the Face? Dark Heresy Set in the wildly popular grimdark distant-future world of Warhammer...
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S02E13 – The Halloween Game: A Bespoke Gaming Experience
Today on Save Vs. Rant, out episode is about the Halloween game Jeremy runs annually, and the art of the bespoke gaming experience. Is the title a bit much? Too late to reconsider! We’re committed now! Let’s dive right in! “The Halloween Game: A Bespoke Gaming Experience” – there’s a lot to…
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S02E12 – Playing 101
Today on Save Vs. Rant, we’ll be discussing some of our biggest tips for being a good player. Our tips are about both how you can best enjoy the game and how you can be the kind of player others want to play with. https://www.savevsrant.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/02-12-Playing_101.mp3 We need...
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S02E11 – Setting Spotlight: Golarion
Welcome to another edition of Save Vs. Rant! Today, we’re focusing on Golarion – the official campaign setting of the Pathfinder RPG. https://www.savevsrant.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/02-11-Setting_Spotlight_Golarion.mp3 Golarion is a big place, and there’s an alarming amount of material for...
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S02E10 – DMing 102
Today on Save Vs. Rant, we present five more considerations vital to the success of any DM, including a bit of advice on keeping your game portable. We call it DMing 102! https://www.savevsrant.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/02-10-DMing-102.mp3 Our DMing 101 podcast contained 10 points we felt…
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S02E09 – Spoils of GenCon
Today on Save Vs. Rant, we’re talking about some of the gems Jeremy plumbed from the rich mines of the exhibit hall. Join us, won’t you? My cat did for about the first 5 minutes of the podcast. Everything is better with cats!...
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S02E08 – Pathfinder Playtest
Today’s episode is all about our impressions of the Pathfinder Playtest. Since we’re both veteran Pathfinder players, we came to the playtest with a pretty strong understanding of what we felt were Pathfinder’s strengths and weaknesses, and what makes Pathfinder, Pathfinder. As such, we were both...
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S02E07 – Expansions
What’s a gaming group to do when you feel like your favorite games are played out? The answer may be “find a new game,” but it might also be “get an expansion!” Today’s Save Vs. Rant is about expansions – their history, what kind of expansions exist, the advantages – and disadvantages – of each,...
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S02E06 – Cohorts
Today’s episode is all about a specific brand of NPC ally – the cohort. For our purposes, a cohort is a character that the player has some control over, but not the level of control they may have over a player characters. They are common in some of the most popular RPGs and can be traced back to...
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S02E05 – Micro RPGs
Today’s episode is about Micro RPGs, typically defined as compact games that fit the entirety of their rules onto one or two pages. These are usually best for one-off or short campaign games, and are, in many cases, intended to be a complete story in a single session....
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S02E04 – An Introduction to Worldbuilding
Today, we decided to take a detour from our road map and talk about world building – the process of creating compelling settings for your RPG. World building is a vital aspect of almost all games, with only a few abstract and classic games offering experiences devoid of flavor....
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S02E03 – Retelling Classic Stories
Today’s episode of Save Vs. Rant is all about novel ways of telling classic stories, be they real-world legends, existing fiction, outdated modules or other sources of inspiration. https://www.savevsrant.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/02-03-Retelling-Classics.mp3 Something that we touched on in...
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S02E02 – A Touch of RPG
Today on Save Vs. Rant, we’re going to discuss a fairly broad category of game: those with RPG elements. These games are a sort of gateway between RPGs and pure tabletop games. What makes a game with RPG elements so interesting to the tabletop game hobby is that they act as a sort of bridge…
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S02E01 – Virtual Tabletops
Welcome to the 2nd season of Save Vs. Rant! Today’s episode is all about Virtual Tabletops, and, to a lesser degree, the broader topic of gaming over the internet. https://www.savevsrant.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/02-01-Virtual-Tabletops.mp3 In today’s episode, we focused on a few specific...
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Episode 24 – Kingdom Death: Monster Part 2
Today is our second episode Kingdom Death: Monster. This is our full spoiler episode where we talk about the unfolding story and discuss the ever problematic nemesis encounters. This episode is a little longer because there are so many hidden secrets in this game and wonderful little twists and...
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Episode 23 – Kingdom Death: Monster Part 1
Today’s episode is about Kingdom Death: Monster, a cooperative boutique nightmare horror miniatures game. This is our mostly spoiler free episode. describing the game play, theme, and controversies surrounding this game. https://www.savevsrant.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/01-23-KDM-Part-1.mp3...
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Episode 22 – Favorite RPG Rules
Today on Save Vs. Rant, we’re discussing RPG rules we really like – rules that can make good games great as well as rules that make unique game systems unforgettable. https://www.savevsrant.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/svr22-Favorite_RPG_Rule.mp3 Part of what we discussed today was rules that…
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Episode 21 – Bad House Rules
Today’s episode of Save Vs. Rant is about bad house rules – non-canonical rules introduced to a game by a well-meaning group that end up making the game worse. https://www.savevsrant.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/01-21-Bad-House-Rules.mp3 What makes a rule bad? What causes part of a game to fail...
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Episode 20 – Touchstones of Board Gaming
The focus of today’s episode is how to ease newcomers to the tabletop board gaming hobby. When the average person thinks of “board games” and “card games,” they tend to think of the family game night games that everyone remembers with varying degrees of fondness (often completely unrelated to how...
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Episode 19 – Complexity Creep
Today’s episode is about complexity creep, of which the making of this episode was an example. When we set out to do this episode, we planned to go over only a few specific examples, but the subject proved much richer than initially expected....
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Episode 18 – Sentinels of the Multiverse
Today, we talk about Sentinels of the Multiverse by Greater Than Games, one of our favorite co-op card game experiences! https://www.savevsrant.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/01-18-Sentinals_of_the_Multiverse.mp3 Sentinels of the Multiverse is an homage to comic books, which I only discussed very...
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Episode 17 – Old Vs. New RPGs
Design philosophy changes with time. You can see this in advertising, in clothing style, in food (consider the truly incredible inedible Jell-O nightmares of the 1950’s) and, most pertinent to this podcast and its blog, in gaming. In today’s Save Vs. Rant, we’re going to break down the…
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Episode 16 – Getting Serious About Casual Games
Today on Save Vs. Rant, we want to discuss something that will hopefully be valuable information with all the upcoming (and ongoing) gift-giving holidays: casual games. Casual games are not only a huge part of the story of tabletop gaming, but an awesome way to introduce people to the hobby!...
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Episode 15 – Eight Flavors of Fun
On today’s episode of Save Vs. Rant, we delve into the theory of fun itself. What makes things fun? How can we understand fun on a deeper level? Why are two completely different things both enjoyable even though they may share virtually nothing in common? Find out, when we discuss Eight Flavors…
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Episode 14 – Mary Sue and Pants
Today’s episode is about two examples of poor characterization: the Mary Sue and Pants. Mary Sue being a reference to a very old Star Trek parody fanfiction, and Pants being a reference to the Oatmeal’s less than flattering review of the Twilight series. Spoilers start at 09:05 and continue to...
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ABOUT THIS SHOW
Save Vs Rant is an everyman tabletop gaming podcast with your hosts John and Jeremy (and featuring the music of Timmy Skittles). In it, we tackle broad topics such as powergaming and character death, as well as specific topics such game mechanics, design features and even the occasional rant regarding a specific game.
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Save Vs Rant
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Frequently Asked Questions
How many episodes does Save Vs Rant have?
Save Vs Rant currently has 64 episodes available on PodParley. New episodes are automatically indexed when they're published to the podcast feed.
What is Save Vs Rant about?
Save Vs Rant is an everyman tabletop gaming podcast with your hosts John and Jeremy (and featuring the music of Timmy Skittles). In it, we tackle broad topics such as powergaming and character death, as well as specific topics such game mechanics, design features and even the occasional rant...
How often does Save Vs Rant release new episodes?
Save Vs Rant has 64 episodes. Check the episode list to see recent publication dates and frequency.
Where can I listen to Save Vs Rant?
You can listen to Save Vs Rant on PodParley by clicking any episode. We provide an embedded audio player for direct listening, and you can also subscribe via your preferred podcast app using the RSS feed.
Who hosts Save Vs Rant?
Save Vs Rant is created and hosted by Save Vs Rant.
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