Audio EXP: #8 – We Encounter Attack Lawyers and Tieflings

Welcome home.

This is Audio EXP for the 7th of September 2019, and the title of this episode is We Encounter Attack Lawyers and Tieflings.

[The following is a transcript of Audio EXP: #8]

In a world rich with hour-long podcasts here you are, picking one that lasts for about 10 minutes or so and covers Geek Native’s highlights.

Good on you.

We’e about to chat about a handful of RPG and other geeky headlines, with a touch of opinion and observation thrown in.

Let’s talk about Tieflings first. How do you pronounce the name? I see three options but if there are more, let me know. The three we have are;

• Teef-ling
• Tie-fling
• Tea-fling

If you care then it’s worth voting on the Geek Native poll as the answer has swung around. Right now, though, teef-ling has a commanding lead.

Is that what you use?

Does it matter?

Could the fact that the race has different names in different parts of your game world not add some flavour? I’m thinking now of Studio Agate’s new 5e setting Fateforge. It does not rename Tieflings, but does give other playable races new names unique to the setting, and I think it works really well.

Do you know other 5e settings that do something similar?

Anyway, let’s loop back to those attack lawyers!

Diamond Comic Distributors won’t be distributing The Cimmerian Queen of the Black Coast comic book. They are the dominant – crush you in a fight – comic book distributor so their decision matters.

The problem? Some of these Robert E Howard Conan stories are now in the public domain. The parties involved are not commenting, but I think the suggestion is the comic book’s contents are in or drawn from those public domain aspects of the barbarian.

However, Conan Properties International sold rights to Marvel. The result? Attack lawyers.

Spoilsports! That’s almost as bad as the cops who turned out to protect an IKEA in Scotland. What were they worried about? A horde of rampaging orcs? Nope, nothing as dramatic. Just a few thousand Scottish kids who wanted to play hide and seek in the store.

It turns out that IKEA has banned all LARPs and similar live games since 2015.

Have you ever succumb to the temptation to hide in an IKEA store? Let us know over at Geek Native and in this Audio EXP blog post page.

Also on the spoilsport radar, but not deliberate is Asmodee UK who have warned that Keyforge Store Championship kits won’t be ready.

Keyforge is a Fantasy Flight living card game. In this case of this delay, it’s pretty straight-forward; the bonuses and loot you might be hoping for if you take part in the in-store championships next week are not ready. Asmodee cites production delays.

Whereas Keyforge has been delayed, there’s an RPG that’s hit the shelves that no one was expecting. It’s been a well-kept secret.

What RPG are we talking about?

We’re talking about the Tingleverse from Chuck Tingle!

I’ll admit that I had heard the name Chuck Tingle before but wasn’t aware of his particular area of expertise. What’s his area? The butt, mostly.

Tingle’s stories have featured gay dinosaur boyfriends, gay unicorn boyfriends and gay bigfoot boyfriends to name but a few erotic romances. His books have long and fanciful titles and often seem to stray down to the butt.

The most famous Tingle-named book, though, didn’t get written and is a collaboration between Patrick Rothfuss, Neil Gaiman and Tingle. As a potential sequel to A Wise Man’s Fear, the authors suggested A Wise Man’s Butt. You could tell he’s wise because he has a beard.

There is no delay on the Tingleverse. If this is the RPG your life needs, then the good news is you can buy it right now.

If romances with manly aliens aren’t your sort of testosterone then what about Justice Velocity? This is a roleplaying game from Polyhedra Games inspired by the likes of The Fast & The Furious.

There’s soon to be a Justice Velocity quickstart.

This means you can check out the game without splashing any cash. You can decide whether or not high-speed car chases, fights with Jeff Bezos in mecha armour and martial arts contests hidden in dockside warehouses are your thing.

Geek Native was lucky enough to land the first look exclusive of that quickstart. You’ll find the link to that in the show notes or just search for it on the blog.

If you prefer not to stray too far from D&D then the growing playtest Wizards of the Coast are running for their flagship RPG might interest you. In an earlier Audio EXP, we talked briefly about the new Monk and Barbarian subclasses. The new material adds a subclass for the Sorcerer and one for the Warlock.

Both have a Lovecraftian theme. They introduce deals with alien minds, summoned tentacles and even pisonics.

Previous Wizards of the Coast playtests became official via setting books. The Artificer class became official Eberron.

This is purely speculation, but the new Aberrant Mind Sorcerer and the Lurker in the Deep Warlock make me think of Dark Sun. We’ve not seen a Dark Sun for 5e, but it would be nice.

Lastly, let’s give a quick mention to the Hurricane Dorian emergency sale from Fat Goblin Games. Geek Native can’t cover all the sales that pop up on DriveThruRPG but two things make this sale from Fat Goblin stand out.

Firstly, this is an emergency sale due to Hurricane Dorian and other life events.

Secondly, Fat Goblin Games are the publisher in Geek Native’s publisher spotlight this month. How could I not mention their sale?

Need cheap art? Perhaps you’re looking for backgrounds for a virtual tabletop? Then this is a sale worth investigating.

The good thing about using correctly licensed art from publishers like Fat Goblin Games is that it’s legal. Staying legal is the best way to avoid encounters with those scary Attack Lawyers.

Thanks for listening, especially Patreon supporters, and see you next week.