Now that we've tackled the worlds of character sheet apps and map-making tools, it's time to take a look at a truly cutting-edge element in modern Dungeons & Dragons: podcasting. Podcasts have been around for roughly a decade now, and some RPG-focused podcasts have been going strong for a few years, but with the emergence of the recent 5th edition of D&D and the associated resurgence of interest in the game, podcasts recording actual games being played are more popular than ever.

Outside of pure entertainment value, D&D podcasts are great for both picking up new ideas and learning rules and useful play techniques. With podcasts, it's now possible for new players or novice DMs to be exposed to dozens of different games and campaign types from the comfort of their own home.

Even if podcasts aren't normally your thing, listening to a good D&D session is a great way to understand what the game is actually about if you've never played. If you're an experienced player, following along with a new group can give you a new perspective on your own playstyle.

Reddit is full of threads where D&D fans discuss their favorite RPG podcasts and video series. There are some common favorites that are frequently mentioned (The Adventure Zone is popular with comedy fans and Geek and Sundry's Critical Role series recently recorded an episode with Vin Diesel).

My personal recommendation for best all-around D&D podcast is Board with Life Radio, from the cast and crew of the Board with Life YouTube series. Board with Life Radio comes out weekly and does a fantastic job of balancing humor with engaging storytelling and rules explanations.

Many gamers are interested in how they can best record audio in their D&D games, whether to turn the sessions into a podcast or just to share the recordings within their gaming group. With that in mind, I reached out to Donald and Kellen from Board with Life Radio for insight into how they make their show. Both are producers on Board with Life Radio, and Donald acts as the Dungeon Master both on the core podcast and the spin-off Houses and Humans show.

GameCrate: How much experience in podcasting did you have before you began your D&D podcast?

Donald: When we first started the show, Kellen and I were both working together at a recording studio. Surprisingly, I don't think either of us had ever worked on a podcast specifically.

Kellen: Yeah, of all the different kinds of audio-related projects we had worked on, podcasting hadn’t come up. We certainly listened to a lot of them though.

D: We have so little cred -- You've found us out!!

GC: What’s the biggest challenge involved in podcasting a D&D session?

K: Miking seven people… Scheduling seven people… It’s herding cats in both respects. There is a lot of editing involved to make it work.

D: On my end, it’s a lot of trouble spent on crafting adventures with a loose enough structure that the players don’t completely throw me when they go nuts -- or that allows opportunities for them to tell the story. For me, those moments end up the funniest. I try not to make it too goofy, because it’s usually funniest when I am the straight man.

GC: Do you have to change the way you play D&D in order to make it suitable for a podcast?

D: Totally, you have to be really aware of the episodic nature and try to make sure something exciting or funny happens within each episode. In a traditional RPG players can have a surprising amount of fun just inhabiting the characters and deciding how and when they want to buy a new sword or knock on a door. When you are playing as a performance of sorts, it can get boring quick if you don't keep it moving at a faster than usual pace.

These are good habits in any game really, but I take them to an extreme for the podcast. In a normal game of D&D I would nudge the players way less.

K: Definitely. We'll sometimes repeat lines or shorten descriptions while playing for the sake of our audience. Everyone there is having a great time - that’s certainly genuine - but everyone is trying to make a show as well. Sometimes we describe someone’s facial expressions or explain an inside joke so listeners won’t feel left out. It’s become kinda second nature at this point. I don’t think it affects how much we dig into the world though. Also, believe it or not, we try not to swear as much as we normally might.

D: Also, on a more practical level I use less props and battle mats because I find them to change the language the players use in a way that makes it harder to follow as a podcast. When someone says, "I move over here" while pointing to a map it makes things clear to the room, but not the audience.

GC: What microphones and other hardware do you use?

D: At this point, this is where it's going to get a bit impractical for the average enthusiast, haha -- BUT there are great options for gamers on a reasonable budget.

K: Having access to recording equipment was what made it easy to start the show. It was just a matter of getting people together. At it’s core, sound is just vibrating air. So, the most valuable piece of gear you can have is a nice room.

D: If you are casually wanting to record your games you can get a lot accomplished with something like a Zoom H4n or a nice cardioid mic. I do Houses and Humans over Skype which requires everyone to record themselves at home, and I sync that audio on my end. There is audio software that lets you record the Skype feed itself and ways of doing it with two computers, but I find that this comes with more problems than I usually want to deal with. Long story short: You’re basically looking for a way to record everyone at the table, get that audio into a computer and edit it.

GC: What software do you use to record and produce your show?

K: We use Pro Tools to record, edit and mix the podcast and we use some Waves plug ins for effects. You can get a lot accomplished with Garage Band, Reaper or Audacity if you are on a budget. The key is always just finding a workflow that works for you. If you can easily mic each person individually, you’ll have more control in the edit, but it’s a lot more trouble.

In the end, we heavily limit the audio to make sure you can hear everyone and that it’s nice and loud through crummy cell phone speakers.

D: That's the number one thing to remember: People are animals and they will take all of your hard work and pump it through tiny ugly sounding speakers.

GC: What other software, apps, or tech do you use when you play?

D: I know this makes me sound like an old grump, but I don't like screens at my table. I spend my entire workday and most of my spare time looking at computer monitors so I use D&D as a way to help escape that and look at my friends' faces. All of that being said, I can see a lot of value in using a tablet as a DM or player. Having all of your books and modules on one device - with a search function - seems undeniably cool. I may try it sometime.

GC: Beyond RPGs, have you seen other tabletop games that use technology in interesting ways?

D: Board games are finding some really interesting ways to explore that space - and despite being a luddite - I admit it IS a natural fit. Golem Arcana looks like a glimpse into the future of how these sorts of things will work but I've never personally played it. Fantasy Flight recently did a table top version of X-Com that does some interesting stuff. Games with hidden information like One Night Ultimate Werewolf, Spyfall and Dead of Winter have some cool apps as well.

I think that we've started to see a lot of people who came of age with online video games looking at tabletop games with fresh eyes. A lot of us grew up having sleepovers where we played local multiplayer games all night and that sense of connection is really easy to recapture with tabletop games. Meanwhile stuff like Nintendo's Amiibos and Skylanders show an interest from video games in exploring the physical space. I figure that the line between tabletop and digital games will only continue to blur. I'm cautiously excited to see where it goes.

K: Me too.

Many thanks to Donald and Kellen for taking the time to answer my questions. Make sure to check them out on Twitter to keep up with all their projects.

Recording sessions on the cheap

As part of the ongoing D&D campaign we have here at GameCrate, I decided to see what sorts of results we could get recording audio with a single, affordable microphone. We used a Yeti from Blue Microphones, a popular choice for game streamers who want a step up from a headset mic but don't want to spend several hundred dollars to do it. We've reviewed the Yeti in the past and found it to be a strong option for streaming purposes, but how would it perform when tasked with recording five players and a DM playing a noisy D&D session?

For our setup, we placed the Yeti on one end of our gaming table in the small, relatively soundproof meeting room we use for our sessions. The microphone was hooked up directly to our PC, and we recorded our session audio with the free program Audacity. We used the Yeti in its omnidirectional recording mode, which we found was the best setting for our configuration around the table.

At the end of our session, we were left with a surprisingly high-quality recording of the whole thing. Every voice was audible and clear, and the few audio issues we did run into (such as overly-loud sections when everyone was talking at once) were things that could be adjusted via Audacity or other recording software.

Here's a short sample of the audio we recorded in our session using nothing but a single Yeti mic:

Not Board with Life Radio level, to be sure, but pretty good, right? If you're interested in podcasting professionally you'll probably need a multi-mic setup, but if you just want to save your sessions to listen back to later, it certainly seems like a Yeti could be the right tool for the job.

TableTech is our ongoing series taking a look at the ways people are bringing technology into the world of tabletop role-playing games. You can check out other articles in the series here.