Show Notes
Welcome to Bytopia, the Upper Plane for people who looked at Heaven and said, "This is nice, but could we make everyone work a little harder?" The weather is lovely, the neighbors are aggressively helpful, the economy is apparently powered by ethical commerce, and there's another entire world hanging upside down over your head. Also, there are adamantine dragons, because apparently even paradise needs something capable of turning your adventuring party into a fine red mist. Pack a lunch, bring your climbing gear, and try not to become so content that you forget you were supposed to leave. Show Notes This week on the RPGBOT.Podcast, we head to Bytopia, D&D's plane of good neighbors, hard work, beautiful weather, and deeply questionable planetary physics. Tyler, Randall, and Ash explore Bytopia's two facing layers, the people and creatures who live there, and what happens when an entire plane is infused with enough goodwill that visitors might simply decide everything is fine and never go home. We dig into travel between the layers, life and trade in Bytopia, intelligent plants, adamantine dragons, and the planar marketplace of Tradegate, where even the currency seems determined to make capitalism behave itself. Along the way, we consider the strange implications of an afterlife built around productive happiness and tackle the question of the week: if you built an "oops all" party using ancestries outside the Player's Handbook, what glorious collection of weirdos would you bring to the table? It's paradise. There's nice weather. Everyone is helpful. Naturally, we're suspicious. Key Takeaways Bytopia is good, but not lazy: The plane emphasizes community, cooperation, work, and the satisfaction that comes from building something worthwhile. The geography is wonderfully ridiculous: Its two layers face each other, creating one of the strangest landscapes in the D&D multiverse. Being happy can apparently be a planar hazard: Bytopia's pervasive goodwill and contentment could make visitors surprisingly reluctant to leave. Tradegate takes ethical commerce seriously: Its unusual currency and trading rules reinforce Bytopia's broader themes of fairness and cooperation. The wildlife gets weird: Intelligent plants and adamantine dragons help ensure that "pleasant Upper Plane" does not mean "nothing interesting happens here." Bytopia has strong adventure potential: Its unusual physics, settlements, trade, inhabitants, and planar travel offer considerably more than a peaceful celestial vacation. Oops All Weirdos remains a valid party-building strategy: The episode's non-PHB ancestry discussion proves that sometimes the best adventuring party looks like everyone ignored the character creation instructions. Welcome to the RPGBOT Podcast. If you love Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder, and tabletop RPGs, this is the podcast for you. Support the show for free: Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any podcast app. It helps new listeners find the best RPG podcast for D&D and Pathfinder players. Level up your experience: Join us on Patreon to unlock ad-free access to RPGBOT.net and the RPGBOT Podcast, chat with us and the community on the RPGBOT Discord, and jump into live-streamed RPG podcast recordings. Support while you shop: Use our Amazon affiliate link at https://amzn.to/3NwElxQ and help us keep building tools and guides for the RPG community. Meet the Hosts Tyler Kamstra – Master of mechanics, seeing the Pathfinder action economy like Neo in the Matrix.
Randall James – Lore buff and technologist, always ready to debate which Lord of the Rings edition reigns supreme.
Ash Ely – Resident cynic, chaos agent, and AI's worst nightmare, bringing pure table-flipping RPG podcast energy.
Join the RPGBOT team where fantasy roleplaying meets real strategy, sarcasm, and community chaos. How to Find Us: In-depth articles, guides, handbooks, reviews, news on Tabletop Role Playing at RPGBOT.net Tyler Kamstra BlueSky: @rp
More from RPGBOT.Podcast
Last time, we opened a door that had been sealed for thousands of years, murdered a dinosaur, adopted its baby, and turned a crank we probably shouldn't have touched. Now the village is flooding, the ancient machinery is waking up, and our only hope is building weapons from whatever junk we can find. Oh, and Tyler wants to dismantle a horse for spare parts. Welcome back to Numenera, where saving the world requires a little engineering, a lot of questionable judgment, and apparently a working knowledge of French grammar
What happens when a mysterious cowboy rides out of a deadly desert, introduces himself, and immediately falls off his horse? Naturally, you trust his god, open a door that's been locked for thousands of years, and discover your entire village might be living inside a dead monster. Welcome to Numenera, where the birds are terrifying, the technology is incomprehensible, and Tyler can't roll above a five when it matters. At least Ash gets a pet dinosaur. Things are going great.
You've slain dragons, defeated liches, and saved the kingdom. But now an NPC is flirting with you, and suddenly everyone at the table is making death saves against awkwardness. Romance in D&D can be terrifying, especially when the GM's idea of flirting involves a Persuasion check and prolonged eye contact. Fortunately, Sebastian Yūe and Friday Strout are here to help us navigate love, relationships, and the delicate art of making imaginary people kiss without making real people uncomfortable. Roll for initiative. No, wait. Roll for chemistry.
So you've survived character creation in Numenera. Congratulations! Now it's time to level up, rummage through ancient garbage, and build a giant murder robot that might eventually decide you're the problem. What could possibly go wrong? In this episode, we're spending XP, scavenging the ruins of forgotten civilizations, and exploring the joys of community development. Because nothing says heroic adventure quite like spending six months building a machine that might explode, or thirty years constructing a castle. Welcome to the Ninth World, where yesterday's trash is tomorrow's technology, and apparently nobody can agree on how to pronounce a two-by-four.
Welcome to Numenera, where ancient technology is magic, character creation is an adventure, and Tyler is already looking for something dangerous to invent. This time, Randall walks us through building characters in the Ninth World, where your personality, abilities, and questionable life choices all become part of your character sheet. Ash wants a loyal adventurer. Tyler wants a reckless inventor. Randall just wants everyone to understand the rules before somebody accidentally destroys civilization. Again. VBM.games/rpgbot