00:00:04.96 Kurt Crenwelge Hello and welcome to another month's exciting episode of Sidekicks and Sidequests, the best unofficial Dungeons and Dragons podcast in my humbly biased opinion. 00:00:15.61 Kurt Crenwelge I've got an amazing guest for you this month, but before I reveal who we are speaking with today, you know I have to do it. I have to leave you in suspense with the ad read. And post-production Kurt knows that here is where he talks about Plus One EXP and RPG Zine Club. 00:00:32.30 Kurt Crenwelge They're amazing. Tony's a great friend of the podcast. And ah so make sure if you're interested in some new indie ah TTRPGs and supporting small-time, sometimes first-time creators, be sure to subscribe. 00:00:46.53 Kurt Crenwelge sign up for the rpgzine.club and hey if you're looking for a beard balm or a lip balm or a beard themed RPG game well when you go to plus1exp.com make sure you use that code Randolph at checkout R-A-N-D-O-L-P-H and you save some coin on your purchase and it helps support the podcast so again plus1exp.com rpgzine.club All right. 00:01:13.18 Kurt Crenwelge And without further ado, I turn the microphone over to my guest and I ask, hello, mystery contestant. Would you care to introduce yourself? Tell us who it is that you are and what is it that you do? 00:01:23.26 Tanya DePass ah Hello, everyone all over on the internet and over on Sidekicks. My name is Tanya DePass, also known as Cypher of Tier Online. And what I do is ah internet ne'er-do-well, jokingly. 00:01:34.93 Tanya DePass um You know, do a lot of TTRPG stuff, a freelance video game developer because the industry is what the industry is, and ah stream streamer. A lot of random games have been doing so for about 11 years. Twitch partner for about eight. 00:01:50.63 Tanya DePass And um usually just cause trouble on the internet. Hopefully the good kind. 00:01:55.50 Kurt Crenwelge Yes. And yeah, you're you're someone definitely that I've been following for a while on social media just because of, you know, all the various projects that you're in. And I was kind of nervous, like, oh, do I do like a whole big, ah you know, bio read off? But I feel like I wouldn't be able to to fully do it justice just because of all that you do online. 00:02:17.93 Tanya DePass I'm a human being like everyone else listening to this podcast, unless there's a beholder hanging out somewhere that we don't know about. um You know, i I do a lot of stuff, but, you know, what I try to make people remember is I'm ah i'm human. roll my D20 the same way anyone else does. 00:02:33.26 Tanya DePass Hope for a crit. ah And i i've I've just been very fortunate and, you know, both done the work and also had people looking out for me to get to where I'm at. 00:02:42.81 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah, no, that's great. And I love that too. You know, this is a, this is a one man band kind of ah a podcast. ah So I feel very much the same thing of like, you know, Hey, I'm just a 37 year old dad. That's just, I love D and D I love interviewing and talking with all kinds of people, ah you know, from all different walks of life, whether they are the ah you know, the, the perceived people on the pedestals or just like my friends and family, you know, because everyone's got ah a viewpoint and everyone's got a unique perspective. 00:03:12.53 Kurt Crenwelge And in getting to learn more about each other, I feel like we we we do a better job of being able to tell a more well-rounded sort of story. 00:03:20.87 Tanya DePass Absolutely. And as for the pedestal thing, i i feel like the industry and the community, air quotes, would do a lot better if we stopped putting people on pedestals. ah There's a lot of people, whether they want to be there, whether they aspire to be there or get put there and then are like, please, God, let me off of this thing as soon as I can. 00:03:31.18 Kurt Crenwelge Mm-hmm. 00:03:41.51 Kurt Crenwelge Mm-hmm. 00:03:41.82 Tanya DePass We need to remember that other creators are are people. Yeah, they're talented. They do whatever. that you know they've got something you really like watching or viewing or listening to, you they are still people. 00:03:53.58 Tanya DePass And at the end of the day, I really wish that we would stop putting people on pedestals because it can only come to a bad end. 00:04:02.15 Kurt Crenwelge True, yes. And I do try and do my best to keep things upbeat and positive, but you know everyone who follows along with the news and the hobby, of course, knows all the sorts of ups and downs ah that have that have happened and gone on, so hopefully this podcast, this humble little silly sort of thing helps to brighten someone's day. 00:04:22.72 Kurt Crenwelge And, you know, we just hit our big ah milestone recently of crossing 20,000 downloads. So I know, you know, yeah, I know in the, in the grand scheme of things as like, you know, major, 00:04:30.17 Tanya DePass Awesome. 00:04:35.03 Kurt Crenwelge or other podcasts out there. Um, you know, that seems like a, you know, like, Oh, 20,000, no big deal. But the fact that this, uh, this program, this, this experiment is so, uh, sort of niche. 00:04:47.76 Kurt Crenwelge Uh, I remember talking with Andrew Strother, uh, on his podcast, when he interviewed me years ago, in the midst of the pandemic. And he was like, Oh yeah, you and me, And like at the time, James and Tricasso are doing these D&D podcasts that have like nothing to do with like actual plays. And we're not one of the ones that are like explaining rules or like ah history or something of the hobby. It's just like we're literally trying this experimental interview, making up something sort of a thing. So I like and I'm proud of ah me being able to, you know, continue on now in our in the midst of our 00:05:24.26 Kurt Crenwelge sixth season here so welcome to the sixth season and thank you again so much for being a guest 00:05:29.80 Tanya DePass You're welcome. And congratulations. That's not a small milestone. So a lot of people don't keep going. A lot of people don't, you know, keep doing things for the love of doing it. They're so obsessed with the numbers. 00:05:44.84 Tanya DePass If they don't hit a certain milestone, then they stop doing it without realizing if I stop doing the thing, i will never hit the milestone I'm trying to hit. 00:05:44.91 Kurt Crenwelge mm-hmm 00:05:53.64 Tanya DePass So good on all of you. 00:05:55.87 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah, what is it, the ah the often ah picture that's shown on Facebook where it's the guy digging in the mine, and then he looks sad and dejected, and he's turning around because like, oh if he had just dug like the you know the one more foot through the dirt, he would have found the humongous diamond, whereas the other guy maybe has a smaller pickaxe, but he's like still working his way through the dirt to find ah the the mother load of all of scores or whatever. 00:06:19.79 Tanya DePass Yep. yep 00:06:21.88 Kurt Crenwelge Well, um you know, this ah this podcast is Dungeons and Dragons themed, so I would be remiss if I did not ask you the question. do you currently or have you ever played Dungeons and Dragons before? 00:06:34.04 Tanya DePass ah Well, yes, I've been playing D&D, you know, since Redbox. And, ah you know, i was on two D&D official shows, so Rivals Waterdeep and then Black Dice Society. 00:06:45.78 Tanya DePass ah Not currently playing just for the big bad of everyone's schedule, which is getting five or six people together in order to play on a regular basis. 00:06:54.91 Kurt Crenwelge Mm-hmm. 00:06:55.03 Tanya DePass um But I would love to get back to it. I'd love to get back to actually doing an actual play. But money, there is no money in this right now. And I don't have the personal funds to pay people to do a show. 00:07:08.71 Kurt Crenwelge Mm-hmm. 00:07:08.87 Tanya DePass So if there's anyone looking for a cast member, I i might not say no. It all depends on who it is, et cetera, et cetera. 00:07:15.39 Kurt Crenwelge Mm-hmm. 00:07:16.42 Tanya DePass um i have no shame as how I got where I am. ah But you know I've got all my books. you know I'm very fortunate that Wizards still keeps me on on the PR list. I'm up to date on all my books. I got the 2024 books. 00:07:28.32 Kurt Crenwelge Mm 00:07:28.35 Tanya DePass um But you know for for several years, D&D was a big part of not just my creativity, but you know like part of what I do, part of what people know me for. 00:07:38.43 Kurt Crenwelge hmm. So what's that experience like? Because I know our good friend of the podcast, ah Goblin Katie, a.k.a. Katie Downey, you know, has you know been able to share like some of her perspective of like, oh, yeah, the one time when I was at a convention in ah in Georgia And I got to meet Chris Perkins and, you know, some of these other other guests of the podcast that I've talked to, ah to get to share their perspectives and insights as far as, you know, getting to to work with, you know, the IP holder and and as officially, ah you know, produced 00:08:10.96 Kurt Crenwelge actual plays. So getting to be part of, you know, Rivals of Waterdeep and the Black Dice Society, um which I know I, in in all honesty, you know, I definitely have those on my list of like, oh, I need to go back and watch those. But of course, ah you know, the plethora of entertainment that's out there in my only so many hours in the day, i just have not gotten around ah to watching them. But i I will definitely make sure I try and prioritize that Just because I'm sure I'm missing out on on a great story and a fantastic ah narrative. 00:08:42.48 Kurt Crenwelge But all that to say, how do you feel that experience was getting to, you know, get get to be part of those actual plays to to play these characters and to, you know, get to show a perspective of playing Dungeons and Dragons? 00:08:58.90 Tanya DePass um It was good. are So for those who don't know, um Rivals of Waterdeep premiered at Stream of Many Eyes, oh God, 2018. Yeah, 2018. 00:09:09.76 Tanya DePass It feels like that was both a million years ago and the other day. ah You know, shout out to Greg Tito forever and ever for reaching out and helping us put together the cast and the show and getting us out to LA for that event. 00:09:21.68 Tanya DePass That was pretty wild because, know, like I stream, I do other stuff, I do public speaking. So being in front of a camera was not new for me, but we also had a group that 00:09:29.28 Kurt Crenwelge Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. 00:09:31.30 Tanya DePass Some of us were experienced players and DMs. Some people had never played before. And, you know, a lot of people say this about the show and about our group, which isn't the case. We were brought together to show how easy it is to learn 5th edition. 00:09:44.56 Tanya DePass ah We just happened to pull together an all POC cast to show how easy it is to play 5th edition. And, um you know, it was very cool to be there, be in costume, be in l la show off our characters. 00:09:56.84 Tanya DePass And also, you know, it wasn't the purpose, but to be there and show that, yes, people of color play D&D. Yes, black people play D&D. 00:10:03.82 Kurt Crenwelge Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. 00:10:05.48 Tanya DePass That we are part of this of this grouping. um And it was very cool because we had like some really cool clutch moments. And it was also, there was the business side, which I think people need to understand. Running ah actual play is not cheap. 00:10:19.52 Tanya DePass If you want to pay people, whether or not, wherever the money's coming from, whether you're fundraising, doing Patreon, what have you, you know, one season of Rivals, including studio time, including paying everyone, including production, was a five-digit affair every season. 00:10:38.77 Kurt Crenwelge wow 00:10:39.32 Tanya DePass So, um and you know, this is also three to four hours every Sunday out of people's schedules. Cause until the pandemic, we were meeting in a studio in Chicago every Sunday and, you know, doing a live stream on the D and D channel until we moved to our own Twitch channel. 00:10:55.51 Kurt Crenwelge Mm-hmm. 00:10:55.64 Tanya DePass um So it was very, it was fun. 00:10:55.65 Kurt Crenwelge Mm-hmm. 00:10:58.57 Tanya DePass It was great. I got to reconnect with people I knew, but hadn't seen in a while. Cause I brought in a couple of friends ah from our podcasting days so and, you know, game reviewing game journalism, 00:11:08.99 Tanya DePass And then um Greg had recruited some other folks that we didn't know. And through that, we became friends. And it was also just, and I'm sure you know this, there is nothing that beats that time spent together at the table. 00:11:22.38 Tanya DePass It's emotional. It's vulnerable. It's... something where you have that cool moment of, I get to do this as part of making my living and the additional part of it. 00:11:26.50 Kurt Crenwelge Thank you. 00:11:34.49 Tanya DePass And again, we didn't do it for this reason, but we wound up doing live shows at C2ET, which is our local comic con in Chicago. We wound up doing live shows at PAX's and to have people especially black people, especially for me, black fems come up and go, i see you all doing this. 00:11:51.96 Tanya DePass I know that I too can go do this, whether it's just streaming their show on Twitch. I shouldn't say just, but if it's streaming a show on Twitch, whether it's putting out a podcast, um, 00:11:56.74 Kurt Crenwelge Mm-hmm. 00:12:00.84 Tanya DePass um that people saw that there is a place for them. And that was a great bonus to doing the show. In addition to, I'm a big nerd. I like to roll dice. I like to tell stories. 00:12:11.35 Tanya DePass But it was also a lot of work. And I think people need to understand that whether it's an audio podcast, whether it's a Twitch stream, whether it's a pre-recorded post-production affair, you're spending a lot of money and time, at least on something with high production value. 00:12:27.47 Tanya DePass And last thing about this, not everyone needs to be on our official show. Not everyone needs to aim to be the next crit role because we should all stop trying to do that because crit role is crit role. That magic moment was theirs and that was 11 years ago. Let that go. You are not going to capture lightning in a bottle with your podcast. 00:12:46.24 Tanya DePass The other side of it is um you also have to put in the work. You have to put in the work to, you know, find people that work well together that are going to be professional. If you're putting yourself out there in the sense of we want to put this out here, we want to make money off of it. We want to do whatever. 00:13:01.14 Kurt Crenwelge Mm-hmm. 00:13:01.53 Tanya DePass But if you're doing it for the fun of doing it and you just want to record it and people listen, if they listen, if not, that's great too. Cause I feel like too many people try to monetize the hobby. 00:13:10.26 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah, I agree. 00:13:12.03 Tanya DePass um, 00:13:12.78 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. And it's I was reticent for the longest time to even start a Patreon because I agree with what you said as far as like, oh, everyone's rushing to monetize something. It's like, oh, join my Patreon so you can get like pins and buttons and dice and, you know, ah after exclusive after talk shows and all this stuff, um you know, which is fun and good. If like like you were saying, like if you front load it with, ah you know, production, 00:13:40.23 Kurt Crenwelge and a team, you know, one man, one man band. 00:13:43.23 Tanya DePass Right. right 00:13:43.83 Kurt Crenwelge It's it's a little harder to do all that sort of stuff, which is why I was ah reticent for so long. But, you know, with Goblin Katie and my mom and dad and my good buddy Anson, you know, those are my, the those have been my core like Patreon supporters, which is great. 00:13:59.05 Kurt Crenwelge And my slowly, I'm getting more people on the Patreon on the free tier, which is, which is completely fine. But, you know, again, being a 37 year old dad of a four year old, Uh, it's even taken me until now to finally catch up on patron rewards. And I certainly am like, I, I don't want to, you know, neglect this and, uh, you know, monetize this. So I'm just happy that people are listening to the podcast and I hope that they're taking these NPCs and they're using them in their character backstories or their games. 00:14:25.98 Kurt Crenwelge If, if anything, I'm certainly mining them for my one-on-one and D game that I've been running over Google docs for like over the last year. So it's been incredible. Uh, you know, 00:14:36.60 Kurt Crenwelge in all in all facets of this podcast, you know big and small. 00:14:40.65 Tanya DePass Yeah. And and that's what I think people, I mean, and this is me, like I'm, I'm being the old in the room. um but I feel like people, and this goes with streaming, this goes with any other creation or or, trying to do something, whether it's making dice, whether it's anything you're trying to do is do it for the love of doing it. 00:14:58.98 Tanya DePass And if other people find it, other people enjoy it. 00:14:59.03 Kurt Crenwelge Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. 00:15:00.98 Tanya DePass Great. because I, at one point during the height of the pandemic, I was like, I love to run Dragon Age again, but also realized how much time and effort it is. I like to pay people for their time and I tried to fundraise for it, make it a coffee goal. 00:15:16.61 Tanya DePass And I got maybe 10% of the way. And it's hard because the preced the unprecedented times we're living in it is hard and people sometimes have to make really hard decisions about where their money goes and who they support. 00:15:24.65 Kurt Crenwelge Yes. Yes. 00:15:29.80 Tanya DePass And that is, I will never begrudge anyone of like, Well, I have to take care of x Y, and Z before I have any spare money, if I have spare money. So and that is a very roundup boy roundabout way of saying, follow what you want to do, but don't get into it to be rich or even make a lot of money. 00:15:49.04 Tanya DePass And that's where I think a lot of people fall down because they think like, oh, well I can just be my own boss. 00:15:51.46 Kurt Crenwelge Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. 00:15:53.57 Tanya DePass I can do whatever. But if you're working with an IP holder, like we were with wizards, you also have to remember if you're on their stream, but what is it you're signing? Read your contract thoroughly. 00:16:04.93 Tanya DePass Or if you want to get together and start a collective with friends and say, okay, well, this person is going to be the engineer. This person is going to be the streamer. What have you still, In doing business with anyone, but especially with friends, have a contract, read it, and follow it. 00:16:21.16 Tanya DePass The professionalism must be there first and foremost if that is your intent and end goal. But understand that you can do something for the love of doing it. You do not have to monetize every single hobby you have. 00:16:34.14 Kurt Crenwelge Right. We can all just be Kevin Costner and James Earl Jones, and if you build it, they will come, and they will play baseball. 00:16:40.81 Tanya DePass oh oh I wish that was true. i actually did a panel at TwitchCon ah and three years ago, and we talked about streaming as a career versus streaming as a hobby. 00:16:51.90 Tanya DePass And we did include no things like you know trying to do your your home game, your TTRPG stuff on Twitch. 00:16:57.84 Kurt Crenwelge Hmm. 00:16:58.15 Tanya DePass And it was very interesting. of The people that literally had the idea of, well, I put it out there. Where's everyone at? People have always told me they love my art. They love my crochet. They love They love it when I guest on a TTRPG stream, but where are the people to support me? And it's like, you got to do the work to market yourself. 00:17:14.37 Tanya DePass You will wear many hats trying to do this as a career versus a hobby. 00:17:18.73 Kurt Crenwelge Right. And, and, uh, you know, you said, Oh, I was speaking as a, as an older person with experience. I, you, you just said that of like, Oh, where is everyone? I've, I've felt that at times with this podcast, but then I also remember 37 year old dad with a four year old. And I'm like, 00:17:34.83 Kurt Crenwelge man, I'm just too old with social media. i'm I'm tired. I don't want to be, you know, part of my my day job is working with a nonprofit. And there's a whole team of people that but take care of the social media stuff. 00:17:46.27 Kurt Crenwelge I don't have that. And I also don't want to just be scrolling doom scrolling or or posting brain rot or memes for the sake of like getting clicks and eyeballs. You know, I want to stand on the the goofy title names of the episodes. I want to stand on the fact of the interesting and fun conversations I get to have with people. And I want that to be bringing people in. So if it takes me, you know, another six seasons to get to 40,000 downloads, well then i will be happy with that. And I will be, I will be satisfied and and and content with my place in life. 00:18:19.97 Tanya DePass Yeah. And, I mean, and and you're doing it for the right reason. You're doing this because you enjoy it. 00:18:24.64 Kurt Crenwelge Mm-hmm. 00:18:24.72 Tanya DePass And i think that comes through when you make this kind of podcast or when you, when you stream or whatever it is that you're doing, It's going to come through if you're doing it because you truly love it versus I'm doing this and I really need to pay my rent with this this month. 00:18:41.03 Tanya DePass Spoiler, I've been streaming 11 years. I have never made enough to pay my rent off a single month of streaming on Twitch. So, you know, money was quote unquote good when we were doing the live show, not live shows, but the ap But that was a contracted gig where we had a we knew money was coming at some point. 00:19:02.02 Kurt Crenwelge Awesome. and and And so we had the Rivals of Waterdeep and then the Black Dice Society, if I understand, that was kind of the more Van Richten Barovia Curse of Strahd flavored campaign. 00:19:08.06 Tanya DePass Yes. 00:19:13.83 Tanya DePass yeah Right. Yes. 00:19:16.94 Kurt Crenwelge Okay. 00:19:17.14 Tanya DePass And ah B-Day Walters was our DM and our producer all of that. And he had reached out to me and then everyone who wound up on the show um going, Hey, I got this opportunity. 00:19:27.57 Tanya DePass You know, Wizards wants to let us do an AP, you know, would you be interested? And I, and for me, it was like, Hey, I get a chance to work B-Day. He's my homie, but also i get to be darker. i get to play a dark character because while Sleaze was not a darker evil character, know, 00:19:44.06 Tanya DePass She was morally gray as a paladin. Said you can do that in fifth edition now. You don't have to be all sweetness and light. 00:19:48.91 Kurt Crenwelge Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. 00:19:50.87 Tanya DePass But I was like, I get to be a dark character. 00:19:50.90 Kurt Crenwelge Mm-hmm. 00:19:53.17 Tanya DePass Sign me up. Sign me up right now. 00:19:57.41 Kurt Crenwelge Oh, man. Yeah. and and of course, I've seen you know b Dave Walters has ah has also done fabulous, successful stuff with Vampire the Masquerade. And he would be a fascinating person to talk to as well. 00:20:10.47 Kurt Crenwelge Add him to the Rolodex of people to eventually reach out to. ah 00:20:14.30 Tanya DePass Yes. 00:20:14.45 Kurt Crenwelge But awesome. Awesome. And then also, if I'm to understand, you you were involved in the production of Into the Motherlands. Is that correct? 00:20:22.20 Tanya DePass So I'm the, so with into the motherlands, initially it was a, an AP on my Twitch channel. um I pitched an idea to Twitch and of the ideas I pitched motherlands is what formed out of that. 00:20:34.45 Tanya DePass Cause they were like, you know, let's try to have something original. 00:20:35.14 Kurt Crenwelge you 00:20:37.61 Tanya DePass And I was like, cool. Because i I had pitched like yet more D and I'd pitch like Star Trek, the RPG I'd pitched all this other stuff. And they're like what if you could just tell your own story? And i was like, Oh, and with B Dave, because B. Dave sometimes in my brain, we joke that we're tadpoles on occasion, AKA BG3. 00:20:56.83 Tanya DePass And ah we sat down and hammered out a concept, hammered out everything, presented Twitch, they said yes. um And the response to it was enough for people, we were like, would people wanna play this if we've made a game? 00:21:09.73 Tanya DePass And we did, and then we have been beset by every cursed thing that could happen to a Kickstarter project. 00:21:16.95 Kurt Crenwelge Wow. 00:21:16.97 Tanya DePass So if you back the Kickstarter, I'm sorry, but also the world is kind of burning and tariffs. So we're getting there. um But, you know, we we had a publisher, then they got out of publishing RPGs entirely. 00:21:33.18 Kurt Crenwelge Wow. 00:21:33.73 Tanya DePass And then ah we were going to use a pre- preconceived, almost said metrics, preconceived system, the licensing for that did not work out. 00:21:45.14 Tanya DePass We had to make our own system. And if you've never designed your own system for an RPG, that is a lot of work. 00:21:50.66 Kurt Crenwelge Well, 00:21:51.60 Tanya DePass We had to bring in more people, it added more time, yada, yada. It's just been cursed at this point. 00:21:57.81 Kurt Crenwelge well 00:21:57.86 Tanya DePass And it will come out as for the printed books, who knows, because tariffs, we are trying to get the PDF out soon. 00:22:05.96 Kurt Crenwelge Okay. Well, we will, we will keep, uh, keep that all in our prayers that that will all resolve, uh, and we'll, and we'll be, uh, you know, you'll be like, man, all the struggles that we had trying to get this thing produced. Well, now it's, now it's here and you know, now it's awesome and everyone's loving it. 00:22:22.20 Kurt Crenwelge So, uh, 00:22:22.90 Tanya DePass I'm good once that book is out the door, I'm never going to think about it again. 00:22:26.43 Kurt Crenwelge Oh, Well, ah you know this is just ah you know a wonderful discussion getting to you know learn more ah learnur learn more about you, and especially you know with your ah you know the vast amounts of stories you've been able to tell and play and since since your Redbox days. 00:22:43.61 Kurt Crenwelge um So I think this would be good to segue into the the namesake of the show, which is the sidekicks and the sidequests. So, ah Miss Tanya, do you happen to have a favorite NPC or sidekick character, whether they're from one of your many games you've played in, video game, movie, film, television, literature, etc.? And why is this character your favorite NPC or sidekick character? 00:23:08.34 Tanya DePass So anyone who talks to me for more than 30 seconds knows I'm a big Dragon Age nerd. And my favorite character of the series is Fenris, who's in Dragon Age 2. And I did base a character i played off of him in a very long go campaign, a three, five campaign. 00:23:25.82 Tanya DePass um But I just love the character growth he goes through. And also the kind of grumpy, snarly, snappy, lone wolf character that that learns to open up and learns to grow and grows up through the course of Dragon Age 2. 00:23:39.09 Tanya DePass And you know he's an elf. So, oh, look, I can be an elf. Surprise. 00:23:45.10 Kurt Crenwelge I know I have not been a ah Dragon Age player myself, but I know it is often ah you know claimed as one of the the favorites out there on the podcast. so ah So very cool. you know the the Yeah, like you said, the loanne the lone wolf that that grows on you. That's cool. 00:24:01.28 Tanya DePass Oh, 00:24:01.38 Kurt Crenwelge I like that. um And then same thing with the side quest portion. What's been a favorite side quest or B plot elements? 00:24:07.96 Tanya DePass wow. Um... 00:24:09.09 Kurt Crenwelge Again, same criteria, movie, film, um RPGs, video games, television, literature, et cetera, history even. And why is this been your favorite side quest or B plot elements? 00:24:21.47 Tanya DePass oh wow um 00:24:28.63 Tanya DePass wow, this might stump me because I've been thinking about it and ah kind of going back to you Dragon Age, but the first Dragon Age, ah early in the game, there's a there's a side mission to save the Mabari, which is the warhound of the series. 00:24:38.94 Kurt Crenwelge Oh. 00:24:43.23 Tanya DePass And you have to go find a specific flower, save this dog, and the dog becomes your companion. um But also there's the i I have a homebrew thing that I do usually for one shots called the Infernal Goose Chase. 00:24:56.44 Tanya DePass And you have to you have to find and kill a Kaiju-sized goose. But it's in Avernus, yes. 00:25:00.76 Kurt Crenwelge oh 00:25:03.29 Tanya DePass And without fail, my players always wander off the path of I have set them upon. Once they even got to the point where they didn't even get to Avernus... 00:25:10.63 Kurt Crenwelge Thank you. 00:25:14.60 Tanya DePass They negotiated and rolled very, one of my players rolled very high on an animal handling, animal friendship. They got a 32 because they're a ranger and and got a nat 20. Um, they, they talked to dragon, not only out of killing them and the villagers, but also talked, taught it about sustainable farming and ethical farming. 00:25:36.74 Tanya DePass Um, so that became a side quest, which became the rest of the, of the game because I was like well, they're not going to die now. I, I guess, um, They're never going to meet the goose. 00:25:47.18 Tanya DePass And if you ever watch the VOD, you can see the real time. I'm the the gif of the of the math over the face. That is me trying to figure out what do I do? They're not even going to get to the goose. 00:25:59.72 Tanya DePass Well, damn it. 00:26:03.82 Kurt Crenwelge Yep, it's it's ah how suddenly a side quest can quickly turn into the main plot based on the choices of our of our characters. 00:26:12.45 Tanya DePass And the dice, because the dice were definitely in their favor on that um that time. 00:26:17.73 Kurt Crenwelge Indeed. And then ah the way that we round out the personal interview section of the episode, what are you passionate about and why? 00:26:31.21 Tanya DePass ah Relating to TTRPGs or in general? 00:26:34.04 Kurt Crenwelge It can be either both, something else entirely. 00:26:37.10 Tanya DePass but ah Well, in regards to TTRPGs is... Having fun while you're doing this and remembering that the DMGM is a player too, that we should really get out of the mindset of a versus. 00:26:53.86 Tanya DePass the GM and the players instead of a, this is collaboration. cause you know, like I played when it was still very much like a go in and murder everything and steal their treasure. And that was kind of the definition of of playing where versus now a lot of people are very narrative in their search or stare storytelling. Wow. Words are hard. 00:27:15.76 Tanya DePass Uh, you know, you have these drawn out moments, you have character growth, you have very emotional, vulnerable moments in your campaign. and and I like the idea of going from like level one to level 20, if possible, because there's so much growth that comes from you as a player, 00:27:35.89 Tanya DePass but also what you see the character going through. Because we all know that we put ourselves in our characters. We can't help it. 00:27:43.18 Kurt Crenwelge Mm-hmm. 00:27:43.24 Tanya DePass you know People like to think they're above it and they don't put themselves in the in the players they the characters they play. We absolutely do it. And you know also having those kind of light bulb moments when you're playing. I'm passionate about you know everyone kind of getting a chance to shine because I'm sure we've all we've all had the unfortunate experience of playing with someone who doesn't know how to share the spotlight. They don't know how to be a care, be anything other than try to be the main character of recession. 00:28:12.41 Tanya DePass And so I want everyone to have fun, to let, to, to have that hero moment. Now, granted, they're playing an evil character, maybe they have their villain villain moment, but um I just want everyone to enjoy things um in terms of personal stuff or the world in general ah justice. 00:28:21.74 Kurt Crenwelge Mm-hmm. 00:28:31.29 Tanya DePass because we are living and struggling in a very unjust world today as we record this. and there's no reason we should be at this point in the world's history. There's no point. 00:28:44.45 Tanya DePass There's no reason we should all be struggling so deeply that we have people going without food, shelter, or medication, that we have people that can't that may may have this beautiful bright light inside them to create, to do things that we'll never know, that they'll never get to enjoy because every day is a struggle to survive. 00:28:56.04 Kurt Crenwelge Mm-hmm. 00:29:07.02 Tanya DePass And that's why I'm passionate about whatever small way I can do that is helping people either find some joy, know, being silly on stream, doing one doing whatever I can, um but also just kind of being there as as support for people and hoping that, you know, and this isn't trying to say I'm like a great person. I'm often not a great person or even a good person some days. 00:29:30.87 Tanya DePass um But, you know, having people find compassion again, having people hopefully get back to doing the right thing you 00:29:38.38 Kurt Crenwelge Mm-hmm. 00:29:42.75 Tanya DePass Finding that love for other people. And that's not to say like everybody and let them walk over you. I don't believe in that either. But finding the the goodness and compassion themselves and bringing that back out in the world because we don't see it anymore. 00:29:57.97 Tanya DePass we're What we're living through right now is just proof of that. 00:30:03.81 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. Well, I mean, i certainly make no apologies on this podcast of of my Catholicity. And I certainly don't try and Bible thump anyone over the head who comes on as a as a guest of the podcast either. 00:30:17.60 Kurt Crenwelge um It's just that that ethos helps to to form the spirit of this podcast. So I very much resonate with what you say. It's like, yeah. You know, the Beatitudes, you know, the Golden Rule, like, you know, Catholic social teaching, all these things ah that, you know, people are ignorant of or they they they they don't take advantage of it. They're not doing their their part. 00:30:39.47 Kurt Crenwelge um You know, as you were explaining it, yeah, just the the the words in my head, you know, ah Christ talking about like, oh, you will always have the poor, but you will not always have me. 00:30:50.07 Kurt Crenwelge And coupling that along with, ah you know, the what you did for the least of my brothers and sisters you did for me. 00:30:55.82 Tanya DePass Yep. 00:30:56.21 Kurt Crenwelge So I think that's all a good reminder. I know, you know, yeah, especially the times we're in and current events and all they they they are, because I know this episode will come out in August. But as we're recording right now, it's it's the the no king ah protests that are happening today across ah the country. 00:31:13.01 Tanya DePass Yeah. 00:31:13.30 Kurt Crenwelge And of course, the startling news out of Minnesota um for the for those those politicians. so ah 00:31:20.31 Tanya DePass yeah 00:31:20.53 Kurt Crenwelge certainly for everyone in our prayers and, you know, all that we can do in our local communities, ah you know, to make a positive impact and and change and where, where we are, where our talents are best allocated and how we can help others. We should, we should definitely try and do that. 00:31:39.03 Tanya DePass So fun fact, I grew up Catholic. um I'm no longer practicing, but you know, there were many things that I still take with me. And there's also things I take from following the, following Satruar because Tyr, know, is a, is a deity in the Nordic path, not just a D and D deity. Cause a lot of people assume that my username comes from D and D oh actually it doesn't. 00:32:05.59 Tanya DePass um So we can, we can find a righteous path no matter what the end light is. 00:32:15.24 Kurt Crenwelge and then there we go that is the personal interview section of the show and now it is time to head in to some npc creation 00:32:30.50 Kurt Crenwelge And NPC creation is brought to you by you, ah the podcast audience and our patrons from Patreon. ah So now's the time in the show where we give a shout out to our comfortable patrons and above with a loud hurrah. 00:32:42.95 Kurt Crenwelge I've only got a cup of water today, but that's okay. Hey, you got hydrate. You got to keep your body healthy. So... ah So to you, Anson Jablinski and good old mom and dad, we say cheers again. All these folks are donating at least $2 or more a month. 00:32:59.78 Kurt Crenwelge They're actually all wealthy tier, which means they get to introduce an element of chance to our random tables that we have. So if we're going to use if we're going roll some dice here today and randomly generate a character. 00:33:10.33 Kurt Crenwelge we might get to hear some of their responses used today. So if you want to learn more about our Patreon community, you should check out the show notes below, go to the podcast website, or just go directly to patreon.com forward slash sidekicksandsidequests. 00:33:24.98 Kurt Crenwelge Find out about all of the tiers of accommodations that we have awaiting for you in the levitating platter. Help us to grow and expand our operations in this demiplane and worlds beyond. 00:33:36.21 Kurt Crenwelge Alright, so now we're here in the section where we get to make up an NPC. So I know before we started recording, we were debating like, oh, you know, are we, ah we're gonna bring a character in? Are we gonna randomize a character? are we gonna do a mix and match of both? So what is it that you would like to do today? 00:33:55.04 Tanya DePass Let's roll for stats, but the character could be a warrior um elf, not a drow. um And... ah Well, Fenris' thing in the game is that he was put underneath put through a ritual that basically gave him great power, but stripped everything from him. 00:34:16.42 Tanya DePass So this could be... He's gotten his he's gotten his memories back. But, you know... He still has things to do in the world so we can randomize everything else. 00:34:27.94 Kurt Crenwelge Okay. Okay, so we've got an idea of a character that we're working with. We'll just work our way through the question, so if we have an answer for it, we'll plug that in. ah Or if you don't have an answer, then we'll roll the aforementioned dice, and we'll see what we get. Okay. 00:34:41.94 Tanya DePass Cool. 00:34:42.02 Kurt Crenwelge Perfect. Okay, so then the first question here, what is going to be the name of the character? It sounds like maybe Fen... Fen... Fenvris? 00:34:50.03 Tanya DePass Well, Fenris is, I mean, also property of Bioware. But, ah well, what's interesting is his actual name, because they do the whole, once he finds out who he is, his actual name is Leto, which I'm sure is a a not Dune, which is timely because Dune Awakening just came out. 00:34:54.87 Kurt Crenwelge Oh, true, yeah. 00:35:07.01 Tanya DePass um 00:35:10.77 Tanya DePass Let's call him alex Alexander. 00:35:13.37 Kurt Crenwelge Okay, Alexander. Okay. ah Perfectly good ah conquering hero sort of a name, you know, had had his old ah empire and such. Okay. 00:35:24.92 Kurt Crenwelge All right. So we got the character name. And so the ancestry of the character, you did specify that you wanted Elvish, not Drow. 00:35:31.79 Tanya DePass yes correct 00:35:32.53 Kurt Crenwelge But is there any specific flavoring of Elf? I know there's a bunch of different ones. I even have some homebrew flavor of Elves as well. 00:35:40.19 Tanya DePass oh um i would say a ladrin because ladrin are like so out there powerful 00:35:47.62 Kurt Crenwelge Okay, Eladrin, perfect. Yeah, so so from the Feywild has the ability to shift through the seasons. Perfect, okay. And then, let's see, so name, answer. What is the job or role in society ah for Alexander? 00:36:04.99 Tanya DePass ah Mercenary with a side of ah vengeance with with a hint of paladin as he's trying to right the wrongs done to him and others. So he's a mercenary paladin. 00:36:14.49 Kurt Crenwelge Okay. Okay. 00:36:17.50 Kurt Crenwelge Ooh, okay. paladin Paladin for hire. Okay. 00:36:21.74 Tanya DePass Yes. 00:36:22.53 Kurt Crenwelge There we go. im Okay. And then let's see. How old is Alexander? 00:36:29.91 Tanya DePass Well, elves in the farewell can get up there. So he's an adult elf. So let's say two 50. 00:36:36.66 Kurt Crenwelge Okay, 250. Perfect. And then, uh, so if we were rolling dice, this is the part where i get to say, and now we take a pause from the dice rolling as we now ask the question, can you describe the physical appearance of Alexander, the paladin for hire, a ladrin mercenary adult? 00:36:55.32 Tanya DePass ah So this Eladrin is tall. Eladrin, if I recall correctly, get to be pretty tall because um we had an Eladrin that is in um Black Dice Society that my character wound up romancing. 00:37:11.20 Tanya DePass I would say it's six and a half feet tall. 00:37:16.08 Kurt Crenwelge Ooh. 00:37:16.54 Tanya DePass um Brown skin. has tattoos that are white ink. 00:37:22.66 Kurt Crenwelge OK. 00:37:22.72 Tanya DePass ah because lyrium doesn't exist in D&D. 00:37:22.92 Kurt Crenwelge Oh, 00:37:25.86 Tanya DePass um You know, and various, like, their tribal tattoos of places he's lived, places he's encountered, they're a living memory of of the life he's led so far, both in and out of the Frey Wild. 00:37:36.45 Kurt Crenwelge OK. 00:37:38.28 Tanya DePass um You know, white hair, um piercings in in both and um You know, wears... 00:37:50.36 Tanya DePass Even though he he introduces himself sometimes as a paladin, he wears, like, leather armor for ease of movement, things like that, so he can ah handily fight people and take them on and not be weighed down by heavy heavy armor. 00:38:01.43 Kurt Crenwelge Mm-hmm. Ooh. 00:38:06.52 Tanya DePass um Even though his preferred weapon is a two-handed sword, he does carry a short bow and a quiver. um and on occasion, you know, he can't... If he can have it... 00:38:19.22 Tanya DePass he can summon uh, an animal companion from the Feywild, which companion I will leave up to you. Cause I don't remember what's in the Feywild. 00:38:28.22 Kurt Crenwelge Oh, yeah. I mean, there's all sorts of ah all sorts of creatures, and that certainly leaves it up to a customizability for ah players that are going to introduce Alexander in their backstory or dungeon masters that are like, great, I've got an Eladrin paladin for hire. What sort of animal companion they summon will be the flavor of the tone of their campaign. So perfect. 00:38:49.04 Kurt Crenwelge Okay. 00:38:49.63 Tanya DePass Yeah. 00:38:50.44 Kurt Crenwelge Huzzah. All right. ah Yeah, no, that's a cool detail. You were saying about the white ink on the brown skin and telling the story of where he lived. I was getting a very Maui, the Disney Maui. 00:39:00.87 Kurt Crenwelge And I know my son has a book. 00:39:00.89 Tanya DePass yeah 00:39:03.49 Kurt Crenwelge It's like a children's version of like ah the the, you know, encyclopedia of legends and myths and stuff like that. And so there's a story in there. there's's The story is in there about Maui. And so the the Polynesian depiction of Maui and he's got all the tattoos. I'm like, yeah, yeah. 00:39:17.74 Kurt Crenwelge This is like the real story of Maui, not necessarily like the Disney one that we've seen, which is fun to sing along with the rock and and all that stuff. But yeah, cool. are Are there any interesting particular scenes that are depicted or locations? 00:39:32.03 Kurt Crenwelge Or is that just depending on where Alexander is and whichever campaign will be unique to that world or that story? 00:39:38.65 Tanya DePass Well, theyre i mean the the well the one the one that's always visible, i would think, on his right arm is is dedicated to his his time in the Feywild, both as a young elf and then when he returned. 00:39:51.15 Tanya DePass after he um 00:39:51.26 Kurt Crenwelge oh 00:39:52.98 Tanya DePass Every kind of has gone through his journey of training, his montage, ah has been out in the moral realm and Feyruin, not Feywild. um But the others could be up to interpretation. 00:40:06.52 Kurt Crenwelge Okay. Okay. And is there a particular deity that he serves? Would that be indicated in any way on his leather armor or ah his other accoutrement that he has about his person? 00:40:20.83 Tanya DePass um Even though he's an Eladrin, he has found himself drawn to Tyr because of seeking justice. 00:40:27.86 Kurt Crenwelge okay 00:40:29.09 Tanya DePass um So he is a paladin of Tyr, but he he can get a little morally gray when he needs to. 00:40:35.82 Kurt Crenwelge Interesting. That's some of the Feywild flavoring coming into play. 00:40:39.73 Tanya DePass Exactly. 00:40:40.89 Kurt Crenwelge Okay. And then if you had to describe Alexander with three adjectives, what three adjectives would you use? 00:40:50.09 Tanya DePass Intelligent. 00:40:53.50 Tanya DePass Broody. 00:40:54.67 Kurt Crenwelge Hmm. 00:40:58.45 Tanya DePass Enigmatic. 00:41:00.44 Kurt Crenwelge Okay. Interesting. Yeah. So just, uh, so not, not necessarily stonewalling, but just sort of a mystery. when when you encounter him Alexander just is like, like you said, enigmatic. 00:41:12.98 Kurt Crenwelge So just, he's just very mysterious and you just don't know until you get to like befriend him and talk to him. 00:41:18.61 Tanya DePass Exactly. 00:41:20.38 Kurt Crenwelge Ah, okay. 00:41:21.89 Tanya DePass So he's the NPC with the with the with the shell to crack. But when you do finally get to know him, if if characters or the DM has a kind of interaction for him as a NPC, he could be a very rich character. 00:41:25.75 Kurt Crenwelge Mm. Hmm. 00:41:34.58 Tanya DePass He could be like, youre wind up your best friend. And, you know, i have a similar character in a Dragon Age game because Fenris is canonically in Dragon Age, whereas that kind of, he's not as mean and grumpy as many people will take him. 00:41:53.40 Tanya DePass There's very good reasons for the way he's like this. 00:41:57.56 Kurt Crenwelge And again, yeah, that could be totally up to the DM to invent, like, oh, what's the chip on his shoulder from his past, and, like, what's the thing that he's got to work through ah to come out the other side as the as the mercenary with the heart of gold? 00:42:11.06 Tanya DePass Exactly. 00:42:12.32 Kurt Crenwelge There we go. ah And now is the part where I get to say, and now we get to go back to some dice rolling if that's ah in our future here. We'd like all of our NPCs to have something cool on their person. 00:42:23.07 Kurt Crenwelge So what is going to be a valuable item, piece of lore, secret, or ideal or concept that the character would ascribe to? 00:42:24.83 Tanya DePass Woohoo. 00:42:31.89 Kurt Crenwelge If you are interested in randomizing this, this is where we get to do a combination roll because we roll a D4 for the category and then a D6 for the particular thing. 00:42:41.30 Tanya DePass You know what? Let's roll and see we come up with. 00:42:43.71 Kurt Crenwelge There we go. 00:42:45.35 Tanya DePass All right. So a d four 00:42:49.27 Tanya DePass That was a two. 00:42:50.60 Kurt Crenwelge Okay, this will be a piece of lore. 00:42:52.82 Tanya DePass Okay. And then a D6, you said? 00:42:55.11 Kurt Crenwelge Indeed. 00:42:57.24 Tanya DePass A four. 00:42:58.72 Kurt Crenwelge Four. Okay, perfect. Your answer was submitted by our previous guest, Kevin Ngo. Alexander knows the best place to go fishing in the port town. 00:43:11.65 Tanya DePass Sure, let's do it. 00:43:13.11 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. ah Maybe something part of ah part of his backstory with the Feywild, maybe that was something that he enjoyed doing was fishing, maybe? His downtime. 00:43:22.90 Tanya DePass that was That was his happy place. 00:43:25.62 Kurt Crenwelge Ah. So then he in the in the port town of your game, he just happens to know the best fishing spot where you're just kind of like, hmm, that's interesting. 00:43:34.79 Tanya DePass Like, how do you know this? Okay, I guess. 00:43:38.98 Kurt Crenwelge All right, perfect. And then ah now we come to the question of, ah because obviously we want all of our NPCs to be able to have that bright gold exclamation point when you find them. 00:43:49.78 Kurt Crenwelge ah What's going to be your particular quest that Alexander would... recruit the party or you know ah hire them to go do something on his behalf. 00:44:00.40 Kurt Crenwelge you know If you have an idea, you know you could say what it is. If you feel like randomizing it, that's a roll of a D12. ah If you want to mix and match, ah you know you could do that too. 00:44:11.08 Tanya DePass um So i'm going to lift this from the actual character Fenris. 00:44:14.97 Kurt Crenwelge Okay. 00:44:15.24 Tanya DePass um One thing that ah quest his personal quest in Dragon Age 2, in addition to you kind of fleeing the the evil mage that owned him because he was he's a former slave, um he finds out that he has a sister. 00:44:30.55 Kurt Crenwelge oh 00:44:30.57 Tanya DePass And he helps you Well, you help him write to her because he was a slave. He's illiterate. um 00:44:36.56 Kurt Crenwelge Mm. 00:44:37.53 Tanya DePass And so there's the finding her, contacting her, And then going to meet her, which is all part of his personal quest. So there's the, after he's gotten his memories back, he knows who he used to be, is finding this either relative or someone, it and doesn't mean have to be a relative. 00:44:54.02 Tanya DePass It could be someone from his past that he wants to find again. 00:44:56.25 Kurt Crenwelge Okay. 00:44:58.54 Kurt Crenwelge Okay, interesting. So, ah you know, so but potentially you could have Alexander there as like part of a pool of NPCs to be able to recruit because you're like, great, we're going to go in this dungeon. We need a paladin. 00:45:10.86 Kurt Crenwelge And then as you get to know the paladin, the paladin opens up and is like, you know, hey, I just found out about this person in my backstory and I would really like to to get to know them and meet them and such. 00:45:23.29 Kurt Crenwelge um And so that's the quest, the side quest that he's going to offer up as far as asking for the party's help ah to get this done. 00:45:23.40 Tanya DePass honey 00:45:29.15 Tanya DePass Correct. Correct. 00:45:31.58 Kurt Crenwelge Okay. All right. That's a nice one. you know, it's not always like, oh go charging into the dungeon and go slay a Hydra. It's just, hey, I want to get to know this person from a past. and Can you help me, please? You even stuff like that is really nice. 00:45:47.30 Kurt Crenwelge ah 00:45:47.57 Tanya DePass Yep. (editing cut) 00:46:26.73 Kurt Crenwelge That's true. Yes. ah And so with with this side quest, we have to consider, you know, success and failure. So what's going to be the reward for successfully helping Alexander make contact with this person from his past? 00:46:41.06 Tanya DePass um Obviously you get to know him better. um he's He's very happy he's gotten this person back. If it's his sister, he's got that family connection. If it's someone else, he's got a friend. 00:46:52.38 Tanya DePass Maybe it's a former lover, if that's the flavor of your campaign. um And, you know, your friendship with him increases and he's kind of on call for you as an NPC going forward. 00:46:57.87 Kurt Crenwelge Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. 00:47:02.91 Tanya DePass If he just doesn't hang out with you. um Failure could be maybe he before you can find the person, Maybe they either leave town, maybe they die, don't know, depending on how serious and dark your campaign is. 00:47:16.01 Tanya DePass Or he finds them and they're not who they they're not who he thought they were. 00:47:20.86 Kurt Crenwelge o 00:47:22.00 Tanya DePass ah Because that is that is lifted from the actual Dragon Age character's thing where he does find his sister, but she betrays him. 00:47:29.65 Kurt Crenwelge Oh no Yeah. Yeah. Depending on how Shakespearean you want to go on that, I suppose. 00:47:31.45 Tanya DePass Yeah. 00:47:34.49 Tanya DePass Yeah. 00:47:35.65 Kurt Crenwelge Okay. All right. So the, you know, so he, he becomes a a reliable, uh, retainer or follower character for sure in the future and whatever adventures you decide to go on, um, ah for the success. And if for failure, you know, depending on the flavor of like, oh, there's some NPC boss battle. Now you have to do, ah or, you know, whatever it may be. 00:47:57.62 Kurt Crenwelge ah okay. Yeah. That sounds pretty straightforward. Um, So, you know, we do have some optional questions here as well. If you feel like Alexander needs to be fleshed out or if you feel like Alexander's pretty good, we can head on to the next part of the podcast. 00:48:13.87 Tanya DePass Let's try a couple optional questions or pick. 00:48:16.92 Kurt Crenwelge Okay. um Well, I mean, you did mention, you know, illiteracy as part of a thing. So maybe this would be a good. um Does Alexander have a particular accent or language with how he speaks and interacts with people? are they Are there any idiosyncrasies in how he acts or speaks? 00:48:37.13 Tanya DePass So he's because of the way he um one the one, the way he was raised because he was property um or his, his past of kind of being a mercenary and having to adapt around being other people. 00:48:52.09 Tanya DePass He's one those people. I'm sure we've met them where they can kind of adapt and mimic any accent, anything like that. They, they can kind of just fit in because that has been his thing of, he has to fit in to do the job if he's a mercenary Or if he's a paladin, he wants to bring comfort to people. If he if he is bringing that part of a paladin to what he's doing. 00:49:10.33 Tanya DePass So he's got one of those accents that you just can't quite place. 00:49:14.32 Kurt Crenwelge o 00:49:14.51 Tanya DePass You're like, it's a little Faerun, it's little Faewall, it's little Barovia, depending on who he's talking to and where he is. 00:49:20.08 Kurt Crenwelge interesting 00:49:20.33 Tanya DePass um But he's he's, you know, he he's People who don't know him at all would read him as either a soldier on a mission or kind of stoic. um But give him a couple of pints. You might hear him laugh. You might hear him sing. um And he can be very jovial once he is comfortable with you, but that is a long road. So you'd have to be a long running NPC to get there. 00:49:43.90 Tanya DePass um So he, he can fit in, he can play the part. He can wear the mask, but he's also very much a from everywhere i nowhere at once kind of character. 00:49:53.95 Kurt Crenwelge Hmm. Okay. And then let's see, I'm just trying to think, um, you know, goals and motivations of Alexander as a character. Is it just making contact with this person? 00:50:05.36 Kurt Crenwelge Is that pretty much what's driving him? 00:50:08.23 Tanya DePass That's a big part of what's driving him. And then depending on how people want to play the backstory, if they want to tie it kind of almost canonically to like the the original, the it the inspiring character is, has he, is he gotten the oath of vengeance part of his paladin storyline done? Has he gotten to the people that have wronged him or misused him? 00:50:28.85 Tanya DePass kept his memories and his life from him, you know, in, because, you know, he's gotten his memories back. 00:50:31.35 Kurt Crenwelge Right. Mm-hmm. 00:50:35.47 Tanya DePass So he knows he has his list. Has he gotten through that list or has he gotten through that list? Is it now working through the, ah got my revenge. I guess what do I do now? Because many times you have characters that have a vengeance oath or they're on a path of revenge. And it's like, cool, you got your revenge. Okay. 00:50:55.18 Tanya DePass Now what are you going to do And kind of, that to me at least, for me as a player, it's very it's very satisfying to do, like get past the revenge portion because then there's the, okay, now what? 00:50:56.97 Kurt Crenwelge right 00:51:08.78 Kurt Crenwelge Right. 00:51:08.82 Tanya DePass The lot of media doesn't really deal with. 00:51:11.51 Kurt Crenwelge right 00:51:11.77 Tanya DePass It's like, okay, I got my revenge. ah I ah guess I'm here now. 00:51:17.60 Kurt Crenwelge Right, which is, I finally finished my first playthrough of Baldur's Gate 3, and i'm I made a version of Duncan from the podcast, so the chaotically good ah Battlemaster fighter guy, so I had to reload the whole goblin camp to do this, but, you know, knocked out Minthara, and then later rescued her and recruited her, so I know she's the prominent in-media example of like, oh, I'm the Oath of Vengeance like ah Paladin that you can recruit for the party, so 00:51:46.87 Tanya DePass Uh-huh. 00:51:47.25 Kurt Crenwelge you know Duncan being a very good person and Mintara being like, you know let's let's suggest like the cruel or manipulative option. um so it was very interesting over the course of that playthrough to you know kind of wear her down as far as like, huh, you are insane and crazy at times, but you know what? Maybe everything that you're saying isn't completely unfounded. So it was really nice to get to that. 00:52:10.15 Kurt Crenwelge that that turnaround portion so by the end she's kind of like alright yeah I'm leading that rebellion against Menzo Baranzen and you know life is life is pretty good ah sort sort of an angle 00:52:22.12 Tanya DePass Yeah, I mean, but, you know, let's keep in mind that I don't think there's anything quote-unquote insane or crazy about her is that she was brainwashed. She's also a drowned driver, very particular person. 00:52:31.71 Kurt Crenwelge sure 00:52:31.76 Tanya DePass social structure and she was, if not royalty, she was very high up in drow society and she was snatched away and made part of this cult. So she is also getting out from under the thumb of literally being brainwashed and escaping a cult, which it's hard to portray that in a in a way that doesn't overpower the narrative, but we are we are dealing with someone who is literally trying to get through, recover from brainwashing and having an actual tadpole put in them that is what's controlling them. 00:52:40.63 Kurt Crenwelge right Yeah. 00:52:52.10 Kurt Crenwelge Sure. 00:53:01.78 Kurt Crenwelge Right. Which, ah you she was very clutch in Act 3. I definitely appreciated having her in the party with Carlack, for sure. 00:53:08.66 Tanya DePass Oh, yeah. 00:53:09.36 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. And then ah do you feel like that's a good spread on some of those optional questions? 00:53:17.50 Tanya DePass I think we're good. I think that works. 00:53:19.77 Kurt Crenwelge All right. Excellent. Well, we have a better picture and understanding of Alexander as a character. And you know what? I think it's time to throw him into ah random encounter. 00:53:36.78 Kurt Crenwelge And this final part of the show is brought to you by my sponsor, Zencaster. ah You know, they're they what allowed me to record the episodes. So thank you all, you transcription readers. ah Be sure to go Zencaster.com forward slash pricing. 00:53:52.52 Kurt Crenwelge Use the code SideKAQPodcast get 30% off your first month of any paid Zencaster plan. Supporting the sponsor supports the podcast. So thank you, everyone. 00:54:03.93 Kurt Crenwelge And let's let's get on with it, shall we? 00:54:07.01 Tanya DePass All right. 00:54:07.80 Kurt Crenwelge All right. So this is the part of the show where we get to do a little bit of a role play, a vignette, a scene with the character that has been made here today. So I think Tanya will do a fantastic job of bringing a life and a presence, a gravitas ah to Alexander. But the question for me is, who am I going to be in the scene? Am I going to be one of my podcast adventuring characters meeting Alexander? 00:54:30.84 Kurt Crenwelge Is this going to be at some point in the timeline, either like in the prehistory or like later down the line when, um you know, Alexander's learned of this person that he wants to make contact with or or I don't know what sort of scene are you interested in showcasing Alexander in? 00:54:48.30 Tanya DePass Um, you've gotten to know him a little bit and maybe it's a it's a scene in the tavern. you know, you've had a day of adventuring, you've gotten back and, you know, you've taken on it. You've fulfilled a contract. Maybe you helped him a, as a way to get him to join your party and help you out. 00:55:09.28 Tanya DePass And he's feeling, a little loose, you know, you've you've all had a bit of meat or ale and ah maybe just like ah a downtime conversation. 00:55:20.58 Kurt Crenwelge Oh, perfect. Yeah, we could do that. um So if you are wanting, ah like we have these pre-made, if you will, adventuring ah characters that we use for this part of the show. So, um you know, we have a number of them to choose from. Of course, I mentioned earlier, Duncan, he's the recklessly brave adventurer for hire, happy-go-lucky, no task too big, no feet too daring sort of a guy. Yeah. 00:55:44.14 Kurt Crenwelge fighter. We've also got Sonya. 00:55:45.06 Tanya DePass Amen. 00:55:46.41 Kurt Crenwelge She's the warrior woman who started off as a barbarian and then multiclass into a paladin who serves a god who wishes to redeem the undead. So that could be an interesting pairing. um We've got Korak. 00:55:57.19 Kurt Crenwelge He's the lawful evil arcane trickster roguish dwarf. ah We have Chrisley. She's the herbalist botanist wood elf druid ah who multiclassed into a cleric who serves living memory. 00:56:10.37 Kurt Crenwelge We've also got Orion, who is the astral elf illusionist wizard. ah There is Agape. She's the lilac colored tiefling sorlock. 00:56:21.81 Kurt Crenwelge So started off as a wild magic sorcerer and then made a pact with a Preserpina, the Archfey. So now she's a Sorlock. We also have Life Spell, the Necromancer. 00:56:32.29 Kurt Crenwelge He is an old, he's an old gnomish man, forest gnome, who's a necromancer with a, with a skeletal manservant named Octavius. 00:56:36.59 Tanya DePass Oh, 00:56:41.14 Kurt Crenwelge And then we also have Anne Boleyn Mithril Shaper, ah who's so so far only been featured in one adventure, but she's like, ah she's a dwarvish bard. characters. 00:56:51.53 Kurt Crenwelge So those are all the ones that have been created. 00:56:51.98 Tanya DePass ah wow. 00:56:53.93 Kurt Crenwelge um and so if any of those speak to you, we could certainly, have them in the scene with Alexander, or if none of them sound good, we could totally make up someone new. 00:57:03.09 Tanya DePass um They can all just kind of be in the bar and and you pick the one that you feel like inhabiting today. 00:57:09.79 Kurt Crenwelge Ooh, well, I kind of like the idea and we haven't seen her in a while. um we could maybe do Sonia like paladin to paladin, you know, sort of having like this, uh, uh, 00:57:20.86 Kurt Crenwelge way of opening up the conversation, and that might be cool. 00:57:25.47 Tanya DePass Okay, cool. Let's do it. 00:57:27.63 Kurt Crenwelge ah Would you care to set the scene, or shall I? 00:57:31.95 Tanya DePass If you don't mind if I do, it's sure. 00:57:34.54 Kurt Crenwelge Go for it. 00:57:37.33 Tanya DePass it's It's later in the evening. Everyone is trudged back after a successful contract. Some of your group is already there and meeting you for later adventures. 00:57:49.81 Tanya DePass Alexander is in a corner, back to the wall as usual. Large flagon of mead in front of him. What remains of a shepherd's pie. in front and he's kind of looking around, checking out the room, seeing if he recognizes anyone doing his usual scan the room to make sure that no one's going to stab him because you never know. 00:58:12.30 Tanya DePass um and he, he's just kind of kicked back, enjoying few sips of me when he looks up and sees you. 00:58:22.96 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. So where we laugh where we last left Sonia, um she had finished up the ah the the the cart job, the transportation job with Antoine and Mina, the fantasy truckers, if you will, who were carrying the dangerous materials. And you know she had gone off to the pub with Hobart and Eliwick, other adventurers. so this is sometime later. 00:58:45.82 Kurt Crenwelge And Sonia is just you know feeling feeling out the call of her God. of where she's being led. You know, she's waiting to hear from Axios, who is this revenant priest ah who she'll who she views as her mentor figure. 00:58:59.00 Kurt Crenwelge And so, you know, she feels that ping. She looks over and she makes eye contact with Alexander. And so ah she'll so see maybe an open seat. 00:59:09.79 Kurt Crenwelge And so she'll say, pardon me, is this this seat taken? Yeah. 00:59:17.37 Tanya DePass And he just kind of looks at the seat, looks at her and just gestures with his, with his, with his mug. Nah, free country. 00:59:27.94 Kurt Crenwelge Yes, last i lest I checked it was, the Lich's forces hadn't made it this far over. So she'll ah she'll laugh and chuckle, and she'll she'll sit down, and you know she flags over someone to like get her meal and stuff like that, and so ah she'll introduce herself saying, Hi, or, you know, ah My name is Sonia, and I serve, well... 00:59:50.11 Kurt Crenwelge You can see her outfit and, you know, maybe it's like very niche ah sort of religious symbology for this ah this, you know, very minor um sort of deity. But, you know, she says, you know, my name is Sonya and I serve the one who wishes to redeem the undead. 01:00:05.89 Tanya DePass Oh, interesting. 01:00:09.28 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. 01:00:09.39 Tanya DePass And he takes a sip and he points to one of his leather poligens. My name's Alexander. ah served here. 01:00:22.04 Kurt Crenwelge Nice. Yeah. Uh, she rolls a religion check and, ah but she does poorly and should she just kind of nod her head. Like, yeah, totally. I know who that is. uh, Alexander can see on her face that she has no clue, uh, who, who he's talking about. 01:00:39.14 Kurt Crenwelge um 01:00:39.66 Tanya DePass Oh. 01:00:39.99 Kurt Crenwelge And she'll just kind of, ah you know, ah she kind of just smirks and and chuckles to herself, just being like, it's all still so kind of new for me. I know it's, you know, it's been a while and I've got Axios to kind of help guide me. 01:00:52.61 Kurt Crenwelge But um i I wasn't always a paladin or half paladin. Yeah. 01:00:59.77 Tanya DePass Half Paladin, you say? 01:01:01.93 Kurt Crenwelge Well, I mean, it's like I started out as a warrior. You know, i got would real I got would get really angry and I could just, you know, I could just rip through whatever was in front of me, ah you know. 01:01:13.12 Kurt Crenwelge But then I met Axios and ah started thinking, you know what? Maybe there's more to just being really angry and and rippon ripping things apart and, you know, getting problems resolved with violence. Now it's interesting, you know, serving a god who wishes to redeem the undead. 01:01:32.36 Kurt Crenwelge don't always have to fight the undead. It's just trying to get them to see about making peace, moving on. 01:01:40.96 Tanya DePass and And Alexander just has a moment where he wants to ask a question, but then he's like, do I feel like having an existential conversation right now? See, he's a little in his c cups by now. It's like, all right, so ah so you deal with the undead. i I serve a God that's all about justice. 01:01:59.14 Kurt Crenwelge Ah. 01:01:59.52 Tanya DePass What made you decide to sit with me? 01:02:02.51 Kurt Crenwelge Well, you know, sometimes you just have a feeling and you just follow the call, right? That's what that's what we do. We follow the call. 01:02:12.56 Tanya DePass Yeah, my following, my call was paved in blood and anger. 01:02:22.23 Kurt Crenwelge So not too different from how I started. 01:02:26.52 Tanya DePass Fair enough. 01:02:29.93 Tanya DePass And he just kind of, ah he holds up his tanker to mug. I keep calling it eight different things. um He holds it up. Cheers. Cheers. 01:02:39.32 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah, by now she's gotten her stuff, so she cheers it and has ah has a healthy chug of it. ah And yeah, no, she's like happy to you know converse, and as the conversation goes, ah you know maybe now she slowly ah feels that inclination to make her insight check, and maybe she does like pretty okay. 01:02:59.80 Kurt Crenwelge And so then she just sort of like opens it up to him as as far as... like So what's, ah I don't know. I mean, I know you're, thankfully you're not undead. I can definitely sense that, but it just seems like I felt a pull to be like, you know, maybe he needs a friend or you need something help with or don't know. Yeah, i'm I'm between jobs right now or helping people. So maybe maybe maybe I need to help you. 01:03:26.15 Tanya DePass And he just kind of pauses ah be he's about to take a drink. Did you say need a friend? 01:03:33.78 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah, why not? i it's I know it's a novel concept for for folk like us sometimes, but yeah, friends. Yeah, friends. 01:03:46.08 Tanya DePass What about you? What do you need? 01:03:48.92 Kurt Crenwelge Well, i I haven't seen Axios in a while, so I mean, I'll have to go find him eventually. You know, you accumulate experience and then you just need to make sense of it with your mentor and check in and metagame speak. 01:04:06.19 Kurt Crenwelge Level up in your paladin levels, but have it make sense thematically. 01:04:07.18 Tanya DePass Thank you. 01:04:09.60 Kurt Crenwelge ah But she's just like, yeah, you know, i've I've just got nothing going on at the minute. And, you know, I don't know. you You seem like a capable fighter and you you know what you're doing. And, you know, the two of us out there on the road, I'm sure we could could do some good. 01:04:26.02 Kurt Crenwelge you You could do some justice. I could help some undead find some redemption. You know, help helping the people. And she gestures widely to the the tavern, which, of course, you know, they're having like this great conversation about like, you know, religion and philosophy and theology and all these big abstract concepts. And, you know, the the camera pans over and it's like, you know, farmers and peasants like, you know, nursing over tankards and, you know, half paying attention and eating food and carrying on the dens of conversations where they don't know this great intellectual discussion is going on. 01:05:02.73 Tanya DePass Um, so he, he, he, he take he finishes actually taking his sip. He's like, well, I'm, I'm not always the best friend. I'm not always really good to know, but you're in luck. I've i actually just picked up a contract after finishing this one. 01:05:23.72 Kurt Crenwelge Ah, okay. 01:05:25.09 Tanya DePass And ah he he very self-consciously pulls out this rolled up parchment and and sits it on the table. it's It's written in the most like rudimentary common that he can now read, but he still struggles. 01:05:39.83 Kurt Crenwelge Mm-hmm. 01:05:39.85 Tanya DePass But he's never going to tell someone he just met that. 01:05:42.42 Kurt Crenwelge Mm-hmm. 01:05:42.74 Tanya DePass It's like, yeah, take ah take a look at it. See if that fits your your undead thing. 01:05:47.63 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah, yeah, she's happy to take a look at it. And, you know, ah may you know, if she rolls an insight check to figure out like whether or not he can read or not, she doesn't ah she doesn't make a big deal about it. She's not going to gloat or hold it over or anything like that. But she'll read it. And she's like, yeah i seems straightforward job, you know, just like what? What is this like merchant caravan guard sort of work stuff? 01:06:13.37 Tanya DePass It's Merchant Caravan, but also, um and this is where you can come in, it seems like they need to go through Barovia. And from what I remember, there's a lot of undead sometimes there. 01:06:26.90 Kurt Crenwelge Oh, yeah. Axios has told me about that place, said I wasn't ready, but but then she has like her epiphany moment of like, oh, but he said if I wasn't ready before, but now I'm presented with this opportunity to go do something about trying to redeem the undead. And so she's like, oh, well, maybe this is my chance. 01:06:44.81 Kurt Crenwelge She's like, yeah, no, I mean, you you need help against the undead. And that's kind of my God's thing. You know, hopefully they're more willing to listen. ah yeah take take take heed take warning take warning 01:06:58.72 Tanya DePass And he just kind of tilts his head and looks at her. He's like, I admit I'm intrigued because most undead I've encountered can't be reasoned with. So I'm i'm intrigued by this. 01:07:09.94 Kurt Crenwelge Oh, yeah. And she's happy to tell the story about Skink knows the Lich, who is the beekeeper, who she helped helped to bring to to resolution to to convince helped convince a Lich to give up their Lichdom to find rest in the afterlife. So she tells a couple of different stories and she's like, oh yeah, and this death night. 01:07:31.01 Kurt Crenwelge there was a whole adventure with like having to find this gambler's ring and releasing a death night from some whole, you know, someone had hold over them and, and yeah, now, now a death light death night is back to being alive again and their old bard self. 01:07:46.98 Kurt Crenwelge So, you know, 01:07:49.54 Tanya DePass That's impressive. 01:07:51.25 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. So yeah, she's happy to continue the conversation and you know, talk, ah talk game and like figure out stuff. um And so is there anything that would kind of close out the scene as far as the two of them are like at the table, they're hunched over, they're making plans, they're looking at maps, they're checking out gear, comparing equipment and stuff that they have. 01:08:11.93 Kurt Crenwelge So what what would close up the scene? 01:08:13.08 Tanya DePass Um, you know ah He gets some another round, and ah you know he asks to learn more about her god, because this is a minor god that he's not heard of. And ah he he offers to explain more about Tyr, because from what he can pick up from her, she's very interested in the justice of helping the undead find a resolution and not either not be undead or or something, because he's still a little... 01:08:40.10 Tanya DePass He's not flabbergasted by it, but this is the first time he's heard of the undead being like helped in this way. Cause most undeadies encountered, usually it's like, take off their head, make sure they are, they stay, the undead become really dead. 01:08:55.66 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah, perfect. um Yeah, so, you know, there's there's an exchange back and forth of learning about each other. And yeah, as the scene closes out, it seems like two paladins are are finding a fast friendship between but between the two them. 01:09:13.12 Tanya DePass Yes. 01:09:16.81 Kurt Crenwelge scene. So there we go. There was Alexander presented ah for the the podcasting world to hear. So how was it getting to be Alexander and breathe a life into him? 01:09:28.25 Tanya DePass It was good. and And it's funny because I've, that's a little bit like how I played Selyse, at least when the show and when rivals first started, but also I, I like the morally gray have a wall of character a lot. 01:09:40.89 Kurt Crenwelge hmm. 01:09:41.20 Tanya DePass Um, And it just feels really good to inhabit that kind of not super goody two shoes, but not exactly evil character either where there's, there's a, there's a whole bunch of layers to peel away to get to know who they are, both for myself as the person who creates them, but also for the characters and the players that you'll interact with as that character. 01:09:55.44 Kurt Crenwelge Right. 01:10:02.47 Kurt Crenwelge Right. Yeah. Not quite an anti-villain or an anti-hero, but just, you know, like a person. They just have layers. There's complications. There's histories. 01:10:10.31 Tanya DePass and 01:10:11.08 Kurt Crenwelge And as we sit and get to know each other, we can eventually, you know, as ah as silly as the analogy may be from Shrek, it's like, ogres have layers like onions. It's so like you just have to you just have to peel away at the onion and and find out the core of a person. 01:10:21.05 Tanya DePass but 01:10:25.83 Tanya DePass Exactly. 01:10:27.08 Kurt Crenwelge Yeah. So this is the part of the show. It's the final thoughts. So, you know, obviously we love to hear how your experience was on the podcast and getting to make Alexander and be Alexander. 01:10:37.84 Kurt Crenwelge um so yeah, this is the part where, you know, essentially I leave it to the guests. So anything you want to share or plug or talk about, you know, these are these are the final thoughts of of the show, of the episode. 01:10:49.53 Tanya DePass ah So it was great to create and be Alexander, definitely a character i would actually play in a campaign, um either as a guest player or have as an NPC kind of in my docket. It was fun getting to hang out and just chat. 01:10:59.94 Tanya DePass I know we we had a lot of email tag trying to figure out a time to to sit and chat together. And, you know, I actually miss doing stuff like this haven't got to do a lot in the TTRPG space recently. 01:11:11.36 Kurt Crenwelge Right. 01:11:11.64 Tanya DePass um And as for me, as for what I've got going on, um I'll be at PAX West. Uh, got a creator badge approved, submitting some panels. If, well, by the time you're listening to hopefully PAX West may or may not have happened. 01:11:24.01 Tanya DePass But I am planning on being there. Forces are lining to make sure I can get there. 01:11:27.98 Kurt Crenwelge right 01:11:28.28 Tanya DePass I'm hoping to make it to TwitchCon in in October. But for the immediate future, until I'm back in a dev studio, ah still streaming a lot on Twitch, still doing a lot of things, trying to get Motherlands out the door, Cypher of Tear everywhere online, come by, say hi, and i also trying to get my own Patreon up. 01:11:47.32 Tanya DePass Because medication's are not cheap. 01:11:49.35 Kurt Crenwelge o 01:11:49.39 Tanya DePass Thanks, US healthcare care system. um But yeah, just you know chugging along, taking a day by day. Because ah for those who don't know, studio I worked at closed. Our game was canceled. 01:12:00.13 Tanya DePass And ah hopefully by the time you read this, maybe I'll be with it or listen. I'll be with the new studio. But yeah, just kind of taking it day by day, trying to figure out what I want to do with myself at at at my ripe old age. 01:12:11.45 Tanya DePass Hashtag ah air quotes as I say this because you can't see me. 01:12:17.14 Kurt Crenwelge Well, no, I mean, you're, you are, you are ah radiant human being and you are, you are young of, of spirits and that's, that's all that matters. You know, not, not necessarily any age that's on a piece of paper or document or anything like that. 01:12:32.50 Kurt Crenwelge Uh, So no, that's, that's good. Um, no, I hope to have this episode out, hopefully fingers crossed August 13th. Uh, so if that makes any, uh, amendments, uh, to what you've been sharing here and your final thoughts, um, yeah, certainly we want to be able to check you out at panels, uh, and on your live streams and on social media. 01:12:39.70 Tanya DePass okay 01:12:51.83 Kurt Crenwelge Um, so that's amazing to hear. So, uh, Yeah, yeah. I'm just, again, I'm just so thankful ah that you were able to take time in your schedule to come on the podcast and and speak with me. 01:13:02.19 Kurt Crenwelge So yeah, totally. 01:13:03.66 Tanya DePass That was great. Thanks for inviting me. 01:13:06.06 Kurt Crenwelge And I can't wait to have you back on making even more interesting NPCs. 01:13:11.81 Tanya DePass Looking forward to it.