Six Of The Best With 'DOC' HOLADAY

'Doc' Holaday is the host of the brilliant Gaming Ether slot on the Midnight's Lair gaming podcast. In his segment, Doc gives ideas and suggestions for using storytelling elements from American 'old time radio' (from the '20s to '50s) in roleplaying games.

(1) Which came first for you – old time radio (OTR) or role-playing games? And how were you introduced to both?

Technically, gaming came first for me. I started playing D&D with the Basic Set in 1978, the one with the blue, monochromatic rulebook cover. I quickly progressed to the 1st Edition AD&D books and Traveller. (I remember others, but those were my favorites.)

Long before that, however, I used to fall asleep listening to story records. Those old story records had a lot in common with the radio dramas of the 1950's and a few were even straight repackaging of radio shows.

The farm house I grew up in had only four other houses within a mile of it in any direction. Without any nearby cities, the light pollution was nonexistent, and the nights were so inky black you literally couldn't see your own hand waving in front of your face. I can remember lying on my back, eyes open but staring at nothing at all, while I listened to the records. It was great training for the imagination. As I grew up, though, I felt kind of silly listening to those old records, so I put them away.

Later, in high school, I also packed up my role playing games. There was a LOT of pressure in the early 1980's to hide one's gaming interests. It was definitely not cool, socially. Also, I grew up in small-town, Fundamentalist, Bible Belt America, where admitting I was into role playing games would have been an open invitation for our pastor to drop by for an exorcism. I'm still a little bitter about that side of my upbringing.

My escapist sweet tooth through this period was largely satisfied with a gross amount of reading. Thank goodness for Tolkien, Silverberg, McCaffery, Zelazney, Lieber, and all my other paperback friends!

I was about 25 when I picked up gaming again. I think it started with the Beta version of Magic the Gathering and Warhammer miniatures. Shortly thereafter I dived back into Call of Cthulhu and D&D.

At the time, I was commuting to work about 40 minutes each way and became addicted to audiobooks, borrowed from the local library.

Buying my first MP3 player in 1999 threw gas on this fire. A year or so after acquiring the audibook habit, though, I moved. My long commute became a 5 minute hop and my son started walking and talking.

This left me with only fragments of free time and listening to audiobooks became a very disjointed experience. I discovered The Cobalt Club on the Internet and downloaded Nero Wolfe and Dimension X, two wonderful old time radio series. The half hour format of these shows fit my available time a lot better, and it didn't take me long to get hooked from that point.

Shortly thereafter I started running a blog called Gwangi's Radio Review, in which I talked about what I was listening to and shared my OTR MP3 files with other fans. The site became very popular. I have since taken it down, but it used to consistently be in the first three Google hits for any search for OTR material and about 700 unique IP addresses hit it daily.

(2) At what point did you realise that old time radio was such a rich source of gaming material?

I was teaching a course on the history of radio and on radio drama to some Honors students at my college when I had an epiphany about the relationship between the two hobbies. I believe I was talking about the "Theater of the Mind" when I realized what was wrong with the gaming sessions I had been running lately.

I am a very visual person; in fact, my first college degree is in Drawing. At the time, I had been relying heavily on miniatures, maps, and visual aids as a GM to shape the stories that were being gamed out in my group. In class, I was pointing out to my students that most OTR fans liked to listen to shows in the dark, because they discovered their imagination worked better without too much visual distraction, when I thought, "Aha!"

I immediately began applying this theory to my gaming and went with a much more minimalistic approach from a tactile standpoint. By reducing the amount of visual stimulation, I was hoping to increase their active imagination. (This seems counterintuitive at first, but it works.) I remember what a relief it was to stop lugging whole tackleboxes of figures and gigantic battlemats around!

It's not that visuals are bad, but they can become a real crutch. I use them much more judiciously now and find that play at the table is faster, more dynamic, and more creative than it was before. Prior to this revolution in my GMing style, my decisions about what story elements to offer the players were being driven by what miniatures and maps I had on hand. A great deal of prep time was spent sorting out these materials and I wasted a lot of precious game time setting them up too.

After this general epiphany, I found a lot of other bits of ideas from OTR creeping into my games.

(3) In all the roleplaying games you have run, can you describe a single incident that best illustrates the benefits of using old time radio tropes?

No, I can't actually. I have racked my brain for a funny story or one really good example of how OTR has affected my games. What I keep coming back to, though, is the fact that it has radically affected my overall style more than any single encounter. I am better at dialogue and voices now. My retinue of characters (PC and NPC alike) are more varied and interesting. I use sound fx and description a lot more effectively than I used to.

My pacing is better, and I am more adept at searching for and finding moments of drama during play. Combat is a prime example. I don't let battles get bogged down in an I-swing-you-swing cycle where the most dramatic thing is watching hit point totals drop. Instead, I try to make sure battles happen in dramatic physical spaces, like lava pits, bridges, slippery tiles next to open sewers, etc.

I also use sound fx, morale, witty banter, expository dialogue, dirty tricks, and other elements to spice up nearly every slugfest. My goal is for each encounter to be something more than just a means to drain party resources. This is true of non-physical conflict as well.

(4) What inspired you to transform your passion for old time radio and roleplaying games into The Gaming Ether segment of The Midnight’s Lair podcast?

I caught onto podcasting pretty early. I used to listen to Geek Speak (later Boardgame Speak) in the fall of 2004, and I got to thinking about how easy it would be to do my own show.

I recorded an anniversary show for Gwangi's Radio Review in may of 2005, in which I talked over the Green Lama radio dramas with a friend of mind who was into comics. It was several years, though, before I caught onto the idea of making a mini podcast about old time radio and gaming.

Not only was I interested in podcasting, in general, I was also looking for another way to spread the OTR listening hobby. The MP3 revolution has really expanded the fan base for OTR drama, because most of the shows are in the public domain and can be easily and freely traded through the Internet.

My blog, Gwangi's Radio Review, had hundreds of regular followers, but they were mostly people who were already fans of Old Time Radio. This was true of the other OTR sites I frequented as well. I kept noticing the same usernames. We were becoming kind of a closed group, and it occured to me that I could cross-pollinate the two hobby populations by recording my ideas for a gaming audience.

I approached a couple of podcasts that were just starting up, and Midnight's Lair was the first to act interested. This was great, because of the two or three that I tried to feel out, ML was my first choice.

(5) What plans do you have to develop The Gaming Ether, for instance would you ever consider making it a standalone podcast?

I have considered making a standalone podcast, but not by lengthening the Gaming Ether. That segment will continue to be a short piece that regularly appears on The Midnight's Lair. (Unless they kick me out.)

I really love what those guys do and feel a lot of loyalty to them for including me. If I do something on my own, it will be similar, but not the same.

Lately I have been thinking about recording dramatized summaries of my games with players from the gaming group delivering their own best lines.

Spirit of the Century would be ideal for this, but other games might work equally well. My big concern is that it might devolve into a self-absorbed exercise, like some nerd droning on and on about his 18th level, dragon-riding paladin.

I'd probably add some sort of breakdown after the summary that discussed mechanical solutions and good GM techiques. I have another idea for a simple 10 minute podcast featuring cool ideas for GM's.

I have actually typed up notes for four of five of these segments. One, for instance, describes an NPC gang of roof-running halfling thieves I created, called the 'Sweeps (short for Chimney Sweeps).

Another is on setting up a campaign world around the old wizard-sorcerer rivalry. Time is a problem for me right now, though. I am changing jobs and moving to San Diego this summer, so I'll have to wait until I get grounded out there before embarking on a project of any serious scope.

(6) If someone was interested in finding out more about old time radio, where would recommend they start – any particular websites or shows they look out for?

I like OTR-TNT. I have found that group to be extremely generous with their files. I believe they trade through file://www.mediamax.com/, which used to be Streamload and is a pay-by-month file sharing service. The Internet Archive of Old Time Radio Drama is also a good place to dive for files, and it's completely free. The only problem is that you will be fishing without guidance.

If people decide to go this route, I would recommend some of the following series, by genre:

Western = Gunsmoke, The Six Shooter, or Fort Laramie
Crime = Nero Wolfe, Pete Kelly's Blues, and Box 13
Science Fiction = Dimension X and X Minus One
Comedy = My Favorite Husband, You Bet Your Life, Jack Benny, and the Bickersons on the Drene Time show
Children = Cinammon Bear, Let's Pretend, and the Minnesota School of the Air
Horror/Suspense = Escape, Suspense, and Frankenstein
Drama = Lux Radio Theater, CBS Radio Workshop, and Mercury Theater.

OTR Cat is a good place to get started if you don't have a great Internet connection. You can download free samples of various shows from there, and the collection at the site is nicely organized. Discs cost $5 each and the owner sends a sampler with each order. Also, a great place to research shows is at the radio GOLDINdex.

If anyone gets hooked, I would encourage them to stop by the Gaming Ether blog and tell me about it.