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Posts Tagged ‘Politics Hut’

Episode 422: Sumerian GM Screens

November 20th, 2020 | Robin

In the Gaming Hut we look at narrative coherence and whether GMs should enforce it by trying to make all introduced story elements pay off.

Something sufficiently definitive has happened that we are willing to risk the wrath of our ten day lead time and reopen the dusty Politics Hut to chew over the results of the US election.

Speaking of which, I guess it’s finally time to duck into Conspiracy Corner and talk about QAnon.

Finally, the Consulting Occultist for the first time trains his eye on a subject who is both a paranormalist and an RPG designer, James “Herbie” Brennan.

Want to pose a question to the show? Get your priority question asking access with your support for the KARTAS Patreon!

Snag Ken and Robin merchandise at TeePublic.


Fans of Robin’s action movie roleplaying game, Feng Shui 2, can now have more gun fu, martial arts and sorcery in their lives as the Feng Shui 2 subscription series blasts its way into your mail slot. Score free PDFs, early access to new adventures, and 10% off cover price by joining Atlas Games’ band of scrappy underdogs today.

Send your 13th Age characters deep below the Dragon Empire, and even deeper into danger, with Gareth Ryder-Hanrahan’s Book of the Underworld. Get all the subterranean exploration and menace your adventurers can handle at the Pelgrane Press store. For a limited time only, get 10% off print or PDF with the voucher code STUFFWORLD.

The treasures of Askfageln can be found at DriveThruRPG. Get all issues of FENIX since 2013 available in special English editions. Score metric oodles of Ken Hite gaming goodness, along with equally stellar pieces by Graeme Davis and Pete Nash. Warning: in English, not in Swedish. In English, not Swedish. While you’re at it, grab DICE and Freeway Warrior!

Suit up, agents of Delta Green. Your battle to save humanity from unnatural horrors is going beyond the Beltway. Delta Green: The Labyrinth is now shipping to a secure dead drop near you. Written by Delta Green co-creator John Scott Tynes, this all-new collection of organizations dives deep into the fissures of America in the new millennium.

Episode 416: They’re Gonna Have Their Lifeforms Fight

October 9th, 2020 | Robin

An all-request episode kicks off in the Gaming Hut as Dicegeeks asks us how to incorporate the Fossil Showman Albert Koch and his Missouri Leviathan into a game.

We jump some bulls on our way into the Archaeology Hut, where Jake B wants to know about a maker of Minoan seals from the town of Zakros around 1500 BCE.

Brian Malcolm impels us to dust off the Politics Hut for tips on getting along across partisan boundaries.

Finally Elias Helfer trudges with us up the cobwebbed stairs to the parlor of the Consulting Occultist for a look at iconic Tarot deck illustrator Pamela Colman Smith.


Want to pose a question to the show? Get your priority question asking access with your support for the KARTAS Patreon!

Snag Ken and Robin merchandise at TeePublic.

In-person Renaissance Faires are off the table for the moment, but what can be on your table, at a limited-time steal price is Ren Faire, Atlas Games’ hilarious card game of competitive historical costuming. Grab it for a stunning 40% off with the voucher code PANTALOONS.

Send your 13th Age characters deep below the Dragon Empire, and even deeper into danger, with Gareth Ryder-Hanrahan’s Book of the Underworld. Get all the subterranean exploration and menace your adventurers can handle at the Pelgrane Press store. For a limited time only, get 10% off print or PDF with the voucher code STUFFWORLD.

The treasures of Askfageln can be found at DriveThruRPG. Get all issues of FENIX since 2013 available in special English editions. Score metric oodles of Ken Hite gaming goodness, along with equally stellar pieces by Graeme Davis and Pete Nash. Warning: in English, not in Swedish. In English, not Swedish. While you’re at it, grab DICE and Freeway Warrior!

Suit up, agents of Delta Green. Your battle to save humanity from unnatural horrors is going beyond the Beltway. Delta Green: The Labyrinth is now shipping to a secure dead drop near you. Written by Delta Green co-creator John Scott Tynes, this all-new collection of organizations dives deep into the fissures of America in the new millennium.

Episode 353: You Can’t Say Eliptonic Without Tonic

July 19th, 2019 | Robin

In the Gaming Hut we deconstruct scenarios where the PCs have to wait for certain events to take place.

How to Write Good comes to the aid of Patreon backer Dustyn Mincey, who seeks guidance on the naming of people and places.

The Politics Hut gets drunk on codeine and loco root with a look at the connection between fringe politics and medicine shows new and old.

Then Ken’s Time Machine answers the call of backer Michael Dinos to rectify the disappointments DC Cinematic Universe.

Want to pose a question to the show? Get your priority question asking access with your support for the KARTAS Patreon!

Snag Ken and Robin merchandise at TeePublic.

 


Be cute! Be cunning! Be fierce! Most of all, be someone backing the Kickstarter for Atlas Games’ Magical Kitties, the roleplaying game of supernatural felines. Suitable for play with young children, it pits its four-footed heroes against robots, witches and more!

Ken’s latest roleplaying game, The Fall of Delta Green, is now available in print or PDF or both from Pelgrane Press. Journey to the head-spinning chaos of the late 1960s, back when everyone’s favorite anti-Cthulhu special ops agency hadn’t gone rogue yet, for this pulse-pounding GUMSHOE game of war, covert action, and Mythos horror.

 

The treasures of Askfageln can be found at DriveThruRPG. Get all issues of FENIX since 2013 available in special English editions. Score metric oodles of Ken Hite gaming goodness, along with equally stellar pieces by Graeme Davis and Pete Nash. Warning: in English, not in Swedish. In English, not Swedish. While you’re at it, grab DICE and Freeway Warrior!

 

Arc Dream Publishing presents a gorgeous new edition of Robert W. Chambers’ The King in Yellow, a deluxe hardback in delightful faux snakeskin, with a foreword by John Scott Tynes, annotations by our own Kenneth Hite, and stunning full-pate color  illustrations by Samuel Araya. Grab it while it lasts in the Arc Dream store.

 

Episode 342: Traduced By Raisins

May 3rd, 2019 | Robin

 

In the Gaming Hut Patreon backer Jake asks us how to portray a character modeled on Janet Armstrong in a NASA adventure series.

We dust off the long-disused Politics Hut so that Ken can give us an update on Chicago politics.

The Food Hut looks at Canada’s iconic desserts, as selected for a series of stamps from Canada Post, including a look at the resulting Nanaimo Bar controversy.

The Eliptony Hut provides refuge to Puerto Rico’s latest chupacabra variant, the perhaps humanoid, perhaps animalistic, perhaps winged Gárgola de Barceloneta.

Want to pose a question to the show? Get your priority question asking access with your support for the KARTAS Patreon!

Snag Ken and Robin merchandise at TeePublic.


Atlas Games’ Godsforge lets you get your wizard battle on. Roll, reroll, and combine dice to summon creations and cast spells as you struggle to be the last sorcerer standing…or at least leave a good-looking, conical-hatted corpse.

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Ken’s latest roleplaying game, The Fall of Delta Green, is now available in print or PDF or both from Pelgrane Press. Journey to the head-spinning chaos of the late 1960s, back when everyone’s favorite anti-Cthulhu special ops agency hadn’t gone rogue yet, for this pulse-pounding GUMSHOE game of war, covert action, and Mythos horror.

 

The treasures of Askfageln can be found at DriveThruRPG. Get all issues of FENIX since 2013 available in special English editions. Score metric oodles of Ken Hite gaming goodness, along with equally stellar pieces by Graeme Davis and Pete Nash. Warning: in English, not in Swedish. In English, not Swedish. While you’re at it, grab DICE and Freeway Warrior!

 

Arc Dream Publishing presents a gorgeous new edition of Robert W. Chambers’ The King in Yellow, a deluxe hardback in delightful faux snakeskin, with a foreword by John Scott Tynes, annotations by our own Kenneth Hite, and stunning full-pate color  illustrations by Samuel Araya. Grab it while it lasts in the Arc Dream store.

 

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Episode 228: I Assume Someone Has Blood-Typed All the Monkeys

February 10th, 2017 | Robin

In the Gaming Hut we ask ourselves how far rules and GM influence should go to prevent the players from idiot plotting their own characters.

Speaking of gaming the system, esteemed Patreon backer Jeremy Forbing acts as a stalking horse for a certain shadowy figure to convene the Politics Hut. With a mysterious knowledge of Ken’s thought processes, Jeremy asks for his theory on how Trump will destroy the Republican party.

On the Crime Blotter we find a report about Los Angeles organized crime in 1937, which just coincidentally happens to feature in Cthulhu Confidential.

Finally at the behest of backer and Hillfolk illustrator Jan Pospisil, the Eliptony Hut considers the connection between Rhesus blood factor and survivors of Atlantis.

Want to pose questions of your own? Support the KARTAS Patreon!

Snag Ken and Robin merchandise at TeePublic.


Sleepers awake, and travel through the secret pathways of the occulted world to preorder the new edition of Unknown Armies from Atlas Games. From the deluxe printed edition to ebooks in a variety of formats, the weird wonders of UA beckon!

Want to plunge headlong into Lovecraftian mystery, but lack a gaming group? Want to introduce a friend or loved one to the roleplaying hobby? GUMSHOE One-2-One has come to your rescue! Find this new system by some guy named Robin D. Laws, in the line’s flagship title, Cthulhu Confidential. Now pre-ordering at the Pelgrane Press store. Do intervals between episodes plunge you into Hite withdrawal? Never fear! his brilliant pieces on parasitic gaming, alternate Newtons, Dacian werewolves and more now lurk among the sparkling bounty of The Best of FENIX Volumes 1-3, from returning sponsors Askfageln. Yes, it’s Sweden’s favorite RPG magazine, now beautifully collected. Warning: not in Swedish. John Scott Tynes’ Puppetland is ready to knock the stuffing out of a game store near you in its gorgeous new full-color hardcover edition. Join the good folks at Arc Dream in battling the horrific forces of Punch the Maker-Killer!

Episode 218: This Podcast Still Hates Nazis

November 25th, 2016 | Robin

Patreon backer Michael Kotschi pops a moony question over the Ask Ken and Robin transom, prompting us to look at 70s NASA from a Moon Dust Men perspective.

The Politics Hut still has a hangover, but I guess we still have to address that thing that happened.

In Ken and/or Robin Talk To Someone Else, Ken talks to blogger, podcaster, freshly minted game designer and snailologist Darcy Ross.

Is the Eliptony Hut an odd place to talk about the Sybil case? The answer might surprise you!

Support the KARTAS Patreon!


Get trapped in Lovecraft’s story “The Call of Cthulhu” in Atlas Games’ addictive new card game Lost in R’lyeh. Take a selfie with your purchased copy of the game at your brick and mortar game retailer and send it to Atlas to claim your special Ken and Robin promo card. Do intervals between Ken’s Time Machine segments leave you listless, bored, and itchy? Then you’re in luck, because TimeWatch, the wild and woolly GUMSHOE game of chrono-hopping adventure has now blasted its way into our reality. Brought to you by master of over-the-top fast-paced fun Kevin Kulp and our reality-maintaining overlords at Pelgrane Press. For those seeking yet more Ken content, his brilliant pieces on parasitic gaming, alternate Newtons, Dacian werewolves and more now lurk among the sparkling bounty of The Best of FENIX Volumes 1-3, from returning sponsors Askfageln. Yes, it’s Sweden’s favorite RPG magazine, now beautifully collected. Warning: not in Swedish. Attention, operatives of Delta Green, the ultra-covert agency charged with battling the contemporary forces of the Cthulhu Mythos! Now everything you need to know to play Delta Green: The Roleplaying Game, perhaps extending your valiantly short field life, can be found in the Delta Green Agent’s Handbook or Delta Green: Need to Know, the quick start rules set with extra-sturdy Handler’s Screen.   

Episode 192: Emulating a Genre That Doesn’t Exist

May 27th, 2016 | Robin

In the Gaming Hut we ponder a meta-terminology games designers might use to describe the purpose and function of the various sub-systems they build into roleplaying rules sets.

Now that Donald Trump has sewn up the Republican nomination, we head into  the Politics Hut to ask Ken what happened to his party, and whether he thinks he’ll get it back after the election.

Installment Two of Tell Me More highlights three Ken and Robin Consume Media items our Patreon backers wanted to hear more about: Batman v. Superman, Ambrose Bierce, and The Burglar’s Guide to the City.

Finally the Consulting Occultist satisfies Patreon backer Allen Wilkins’ desire to hear about writer Alan Moore’s occult thought.

Support the KARTAS Patreon!


It’s yo ho ho and a pocketful of doubloons as Atlas Games surveys the seven seas from the crow’s nest that is our coveted anchor sponsor slot. Parrot on its shoulder, it orders up another special deal for Ken and Robin listeners, this time in the form of their innovative game of piratical nautical warfare, Pieces of Eight.

Ken fans who did not partake of the Kickstarter can now sink their fangs into the general release of the Dracula Dossier from Pelgrane Press, consisting of the Director’s Handbook and Dracula Unredacted.

You say that’s still not enough Ken for you? Very well, my friend. His brilliant pieces on parasitic gaming, alternate Newtons, Dacian werewolves and more now lurk among the sparkling bounty of The Best of FENIX Volumes 1-3, from returning sponsors Askfageln. Yes, it’s Sweden’s favorite RPG magazine, now beautifully collected. Warning: not in Swedish.

Attention, operatives of Delta Green, the ultra-covert agency charged with battling the contemporary forces of the Cthulhu Mythos! Now everything you need to know to play Delta Green: The Roleplaying Game, perhaps extending your valiantly short field life, can be found in the Delta Green Agent’s Handbook.

Episode 187: Honest and Dishonest Graft

April 22nd, 2016 | Robin

The Gaming Hut gets organized as we answer Patreon backer Samwise Crider’s question about tracking clues in GUMSHOE and other investigative games.

Backer Adam McDonald enters the Politics Hut for the 101 on machine politics—particularly that of Ken’s beloved Chicago.

Backer and colleague Hal Mangold grabs his popcorn in the Cinema Hut with his request for a getting started in Asian action movies segment.

Hey, it turns out to be another all-backer request episode, as Tennant Reed lurks in the Conspiracy Corner with his question about Italy’s P2 “Black Lodge” and its many associated tentacular crimes and mysteries.

Support the KARTAS Patreon!


Bend reality to your will, but be ready to pay the price, as Atlas Games’ Unknown Armies bubbles up from the supernatural underground for a weird and majestic new Kickstarter campaign.
Ken fans who did not partake of the Kickstarter can now sink their fangs into the general release of the Dracula Dossier from Pelgrane Press, consisting of the Director’s Handbook and Dracula Unredacted. You say that’s still not enough Ken for you? Very well, my friend. His brilliant pieces on parasitic gaming, alternate Newtons, Dacian werewolves and more now lurk among the sparkling bounty of The Best of FENIX Volumes 1-3, from returning sponsors Askfageln. Yes, it’s Sweden’s favorite RPG magazine, now beautifully collected. Warning: not in Swedish.

When you assemble your bug-out kit, make sure it includes a copy of Delta Green: Need to Know, the everything-you-need quickstart kick for the classic game of covert agents against the Cthulhu mythos, from our fine friends at Arc Dream Publishing.

Episode 180: Nordic Tamborine Cult

March 4th, 2016 | Robin

Sneak up on us very carefully as Ask Ken and Robin responds to a Josh Kroger question regarding stealth systems in RPGs.

Recent events force us to reconsider past Politics Hut pronouncements as, with increasing trepidation, we ask once more, is Donald Trump America’s Rob Ford?

In the Mythology Hut we pry under the ecclesiastical floorboards to look for Finnish frog coffins.

Then it’s just a hop skip and jump across a bridge patrolled by the grim forces of Chris Christie to the Eliptony Hut, where we hunt the elusive Jersey Devil.


Ken and Robin have oft been accused of being cards. Well, we can deny it no longer. We have become super-limited promo cards for Murder of Crows, Atlas Games’ fast-paced card game of murder and the macabre, for two to five players in the mood for something a little morbid. It’s Edward Gorey meets Caligari, by way of Edgar Allan Poe. Wait a minute, what does that graphic say? I’m not so sure about this… Ken fans who did not partake of the Kickstarter can now sink their fangs into the general release of the Dracula Dossier from Pelgrane Press, consisting of the Director’s Handbook and Dracula Unredacted. You say that’s still not enough Ken for you? Very well, my friend. His brilliant pieces on parasitic gaming, alternate Newtons, Dacian werewolves and more now lurk among the sparkling bounty of The Best of FENIX Volumes 1-3, from returning sponsors Askfageln. Yes, it’s Sweden’s favorite RPG magazine, now beautifully collected. Warning: not in Swedish. In a move that surely violates someone’s security clearance, this episode is also brought to you by our friends at Arc Dream Publishing. The Kickstarter for Delta Green: the Roleplaying Game has come to an end, but don’t let that stop you from indulging your fever for this classic game, or that pinnacle of the Cthulhu game zine world, The Unspeakable Oath.

Episode 178: Whoops! Democracy!

February 19th, 2016 | Robin

There’s a rat looking at us and a hawk flying overhead as Ask Ken and Robin fields a Michael Shreeves question on making familiars narratively satisfying.

Our lead time prevents the Politics Hut from engaging in prognostication, so instead we step back to look at ways of understanding this most chaotic and suspenseful of US primary seasons.

Among My Many Hats goes for the gold as Ken tells us about his treatment of alchemy in the latest Ken Writes About Stuff.

Then we discover the role Ken’s Time Machine played in keeping the United States as a two-party country, by request of Adam Waxman.


Ken and Robin have oft been accused of being cards. Well, we can deny it no longer. We have become super-limited promo cards for Murder of Crows, Atlas Games’ fast-paced card game of murder and the macabre, for two to five players in the mood for something a little morbid. It’s Edward Gorey meets Caligari, by way of Edgar Allan Poe. Wait a minute, what does that graphic say? I’m not so sure about this… Ken fans who did not partake of the Kickstarter can now sink their fangs into the general release of the Dracula Dossier from Pelgrane Press, consisting of the Director’s Handbook and Dracula Unredacted. You say that’s still not enough Ken for you? Very well, my friend. His brilliant pieces on parasitic gaming, alternate Newtons, Dacian werewolves and more now lurk among the sparkling bounty of The Best of FENIX Volumes 1-3, from returning sponsors Askfageln. Yes, it’s Sweden’s favorite RPG magazine, now beautifully collected. Warning: not in Swedish. In a move that surely violates someone’s security clearance, this episode is also brought to you by our friends at Arc Dream Publishing. The Kickstarter for Delta Green: the Roleplaying Game has come to an end, but don’t let that stop you from indulging your fever for this classic game, or that pinnacle of the Cthulhu game zine world, The Unspeakable Oath.

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