SPEAKER_02 0:00

We got lit at litrpg con. And there's the opening crack. Welcome everybody to another episode of Barbs and Barrels. I'm Ross Druce, along with me, as always, Phil Boon. Crawler Phil. How's it going, bud? Good, Ross. You?

SPEAKER_01 0:22

I'm doing all right.

SPEAKER_02 0:23

Feels weird to be back.

SPEAKER_03 0:26

Amongst non-nerds, maybe?

SPEAKER_02 0:29

Amongst non-nerds. I don't know. I think everybody in this room is a nerd, as far as I had to go to work today. That's true. And I it did occur to me at one point that we have been together five like the last six days. So I've I've had my Phil share of Phil. Hey. So what we're here tonight is uh speaking of the reason we've been together for the last few days, uh, Phil and I had the opportunity to go to Denver, Colorado to lit RPG Con this year, and it was quite an experience.

SPEAKER_03 1:00

It was everything I was hoping it would be, and probably more. I've never been to a con though, so like I wasn't exactly sure what to expect, right? But the access that we had going in to be able to meet idols, in essence, right? Like people that I look up to and that have written books that I absolutely love was crazy just being that close to them.

SPEAKER_02 1:26

I agree. And I've been I've been to like fan expos before. And you know, the the general feeling when you go to a fan expo is like sure, you might be able to see some of your favorite stars or something like that, but unless you're willing to pay, you're not going to meet them. You're not gonna be shaking people's hands or anything like that. That was the complete opposite of this convention. Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:46

Uh signatures, pictures, right? We didn't pay for any of that.

SPEAKER_02 1:50

No. And there was even books we didn't pay for.

SPEAKER_03 1:52

Like there were they were handing out books. I think I came home with more books I didn't pay for than that I did.

SPEAKER_02 1:57

Yeah, I I would agree with that. Uh let's talk a little bit about pros and cons of this. I think the first pro we already mentioned is just general access to authors, writers, narrators.

SPEAKER_03 2:07

Narrators, yeah. Yeah, I uh agree. Um one on the con side. I think that so this was the second year of lit RPG con and it's growing at such a rapid pace that I already think they're pushing the boundaries of the space that they're in. I agree. But it sounds like a future that may work itself out. I know they're gonna be there next year still because they're in contract.

SPEAKER_02 2:31

Well, and I'd say that's probably uh one of very few cons that I can think of, is like just the sheer amount of people was not ideal for the space that they were in. But what are you gonna do if you signed a contract for three years to hold it there? It's not like you're gonna up and move just because you got a bunch of people coming.

SPEAKER_03 2:47

So no, and uh Denver's easy to get to, right? I mean, there's an airport if you need to fly, it's drivable for a good portion of the country. So I as far as a location goes, it was great. There's good access to restaurants there, anything like that was no problem. Lodging was easy on that side, like that was a great pro.

SPEAKER_02 3:06

Uh and okay, I don't want to back up too hardcore into general thoughts here for a second um uh of the event, but I was pleasantly surprised with how much I learned. Like it was not a con that I went into it thinking, hey, I'm gonna learn a whole lot while I'm here. And and I think back to our episode where we we did our like pseudo-review of of Dungeon Crawler Carl, and we announced that we were going to lit RPG con. And like thinking back to that, we talked about like what is lit RPG. I have a different definition of that now than I did at that point because we learned there like what it truly is, and then even learned terms like crunchy, the and then the opposite of crunchy of what it is. Is it smooth, creamy? What is it? Uh, I I don't know if that's something we want to talk about here necessarily, but it's just I again I didn't pancers, yes. Uh outliners, which you can kind of guess what that probably is, but just a lot of things that I didn't expect. This this was like structured like a work conference with the fun and stuff of a nerd conference.

SPEAKER_03 4:09

That's true. I so if you've never been, which I hadn't until this year, right? I sort of didn't know what to expect. It's almost like it's a con for authors and narrators who are trying to hone their craft. So a lot of the panels that we got to go to were you know about things like hey, what happens when your you know side character becomes a main character? Or hey, you know, how do you write a villain? Like what does that look like? How do you keep them interesting? And it was fantastic to kind of get a glimpse inside the minds of what an author would do. And you know, for us guys that DM a lot of times too, there were a lot of takeaways from those sessions too, as far as your planning goes, like, oh well, that'd be a cool angle for a villain. Or how to how do you keep a villain in pace with an overpowered party? Right. Right.

SPEAKER_02 4:57

Yeah, and and I think I think you hit it on the head there. I think you know, if you if you go to it strictly as a TTRPG fan, uh you might be a little lost potentially. But I think there were, like you and I did, we found ways to get takeaways from that. Like we went to we went to sessions with content creators to kind of get some ideas for like how we do the show, but then we also went to things where I think I feel like we tried to pick general enough panels that it was more about the storytelling so we could potentially take little nuggets back to use within our our own storytelling.

SPEAKER_03 5:30

I I would agree. Um speaking of the panels, did you have a favorite that we went to? Oh gosh. Uh I think they were all good. Um I I don't know. What about you? Let me come back to me first. I there's a couple that I really, really enjoyed, but the one that kind of like sticks out in my mind, I think the most was actually the one about using like pet companions, sort of, or like animal companions in your stories. And how basically a lot of the authors introduce a pet or something like that to kind of play on people's emotions, in essence. Like it's kind of the softened blows of things and and just like you can kill a room full of kids, and people are like, Okay, you kill like one pet, and people are like lose their minds all of a sudden. And they kind of like talked about how that just plays into their stories. Yeah. I really enjoyed that panel.

SPEAKER_02 6:25

Uh I think we went to the one where it was about like the hero has to bleed or the good guy has to bleed.

SPEAKER_04 6:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 6:30

And I I think too often in D D and really any TTRPG, like we we get lost in the you're a hero, and we don't we don't bleed enough, or we don't throw things hard enough at them to like really ground them in some ways. And they talked about like not falling into that trope in a lot of ways, and that's that was my takeaway is like I need to be harsher on you guys, uh, when especially when you're becoming OP'd.

SPEAKER_03 6:55

So I think it it creates better room for character growth, right? Like if they actually have to struggle, it's like you actually had to overcome something to show that growth instead of just oh hey, you you know, you leveled, congrats. Right, 100%.

SPEAKER_02 7:08

Well, and it's interesting that like you even use that as an example because like that's a like a core tenet of like a crunchy lit RPG is you know, you leveled up, here's your options, blah blah blah, and all those things. So it's like it's just funny you mention that. So what is crunchy? So crunchy would be okay. So we gotta back up slightly here. So lit RPG, the general definition that I get is it's an RPG style book, but it has uh the stats from like a TTRPG, but then also has a system AI. And then so that's like the the broad foundational definition of lit RPG. Now, there's different versions of that. A crunchy lit RPG would be ones that is is one that is very stat heavy. And like let's say you level up. Uh, I'm gonna list out in the book what all your options are when you level up and what you're selecting and why. That is a crunchy. Uh Dungeon Crawler Carl, for all you out there who have already read Dungeon Crawler Carl, that's probably somewhere between like the creamy, cozy uh lit RPGs and the crunchy lit RPGs.

SPEAKER_03 8:14

It it starts a little more crunchy too, and the further along in the book you get, yeah, it moves away. Now, like He Who Fights with Monsters, I'm still in book one, but it's crunchier than DCC. Yeah. Like the magic system's a little bit more complex, and all that's listed out as he works through it. But I think that I learned this week that I like crunchy.

SPEAKER_02 8:33

True. I I I I do too. I I actually I think I I'm I'm a little right of crunchy. I I'm in that DCC area post book one, two. I like I like where it goes. I don't want too much, but I like a little bit. Sure. If that makes sense. Okay. Uh unsurprisingly, uh, because this is a convention where a lot of nerdy people are, uh, you beautiful nerdy people, uh, there was some cosplay going on, Phil. What was uh your favorite cosplay? Oh man. You can't count your own. I and yours was fantastic. I give you all the bonus points for that.

SPEAKER_03 9:08

Thank you. It was not my favorite though. So okay, good for you. There are several. And I'm not sure. Uh truthfully, I think it is probably the slugalos. So, like on the first day, there were three girls that dressed up as slugolos, and that one was pretty good. But the next day, they were also like Amani, Ellie, and a foot yes, a giant. That was pretty good. Yeah, that was fantastic. Um there was a creepy as hell Samantha one.

SPEAKER_02 9:34

Well, there's a creepy as hell Samantha. Oh, yeah, she even creeped out Deniman. Yeah, it it was give you nightmares level. That's true. Uh, which was funny, but there were several Samanthas around. And then I think there was even a uh uh There's a Quasar. Serena Signet. Oh, there was a Quasar, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 9:51

There was a Serena. Big Tina.

SPEAKER_02 9:54

Big Tina, yes, we saw Tina walking around. Um, was there any ones? Yes, and there was a Raul too. Yes, I forgot about that. Yeah, you pretty much took all mine, but that's fine. I'm sorry.

SPEAKER_03 10:05

There were and there were like, you know, 50 Carls.

SPEAKER_02 10:08

There were a ton of Carls, yes, in male and female versions of Carl. So uh, but I okay, now that you say it though, I think Amani might be my favorite one.

SPEAKER_03 10:18

There were two like really, really good Amani's I feel like that were there.

SPEAKER_02 10:22

And some of that stems from, and I told you this when we were there. Like, I for whatever reason do not picture Amani how she actually is, like with the butterfly wings and the skull face. Right. That is not for and I and I can't even honestly tell you what uh I picture her like when I read the book or listen to the book, but it's not that. And so I'm always like, oh, that's really cool.

SPEAKER_03 10:43

You know which one you reminded me of too? There was a Lucia Mar. Remember that? Yes, it was had the skull mask. Yes. Oh, that was super creepy. I'd say that one was really good too. Yeah, that was that was a good one too. And there were about a bunch of other cosplayers from like other books that I have yet to read, but now have in my stack to read as well that I didn't recognize all of, but uh we do need to talk about something uh before before we get to uh talking about our favorite book we picked up because it is a book and author convention.

SPEAKER_02 11:11

And you know, we obviously brought home over well over a dozen books apiece. Uh let's talk a little bit about meeting Matt Deniman. Because this this this is a big deal. This is a big deal for us. Um, and we had the opportunity to talk to him twice. And we got super lucky. And one of them, I and I gotta just tell the story. So we we had uh, I don't know, we had gone to a session, we had heard about Discount Dan. So I'm gonna start there. And Phil and I, we had gone and dropped off books and we were coming back to the convention. And the author of Discount Dan, I can't think of his name at that right off the top of my head here. Uh, we ran into him on the corner of the street, and you were like, Hey, that's the guy that wrote Discount Dan. I was like, Yeah. And you were like, Hey, let's go see if he'll sign our uh we have a uh uh Dungeon Anarchist cooking Dungeon Anarchist cookbook, and we had him sign it for us. And so that was really fantastic. So it was like, you know, man, fate was smiling upon us because we never did see him the rest of the show. Uh so he didn't sign our book, but he signed our James Hunter, maybe James Hunter. James Hunter, okay. Uh, but then we had gone back inside and you and I were standing in the lobby, and we were like, oh, we need to figure out where our next session is gonna go. And I turned around and I went, Phil, Matt's standing right over there. And you go, Oh, expletive. It is Matt. Should we go talk to him? I was like, why not? Like he was chatting with somebody, but it was only one person. It wasn't like there was a crowd around him. So we took, we shot our, we shot our shot and uh we gave him a bars and barrels hat, which he promptly uh was like, okay, cool, and took the sticker off, put the hat on, was like, let's take a picture. And then so that that was really cool. We we did introduce ourselves in there too. So we talked a little bit uh briefly and we told him, you know, we have a signing with you later, we don't want to take up a ton of your time, but you know, we were gonna give you a hat if we had the chance. And so we went through that. So really cool experience to right off the get-go. And then later in the day, we actually had an official we had tickets to an official signing with we did not have to pay for, correct. Uh yeah, uh definite pro. Uh, and then we got to go up and meet him again. Both of us did. Uh, if you haven't seen the pictures on our social media, go check it out. But just a cool little one-on-one experience that we both got to have and we took some cool pictures from. So very gracious dude. Uh, I know you know there's people out there that always say, you know, don't meet your heroes because they're not going to be what you expect. I think Matt Dinnama is the complete opposite, is the vibe I got.

SPEAKER_03 13:35

Yeah, I I would agree too. I mean, he I never watched him turn away anyone the whole time. Correct. I agree. At any time. He was sitting behind the trap set at one point in time before one of the s uh panels he was on, and people were coming up to the trap set, and he would lean over the drums and sign things for them. So he just I think he knows the the you know 10 million copies of his book that he sold over the last year that he has to be thankful to the fans. And absolutely he is. I mean, and uh truthfully, I would say relatively humble guy. Like he totally all of our interactions with him, he's very down to earth. So just cool. Once again, like one of the few places I feel like you can gain that kind of access.

SPEAKER_02 14:17

Yeah. Well, and and like I I well, when we met him in the signing line, uh, I I knew for a while back he had made a post, and it was about how book six was dedicated to his dad. Uh and his dad was a Vietnam vet, served in the army, and I had started reading this series when my dad got sick and then eventually passed away. And like reading these books helped me through a very tough time, and I was telling him that. And then like he's reacting to me telling him that, and it's like I'm trying not to like break down and cry in front of in front of a guy who I feel like is definitely one of my idols right now. And so it was just a really and he said he was sorry about my dad, shook my hand. I was like, it was a great moment, and it's it's also very cool to say, you know, I bonded with one of my favorite authors for a brief moment. So it's like, oh, that's crazy.

SPEAKER_03 15:02

So it is, it is, it was it was a cool moment.

SPEAKER_02 15:05

It was it was it was yeah, I I yeah, top ten moments, probably at least after my kids being born, being married. Yeah, and probably you're married. Yeah, that's gotta be up there too. But it puts it at least. It puts it at least number four, so it could go up there pretty high. Uh okay, so let's let's talk about uh of the dozen or so books we brought home, which one are you most excited to read?

SPEAKER_03 15:25

Okay, well, I can't say he who fights with monsters because I'm in the middle of it, but I think after that, um it's one of two. It's either uh discount Dan, just because it got hyped, I feel like, really well at the conference, and I'm excited to read it. Or um that TJ Lombardi book, Gollum Master. One the one where he gave us the card with it too. Yep. Um he was doing a signing at his table, and someone's like, Hey, do you want a free book? Yes, sure. Yes, I do. So they ushered us over there, and he's like, Do you guys like Pokemon? I'm like, my kids are huge into Pokemon right now, so I'm like cultivating that love for them. And uh this book that he wrote is like part that, part like two or three other things. Um, so it's geared towards a younger audience, though. So it's a book that I can actually read with my kids. That'll that'll be a fun experience. One of those two. Those are the two I'm most excited about right now.

SPEAKER_02 16:19

Yeah. Uh I have two as well. Um, one of which is uh is discount down. And the reason I'm excited to read that is like the very first session we went to, which was actually content creators talking about their favorite lit RPG books. Um, one of the guys there, can't remember his name, I think his name was Brian. Uh, he said that back in 2020, he basically predicted that Dungeon Crawler Carl was going to be the next, it was gonna be the lit RPG book that like exploded and put them on the scene. Well, guess what? He was right. Uh so he said, you know, in 2026, I'm gonna say it's discount Dan's gonna be the next one. And I read the first couple pages when we were in line somewhere and I had it with me. Uh and I'm I'm just really excited to dive into that book. The other one would be Heretical Fishing. I I am very curious about that one too. I haven't even opened that one yet, but I'm excited to potentially look into that one as well. Yes, I forgot about that one too. Yeah. All right, yay or nay on the whole thing, Phil.

SPEAKER_03 17:15

Oh, yay for sure. My wife already asked me. She's like, is this an every year thing? I said, yeah, I'm pretty sure it is.

SPEAKER_01 17:22

Uh question from over here. Oh, yeah. Phil. Oh, hi Brett. I'm here. I'm here. Sitting off on the side. Uh, Phil. The shirt. You gotta tell us. Oh, oh, oh.

SPEAKER_00 17:34

People have been waiting, watching this whole episode, wondering what in the world is going on.

SPEAKER_03 17:39

Phil's moist. Uh so Dakota Kraut had a pre-launch party for one of his new book series. Um I had the name of it earlier and I just lost it. It was the the Challenger series? Challenge?

SPEAKER_02 17:50

No, I'll have to Well here, turn around, it's on your back.

SPEAKER_03 17:52

No, it doesn't actually say the name of it.

SPEAKER_02 17:53

Oh, it doesn't. Oh, oh, any any blabber red.

SPEAKER_03 17:56

Uh he's launching this new book, and actually, it just got picked up by a um Penguin Random House. Yes, correct. Yep. Um and apparently I haven't read it yet. I bought this one to read, but he is trying to cultivate a following of Moisties. So when you purchase his book there, you got one of these shirts uh that entered you in a raffle, which is partially also why I bought it. But uh I also I Dakota Kraut's one of the first lit RPG authors that I actually had read before. So he has like a Dungeon Horn series and a completionist chronicle series. Chance Encounter.

SPEAKER_02 18:33

Chance Encounter series, yes.

SPEAKER_03 18:35

Chance Encounter series.

SPEAKER_02 18:36

Knew it would come to me. Uh I also have one of these shirts. I did not wear it tonight. But no moisty tonight. Actually, we should I should have planned that better. We probably both should have worn that.

SPEAKER_03 18:47

We could have been moist together. I thought about bringing my discount Dan Crown too, but gift that.

SPEAKER_02 18:53

Mine's upstairs too. Yay or nay Ross. Uh definite, definite yay. Um, I I think this is one of those conferences that could ebb and flow a little bit. It's gonna be its popularity is gonna be somewhat dependent on. Well, from what we saw, these are authors that crank a lot of books out. But but it could ebb and flow a little bit with popularity. Like once Matt's done with the Dungeon Crawler Carl series, and does something step up and truly take its place to keep the the lit RPG momentum going. Sure. It certainly feels that way, but only time will truly tell whether that's the case. Am I excited to go back to this conference? Yes, I'm hoping we can take a couple of the guys, including Brett, with us. I think that would be fantastic.

SPEAKER_01 19:35

I'm so jealous, I want to go.

SPEAKER_02 19:38

Uh, not to mention just, you know, a fun road trip out would be fun as well. So I think that's it's gonna be great. That's gonna do it for this episode of Bards and Barrels season five will launch in early September, so get excited about that. Don't forget to subscribe to the channel. We'd love it if you joined us on our social channels as well Facebook, Threads, Instagram at Bards and Barrels. Until next time, me your nice to be hot and your beer to go.