Dragonmeet 2023’s Podcast Zone – A Terrific Showcase of UK Tabletop Talent

This year, I attended Dragonmeet for the first time and had an absolutely incredible time. This was mostly due to the Dragonmeet’s Podcast Zone, an area featuring stalls of tabletop podcasters, audio dramas and a wide selection of live shows.

This part of Dragonmeet was run by Fiona KT Howat, the producer of  ‘What Am I Rolling?’  and the DM’s Book Club. 

With so much to see and do, I’d like to share with you the amazing events I got to attend. This should give you a sense of what you can get out of future Dragonmeets and who to look out for on the UK Tabletop scene.

Paranoia: Simulacrum SuperGroup! with Naomi Clarke

This strangely named panel show provided heavily improvised and hilarious performance using the dystopian sci-fi tabletop game, Paranoia. Naomi Clarke, as the game’s host, played the role of ComputerFriend, an all powerful, all seeing intelligence. Struggling to survive her machinations were the performers; Nathan Blades, Laura Girling, Jess Jewel, Emily Bates, Chloe Mashiter, Dan Thompson and Edward Spence.

Due to the dangers they faced and the ruthlessness of ComputerFriend, the performers’ characters wouldn’t usually last long. However, the action was kept going with the cast rotating after every character death. This mean there were always three characters for ComputerFriend to ‘play’ with. To make things more interesting, characters could come back as clones. Each time this happened, they’d have to pick a new characteristic out of a hat. In short, this show is an improviser’s paradise! These characteristics included evil scientist, earnest but clumsy, banjo swamp guy and a bunch of rats in a trench coat!

Seeing such top quality performers deal with all these bizarre prompts and the wacky dangers Naomi threw at them was just incredible fun! It even made me wonder about getting Paranoia myself as a new way of terrorizing friends at parties!

Dungeons & Dragons – Return of the Panto with Modified Roll

Jordan Carmichael of Modified Roll had a special Christmas treat for us in the form of this Dungeons & Dragons pantomime! Accompanying him were Modified Roll co-star, Dani Williams as well as Liv Kennedy, Naomi Clarke and Emily Bates. Together, they took us on a festive adventure with more “Oh no he isn’t”s than you can shake a candy cane at!

(Credit for above photos – Matthew Bateman)

The show started with a rhyming call and response between Jordan and Naomi, the ‘secret’ villain of the story. We then arrive at the wedding of Snow White. Emily played a young prince hoping to find his one true love at this wedding. Meanwhile, Dani played the prince’s fairy godmother/patron. Liv meanwhile starred as the front half of a horse, with Naomi as the back half. This seemed to bemuse Jordan just as much as the audience! All this made for a hilarious take on the classic Christmas pantomime. It even came complete with audience call and responses and all of us using the macarena to bring the fairy godmother back to life!

Realms of Peril & Glory’s Liminal

Realms of Peril & Glory has become my favorite Actual Play podcast this year. Having already seen a live show of their Vael series at the London Podcast Festival, I was eager to catch a live show of their other main series; Liminal London. Liminal is a tabletop game the explores the boundary between the real world and the fantasy world. The setting, modern day UK, with sub-cultures of vampires, werewolves, wizards and the like. 

As with the pre-recorded shows, Zack Fortais-Gomm was the Game Master and was accompanied by regular cast; Liz Campbell, Pip Gladwin and Naomi Clarke. Props to Naomi for doing three shows in one day! Accompanying them was guest star, Grant Howitt, reprising his role of renegade wizard, Oliver Barker. In this story, Oliver was tasked with destroying the magical database used by the Council of Merlin in the British Library. To do this, he enlisted his former associates; Werewolf Mags Holt (Liz), Fae-cursed human detective Declan Buchannan (Pip) and his ne-er-do-well wizard cousin, Monty (Naomi).

The chemistry between the cast is always a joy to behold. Hijinks ranged from Monty trying to get everyone to play Wizard Settlers of Catan to the gang tripping over themselves to dispatch the wizarding interns guarding the library. Since they have already recorded episodes set after this show, poor Zack had to work extra hard to make sure that all this chaos stayed within the lore. Bravo Zack, bravo!

Knights of Potcedonia – Hosted by 3 Black Halflings

Dragonmeet’s final Podcast Zone tabletop show came courtesy of the 3 Black Halflings. This live tabletop actual play took us to the land of Potcedonia, a tiny food based civilization. We followed the story of the inhabitants of the kingdom of Crusteria, a land built out of the remains of a crusty old pie. Jasper William Cartwright GMed this session which starred fellow halfling, Liv Kennedy and guest stars Taylor Navarro, Shamini Bundell and Paul Foxcroft.

It was wonderful to see such creative character work as the players introduced us to who they’d be playing. This included Liv’s gravy-based amphibian, Taylor’s mini-Orc with pie foil armor, Shamini’s tiny owl-person in comically heavy armor and Paul’s translucent soup man.

The action commenced with the appearance of a mysterious professor who warned of a collapse of the world around them. To save the kingdom, our heroes embarked on a journey to the outer crust. There they encountered a possum and an eagle running amok across the realms of Potcedonia!

Like the pantomime, there were some brilliant moments of audience participation. This included us voting on the fate of the professor and rolling the giant d20 on behalf of NPCs. There were also some brilliant character moments throughout. Liv’s gravy based character kept dying and producing another clone of themself out of a gravy pond. Meanwhile Paul’s character defied all explanation with his ability to carry other creatures in his body and his game-breaking spatula sunbeam staff. This was some beautiful character work as Shamini trying to earn Taylor’s respect, whilst Taylor tried to let them down gently. Eventually, Shamini’s owl-person rose to the challenge of protecting Crusteria, launching themself out of a gravy canon at the possum to tame it and win the day!

Free Roaming

Dragonmeet’s reputation of being Britain’s friendliest gaming convention felt very well deserved as I wandered around between shows.

Throughout the day, there was an excited buzz from both attendees and industry professionals.  As mentioned in a previous Dragonmeet article, the event is spread out between different rooms and halls. This made it easier for people to interact with one another without becoming overwhelmed. 

I got to meet up with familiar contacts like the Backwater Bastards and, when she had a moment, Fiona Howat. But I also got to discover new creators such as Of Dice and Them and We Fix Space Junk. On top of that, I got to talk to Daniel Hand, the RPG Therapist about his use of Tabletop games in therapy. I’m looking forward to catching up with these folks in the new year and telling you all about the great stuff they’re doing!

Dragonmeet will be returning next December, hopefully with the Podcast Zone returning to showcase more UK tabletop talent. Until then, keep an eye on KeenGamer for more from the world of entertainment and gaming!

Credit to Ryan Reed Photography (@RyanReedPhotos on Instagram) and Electro-Voice (@electrovoiceofficial on Instagram) for the photos used in this article unless otherwise stated.