#podcaster tips

Awesome! Share your art! This is going to be my little guide of recommendations as someone who used to work in radio and has been involved with a couple of radio plays and online play readings.

Step one: You are good enough.

The first step is to not get discouraged. You may not be the next Critical Role or The Adventure Zone, but you will have a podcast project. The first priority should be a philosophy of sharing rather than ambition of success. Even if you don’t amass a following, you will be sharing a piece of yourself, and that is always something to be admired.

Step two: Set clear expectations with your players.

Making a podcast of a d&d campaign is harder than running a home game. There are a lot of things that you have to take into account during a recording session that aren’t that important in your everyday game.

This is a performance. Players need to be focused on you and the game.

Eating makes sounds that can be picked up by the microphones.

Your levels may be overwhelmed by the dice, consider using dice pads.

You and your players have to be understood, and it has to be clear when they are in character and out of character.

No matter how much you think you won’t, you will have to edit some sections.

If players are talking over each other or having outside of game conversations, it will be picked up by the microphone and it will disturb the flow of the game.

Step three: The equipment and software.

As I said in the previous section, you and your players have to be heard and understood. To that end, you will need to have the right equipment to make that happen. Here is what you will need:

A microphone. Do some research on what microphone to get. It will have to be better than one that is connected on a set of headphones, but you don’t necessarily have to break the bank for a good one.

Audacity open source audio editing software.

This is the program I used to edit all of my pre-recorded radio segments and I still use it when I have to edit any kind of audio. It has a bit of a learning curve, but once you get used to it it has almost unlimited potential.

(it is also super useful for untraceably pirating music)

A room with minimal background noise.

Ideally, you will want a soundproofed room with no windows, but that is not possible for most people. Record some sample audio in different rooms in your house and see what works best. You’ll be able to tell the difference.

A padded dice box or a dice mat.

You do not want to be rolling your dice straight on a table next to a microphone, it will be loud and will be jarring to people listening to the recording.

Step four: Get used to your voice on recording.

We all hate our voices on recording. I had a recurring segment on a local radio station for four years and I deeply hated the way I sounded. It is just something you need to get used to. If you are going to use a character voice, rehearse it. Troubleshoot it in the recording software. See if you can get it to sound the way you want it to. If you are dming, you have your work cut out for you. I would recommend pre-writing introductions and very important pieces of description because once you are on recording, you will forget everything you wanted to say WAY more often.

Step five: Editing

You’ve gotten your first session out of the way! Yay! You might be tempted to just upload it and be done, but that is not going to be the best decision. Here are a few things to do to make the quality just a little bit better.

Get a background noise profile.

Open the audio file in audacity and open the effects tab.

It will ask you to get a noise profile, select a section of the audio where no one is speaking. (Ideally a period of around 10 seconds where everyone is quiet.)

The program will isolate the sounds present in that 10 seconds and do its best to remove those sounds from the whole sound profile.

Normalize.

If a few of your players are slightly quieter than your louder players, there is a tool in the effects window called “Normalize.”

This will take all of the audio in the file and standardize it at a volume you choose (measured in decibels). It will boost quieter voices and bring down the volume of louder voices while keeping things like shouting distinct. Be careful, but it is fairly easy to understand.

Compress.

This effect will reduce clipping (I will explain later). It brings any very loud sounds into a safer range for the ear and brings very quiet sounds up to be audible.

Beware of clipping.

If the spikes on the audio file’s waveform go above a certain point, we call this clipping. It will distort the audio in the final product and be uncomfortable to listen to. You can sometimes fix it by using the amplify tool or the normalization and compression tools, but it is better to set a lower input level on your microphone to avoid it and amplify your volume in the editing process. It is easier to add more volume than to take away too much.

Background music.

If you are using background music, make sure it is licensed for you to use. Royalty free or self-produced music is usually best. If you drag new audio files into audacity, you can create new layers and adjust positioning by adding in silence or by manipulating the start time and end time of your background music. There is also a fade in/fade out function that you can access by selecting a piece of audio in one layer and then going into the effects tab.

Step six: Recaps and Rules

For a produced show, you should start every session with a recap both for anyone tuning in to your podcast and to remind the players of their given circumstances. Take notes during the session if you can, or listen back to the previous episode to study before your next one. This is a good way to get used to your voice, remind yourself of the voices you have given NPCs, and remember where in your story you are.

When you are running a game on stream, you will not have time to stop the game and look up a rule, so get used to problem solving as a dm. Make reminder cards, spell cards, have statblocks ready, and if you do not have a rule in front of you, make a ruling. If you are uploading a prerecorded game, you have a bit more leeway, but it depends on how much time you want to spend editing. My advice would be to get used to making rulings on the fly and confirming them later.

Step seven: General Performance tips

Players:

Stay engaged.

Not paying attention and missing the fact that it is your turn, or not understanding how your sheet works is similar to an actor forgetting their lines and stopping on stage.

Don’t fudge your dice rolls.

I know. It is tempting. No one can see them and if you got a nat 20 here it would be SO POETIC. But seriously, don’t.

Listen to your DM and try to limit off topic conversations.

Make your voice for your character distinct from your own.

DMs:

Be prepared.

Have your statblocks ready, bring any visual aids you need, have your notes opened, have a compendium of spells available, have an initiative tracker, have enough dice, know what the shape of the session will be.

Don’t bring your sourcebooks.

This seems weird, but it is a recommendation I can’t stress enough. If you have it with you, I guarantee you will flip through it to check rules and such. Don’t.

Practice your timing on certain levels of narration.

Try to figure out some fun ways to add tension through how you narrate.

Watch a LOT of liveplay d&d and study what you like about the dms.

I would recommend Dimension 20, Naddpod, Critical Role, The Adventure Zone, or any other piece of media you can find.