Dungeons & Dragons Podcasts are Immersive Gaming Experiences

On Thursday, August 17th The Adventure Zone completed their last adventure in The Balance Arc campaign.

This podcast began almost three years ago in December 2014. It has over 5,000 five star ratings on iTunes and close to 3,000 reviews. The podcast is hosted by brothers Griffin, Travis, and Justin McElroy and their father Clint McElroy. In this podcast, Travis, Justin, and Clint play through a Dungeons & Dragons campaign dm’d by Griffin.

The Adventure Zone is one of the most popular Dungeons & Dragon podcasts. The show’s Twitter has over seventy-eight thousand followers.

This podcast has gained a large fandom. The Adventure Zone is now present at conventions in the form of cosplay and art.

Bre Aubertin and Brooke Aubertin cosplaying as Magnus Burnsides and Taako from The Adventure Zone at Megacon 2017. May 28, 2017. (Photo: Mal Carney)

Podcasting is an increasingly popular form of entertainment media. These productions range from comedic, to cultural, to educational, to political, and more. There are many Dungeons & Dragons podcasts for fans to choose from.

Natural 20Somethings is a “dnd5e actual play podcast.” The show features John Farnsworth, Emily Mckeown, John Michals, Caitlin O’Meally, and Trevor Wade.

“Trevor invited us all to be a part of the podcast because he was listening to The Adventure Zone (by the McElroy Brothers) as they were playing The Lost Mines of Phandelver (which they pretty quickly got away from) and was struck that he didn't know anyone else recording the other book adventures. He'd been wanting to put together an Out of the Abyss campaign and since most of us are performers he asked if we'd mind recording it. As a long time fan of the Adventure Zone and other things like Critical Role I was excited to get to be a part of it,” McKeown states.

McKeown plays a half-orc sorcerer named Valva.

“I came up with the character for Valva because I was reading the players handbook and saw that Half-Orcs reach adulthood at 14. I started thinking about it, wondering if they were adults the same way human beings are supposed to be adults at 18, or 21 and thinking back to how adult I felt at 18 and how very, very wrong I was. I wanted to build a character around that feeling of misplaced maturity, and I wanted to play a caster. So I started thinking, well, how did this lady get her magic? If we're continuing with this theme then the deal with a demon origin made a lot of sense for me, and gave me something to work toward, character growth-wise. And now we've been playing long enough, I've spent enough time with her that I love her so, so much. I'm so happy to get to play with her every week,” McKeown states.

The Adventure Zone and Natural 20Somethings are not the only Dungeons & Dragons podcasts. Critical Role, They See Me Rollin, Drunks and Dragons, and ZeroD20 Fracturia are just a few of the many DnD podcasts available.

These podcasts are created by fans for fans. DnD podcasts demonstrate the passion, creativity, and socialization that is inherent to role-playing games.

“The interactive storytelling aspect of DnD makes it perfect for a radio play/podcast format. It really reminds me of old-school radio plays back before television. Because the DM is forced to describe everything in such detail, and the players have to as well you are painting such an elaborate picture with words you don't really need to see anything to get the whole experience. That said, things like Critical Role or HarmonQuest are also tons of fun, the first because they're all voice actors and are used to messing around in that world, the second because they go the extra mile and animate the radio play they already have going to give and even richer picture,” McKeown states.

Podcasts can be found on many platforms including iTunes, SoundCloud, Stitcher, and more.

Do you listen to podcasts? If so what type of podcasts do you listen to? What subject matters should podcasts cover? Share your thoughts in the comments.

Edit: In the second paragraph Clint McElroy was misnamed as "Cliff" McElroy. This mistake has been fixed as of 8/26/2017

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