Austin's tabletop podcast Friends At the Table

Shortly after @austin_walker came on I decided check out the Stream Friends tabletop game podcast he GMs called Friends At the Table while at work. Outside of some rough audio in some of the earlier episodes it's real good! I've followed some other podcasts of people playing a table top game, but none that quite get interesting characters done so well.

Does anyone else follow it?

If you haven't heard it or don't follow it then let me explain. There's two seasons. The first one the group uses a system called Dungeon World which is a lot more interesting and less number crunchy (therefore less boring to listen to) than something like DnD. The game is still fantasy setting, but they all do a great at doing a lot with overcoming genre conventions.

The second season they play a game called MechNoir which is pretty much Cowboy Bebop/Gundum/Blade Runner stuff. There's only 4 episodes out at the moment but so far it's been a lot of fun. I'd even recommend to the 3+ hour world creation secret podcast.

I've really enjoyed parts that I've been able to hear, but the audio is a real motherfucker on most of the episodes. I have relatively poor hearing, and, when you combine that with my tendency to listen to podcasts while doing other things with noise, that ends up being a problem for enjoying it in full. Is there a problem with the Podbean player? Would I be able to hear better if I straight downloaded them?

@crembaw: Unfortunately no. But! The audio quality does get a better as the series goes on. Early on it sounds like they recorded directly from Skype which is... well... Skype. Now they seem to record locally (with a skype backup) and you can hear things a lot better.

@d_w The quality is certainly much better, but I'm afraid the volume issue still persists. I dunno, I'll download a few and fux around with my music player's audio. I'd really like to listen to them all from the start.

I think they are pretty awesome. I did the same after hearing him talk about it on the beastcast. I'm 13 episodes in and it is my go to podcast when I'm not playing the bomb or beastcast. But I drive 2 hours a day so I've been getting through about an episode or two a day. But yes the audio is hit or miss

It's so good after you get over the audio quality. I'm on episode 22 and I'm addicted. The story is great and flows. And the twists! Also, Boat Party!

For a while I used season 1 as my bedtime podcast. Its really fun to listen to them build a world together. It also single-handedly helped me finish Disgaea 4. But yea the audio starts out pretty rough in the 1st season.

@comradecrash: BOAT PARTY! Oh and to think where the Boat Party ends up. While both Boat and Ice parties have some really great moments, I think my favorite is with the Boat party when they first encounter the Pirate (can't think of his name at the moment) and Keith is just like "Wait, he's a zombie? Is the crew all undead?" then that spun out into a whole new thing that Austin didn't even plan for. That really shows Austin's strength as a GM and the great improv ability of the players.