Planet Arcana | Official Trailer Transcript

4000 years after a calamity known as The Big Oops, Planet Arcana is thriving once more.

Across the continent, citizens both Android and Human alike are preparing for a year of festivities, pomp and ceremony in worship of their pantheon, the Major Arcana.

No city parties as hard as Troponeo Vega, and no party is as wild as the one held at the beginning of each 22-year cycle, when the famous and wealthy gather at Riskotheque Casino to witness the spinning of the Wheel of Fortune. Rumor has that this year, a very special auction will take place. Rumor has it that several notable and interested parties will be present.

Among them, an influencer rogue, a contraband distributing barbarian, and a stargazing cowboy druid have somehow secured VIP invites. The fools. How could they possibly know what they're getting into?

This is Planet Arcana: a tightly edited, Actual Play, Dungeons & Dragons podcast. 

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D&D is, in essence, a game where people tell a long-form story together. There are two roles in the game - the dungeon masters or DMs who set up the world and the scenarios, and the players, who react to the setting created by the DM. Typically, a group of players will have one DM, but we're trying something different by having two, working together.

While the storytelling is collaborative, the most exciting part is not knowing how something will turn out - persuading or deceiving a foe, recalling knowledge, investigating a crime scene... Many events or decisions that impact the story are partially left to chance - in our case, the roll of a dice. If a player wants to try something interesting or risky, the DMs will ask them to make a check: for instance, a deception check when lying to a guard, or an investigation check when searching for clues, an Insight check to intuit the intentions of a hard to read character  - that sort of thing.

The player rolls a 20 sided die, adds any bonuses their character may have, declares the results, and the DMs decide what happens from there. It’s a give and take - the players and DMs throw things at the wall, keep the best parts, and add an element of chaos and chance through dice rolls.

The best thing a player can roll on a d20 is a 20 (aka Natural 20, aka a critical success). The worst is a 1 (aka a Natural 1, aka a critical failure).

The game we've planned takes place in a world where Humans and Androids coexist: a futuristic fantasy setting. The gods of our world are the Major Arcana of a Tarot Card deck.

Everything else, you'll pick up along the way. Join us as three adventurers embark on a heist, and find themselves up to their necks in something much darker. Join us on Planet Arcana.