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Hey, friends! Welcome to The Chimera! We're an actual play RPG podcast bringing you strange fiction across a variety of genres and role-playing systems. In this little pre-episode, we're going to do a quick rundown of our different campaigns to help folks figure out where they'd like to jump on, and then at the end a very very quick overview of what an actual play podcast is, for the uninitiated. You can also find more detailed breakdowns, complete with character descriptions and art, on our website, thechimera.space.

Our inaugural campaign is called The Old Bones. It's a superpowered science fiction game which takes place in an entirely home-brewed universe, drawing inspiration from cosmic Marvel & DC stories like Guardians of the Galaxy, New Gods, and Infinity Watch, where the setting is full of just about every kind of weridness you can think of, from space gods, to reality-bending technology, to living planets.

Like most podcasts, the audio early on is a bit rough. We're working on a remaster, but it's not a quick process, so if sound quality is a sticking point for you, we sometimes recommend episode 8 an an alternative starting point, or you can just try a different season!

Our second campaign is called Misplaced, which mixes the venerable Dungeons and Dragons campaign setting of Greyhawk with the surreal, conspiritorial mystery of Lost. Our ostensible heroes are trapped on a remote island filled with roaming terrors, bizarre magical architecture, and several hostile factions, but the greatest threat they face may be themselves.

After Misplaced comes The House of Black Lanterns, which is technically a spinoff, although it doesn't require a whole lot of context from Misplaced. The House of Black Lanterns is a haunted hotel and casino that exists on the fringes of reality, and plays host to all manner of fantastical beings who seek to play for strange and unnatural stakes.

We play the staff.

And then we have Gallows Hill, set in our version of the World of Darkness, and populated by werewolves, vampires, fairies, mages, and other, stranger things. Our story takes place in the city of Salem, which has become a kind of sanctuary for supernatural beings, largely safe from the turf wars and in-fighting they usually have to deal with. The trade-off is that they have to be even more careful about tipping off the mortal populace--and that's where the Gallows Hill Sanitary Commission comes in.

Gallows Hill also features a six-part world-building game, called Uncover Something Old. You can listen to it before starting Gallows Hill proper, but everything will still make sense if you decide to skip straight to the action.

If you're not familiar with an actual play--such as The Adventure Zone, Critical Role, Friends at the Table, or Rude Tales of Magic--the general pitch is this: we play a table top role playing game, and we record it. It's kind of like a communal storytelling exercise, but with structured rules and, usually, some dice to add an element on unpredictability. There's all sorts of different approaches, but we try to maintain a balance between narrative immersion and giving folks a sense of what it feel like to be at the table, engaged in the process.

I think that's all the important stuff, so I'll let get into the actual show now. If you'd like more information, you can find us online at thechimera.space. Enjoy!