048 - One DM, Three Different Tables: How to Build Characters for Teens, Families, and Game Stores

What makes a D&D party work? In this episode, Clint talks with Jay Aress, a teacher, creator, and community DM, about how to build groups that genuinely connect. From managing a high school club to running games for family or newcomers at a local shop, Jay shares her approach to bringing together players of different ages and experience levels.

Episodes Mentioned:

039: Should You Pay for a Pro GM? With David Northeast - https://claimtogamepodcast.com/episode/039-should-you-pay-for-a-pro-gm-with-david-northeast
042: Beyond D&D - What Makes TTRPGs Click for Kids and Adults? With Martin Lloyd - https://claimtogamepodcast.com/episode/042-beyond-dd-what-makes-ttrpgs-click-for-kids-and-adults-with-martin-lloyd

Games & Modules Mentioned During the Episode:

Marvel Multi-Verse RPG - https://claimtogamepodcast.com/marvelmultiverse
GURPS 4E - https://claimtogamepodcast.com/gurps4e
Rifts Ultimate Edition - https://claimtogamepodcast.com/rifts
D&D 5E 2024 PHB - https://claimtogamepodcast.com/5ephb2024
Fiasco 2E - https://claimtogamepodcast.com/fiasco
Dagger Heart - https://claimtogamepodcast.com/daggerheart

Connect with Jay

Personal Socials: IG, TikTok & Twitter: @AllThatJaz22, Facebook: Jay Aress
Better Backstories: IG &Twitter: @Backstories22, Facebook: Better Backstories, Email: betterbackstories@gmail.com
The Rolling Dungeon Master: IG & Bluesky: @TheRollingDM, Facebook: The Rolling Dungeon Master, Email: RollingDungeonMaster@gmail.com, YouTube: @rollingdungeonmaster@gmail.com

*As an affiliate, I earn from qualifying purchases at no extra cost to you. Some of these links are affiliate links for other programs but once again, if you choose to purchase through these links, it's no extra cost to you. I only promote products or services that I have investigated and feel can deliver value to you.

Please Connect with us!

Visit our Website at www.claimtogamepodcast.com
Better Yourself | Better Your Game - https://claimtogamepodcast.com/newsletter
Find Community - Join the CTG Discord Server- https://discord.gg/UcZVE2SDe2
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Join us on Patreon for exclusive content access - http://patreon.com/ClaimtoGame
Send feedback, thoughts, or suggestions to clint.scheirer@claimtogamepodcast.com

00:00:00
>> Clint Scheirer: What makes a D20 & D party work? Jay Eris is a

00:00:03
teacher, creator and community dm who knows a

00:00:06
thing or two about building groups that genuinely

00:00:08
connect. From managing a high school club to

00:00:12
running games for families and newcomers at a

00:00:14
local shop, Jay will share her approach to

00:00:17
bringing together players of all ages and

00:00:20
experience levels. Let's go make that claim to

00:00:23
game.

00:00:24
>> Jay Eris: M. Sam.

00:00:57
>> Clint Scheirer: You're a teacher.

00:00:58
>> Jay Eris: I'm a ninth grade English teacher.

00:01:00
>> Clint Scheirer: Ninth grade English teacher. You are a multi table

00:01:03
dungeon creator. Tell us a little bit about your

00:01:05
journey with D20 & D. Why do you like it? Like,

00:01:08
what makes it so cool to you?

00:01:09
>> Jay Eris: Well, I got into D20 & D because of Star Wars for

00:01:13
all things. That, might seem like a weird jump,

00:01:15
but when, in the 80s, I knew of D20 & D through

00:01:18
the Saturday Morning comic. I knew of D20 & D

00:01:21
through a couple of video games on my Apple Iie

00:01:24
like Pool of Radiance and Fantasy, three the Wrath

00:01:27
of Nicodemus, which I played pretty regularly. So

00:01:30
I knew of the concept of a role playing game, but

00:01:32
not at a table with people. my family then went to

00:01:35
Disneyland on a trip and we went to Starforged

00:01:37
Tours when it first opened in, I want to say 1984,

00:01:40
85, R2 light speed to Endure. And when we came out

00:01:49
into the gift shop, there was a book that said the

00:01:51
Starforged Wars Sourcebook. And I opened it up and

00:01:54
there was a, a map of the Millennium Falcon. And

00:01:58
there were details on. This is where I first found

00:02:00
out that the emperor's name was Palpatine. So

00:02:03
there were all these deep cut details about all

00:02:05
the characters and all the weapons and all the

00:02:07
ships and stuff. I'm like, oh, this is a great

00:02:08
source book. And I was into technical manuals from

00:02:11
Starforged Trek. you know, with all the where is

00:02:14
10 forward and you know, how does the engineering

00:02:16
work and all this other stuff. so I got the book

00:02:18
and started reading it and it's great background

00:02:21
lore. But then I noticed that for each person and

00:02:23
each ship there was this little box and it had

00:02:26
like, you know, hull 5D, blaster 7D. And I was

00:02:31
like, what, what is, what does this mean? I can't

00:02:33
remember who I talked to, but I mentioned it to my

00:02:35
friends or somebody and they said, oh, this is

00:02:37
like D D. This is like a role playing game. I'm

00:02:39
like what? How? And I looked at the back of the

00:02:42
book in like a little box. It's like a supplement

00:02:45
for the D20 & D roleplaying for the, for the Star

00:02:47
Wars role playing system. So it's like, guys, I

00:02:50
think you could have put that a little more

00:02:51
upfront, you know? so then I got the, the rules

00:02:55
and I kind of like tried to teach myself how to

00:02:57
play and I taught my friends and dragged them into

00:02:59
it. eventually this led me to other games like the

00:03:02
Marvel role playing system, like Gurps, like

00:03:05
Rifts, things like that. And, eventually to the

00:03:08
granddaddy of them all, D20 & D. and I would play

00:03:11
at a Denny's in Alaska, with, some older, you

00:03:16
know, individuals just a few years older than me.

00:03:18
So, which I was like 15, 16. It concerned my mom.

00:03:20
She's like, I don't want you playing D20 & D at

00:03:22
some stranger's house. I was like, mom, it's in

00:03:24
public. You know, we're just having fries and

00:03:26
coffee. We'll be fine.

00:03:27
>> Clint Scheirer: Bottomless hot chocolate.

00:03:28
>> Jay Eris: Bottomless hot chocolate, you know. so I'm still

00:03:31
in touch with that dungeon master, Lance. we're

00:03:33
still friends online and he, lives in Portland.

00:03:35
But he had just some initial concepts that just

00:03:38
blew my mind. Like, he had any time that somebody

00:03:40
said a bad word, specifically the S word, if, he

00:03:44
said it too many times, the God of excrement would

00:03:47
grant you a wish and you get a pile of it on top

00:03:50
of yourself. So I want to say that those initial

00:03:53
bursts of creativity. I was also getting into

00:03:56
creative writing in middle school and high school.

00:03:58
I was writing a lot of my own short stories and

00:04:01
had a lot of crazy ideas. And I think that the,

00:04:04
the element of randomness that the dice grant in a

00:04:08
role playing game is just so much more better than

00:04:10
trying to write down your own story. And then it

00:04:12
can only happen one way and, and that's locked in.

00:04:15
When you're role playing, anything can happen and

00:04:17
you have to deal. Like I teach my students and my,

00:04:20
my children players that D20 & D is about dealing

00:04:23
with the consequences of your actions and moving

00:04:25
forward. You can't save and go back and stuff. You

00:04:27
can't save game right before the boss fight, go in

00:04:30
and see how well you do. Okay, I need to go back

00:04:31
and buy more healing potions or I need to upgrade

00:04:34
my weapon first. You don't get that option. If

00:04:36
you're going to go fight the bad guy, more power

00:04:38
to you. and if you die or get unconscious, it's up

00:04:41
to the dungeon master to come up with a way of

00:04:43
saying, okay, are we actually going to die and

00:04:45
start New characters or are we going to wake up in

00:04:47
prison or are we going to wake up in another

00:04:49
dimension? You know, something like that. And it's

00:04:52
that continual activity of always like yes and yes

00:04:56
and yes and which I get from theater and

00:04:59
improvisation that I think role playing and

00:05:02
Dungeons Dragons can really grant. It really

00:05:04
unleashes the imagination. One of the biggest

00:05:06
things I love to see with my children and first

00:05:09
time players or even my students is, you know,

00:05:11
they'll be playing a wizard and they, they say

00:05:13
okay, I'm gonna cast this, what is this magic

00:05:16
missile? Okay, so I get to shoot him three times,

00:05:18
right? That's the, that's the mechanic. I said

00:05:20
yes, you get to roll the dice and do some damage.

00:05:22
But what does it look like? And their eyes just go

00:05:25
what? I get to describe what my magic looks like.

00:05:28
I said yeah, you can have like little unicorns

00:05:30
that fly out of your hand. You could actually have

00:05:32
like a spinning disc. You can have little black

00:05:35
holes of energy that fly into the person. You get

00:05:38
to describe the color, the shape, the speed and

00:05:40
the method at which it hits them and damages them.

00:05:43
And it just blows their mind because they're so

00:05:45
used to video games where you know, oh, you know,

00:05:47
healing potions are red and it, you shimmer red

00:05:50
when you drink it. You know, you cast a spell and

00:05:52
it's blue kind of shimmering thing that, that

00:05:54
comes over you. To be able to make their mage

00:05:57
armor look like Japanese Ronin armor for like you

00:06:01
know, five seconds that glows on their body or

00:06:04
like appears like something out of iron, man or

00:06:07
something like that. You know, you know, it, it,

00:06:11
that, that freedom of their imagination is just so

00:06:15
powerful.

00:06:17
>> Clint Scheirer: You know, the open endedness, I remember and this

00:06:20
is one of my favorite games, that I learned about

00:06:22
over Covid was Starforged and Ironsworn Sworn by

00:06:25
Shawn Tompkin. And the coolest part of that is the

00:06:29
roll tables. he calls them the oracles. And I'm

00:06:31
sure he didn't coin that exact phrase. You know,

00:06:34
I'm sure it came from many other games. but the

00:06:37
open endedness and the words that could really be

00:06:40
interpreted differently depending on who's

00:06:43
interpreting them. So if, you know, if I roll to a

00:06:46
theme and an action, and the theme happens to be,

00:06:49
you know, sadness and the action happens to be

00:06:53
adventure, then I get to interpret what, what

00:06:56
spurred me on to the call of adventure because I

00:06:59
was sad, or because somebody else is sad or just

00:07:02
interpreting that from the, the creative writing

00:07:04
aspect. I Think that's amazing.

00:07:06
>> Jay Eris: Yeah. I mean, you could. The sadness could have

00:07:08
come from the death of a family member. The

00:07:10
sadness could have come from, the loss of a loved

00:07:12
one, like a girlfriend or a boyfriend or a married

00:07:15
couple, or the death of a child. You know, when

00:07:17
you really think about it, sadness can come from a

00:07:19
lot of different places, and that, gives you a lot

00:07:22
of different options.

00:07:23
>> Clint Scheirer: You were talking about some, some stereotypical,

00:07:26
characters, right? There's somebody, starts to

00:07:29
play a game and they're thinking about Star Wars

00:07:32
and, maybe they're going to be Han Solo. We were

00:07:34
talking about that before we started, recording

00:07:36
earlier. Maybe they're going to be the wizard, the

00:07:39
Gandalf character. And there's nothing wrong with

00:07:42
that. You know, people like stereotypes. there's a

00:07:45
reason some stereotypes exist is because they're,

00:07:48
they're beloved.

00:07:48
>> Jay Eris: Everything is derivative. you know, everything

00:07:50
comes from something else.

00:07:51
All, every idea that can possibly happen has

00:07:54
already been done. when you really boil it down,

00:07:57
you know, like, they'll say there's only seven

00:08:00
basic plot lines, in all of literature, you know,

00:08:03
man versus man, man versus nature, man versus

00:08:05
technology, man versus society, man versus

00:08:07
himself. A man versus, I said nature. I was gonna

00:08:11
say the monster. and then you've got your main

00:08:13
story plots, you know, like, the call to adventure

00:08:15
or, the Odyssey, you know, the rags, to riches,

00:08:19
boy meets girl again. So there's. There's seven

00:08:22
plots and there's seven basic structures. And you

00:08:26
really boil it all down. Everything has been done.

00:08:28
Like the concept of Romeo and Juliet has been

00:08:30
done. How many times is there a boy and a girl

00:08:33
from different sides of the tracks whose families

00:08:35
don't like each other, but they're in love anyway?

00:08:37
That's been done in every TV show. Every, romance

00:08:41
movie. It's been done. I mean, one of my favorite

00:08:43
interpretations of Romeo and Juliet is a movie

00:08:45
called Warm Bodies, which is actually about

00:08:48
zombies, where the Romeo character is a zombie

00:08:52
named R because he doesn't remember his full name.

00:08:55
And he just kind of like shambles around the

00:08:57
airport being like, where am I going in life? I'm

00:08:59
so. I'm so disoriented. Could be because I'm dead.

00:09:02
and in this world, they've established that there,

00:09:04
he's kind of like a halfway zombie. And then

00:09:06
there's. There's zombies that are like, kind of

00:09:08
going over the edge. And those are the only

00:09:10
killers, only, flesh eaters, you know, type of

00:09:13
thing called bonies. They're, they're more of like

00:09:15
a skeleton zombie. And he's not a bony yet. And

00:09:18
when he meets Julie, this human who's out

00:09:20
scavenging, he kind of falls for her and helps her

00:09:24
stay alive in the zombie infested wastelands for a

00:09:27
little while. Eventually, she gets back to her

00:09:29
human establishment. He goes to see her, you know,

00:09:31
and he like, up on the balcony, she's like, r,

00:09:33
what are you doing here? It's like, wanted to see

00:09:35
you. And it's. And, and the cool thing is, is that

00:09:39
as zombie movies go, this has a path to

00:09:41
redemption. The zombies are not permanent. If they

00:09:43
actually have enough overwhelming power of

00:09:46
emotion, they can actually come back from being

00:09:48
zombies and humans again. Which I thought was such

00:09:51
a wonderful message.

00:09:52
>> Clint Scheirer: Going several layers deep with your students.

00:09:54
Sometimes you have to pull that out of them,

00:09:56
right. Because I, know I have younger kids, right.

00:09:59
And you give them a question, and usually the

00:10:01
first thing that comes to mind is what comes out

00:10:03
of their, their mouth.

00:10:04
>> Jay Eris: Right.

00:10:05
>> Clint Scheirer: So when it comes to building characters, what's a

00:10:07
challenge that some players face when trying to

00:10:09
create a character that has a little bit more

00:10:11
depth to it? maybe it's not your basic Han Solo,

00:10:15
but it's your Han Solo that has one of those

00:10:16
sadness elements that we talked about before that

00:10:18
isn't in the Star Wars universe, but could be this

00:10:22
new character that they're creating.

00:10:24
>> Jay Eris: Right. Well, not everybody understands the concept

00:10:27
of building a character. they don't understand how

00:10:29
D20 & D, you don't have to just play yourself in

00:10:32
this fantasy world with magic. You can be more

00:10:35
dashing, you can be more charming, or you can even

00:10:38
be less than. You can play like a scared little,

00:10:41
halfling whose best friend was eaten by a monster

00:10:44
in front of him and now he's got ptsd. you can be

00:10:49
a barbarian, ah, who is, like, trying to find the

00:10:52
cure to a plague that has ravaged their homeland.

00:10:55
>> Clint Scheirer: He's Conan the Librarian.

00:10:57
>> Jay Eris: and that makes them a very stalwart, focused type

00:11:00
of person.

00:11:01
I played a robot, a warforged, who she was

00:11:04
literally a walking scabbard for her lord who had

00:11:08
like a really big great sword. And she is

00:11:10
suddenly, she was left to take care of the sword

00:11:12
in the forest one day, and now she suddenly

00:11:15
realized that the sword is missing. So she is out

00:11:18
beginning her adventure to make, you know, find

00:11:22
the sword, get it back and protect it. What she

00:11:26
doesn't realize is that she has memory damage and

00:11:27
that the sword was actually never had the sword.

00:11:30
you know, she's.

00:11:31
>> Clint Scheirer: She's.

00:11:31
>> Jay Eris: She's been, you know, kind of like, Tin man lost

00:11:34
in the woods for several years, and only now is

00:11:37
her, like, memory starting to recoalesce. And

00:11:38
she's like, oh, I gotta go find my story. But I

00:11:40
play her in kind of a combination of Glados and

00:11:42
the Ironsworn Giant, you know, says, we must go

00:11:45
to, you know, the bakery, you know, and she's very

00:11:48
single, focused. I deliberately designed her to be

00:11:50
a follower, to do what other people say because

00:11:52
she's, like, literally a walking scabbard. She's.

00:11:54
She's a piece of, furniture. And yet, because of

00:11:57
her singular focus and other people not wanting to

00:11:59
make decisions, you know, she'd go to the. To the

00:12:02
bartender and said, you know, where can I find

00:12:04
this, you know, person? They're like, oh, yeah,

00:12:06
you want to go down the street, turn left, and

00:12:07
instead of bantering, it's like, you know, she

00:12:09
just walks out the door. So then everybody's like,

00:12:11
oh, well, carrier knows where she's going. Let's

00:12:13
follow her.

00:12:15
>> Clint Scheirer: So I like that idea of mashing you were

00:12:18
mentioning. You were mentioning, like, mashing two

00:12:20
characters together, mashing two different

00:12:22
elements, and then also adding a twist in there.

00:12:25
and you. And you do this, in your. Your TikTok

00:12:28
series. So I'm going to backtrack a little bit.

00:12:30
the. The Busty Griffin. Use some really clever,

00:12:34
stereotypes, player choices, walking through the

00:12:37
process of starting to build a character and a

00:12:40
campaign and then moving into that by having a

00:12:43
character or I guess a player who's very new and

00:12:47
feels kind of uncertain of themselves. And how.

00:12:50
How are. How am I supposed to play this game that

00:12:52
I just picked up after I got off Starforged Tours

00:12:55
and I have the source book deal? so, you know,

00:12:58
what inspired you to do this fun, kind of take on.

00:13:04
Everybody comes to the table with different

00:13:06
experiences.

00:13:08
>> Jay Eris: Well, the, Bossy Griffin was born out of an idea

00:13:10
in my head that what if a restaurant didn't serve

00:13:13
food but served Dungeons and Dragons adventures?

00:13:16
so it's not so much a restaurant as it is a game

00:13:19
tavern or a game haven or something like that. So,

00:13:23
Roxy, who is the dungeon master slash waitress,

00:13:27
and it's. It's a very. It's got a lot of

00:13:30
restaurant culture mashups. You know, she shows up

00:13:32
at your table, and she's like, okay, what can I

00:13:34
get for you? And she's asking. She sounds like

00:13:36
she's ordering drinks, but, you know, they're

00:13:39
actually ordering characters and again then I

00:13:42
created a couple of stereotypical characters. Brad

00:13:44
is kind of like just big, stupid, hulking,

00:13:47
football player, you know, who just wants to play

00:13:49
the big dumb barbarian. And then you've got

00:13:52
Madison, the girlfriend who is actually the best

00:13:56
gamer at the table. She, she's like the rules

00:13:58
lawyer. She knows exactly how everything works. so

00:14:00
she wants to play an Elvish bard because, you

00:14:03
know, she gets extra spells for being an elf. but

00:14:06
she's, she looks like a stereotypical cheerleader.

00:14:09
So she, it's ironic that she actually knows more

00:14:11
about the game. And then like you said, this

00:14:13
newbie character, Alex, and Alex not only new to

00:14:18
the game but also a non binary character who's

00:14:22
like coming into their, their gender and their

00:14:24
sexuality. And that was you know, a parallel of

00:14:28
myself and I, I play there's aspects of myself and

00:14:31
all these characters. And him, he start, if you

00:14:35
watch the series, he starts off with like the

00:14:36
beginner manual and then he's got the player's

00:14:38
handbook. And then, you know, so he's, he's

00:14:40
absorbing the rules and really getting the hang of

00:14:42
it. He's actually the best artist. So when they

00:14:44
all draw pictures of their characters and, and

00:14:46
Brad's character is like a cartoon drawing of a

00:14:48
barbarian, big axe. And Madison's a little bit

00:14:51
better. It's like a little anime bard with a

00:14:53
feather cap. And then the then the sorceress, by

00:14:57
Alex is up there and it's like all perfectly

00:14:59
colored with red skin and horns and a black tight

00:15:02
outfit. And it's like, okay, she's impressive. So

00:15:07
yeah, he's coming into his own and exploring his

00:15:10
identity and his creativity through D20 & D as

00:15:14
he's playing the game. And again, the game doesn't

00:15:16
show so much gameplay. I mean it'll. Roxy be

00:15:19
describing a scene and then they'll be like, oh,

00:15:21
I'm going to hit it with my ax or something like

00:15:22
that. But for the most part the cats are trying to

00:15:25
get out again. It is just little short snippets of

00:15:29
scenes and then they get interrupted by a birthday

00:15:31
party singing off in the distance. And then, and

00:15:34
then Madison or Roxy will incorporate that music

00:15:37
into the game and make it really dark and creepy.

00:15:39
Or they'll be in the middle of a battle and

00:15:41
everything's really hectic. And this is to

00:15:43
simulate like you're in the middle of eating your

00:15:44
dinner and your mouth is full. And then the

00:15:46
manager shows up. How is everything? You're like,

00:15:50
so everybody's like, yeah, we're fine, we're just

00:15:52
getting killed. and so that's where it ties into

00:15:56
that kind of restaurant, ah, culture. And I'm

00:15:58
working on a second series where Madison is now

00:16:00
also another Dungeon Master. And Alex is bringing

00:16:04
in a couple of more newbie friends to introduce to

00:16:06
the system and to, the Busty Griffin itself.

00:16:10
>> Clint Scheirer: I love that you're scaffolding, right is the word

00:16:14
that we, we would use in education and being able

00:16:17
to use something that people already know. Going

00:16:21
to a restaurant, most of us have done it, and then

00:16:24
incorporating something that some people have a

00:16:26
little trepidation about. You know, they, they

00:16:29
don't. They see D D, maybe in a movie or, you

00:16:32
know, Big Bang Theory, Stranger Things, you name

00:16:35
it. And they're like, wow, that's a lot of dice

00:16:37
and a lot of math. And like, these people that are

00:16:39
playing seem really smart. And like, am I that

00:16:41
smart? Like, can I do this? And, they can. You

00:16:45
know, they just need a little encouragement.

00:16:46
>> Jay Eris: I was at my sister's wedding this week, and, I

00:16:49
drove up to Vermont with my mother and I got to

00:16:52
run Dungeons and Dragons as the groom as part of

00:16:55
the groom's bachelor party, because he realized

00:16:57
that him and some of his D20 & D friends, both in

00:17:00
person and online, were going to be all. And said,

00:17:02
hey, you're a rolling dungeon master. Could you

00:17:04
make us, some basic characters and we'll pick them

00:17:07
at random. And the cool thing was is that the

00:17:09
normal fighter got to be a wizard and the wizard

00:17:11
got to be a rogue. So they were already off

00:17:14
character. And it was a simple second level

00:17:16
campaign. And I'm like, these guys are

00:17:18
experienced. They're just going to, like, blow

00:17:19
through this. These are like little campaigns that

00:17:21
I run for kids. And they still took three hours to

00:17:25
get through it and were fooled by the hidden door

00:17:28
and, dealing with, taking out the bugbear. And

00:17:31
there's all these different steps. Sorry, my cat

00:17:34
just going through all these different steps. And

00:17:35
at the end they were like, I can see why that

00:17:38
scenario is so good for teaching kids how to play.

00:17:40
It's got some social interaction, it's got some

00:17:42
mystery, it's got a lot of options. like, at one

00:17:45
point, you find a single goblin in the farmhouse

00:17:48
and you can kill it or you can try to capture it

00:17:50
and interrogate it. And, I've seen the gambit go

00:17:54
every single direction. And you just. Kids, kids

00:17:57
don't know what they can do until they do it. And

00:17:59
they're Used to being limited by a video game,

00:18:02
kids are often to climb up to the tallest building

00:18:04
and jump off because one will it let you jump off?

00:18:07
Because there were games back in the 80s and 90s

00:18:09
where you can walk right up to a cliff and it

00:18:11
wouldn't let you step off because the game wasn't

00:18:13
programmed for that. And then they said, okay,

00:18:16
well, now we'll let you fall off this cliff, but

00:18:18
we're not going to kill you because that's not

00:18:19
what the game is about. So you'd fall 500ft and

00:18:22
just do a little three point landing and you're

00:18:23
fine. Or you just land and take no fall damage.

00:18:25
And then people are like, well, that ruins the

00:18:27
immersion for me because it's not realistic. But

00:18:29
then when you, when it does kill you, you're like,

00:18:32
oh man, it killed me. Like, what do you want? You

00:18:35
know, it's up to the programmers to decide what

00:18:37
type of game they want you to play.

00:18:38
Is it, is it Spider man where he's a superhero and

00:18:41
why would he die from falling because that's what

00:18:43
he does. Or is it this gritty realism like Skyrim,

00:18:47
where you fall and take damage. I saw something.

00:18:50
>> Clint Scheirer: Assassin's Creed where I. Assassin's Creed where.

00:18:52
>> Jay Eris: You fall off a big thing, you land in a, in a

00:18:54
barrel of hay. But I saw, I saw a guy on Tick

00:19:02
Tock, he was playing, Ratatouille, the video game,

00:19:04
and he jumped like off this platform and fell

00:19:07
like, you know, 200ft and then landed. And he

00:19:10
literally said, good thing I don't take fall

00:19:11
damage.

00:19:12
>> Clint Scheirer: You know, when you're trying to help people get to

00:19:15
really good characters, whether you're rolling for

00:19:18
them or you're guiding them through it.

00:19:20
I heard that you did some, something called better

00:19:23
backstory cards.

00:19:25
>> Jay Eris: That's about it. I ran a Kickstarter.

00:19:28
>> Clint Scheirer: Tell me about that. Tell me about the process. Ten

00:19:31
years, but it still sounds relevant to me.

00:19:33
>> Jay Eris: Oh, sure. so I love making characters. again, in

00:19:37
high school when I was doing Marvel superheroes, I

00:19:39
would just roll up random characters in the back

00:19:42
of the history class. and I ended up with over 600

00:19:45
different superheroes. And, I wanted them all to

00:19:48
be different. So there were different. This

00:19:49
website, this, like some game systems would have,

00:19:52
like, what type of town are they from? What, type.

00:19:54
What do their parents do? you know, how did they,

00:19:56
how were they raised? Did they go to a private

00:19:58
school? Did they go to regular school? Did they,

00:20:00
were they homeschooled? So there Were all these

00:20:02
background elements that you could incorporate

00:20:04
into a character that was on charts. And I

00:20:06
eventually found a set of books called Central

00:20:08
Casting from Task Force Games. And these are way

00:20:11
out of print now, but they had one for fantasy

00:20:13
heroes, for modern day superheroes, for sci fi

00:20:16
heroes. And it was a bunch of charts. You know,

00:20:19
you roll on the first chart to determine what

00:20:20
happened when your character was born, right? Roll

00:20:23
on another chart, figure out what do your parents

00:20:24
do for a living. Roll on another chart. You know,

00:20:26
are your parents alive? Are they still together?

00:20:28
and then as you grew up, what happened when you

00:20:30
were a kid? did you get injured? Did you, did you

00:20:33
have a sibling that died? You know, any one of

00:20:35
these pieces of information. And it was very

00:20:37
detailed but very cumbersome because he had to

00:20:39
jump around. Go to page 22, go to page 6, go to

00:20:42
page 84, back and forth, back and forth. So, but I

00:20:45
loved using it. once I got into going to

00:20:48
conventions and cosplay and started playing DD

00:20:50
more, I started saying to myself, oh, well, I

00:20:53
could do this for people and help them create a

00:20:55
more detailed character. Because I'm also very

00:20:56
good at brainstorming and just like coming up with

00:20:58
ideas. But then I'm like, well, not everybody's

00:21:00
gonna be carrying their character around in their

00:21:02
pocket at a convention, you know, so I can't just

00:21:04
like, hey, I'll make a character background for

00:21:06
you. So I said to myself, maybe if I had like

00:21:08
index cards where I had like the basics. And that

00:21:11
just kind of led to tarot cards, or the idea of

00:21:14
tarot cards where tarot cards lay out and they

00:21:16
predict your future. These cards, create the past.

00:21:20
And then eventually I, did a. The Kickstarter. I

00:21:22
asked for $3 to print about 100 decks and I

00:21:26
ended up with $25. 80. 80 cards all together.

00:21:30
And they are double sided. So on the back it's got

00:21:32
like some numbers and some weather patterns and

00:21:34
some landforms for, you know, stuff beyond your

00:21:37
character. And, then the front side is just like a

00:21:39
little suggestion, with sometimes a chart,

00:21:42
sometimes not. So in this case it's like timing.

00:21:44
You were born at a strange time. Sunset or

00:21:47
sunrise, new or full moon, blue moon, solar or

00:21:51
lunar eclipse, noon or midnight, during a rainbow,

00:21:55
during New Year's, during an astronomical

00:21:57
conjunction, or you were born premature, or you

00:22:02
were born on the same day as one of your

00:22:04
relatives. and just with those ideas, you could do

00:22:06
whatever you want with it. Oh, I was born during

00:22:08
an astronomical Convention, conjunction. That's

00:22:10
why I was imbued with magical warlock powers or

00:22:13
something like that. and then there's stuff about,

00:22:16
you know, you're both your parents are very

00:22:18
religious and you grew up very devoted to a

00:22:21
religion, but, well, you were taught to be devoted

00:22:23
to a religion, but did you, did you become a

00:22:25
cleric? Did you become a paladin? Or did you say

00:22:27
like, no, that stuff is stupid, I'm going to

00:22:29
become a fighter or a rogue or something like

00:22:31
that. you have experience in applied sciences,

00:22:34
like chemistry or meteorology or physics. So the

00:22:37
cards can lean into steampunk or modern day

00:22:40
stories, any, any way you want to interpret them.

00:22:42
They can be used in any genre, any game system

00:22:45
that you like. And my favorite card is the tattoo

00:22:48
card. Because if you only know one thing about a

00:22:52
person, like you hear that a friend has a tattoo,

00:22:56
what is your immediate follow up question?

00:22:58
>> Clint Scheirer: Why did you get that tattoo?

00:22:59
>> Jay Eris: Why did they get it? What is it? Where is it? You

00:23:02
know, maybe people see my tattoo and they're

00:23:04
exact, they're right away, they're like, oh, what

00:23:05
does that represent? You know, I said, well, it's

00:23:07
dice for gaming and it's my, my birthday and then

00:23:10
the area code of my home state, Alaska, right? And

00:23:13
it took me 50 years to come up with that. And

00:23:15
that's a story in and of itself. Why, why did you

00:23:17
get the tattoo sooner or you were in the navy, why

00:23:19
don't you have a tattoo of an anchor on your arm

00:23:22
like every other sailor? so the tattoo card and

00:23:26
any one of these cards, it has taught me that one

00:23:29
detail about a character can expand into multiple

00:23:33
options and multiple ideas. even if you, you know,

00:23:37
your characters walk into a, a tavern and there's

00:23:41
a dwarf over by the fireplace and there's an elf

00:23:44
at the bar. Now as far as the GM is concerned,

00:23:46
these are just faceless, you know, archetypes that

00:23:48
don't have really an appearance or any details,

00:23:51
but they're going to, the players are going to

00:23:52
say, I want to go talk to that dwarf you just made

00:23:54
up five seconds ago. What's his name? Who are his

00:23:56
parents? What does he do for a living? And you're

00:23:58
like, oh, and you just pull one card really quick

00:24:00
and you say that he's made an interesting

00:24:01
discovery of some kind, right? So now this guy,

00:24:04
instead of just being nameless, faceless dwarf,

00:24:07
he's kind of like, he's got like this shiftiness

00:24:09
to him, right? He's worried somebody else is going

00:24:11
to Figure out his discovery and he needs to be

00:24:13
feels he needs to be protected. Right. He's found

00:24:16
some, a very fancy gemstone that seems to hum in

00:24:18
the moonlight and he needs to be escorted to a big

00:24:21
city so he can have it investigated. So now this

00:24:25
guy who is a nobody, suddenly he's got a

00:24:28
personality and a side quest just from one card.

00:24:32
And that's how the cards are useful in Dungeons

00:24:35
and Dragons or any role playing game. Yeah.

00:24:37
>> Clint Scheirer: And I sell them on, you know, it made me think of

00:24:40
Mike Shea's lazy dungeon master and his method of

00:24:44
DMing and so creating notable NPCs that don't

00:24:48
become actual NPCs until the players walk up to

00:24:52
the dwarf and then you have something to pull

00:24:53
from. So I could even see your cards integrating

00:24:56
into that. Like when I'm doing my activity

00:24:58
beforehand, prepping, I could do use the cards to,

00:25:02
to Prep my potential NPCs.

00:25:04
>> Jay Eris: Well, I've had people, I've had people use the

00:25:06
cards in all different types of methods. They,

00:25:08
they'll give three cards out to the players like

00:25:11
mid game. You know, it'd be like, okay, you have

00:25:13
these three backstory elements that you can evoke

00:25:16
whenever you think they are applicable. Right. So

00:25:18
you know, the adventure is going on. And let me

00:25:20
get three different cards. The adventure is going

00:25:23
on and to be like, oh, turns out I have a patron,

00:25:25
the mayor owes me a favor, you know, because of

00:25:28
something.

00:25:29
And they can incorporate that in the storyline.

00:25:31
Other Dungeon masters they go through and they

00:25:33
pick their favorite 20 cards and they actually

00:25:36
weave their whole storyline around those cards.

00:25:39
Then they give them out to the players so they

00:25:41
don't know who's going to be the noble, who's

00:25:43
going to have the crazy pet, who's going to have

00:25:45
the parents that are religious. But he just, but

00:25:48
he already knows how those cards, how those

00:25:50
backstory elements are going to fit into his

00:25:52
overall storyline.

00:25:53
>> Clint Scheirer: This is just blowing my mind because there's you

00:25:55
know, you get a printed adventure, right. And it

00:25:58
has its bones and it's great. Some people love

00:26:01
running pre made games. but there are ways, yeah,

00:26:04
it's great to play a game that's already made.

00:26:07
It's a lot of reading for me. I have to go over

00:26:09
and read it before I do it.

00:26:10
>> Jay Eris: I like it because once I've done it enough times,

00:26:12
I almost have it committed to memory. Memory. But

00:26:14
yeah, the players always surprise me by doing

00:26:17
things off book. You know, it's like, oh, well,

00:26:20
easy enough, they'll go to the to the farmhouse

00:26:22
and they'll find the goblin and they'll find the

00:26:24
tracks and everything's fine. I want to jump in

00:26:26
the well. Okay, you jumped in the well. And the

00:26:30
thing is, it's like Chekhov's gun. They're like,

00:26:32
if I can jump in the well, there must be a reason

00:26:34
I could jump in the well. Is there a secret

00:26:35
passage? Is there treasure? Is it said? No, it's a

00:26:38
well. You can jump into a well in reality, you can

00:26:41
jump into a well in this universe. And that's a

00:26:43
new. That's another thing getting away from gaming

00:26:46
or video games that the kids have to learn is that

00:26:49
there are realistic elements. Also you're playing

00:26:51
with other people and they have feelings too. So

00:26:54
you can't, when you're, when your heroes, when

00:26:56
your friends or your teammates are fighting

00:26:58
skeletons in one room, you can't just say, oh, I'm

00:27:01
just gonna walk out and go down and look at some

00:27:03
fountain. It's like you are, you are deliberately

00:27:07
abandoning your friends. But in their mind,

00:27:09
they're like, it's a video game, they're NPCs. I'm

00:27:11
the main character, I can do whatever I want. I'm

00:27:13
like, you know, yes, you can, but is it the right

00:27:17
thing to do? Yeah.

00:27:19
>> Clint Scheirer: And I mean with session zero and being able to

00:27:22
meet beforehand, which isn't always the case in

00:27:24
certain instances. Right. I've talked to some

00:27:27
folks that really love running, one shots at

00:27:30
conventions where you don't know the people that

00:27:32
are going to be at your table. you have maybe 10

00:27:35
minutes, 20 minutes before you actually start

00:27:37
playing a game. And you getting people up to

00:27:39
speed, you have to do it pretty quickly. But being

00:27:41
able to set the expectations, I think just like if

00:27:44
you're running a classroom, it's key to do that

00:27:47
right away.

00:27:48
>> Jay Eris: Right. And I do, I, I, I feel it's necessary to

00:27:51
interest, to hook people into D20 & D. You got to

00:27:53
get them playing as soon as possible. Right. I'm

00:27:56
not going to take a brand new newbie who's never

00:27:58
played the game, has, has never rolled dice and

00:27:59
knows nothing to do. I'm not going to say, okay,

00:28:01
what's your character's motivation? Why are you

00:28:04
out adventuring? I'm not going to take them that

00:28:06
deep into the lore. I'm going to be like, here's a

00:28:09
character sheet. You roll this dice and add this

00:28:12
number. If you want to hit something, you're in

00:28:14
the forest, you hear a twig snap. What do you do?

00:28:17
And they're like, whoa, what. What do you mean?

00:28:19
I'm in the forest. Have a what? And I have a

00:28:20
sword. Have a bow and arrow. And I look at this.

00:28:22
I. I turn to the quick snap, and. And I get that

00:28:25
idea from, saw, an interview that Deborah Ann Wall

00:28:27
did where she. So you. What do you see? You've got

00:28:31
a bow strapped your back, a sword, and a dagger at

00:28:34
your hilt, right? So you're walking through the

00:28:36
woods. It's dark, it's at night, almost. No

00:28:38
moonlight is coming through. You hear a crack off

00:28:40
in the distance. Something large stepped on a

00:28:43
branch. What would you do? Yeah, and it is great.

00:28:46
I've done that with again at my sister's wedding,

00:28:48
after we did the bachelor, party. The next day at

00:28:51
the wedding dinner, as I'm walking across with

00:28:54
food, the wedding coordinator and a couple of the

00:28:57
servers are just like, hey, what was that little

00:28:59
game you were playing yesterday in the bar? And I

00:29:02
said, oh, dnd is this. And one girl's like, you

00:29:04
roll dice and you make what? I don't get it. So

00:29:07
that I literally did that to her. I said, okay,

00:29:09
you're in the forest, and this happens. And she

00:29:11
was just like. Everybody was just like, whoa. I'm,

00:29:13
like, totally invested because I'm describing, you

00:29:15
know, the birds chirping through the trees, and

00:29:18
the moon is starting to rise, and there's this

00:29:20
light fog on the grass. And it's that immersion.

00:29:23
It's that evoking, kickstarting your imagination

00:29:26
that makes people really get into it. And they're

00:29:29
again, just like. With the magic. I can describe

00:29:31
by magic.

00:29:32
Oh, I can say what my character looks like. I can

00:29:35
make the decisions for my character and then, do

00:29:38
what they want to do. Because who hasn't watched a

00:29:40
movie and the character did something that you

00:29:43
didn't want them to do? He's like, no, no, no.

00:29:44
Keep going upstairs, right? Or, you know, stop and

00:29:47
save the cat, right? So, now you get to be that

00:29:51
hero. And because, you know, there's no going back

00:29:54
like a video game, you have to deal with the

00:29:56
consequences. And it's. It's just such a great

00:29:58
element of role playing that is adaptive, it's

00:30:02
creative, it's innovative, it's improvisational,

00:30:05
and it helps people test their limits. People be.

00:30:08
I'm not creative. I'm not imagining. I'm not, you

00:30:10
know, good with my imagination. Once they start

00:30:12
rolling some dice and they realize that they don't

00:30:14
have to be good at everything, I think that's what

00:30:18
it is. I Think, oh, if I'm not. If I don't know

00:30:20
how to play the rule, if I don't know the rules, I

00:30:21
can't play the game. It's. Let's pretend with

00:30:23
rules. There are. Let's pretend it's bang, bang, I

00:30:26
shot you. You know, in this case, we're just

00:30:28
rolling dice to see if you actually hit them or

00:30:30
not. That's all it is. Yeah.

00:30:32
>> Clint Scheirer: And, you know, you're tapping into imagery and

00:30:36
emotions and all the things that make us love

00:30:40
movies and books and all of the art. Oh, yeah,

00:30:45
yeah. It is an art. And you're like, I've shown

00:30:47
them.

00:30:48
>> Jay Eris: Well, and the other thing I've said with back

00:30:49
once, once we get into like a couple of levels and

00:30:51
they played a few times, I start, start trying to

00:30:53
implement background elements and say, okay, your

00:30:56
character was in the army. His character, is a

00:30:59
bookworm. How did you guys meet? Why are you

00:31:02
friends? You know what? You know, how does that

00:31:04
work? Oh, well, actually, we're brothers. Okay.

00:31:07
You know, and they can start working that out.

00:31:09
Even with 8, 9 year olds, they start finding these

00:31:11
connections. And in the long term, I find that the

00:31:15
story is way much more meaningful when there's a

00:31:18
personal connection to your character. So I, I

00:31:20
always, you know, the example I give is, what if

00:31:22
you've been playing this game for weeks, months,

00:31:25
years on end, and you're like a level 8 character

00:31:28
and you're going to fight the big bad evil person

00:31:30
in the, in the castle or whatever, and the doors

00:31:32
open up and there's skeletons everywhere and

00:31:35
standing in the, in the distance, in front of this

00:31:37
throne and a glowing ball of energy is your dead

00:31:40
sister. What? I thought you told me you had a dead

00:31:46
sister. You never saw her die. Turns out she

00:31:49
became an evil warlock and go from there. So that

00:31:53
emotional connection really helps them get more

00:31:56
invested in the storyline.

00:31:58
>> Clint Scheirer: The best game that I've ever seen do that really

00:32:00
quickly is Fiasco by Jason Morningstar. the second

00:32:04
edition has cards, so part of the thing you have

00:32:07
to do is create a bond between the people at the

00:32:10
table around you. phenomenal. But the idea of that

00:32:14
is, it's like quick, fast, kind of silly, not

00:32:17
quite as emotional. So you got to be in the right

00:32:19
mood for it.

00:32:19
>> Jay Eris: Well, Daggerheart has also banked on that player

00:32:23
connections early on. Like on your sheet, it's

00:32:26
like, who at the table have you told a secret to

00:32:29
and, and why? You know, or what's something that

00:32:33
you believe about my character? That is Actually a

00:32:36
total lie, you know, so. And those are great

00:32:38
little connections that I, I've copied and I've

00:32:41
used in other games. d d specifically to say,

00:32:44
okay, everybody pick one of these weird little

00:32:46
questions. And you. I'm not asking you the

00:32:48
question. You are asking another player the

00:32:52
question about your two. Your two characters. It's

00:32:55
like, why do you, why does your character trust me

00:32:56
so much? You know, why. Why does your character,

00:33:01
curl up against me at night when it's cold? Like,

00:33:04
what. Where is the backstory element there? And

00:33:06
they start. It really gets their, their synapses

00:33:08
firing.

00:33:08
>> Clint Scheirer: You know, this. We've been tap dancing around this

00:33:11
question, I think. Yeah, for a couple, A couple of

00:33:13
questions, but the group itself, right? So we're

00:33:17
talking about bonds. we were talking about your

00:33:21
pretend, characters, you know, Alex and Madison

00:33:24
and can't remember the dude. Brad. Brad. you know,

00:33:28
the table itself, the people who bring themselves

00:33:30
to the table. How, how does the group itself

00:33:34
provide influence on each other's characters? You

00:33:38
know, we have Daggerheart that has these really

00:33:40
cool questions, but, you know, as you're playing

00:33:43
the game and your characters start to develop, how

00:33:45
do the people's interactions do that naturally?

00:33:48
>> Jay Eris: Well, again, every table is different, both the,

00:33:52
the Dungeon Master and the way they reveal

00:33:55
information. I have a Dungeon Master friend who,

00:33:58
he gives a lot of backs, a lot of lore, right?

00:34:01
It's like, okay, you walk into this house. This

00:34:04
house was built 150 years ago by Lord so and so,

00:34:07
and it fell into disrepair after his wife died.

00:34:11
And it's like, all I've done is walk into a

00:34:14
dilapidated building, and he's already giving me

00:34:17
all of these elements that I haven't earned. You

00:34:21
know, it's like, I did not discover these for

00:34:22
myself. He's just, like, shoveling them out to me,

00:34:25
right? Oh, you walk into the kitchen, and it

00:34:26
clearly has this, this, this, this, this, this,

00:34:28
this, this, this. I'm like, okay, I could have

00:34:30
looked around. You could have. You know, I could,

00:34:33
I, I, I'm the type of person who says, you know,

00:34:35
you walk up to a dilapidated, rundown, broken

00:34:38
house with broken windows. The door is hanging off

00:34:41
the hinges, it's overgrown with weeds. What do you

00:34:44
do? And then it's like, well, I want to look at,

00:34:45
do I know anything about this property? Okay, Make

00:34:47
a history. Check. Anyway, so the Dungeon master

00:34:50
alone sets a different pace, a different, A

00:34:53
different mood. Whether they are a killer dm, they

00:34:56
just want to, you know, fight monsters and kill

00:34:57
the characters or they actually have a lot of

00:34:59
intrigue and a lot of characterization.

00:35:02
So that's one thing that comes to the table and

00:35:04
then it's the players at the table. Even if

00:35:06
they're all playing the exact same characters.

00:35:08
Okay, we've got a fighter, a rogue, a wizard and a

00:35:11
cleric. Even if that is the same across multiple

00:35:14
tables, the people playing that character are

00:35:16
going to play them differently. They're going to

00:35:18
react to certain stimuli differently based on

00:35:20
their own life experiences and what they want to

00:35:22
get out of the character. When I was running the

00:35:24
game for my brother in law, he got the cleric and

00:35:27
he just like right off, oh, I'm a cleric of

00:35:29
Lathander. Praise Lathander. Right. It was just

00:35:32
every time he cast a spell, praise Lithander. And

00:35:34
then by the end of the game even all the other

00:35:36
players are like, praise Luthander. So he

00:35:38
converted all the players to, with the, under the

00:35:41
characters in the game. but somebody else who was

00:35:44
playing that same cleric, they might not get into

00:35:46
the religious part at all. They just like, oh,

00:35:48
I've got these cool superpowers and a mace and a

00:35:51
shield. I'm just going to tank my way into this,

00:35:53
into this battle. So the, and, and because of

00:35:57
that, the structure of the game allows complete

00:35:59
strangers to come together and bond, ah, very

00:36:02
quickly. You know, you'd be like, hey, I need

00:36:04
healing potions. Somebody help me. It's like,

00:36:06
yeah, I got you. Right? And it's like you guys

00:36:08
were complete strangers an hour ago and now you

00:36:11
are literally saving each other's lives. Yeah. And

00:36:15
that dynamic doesn't exist in anything else. You

00:36:17
don't, you don't get that in sports. You don't get

00:36:20
that in small, talk. You know, you don't get it in

00:36:24
reading a book or even going to a movie. Sure. You

00:36:25
go to a movie. You all have this same kind of

00:36:27
emotional experience, of, oh, the, the good guy

00:36:30
won or the bad guy was defeated. And you have that

00:36:32
same type of emotional response, but you didn't

00:36:34
create that emotional response for yourselves. And

00:36:38
that's way more powerful in my opinion.

00:36:40
>> Clint Scheirer: Yeah, you're a part of the story, not just a

00:36:43
voyeur on the story.

00:36:45
>> Jay Eris: Correct.

00:36:46
>> Clint Scheirer: okay, so now I'm gonna, I, I titled these case

00:36:49
studies. So we're gonna go through three different

00:36:51
case studies of, of you and how you interact.

00:36:55
>> Jay Eris: Yeah.

00:36:55
>> Clint Scheirer: How you interact with these, different entities

00:36:58
when you're playing Dungeons and Dragons or any

00:37:01
tabletop game. So you have a high school DND club

00:37:07
or High. Is it tabletop or is it dnd?

00:37:09
>> Jay Eris: Specifically, it's D20 & D specific.

00:37:11
>> Clint Scheirer: Okay. Which is fine because that's what everybody

00:37:14
knows. how, how do you guide teenagers through the

00:37:17
creation process? What does that look like? And

00:37:19
what do you need to consider when teenagers are at

00:37:22
the table?

00:37:23
>> Jay Eris: Okay, teenagers have this. That not all of them

00:37:30
have had the life squeezed out of their

00:37:32
imagination yet. They're still. Teenagers are

00:37:35
still on the cusp of that 10 year old who thinks

00:37:38
that they can make a, rocket ship made of cotton

00:37:41
candy. And then it's school and society that

00:37:44
slowly squeezes the imagination out of them and

00:37:47
makes them into good little worker bees. It's

00:37:50
like, oh, no, you need to be practical. And it's

00:37:53
like, there always comes that point in adulthood

00:37:55
where you like, oh, I have to put away childish

00:37:58
things. I have to stop reading comic books and

00:37:59
playing video games and get serious about my job.

00:38:02
And it's like, why, you know, I still eat Fruit

00:38:06
Loop cereal. I still play video games in my free

00:38:09
time because I enjoy them. Why would I stop doing

00:38:11
something I enjoy? My friend Lance, he literally

00:38:14
gave away a bunch of his comic books and anime

00:38:17
movies. And he's like, here, my dad says I need to

00:38:19
get serious and I need to put away these childish

00:38:21
things. I'm like, no, you don't. so kids are all.

00:38:24
Are still in that kind of play mode. Their

00:38:27
imaginations are still kicking into high gear. And

00:38:31
I've seen teenagers that try D D and it just

00:38:34
doesn't land. They're just like, I don't get it.

00:38:37
And it's like, okay, well, it's not for you. And

00:38:38
then other kids, this one freshman, this year in

00:38:43
the last two months, she, she rolled some dice,

00:38:46
she played a game the next day, she's like, I got

00:38:48
this idea for a character, and I got that idea for

00:38:50
a character. Even other teachers are coming up to

00:38:52
me going, she will not shut up about Dungeons and

00:38:55
Dragons. What did you do to her? I'm like, I let

00:38:57
her roll a dice. And, you know, the rest, the rest

00:39:00
is history. And then I finally got so many

00:39:02
characters or so many players. Both my old

00:39:05
previous players juniors now, and my new freshmen

00:39:09
who were like, really getting into it hardcore. I

00:39:11
got too many. I had like eight, nine, ten players,

00:39:14
and I can't run that many people at a table

00:39:16
successfully. So I said, hey, would you want to be

00:39:18
a dungeon master? She was like, yes, hands down,

00:39:21
right? And this is a girl who has trouble in class

00:39:24
writing out long form sentences. And yet I gave

00:39:27
her the, the Player's Handbook and she devoured it

00:39:29
overnight and just absorbed the rules. And now she

00:39:32
runs the games for the juniors while I'm running

00:39:36
games for the freshmen in two separate rooms. And

00:39:39
that's been, again, a matter of weeks that she's

00:39:42
had that transformation. so, yeah, kids are still

00:39:44
more in touch with their imagination. Again, I

00:39:47
start very basic. Here is a character sheet.

00:39:49
You're a fighter, you're like Gimli, or you're a

00:39:53
rogue, like, but Frodo. And the thing is, is that

00:39:58
not all kids know Lord of the Rings-esque. Not all

00:40:00
kids know, Star Wars and Starforged Trek. So you

00:40:03
have to try to find the, the things that they

00:40:05
relate to, like sports or, you know, TV shows like

00:40:08
Casey Undercover or Disney shows, and say, okay,

00:40:11
so, you know, you've got this little superpower.

00:40:13
And they're like, oh, okay. I was, I was talking

00:40:15
to a kid at a convention and his parents, I said,

00:40:17
you can do a superhero role play game. He's like,

00:40:19
I can. I was like, yeah, what's. Who's your

00:40:20
favorite superhero? He goes, flash. I was like,

00:40:22
okay, you could be the Blur. And you know, you're,

00:40:25
you're racing down the road and the cop, the, the,

00:40:27
the bank robbers are in their car. You're now

00:40:30
running right next to them. What are you going to

00:40:31
do? I'm going to punch him. And he was already, he

00:40:34
got it. You know, he was already zoned in. And

00:40:36
this is just like five seconds over a table again

00:40:39
out in the wild. And he, and he got it. And his

00:40:42
parents were like, I never realized it was so

00:40:44
creative and so improvisational. I'm like, yeah.

00:40:48
So it's great to see the kids go and it's great to

00:40:51
see adults tap back into that childishness. I had

00:40:55
a mother and a daughter at one of my beginner

00:40:57
games, and the mom just like, she, she was in

00:41:00
this, she was like, yes, I want to do this more.

00:41:02
So they came back to another session with her son

00:41:05
and her brother. So this is like mom and uncle and

00:41:08
then two kids. And then eventually they contacted

00:41:11
me offline and they said, we want to run a game

00:41:13
for our entire family. And it's a family of eight

00:41:15
people. So about every two, three months they

00:41:18
contact me, we get together, and I've been running

00:41:20
that game now for three years.

00:41:22
>> Clint Scheirer: That's, ah, awesome. The relationships that we get

00:41:25
to make playing these games is just out of this

00:41:29
world.

00:41:29
>> Jay Eris: And the stories that are like, real visceral

00:41:32
things, like I tell the story of how me, and my

00:41:35
party were trying to get a key, and there was a

00:41:37
gargoyle in the middle of a pit of acid who had

00:41:39
the key. And he was giving us a hard time. He's

00:41:42
hurling insults at us, kind of like the French

00:41:44
taunter from Monty Python.

00:41:46
>> Clint Scheirer: Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of

00:41:50
elderberry.

00:41:51
>> Jay Eris: And I stepped up and said, I bet you I could shoot

00:41:53
you in the eye from here. He goes, oh, yeah, but

00:41:55
you can't. I rolled a natural 20, got him in the

00:41:58
eye, right? And then it caused him to fly away.

00:42:01
And then we were able to knock him down and get

00:42:02
the key from him. And one thing led to another,

00:42:04
but I tell that story. So I shot this gargoyle in

00:42:06
the eye. And out of context, complete newbies are

00:42:09
like, you did what? I mean, they're imagining a

00:42:12
gargoyle sitting on, like, a church statue

00:42:14
downtown, because that's where their brain goes.

00:42:16
I'm like, no, no, it's a fantasy role playing

00:42:17
game. You know, I didn't literally shoot, a

00:42:20
gargoyle. I did it in my head. But that's 30 years

00:42:23
ago, and I still tell that story like it happened

00:42:25
yesterday.

00:42:26
>> Clint Scheirer: Yeah, the memories stick with us far after the

00:42:29
game's already done.

00:42:30
>> Jay Eris: Oh, yeah, you'll always remember your first

00:42:32
natural 20. Or, you know, the way, the way you

00:42:34
took out the big, bad evil guy, or the time you

00:42:37
tried to, you know, walk across a rickety, rickety

00:42:40
bridge and it collapsed under your feet, you know?

00:42:42
You know, it's those moments that, that really

00:42:44
sink in.

00:42:45
>> Clint Scheirer: Okay, so for, for teenagers, for kids, they still

00:42:48
have that playfulness. they're, they're able to

00:42:50
tap into that. You start out with the character

00:42:52
sheet. You start basic. You try to find what they

00:42:55
know with families. Like you mentioned that you

00:42:58
run a game for a family of eight. families where

00:43:01
there's different dynamics, different ages. You

00:43:03
might have adults, you might have teenagers, you

00:43:06
might have preteens, you might have not even

00:43:08
preteens. how do you, how do you manage that when

00:43:11
you run a game where it's multi generational?

00:43:14
>> Jay Eris: Well, and, and, what I find is that if they're, as

00:43:17
opposed to strangers playing a game together, who

00:43:19
kind of, there's this hesitancy to do anything

00:43:22
stupid to a complete stranger, you know, I'm not

00:43:24
gonna kill you or attack you or, you know, I'm

00:43:28
gonna help you in the situation. Families have

00:43:30
their own dynamic. They, you know, the two sisters

00:43:33
are already butting Heads. the, the older son is

00:43:36
already having, is, already has issues with the

00:43:38
mother or the uncle he played years ago. And he's

00:43:42
like, got these grandiose ideas of how his

00:43:45
character relates to his God and all this type of

00:43:47
stuff. And he's like always shooting these little

00:43:48
asides, but he's not honed in on the game. Like

00:43:52
once we're in combat and it's his turn, he's like,

00:43:54
what is it my turn? What am I doing? Meanwhile,

00:43:57
like during other parts of the game, he's just

00:43:59
like, he's got this, all this creativity stuff,

00:44:01
where how his God relates to his character. so I

00:44:04
find that families, because they've already got

00:44:06
those internal struggles and those internal

00:44:08
dynamics, they're more prone to the possibility of

00:44:11
player versus player interactions picking on each

00:44:13
other, you know, because they can't fight each

00:44:16
other in real life anymore, you know, beat up on

00:44:18
each other. Or maybe they can, but they're like,

00:44:20
oh, this is just another way of poking fun at my

00:44:22
sister or picking on my little brother, or

00:44:25
something like that. But then when the little

00:44:27
brother gets that, that deciding blow on the big

00:44:30
bad evil guy, and it's just, it's this celebration

00:44:34
for everybody. Like the first time that the 8 year

00:44:36
old tied his shoes by himself and everybody's

00:44:38
like, yay, right? Or the first time a baby walked.

00:44:41
And that family, they feel that interaction, those

00:44:46
achievements way stronger than a bunch of

00:44:48
strangers might. And that's, that's a beautiful

00:44:50
thing to see.

00:44:51
>> Clint Scheirer: A lot of this is so emotional, right? Like a lot

00:44:54
of this, it really just taps into, you know, how

00:44:56
would my family be playing a game?

00:44:59
>> Jay Eris: Let me tell you a story. So I was running a game

00:45:02
for a family, about 12 years ago, give or take.

00:45:07
And this was mom, older brother, younger sister

00:45:11
and younger brother. And like the younger kids

00:45:15
were like 8 and 9. They were really young. The

00:45:17
brother was maybe 15 or 16. And a little aside to

00:45:20
this story is I started, the brother was playing

00:45:23
in my group first, and then one day he shows up

00:45:25
with his mother and she has like, like a hair wrap

00:45:29
and she's wearing these very traditional,

00:45:31
religious clothes, right? She dressed like a nun

00:45:33
basically. And, and so he kind of like walks in

00:45:36
embarrassed. You know, he's like, this is my

00:45:38
mother. And I'm like, okay, I'm gonna have to

00:45:41
explain that DND is not satanic. That, you know,

00:45:45
we're, we're all here to have fun. So I'm like,

00:45:47
hello ma'.

00:45:48
>> Clint Scheirer: Am.

00:45:48
>> Jay Eris: Nice to meet you. She goes, yeah, I've got a

00:45:50
transgender dwarf here, with a clerical ill

00:45:53
matter. Is that okay? And I'm like, okay, let's

00:45:56
just break through some stereotypes while we're at

00:45:58
it. But she had played before, and she was very

00:46:01
into the strategy and tactics of the game. And at

00:46:05
one point, the brother and sister were both in a

00:46:08
hallway, on opposite. They were on opposite sides

00:46:11
of some monsters, right? So she's here, he's here,

00:46:13
and there's monsters in between them. And the

00:46:16
brother, the little brother, he's like, you know,

00:46:17
8 years old. He says, well, I wanna. I wanna move

00:46:20
past my monster and go help my sister with her

00:46:23
monster. Now, right away, the mother is like, no,

00:46:26
no, you. You sit and finish your monster until

00:46:28
it's dead, right? Because she's thinking

00:46:30
tactically because she knows that if he moves away

00:46:32
from the monster, he could get hit. that could

00:46:34
cause further damage and limit everybody else. So

00:46:37
he kind of, like, when she says, no, no, finish

00:46:39
your monster. And he kind of, like, shied away

00:46:40
because, oh, mom said I shouldn't do that. I'm

00:46:43
playing the game wrong. And I had to literally

00:46:45
stop and go, tiffany, I got this. And I said,

00:46:47
okay, aj, you can try that. But I just want to

00:46:51
make sure you're aware of the possible

00:46:52
consequences. When you move to move past the

00:46:55
character, the creature, you have to make an

00:46:56
athletics check to double past him because he

00:46:58
doesn't want you to move past him. Then when you

00:47:00
move away from m him, he's going to get a free

00:47:02
swing at you, which is attack of opportunity. Do

00:47:05
you still want to risk that? he goes, yes, he did.

00:47:07
He did not hesitate. So he rolled to see if he

00:47:10
tumbled past the monster. He succeeded. I rolled.

00:47:13
The attack of opportunity I missed. So he was able

00:47:16
to get to his sister, give her the help option.

00:47:19
Giving her advantage on her attack, they took out

00:47:22
her monster together. They then turned and joined

00:47:25
forces on the remaining monster that the son had

00:47:27
been dealing. And I had to say, aj, that was,

00:47:29
like, one of the most cinematic moments and

00:47:31
selfless moments that I've seen in any game of D

00:47:34
And D in 30 years.

00:47:36
>> Clint Scheirer: Yeah.

00:47:36
>> Jay Eris: And just such, like you said, it was such a

00:47:38
touching moment, for him to, sacrifice or take

00:47:41
that risk because my sister's in trouble, right?

00:47:44
I'm reminded of the scene in Parenthood, when,

00:47:48
the. The little sister is up on stage trying to

00:47:51
play dopey in. In Snow White, and the kids are

00:47:54
picking on her because the characters are Picking

00:47:55
on. On Dopey. but the little brother out in the

00:47:58
audience is like, they're picking on my sister.

00:48:00
They're hurting my sister. And he runs up on the

00:48:03
stage and starts headbutting all the other kids.

00:48:05
>> Clint Scheirer: I think what's going on inside of me, right now,

00:48:08
and I'll just tap in is, you know, I so badly

00:48:11
want, you know, my family to be that way

00:48:14
sometimes. You know, I. I want us to connect. I

00:48:16
want us to have these grand experiences. But, you

00:48:19
know, maybe our listener also feels that they.

00:48:24
They don't have that in their family. You know,

00:48:27
for one reason or another, the family just doesn't

00:48:29
get along. There isn't that, sense of family. And

00:48:33
I found that, yeah, there's not the connection.

00:48:36
And, you know, in DND and tabletops in general, I

00:48:40
just. There's so much acceptance and there's just

00:48:43
so much welcoming to the table. I. I can't say

00:48:47
enough of good things about it. So I'm really glad

00:48:49
that came up in our conversation tonight because

00:48:52
it's, it's what I want everybody to know.

00:48:53
I want everybody to know how good it is.

00:48:55
>> Jay Eris: And you're right. You may have a family that

00:48:56
doesn't get along in real life. You know, they.

00:48:59
They go to their neutral corners. I have one

00:49:01
mother. She deliberately. I met her at a

00:49:03
convention and told her about D D and she

00:49:05
contacted me. She says, I want you to come to my

00:49:06
home, and I want to play D20 & D with my kids. And

00:49:08
she's got like a 12 year old, 11 year old and like

00:49:10
an 8 year old. And she goes, I want, I

00:49:12
deliberately want them to put down their phones,

00:49:15
step away from the Xbox, and do something as a

00:49:18
family. and initially the kids were like, what is

00:49:21
this? Who's this stranger coming into our home?

00:49:23
And why do I. Why do I need to do this? I don't

00:49:25
get it. But slowly, the, the daughter, the older,

00:49:29
oldest daughter, she started to catch on and be

00:49:31
like, oh, I can. I could be a ranger and I can

00:49:34
have a pet wolf, and I can, I can tell it what to

00:49:36
do and I can name it and I can cast spells. And

00:49:39
then the son, the, the older son started, really

00:49:42
getting into his character. And now he, like, he

00:49:44
knows his character backwards and forwards. I

00:49:46
mean, I'll forget that he has, like, sneak attack

00:49:48
and be like, oh, I got sneak attack. I'm a rogue.

00:49:50
Like, all right. And the youngest kid, he's still

00:49:53
squirmy and can't sit at a table for more than 20

00:49:56
minutes, you know, but when it's his turn, he's a

00:50:00
wizard, to cast a spell or whatever, he can. He

00:50:02
can be very selfish. Selfish, selfless, and help

00:50:06
out his brother and sister in a clutch moment. He.

00:50:08
He likes being, you know, the hero. He likes, you

00:50:11
know, doing the really cool things. And it sucks

00:50:13
when he misses a spell or something like that

00:50:14
because it's like, oh, why didn't it work? You

00:50:17
know, it would have worked in a video game. So

00:50:18
he's, he's still growing into that kind of sense

00:50:21
of. And kids are like that. There comes a point

00:50:23
where they realize they're not the center of the

00:50:25
universe, that other people. Yes, you are the main

00:50:29
player in your, Your universe. Everybody else is

00:50:31
just an NPC to you. But NPC's got lives too, you

00:50:35
know, like, when my students realize that I have a

00:50:37
life, I go home and I have a cat.

00:50:39
>> Clint Scheirer: Cats, cats and more cats.

00:50:41
>> Jay Eris: And I play video games and I have friendships and

00:50:44
relationships and stuff like that. I don't just

00:50:46
power down out of teacher mode, wake up the next

00:50:49
morning and, you know, change. Change clothes at

00:50:52
school. I remember thinking that about my

00:50:54
teachers, where it's just kind of like, oh, they

00:50:56
don't really go out into the world. They just

00:50:58
change clothes at school. And that's the. That's

00:51:01
where they live. So that's why it was always so

00:51:03
weird to run into a teacher at the grocery store

00:51:05
or at a concert. And it's just like, oh, hi, Ms.

00:51:08
Rainey, how are you?

00:51:09
>> Clint Scheirer: Or I'm thinking of the Charlie Brown parents and

00:51:12
adults that are just faceless, faceless voices.

00:51:16
>> Jay Eris: Well, ma', am, I think that's not really the best

00:51:18
idea. Want. Exactly.

00:51:21
>> Clint Scheirer: And yet it kind of does encapsulate how sometimes

00:51:24
kids, that their universe is them.

00:51:27
>> Jay Eris: Yeah.

00:51:28
>> Clint Scheirer: so there's a third case study, and it may not be

00:51:31
any different than what we've already talked

00:51:34
about. The tactics of building characters, of

00:51:37
managing the people at the table, might be the

00:51:39
same. But, you know, I could even extend this

00:51:42
beyond just a game store game, but also a

00:51:46
convention or a place where, you know, people are

00:51:48
maybe coming to pay to play, or maybe they are

00:51:51
coming and it's a free time where people can just

00:51:54
come. But how would you manage that differently?

00:51:57
You know, how would you manage character creation?

00:51:59
How would you manage the people at the table? Is

00:52:02
it any different than if you're playing with, you

00:52:04
know, somebody at a school or playing with a

00:52:07
family at their home?

00:52:08
>> Jay Eris: I think the difference there, because I Mean,

00:52:11
again, parents, families are still paying me to

00:52:14
come to their homes, and.

00:52:16
>> Clint Scheirer: Very good.

00:52:17
>> Jay Eris: but, like, the kids at my high school, I'm, not

00:52:21
being paid, right? They're there, you know, so

00:52:24
they're there because they want to be on, on this

00:52:26
adventure, and they want to see what it's all

00:52:27
about. and at a convention, kid, they paid to get

00:52:30
in there, and they want to see it. And even at the

00:52:32
game store, the kids are dropped off by their

00:52:34
parents, and they still pay, like, 15 bucks to

00:52:38
entertain my children for three hours. but I think

00:52:40
in that respect, because of the payment, you, you

00:52:45
feel kind of a little bit of pressure to, to get

00:52:48
their, you know, the bang for their buck. Yeah,

00:52:50
you know, it's like, oh, okay, if you're paying

00:52:52
me, I need to make sure that this is actually

00:52:54
good, right? So I, I, I, most of my games are the

00:52:58
same. I don't, I, I don't really. You say about

00:53:00
character creation, I give you a character. I,

00:53:02
then give you the option if, oh, you don't want to

00:53:04
be an elf. You want to be a dragonborn. Okay,

00:53:06
we'll change that before the next adventure. Oh,

00:53:08
you want to try something out of the box? You want

00:53:10
to try it. You want to be a barbarian, halfling,

00:53:13
Right? You want to be a wizard orc. It's, fine.

00:53:15
You know, I give them that leeway to adjust and

00:53:18
personalize their character very early on in the

00:53:21
process so that they can really glom on. So I

00:53:24
really want to play a Tiefling. And I'm like,

00:53:26
okay, easy enough to shift your character to be a

00:53:28
tiefling, before you get too locked into their

00:53:31
abilities, right? Because it'd be like, oh, I

00:53:33
don't have that ability anymore because I'm not an

00:53:34
elf anymore. Now I'm something else. but, yeah,

00:53:38
that bang for their buck where it's like, okay, if

00:53:40
you're actually paying for this, then you deserve

00:53:42
to actually have fun, have an adventure. And

00:53:45
sometimes it doesn't work. You know, I mean, my

00:53:47
Wednesday night game at the game store with these

00:53:50
kids who a range in age from 8 to 14. and they

00:53:55
will just start 6, 7, right? And they'll just

00:53:58
build, and I'll just, I'll just lean back and be

00:54:00
like, when you're ready. Because again, they're

00:54:05
there. They're there to meet with their friends

00:54:07
and have fun, not to play the game. I play the

00:54:11
game. I'm the type of person who's like, you know,

00:54:13
it's Your turn to roll. Okay. Okay. You, that's

00:54:16
the dice you want to use, right? So I'm very, and

00:54:18
I'm like that with video games and tabletop games

00:54:21
and card games and, and especially D D When I'm a

00:54:24
player, I'm like, guys, stop. Not that I don't

00:54:28
have my own moments where I, you know, do a Monty

00:54:31
Python zinger or, you know, say something snarky.

00:54:34
You say shrubberies. Yes. For the most part, we're

00:54:37
playing the game. And the kids don't always do

00:54:40
that. They just, you know. One thing I'm trying to

00:54:41
incorporate now with my kid groups is, a little

00:54:44
bit of physical time. I've realized that these,

00:54:47
these eight, nine year olds, they can't sit at a

00:54:49
table for three hours. So I'm gonna be like, okay,

00:54:52
every hour, every half hour, maybe after every

00:54:54
round of combat, let's all do some jumping jacks.

00:54:58
Let's all, you know, run around the table. Let's,

00:55:00
let's play Duck Duck goose really quick. I,

00:55:03
haven't incorporated it yet because I just came up

00:55:04
with the idea, but I think I need to get, I need

00:55:07
to burn them out physically because they're,

00:55:09
they're, you know, they're, because when, when

00:55:10
they're waiting for other people to make their

00:55:11
decision, I try to say, guys, you should be

00:55:13
thinking about what you should do, you're going to

00:55:15
do in your turn. And they can't focus that long

00:55:17
because, you know, this kid is taking forever to

00:55:19
make his decision. and you just got to be

00:55:22
flexible. I, I had one, player. The girl wasn't,

00:55:26
she just, she wasn't making decisions. You know,

00:55:28
she, she felt, I think she felt anything she was

00:55:30
going to do was going to be wrong. She got really

00:55:32
anxious about, you know, being in the game.

00:55:34
Everybody else is, oh, he's hitting and he's

00:55:36
fighting and she's casting spells. I, I, I, I, I

00:55:39
don't know what to do. So I gave her the option. I

00:55:41
said, do you want somebody else to take over for

00:55:43
you? Luckily, we had a, another one of the players

00:55:45
brothers was there and he had a little bit of

00:55:48
experience with D20 & D. I was like, hey, you want

00:55:50
to swap out with her? And he said, yeah, no

00:55:52
problem. And then he immediately became like me.

00:55:54
Guys, it's your turn. Go. He's a little bit older,

00:55:57
so, you know, he's a little more focused on the

00:55:59
gameplay aspect of the game. So you've just got to

00:56:01
be attentive. You've got to see what works for

00:56:04
them? Not everybody is there to do a perfect

00:56:06
combat simulator. Some people are just there to

00:56:09
hang out with their friends and be silly. and you

00:56:12
just got to like, read the room.

00:56:14
>> Clint Scheirer: The social gamer, I think is what Robin D. Laws

00:56:18
calls them. the, the social gamers.

00:56:20
okay, so this is, this is the last question that I

00:56:23
ask anybody on my, on my show. and, and I, I got

00:56:27
it from Eric Newsom, NPR News. Love that guy. Read

00:56:31
his book. It was, called Make Noise and it was

00:56:35
about podcasting. And I just thought it was such a

00:56:38
good question that I, I just ask everybody. So the

00:56:40
question is, if I was going to ask you to give me

00:56:43
a 10 word phrase that could help everybody or the

00:56:47
listener remember what we learned tonight, the one

00:56:51
thing you don't want them to forget. What is it in

00:56:54
10 words? You can't do more than 10 words. You

00:56:56
can't do less than 10 words. It's got to be

00:56:58
exactly 10 words for the economy of words. And to

00:57:01
be very specific, engage with your imagination.

00:57:04
>> Jay Eris: Your imagination. Find friends. Fly your nerd

00:57:08
flag.

00:57:10
>> Clint Scheirer: There we go.

00:57:11
>> Jay Eris: because I think people again, just like society

00:57:15
has squeezed your imagination to. Oh, you can't,

00:57:17
you're never gonna, you know, be able to be a

00:57:20
rocket scientist or you're never going to be able

00:57:22
to be a novelist or what like that. It's not, it's

00:57:24
not practical. I can remember my own family when I

00:57:26
was younger wanting to get into writing. It's

00:57:28
like, oh, you'll never make any money as a

00:57:30
novelist, right? It's like, well, no, you, you

00:57:31
can, it just, it's a little harder than getting a

00:57:35
regular 9 to 5 job, you know, so I've seen it

00:57:38
happen to myself and to others where they just

00:57:40
into students who just like, aren't allowed to

00:57:43
engage their dreams. And now I have like, other

00:57:46
teachers at school who are like, practical,

00:57:48
practical, practical. You know, get a real job,

00:57:50
you know, focus on the things that are going to

00:57:53
help you be successful. And I'm like, well, how do

00:57:55
you define success, right? I mean, I think it was

00:57:57
John Lennon when he was a kid. They said, you

00:58:00
know, what do you want to be when you grow up? And

00:58:01
he said, I want to be happy. And they thought he

00:58:03
didn't understand the question. but you, you need

00:58:08
to, let that nerd flag fly. You know, don't be

00:58:11
afraid to embrace your passions and that. And this

00:58:14
is where I'm very different. One teacher is

00:58:16
practical, practical, practical. And I'm like, if

00:58:18
you Want to be a cartoonist, if you want to be a

00:58:20
voice actor, if you want to be an animator, if you

00:58:22
want to, you know, become a dancer, just do it.

00:58:26
Just, you know, engage and that's, you will get

00:58:29
out of it what you put in. You know, if you want

00:58:32
to be a basketball star, you need to be on the

00:58:34
basketball court. You need to be playing, every

00:58:36
day. You can't just say, oh, I played Madden and

00:58:39
one day I'll try it for the football team and I'm

00:58:41
sure I'll be great and then I'll, then I'll get an

00:58:44
NBA contract, and everything will be fine. It's

00:58:46
like, doesn't work that way. You need to start

00:58:49
now. And I've seen students who are so committed

00:58:51
that in their sophomore year they already knew

00:58:53
they were going to be an architect and they were

00:58:55
going to go to the Naval Academy. So they,

00:58:57
they're, you know, their sophomore year of high

00:58:59
school and they're already thinking about these

00:59:01
big, big, long term things and how they're going

00:59:04
to pay for it and, engaging with their passions.

00:59:07
And the other thing is, when you let that nerd

00:59:10
flag fly, other people who identify with that flag

00:59:15
are going to flock to you. Right? So don't hide

00:59:19
these things because you think they're too silly

00:59:21
or too nerdy. I can think of friends in high

00:59:23
school who, they were the jocks and they were the,

00:59:27
the popular smart kids and stuff like that. And

00:59:29
again, they, these were the ones who were going to

00:59:31
get out into the real world and have great

00:59:33
practical jobs and become doctors and nurses and,

00:59:35
you know, lawyers and stuff like that. and then

00:59:38
here it is, 30 years later, they hook up with me

00:59:40
on Facebook and they're all like, I always wanted

00:59:41
to play D20 & D, why didn't you? Yeah.

00:59:46
>> Clint Scheirer: So engage with your imagination, find friends and

00:59:50
let your nerd flag fly. Jay, this has been

00:59:53
awesome. if people want to continue to engage in

00:59:57
your work and what you've done, your passion for

01:00:01
this hobby, you know, we heard about Better

01:00:03
Backstory cards, we've heard about the Busty

01:00:05
Griffin. Where can people find you? What is the

01:00:08
best way to connect?

01:00:10
>> Jay Eris: Okay, so all that jazz with one Z and then 22 is

01:00:16
my, my main handle across most platforms.

01:00:19
Twitter (X, TikTok, Instagram, Better Backstories

01:00:23
has its own feed. so that's backstories22 on

01:00:27
Instagram and ah, Twitter (X. I've now started

01:00:31
some pages for the Rolling Dungeon Master and that

01:00:34
is the Rolling DM m. on, Instagram and blue, sky.

01:00:41
And of course, my big one is Tick Tock, because

01:00:44
that's where the Busty Griffin currently lives.

01:00:46
And that is, of course, all that jazz 1z22. And,

01:00:51
people can find them and, and follow. some. Some

01:00:53
of my profiles are, are live, some are not, or are

01:00:57
private. Some are not. So it's like, sometimes

01:00:59
that can be kind of hard to find because as a

01:01:00
teacher, I have to make sure there's this

01:01:02
separation between, what the kids can see and what

01:01:05
they can interact with and then what else I'm

01:01:07
putting out, into the world. So it's. There's a

01:01:09
little bit of an overlap, of course.

01:01:11
>> Clint Scheirer: And we'll make sure that anything that you want

01:01:14
people to connect with, we'll have that in the

01:01:16
show notes so that people can, can, find you. So

01:01:19
thanks for being here. I can't wait to talk to you

01:01:21
in the near future. And, thanks again.

01:01:24
>> Jay Eris: Oh, thank you,

01:01:24
Clint.Scheirer@claimtogamepodcast.com. Appreciate

01:01:25
it. And hey, let your nerd flag fly.

01:01:28
>> Clint Scheirer: That's right, we're flying. Jay, thanks for giving

01:01:30
us the foundation for a cohesive table where

01:01:32
everyone can be invested in the story. And thank

01:01:35
you for giving me a hankering for Denny's

01:01:37
bottomless hot chocolate. Denny's connect with Jay

01:01:40
and all of her creative works through the links

01:01:42
provided in the show notes. Please hit like or

01:01:44
subscribe if you liked what you heard today. And

01:01:46
may you keep having a great time with friends as

01:01:48
you tell amazing stories through tabletop role

01:01:51
playing games.

01:01:57
>> Jay Eris: Sam.

048 - One DM, Three Different Tables: How to Build Characters for Teens, Families, and Game Stores - with Jay Aress