1.) Get in at least 18 rpg game sessions this year. 1 to 2 a month, plus con games, should be reasonable.
2.) Be a better GM. Be better organized and prepared, and put more effort into honing my gaming skills.
3.) Less internet more reading. The unread stack of books and comic books is becoming borderline mountainous. One of these nights my nightstand is going to give way under the weight and the whole pile is going to topple over and crush me.
4.) Oh yeah- 150 minutes of exercise a week, and a low carb, low sugar, low fat, low fun, diet. Thanks Dr. Ivan!

Blackadder23 wrote:

Where specifically do you feel you're having issues?  What in particular are you trying to improve?

I would like to break out of the, "Kick the door open, kill things, and take their stuff" mode. As a group we start off with higher goals but, being people with kids and jobs and all that other mundane responsibility hooey, sometimes at the end of the day the imagination and energy isn't exactly peak. The easy thing is to slip back into being a pack of murder hobos. It's not all bad, we still have fun getting some real world stress out by battling monsters but, I have a hard time keeping any momentum going in that type of game, because there is no real buy in to their characters, the NPC's, or the world. Hope some of that makes sense.

Caveman, what you said about knowing and developing my game world environment makes good sense. I'm not someone who is known for fast thinking on their feet. I think that goes a long way towards a more consistent, believable world.
 

One of my favorite comics from the last year or so is Birthright from Image comics. Written by Joshua Williamson with art by Andrei Bressan. The story is split between our world and the "weird fantasy" world of Terronos. You can get issues 1-5 collected in trade paperback for under 8$. Highly recommend it.

I would call this my "Hot 5." Ones that, at the moment, are must listen to's. Not necessarily in the strictest of orders:
5.) The Adventure Zone http://www.maximumfun.org/shows/adventure-zone An actual play podcast where the very funny McElroy brothers, from the podcast "My Brother, My Brother, and Me," play D&D with their dad. I think they are playing 5E, but they are really not big on rules.
4.) Sword and Laser http://swordandlaser.com/  A sci-fi and fantasy book club podcast.
3.) The Two Headed Nerd. http://twoheadednerd.com/ I have to throw a comic book podcast in here. These guys are knowledgeable and humorous, and they keep it under an hour, something comic podcasts seem to have a hard time doing.
2.) GamersTable http://gamerstable.com/ Can't say enough good things about this one. They have a large cast but, keep talking over each other to a minimum. They come out weekly, for something like 5 years now, and still have something fresh and interesting to say about our hobby. Plus, in my opinion, their actual play podcasts are the BEST out there. Be sure to check out their "Tower of the Ape" actual play set in the the Conan RPG universe.
1.) Save or Die http://saveordie.info/ This cast has gone through some changes since it started out, but right now they are just hitting it out of the park, for me anyways.

Hope you find something you'll enjoy listening to there! 

I'm a huge fan of podcast listening and I'm always looking for good gaming, literary, or generally geeky podcasts. A few recommendations if you haven't stumbled across them already.

StarShipSofa has a 3 part Moorcock story called Black Petals that I always thought would make a great adventure. It starts here http://www.starshipsofa.com/blog/2011/05/31/starshipsofa-no-191-michael-moorcock/

https://librivox.org/  does audio stories that are in the public domain so there is a good selection of  Howard and Lovecraft. If you haven't checked it out already, Librivox is done by volunteers so the recordings are of varying quality but worth listening to.

How about you, what are you listening to? Thanks!

Thanks Seb! The wheels are in motion.

Hey there! My name is Matt and I've been gaming for something like 35 years. My two big loves are RPG's and table top wargaming. I've dabbled in a lot of different RPG systems but D&D has always been the go to game for me but, 3rd ed. was as far as I could go. I bought the AS&SH box set from Jeff about a week ago at Carnage Con. I have to say I haven't been this excited about an RPG since I was in the 5th grade battling giant toads outside the village of Hommlet!