We bid a wistful Book Hut farewell to Jack Vance, the titan of SF and fantasy literature who inspired certain key concepts of roleplaying, not to mention the output of our sponsor Pelgrane Press—so much so that it is named after a Vancian creature.

In the Gaming Hut we list techniques for running successful defensive scenarios. Protecting your base needn’t lead to turtling all the way down.

Finally, a very special Among My Many Hats takes you inside the process of The Nazi Occult, Ken’s new history-bending work for the Osprey Adventures line. This serves as the prelude for a multi-part series on that very subject, which we’ll kick off next week!

In the Tradecraft Hut, we discuss the implications of the Obama administration’s war on leakers, and how to bring press revelations into your espionage gaming.

Robin then bows to popular demand with a Politics Hut Rob Ford update, this one covering the first thirteen days of the Toronto mayor’s crack video problems. (Warning: contents of scandal may have shifted our recording date.)

Finally Ken’s Time Machine revs up, with an account of how Ken altered our timeline to keep the 1928 Baltimore space program an amusing footnote, and not a historical catastrophe.

Then Ken and Robin adjourn to the Cinema Hut, where they try not to tell you too much about Shane Carruth’s Upstream Color while urging you to see it, and from there jump into the distinction between the explanatory and the experiential in storytelling.

In Ask Ken and Robin, Jon Leitheusser asks Robin to explain the process by which his game design aesthetic gelled.

Finally, fraud at Alaska’s ionosphere-bombarding HAARP facility sends us spiraling into an extra-chilly installment of Conspiracy Corner.

In Ask Ken and Robin, Terry O’Connell asks, “What’s your take on the Beyonce as Illuminati meme?”

How to Write Good leads us into a general consideration of the mash-up age, before we provide advice on how to pastiche the prose styles of previous eras.

Finally we rev up Ken’s Time Machine to prevent Cannibalism at the Jamestown colony.

Ask Ken and Robin takes an alternate history turn as Crane Brinton wonders: What does the alternate timeline where the Kaiser won WWI look like?

Then we hop into a mapping car and head to the Cartography Hut, where we riff on the storytelling inspiration of Google’s recent documentation of the Fukushima ghost zone.

We close with a visit to the Consulting Occultist, who recounts the Theosophy-meets-Evangelical-meets-New Age tale of Elizabeth Clare Prophet.

In the Food Hut we explore the legends and lore of packaged goods, including the secret origins of Cool Whip, the Twinkie, and Gatorade.

Conrad Kinch Asks Ken and Robin how one guides a playtester to greatness. Michael Cule adds a supplemental: have we ever regretted not implementing a piece of playtester advice?

Finally, Ken’s Time Machine takes us to the intractable yet little mythologized tragedy that was the Trail of Tears.

The trip also provides another opportunity for Ken and/or Robin To Talk To Someone Else—in this case, show sponsor John Kovalic, who discusses the design of his addictively fun party new party game, ROFL.

Ripped From the Headlines finds us grappling with the aftermath of the Boston Marathon bombings and subsequent manhunt of the Brothers Tsarnaev. Though hardly a fun story, it touches on so many of our perennial topics that a weighing-in seems obligatory.

Then we move on to more entertaining and distant history, as, at the request of Ask Lovecraft, the Consulting Occultist tells us tales of Paschal Beverly Randolph, 19th century exponent of Mesmerism, pre-Adamism, and wholesome sex magic.

In Ask Ken and Robin, they answer Kevin J. Maroney’s question about picking a game for roleplaying newbies.

In its return appearance, How To Write Good tackles the basics of short story structure.

And finally, listener Falko Sieverding proposes a mission for Ken’s Time Machine. Is maintaining the Vice-Presidency of Henry Wallace past 1944 the way to stop the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki?

Still in a choleric mood, we nip over to the Gaming Hut to examine the presentation of epidemic disease in fantasy gaming worlds.

Among My Many Hats provides an inside look at Ken’s new subscription series from Pelgrane Press, the euphoniously titled Ken Writes About Stuff. Snag it from the newly spiffed-up Pelgrane shop.

A recent TED talk controversy provides a jumping-off point for the Eliptony Hut, in which we consider the works of cross-disciplinary eliptonist Graham Hancock.

The Tradecraft Hut uses further evidence that Blackwater served as a CIA front as an opportunity to riff on the differences between reality levels in espionage games and fiction.

Ask Ken and Robin sees our intrepid heroes venturing from behind the couch to answer HippyWizard’s query on overcoming the shyness factor at the game table.

And finally, Ken’s Time Machine prevents the arrest and death in custody of Pope Pius VI.