We’re starting another new series here at The Flickcast. This time around it’s all about books with the first edition of What We’re Reading. So, what are we reading? Today, it’s some helpful D&D books from author Keith Ammann.

These helpful D&D books are The Monsters Know What They’re Doing: Combat Tactics for Dungeon Masters and Live to Tell the Tale: Combat Tactics for Players. We know, those titles are kinda long, but they’re really good books, so we won’t hold it against him. In fact, the info in these books is so helpful and useful, we don’t mind if he uses twenty or thirty words for the title of his next one!

Moving on, you can probably guess these D&D books deal with various aspects of playing Dungeons & Dragons, especially combat. The first, targeted at Dungeon Masters . . .

“. . . lightens the DM’s burden by helping you understand your monsters’ abilities and develop battle plans before your fifth edition D&D game session begins. Just as soldiers don’t whip out their field manuals for the first time when they’re already under fire, a DM shouldn’t wait until the PCs have just encountered a dozen bullywugs to figure out how they advance, fight, and retreat.”

It really helps DM’s get inside the minds and motivations of NPC’s and creatures in the game. It also makes combat encounters more realistic and fun. Sounds great, right? We’ve used it during many of our games with great success. 

The second book is targeted at players and deals with their mindset and tactics during combat. It’s . . . 

“. . . an introduction to combat tactics for fifth-edition Dungeons & Dragons players, Live to Tell the Tale evens the score. It examines the fundamentals of D&D battles: combat roles, party composition, attacking combos, advantage and disadvantage, Stealth and Perception, and more…including the ever-important consideration of how to run away!”

It also offers several combat scenarios featuring character and monsters of increasingly higher level. This helps to better illustrate the tactics of each character class, abilities available at various levels, what to do with them during combat and the roles each class can play to help ensure combat success. It’s pretty cool. 

If you’re a D&D player, Dungeon Master (or both) and you want to improve your games, especially during combat, give these books a try. You’ll definately learn something. We sure did. 

You can find these books at Amazon, or your local bookstore. We get a lot of our books at Book People, which is one of our favorite local shops here in Austin. Please support local bookstores when you can. 

Keith’s next book, featuring more combat tactics and monsters from Volo’s Guide to Monsters and Mordenkainen’s Tome of Foes, is available for pre-order now. And in addition to the books, you can get more insights and info over at his blog.

What are you reading and enjoying these days? Let us know in the comments or hit us up on Twitter, Facebook or Instagram. Happy reading!

Note: This post contains Amazon affiliate links.  
Artwork: Saga Press / Keith Ammann

Welcome back to a brand new episode of The Flickcast. Episode 423: Here Comes the Juice!

This week Chris and Joe dive right back into it. First up is WandaVision where they provide insight and analysis of episode 5 of the Marvel/Disney+, where the show might go from here and that very interesting character who popped in at the end. They’ve got some pretty wild theories, but they just might turn out the be correct. We’ll know soon enough.

Then, the boys shift gears to talk about the last two episodes of Amazon Prime’s amazing series The Expanse. Some of the discussion focuses on the penultimate episode of the season with the rest all about the season finale. They also talk about the direction, writing, cinematography and effects of the show, some of the standout acting performances during the season as well as the departure of a series regular and the death of a major character in the season finale (Spoilers).

And yeah, with the actor leaving The Expanse, Chris and Joe do get into some of the reasons why he might have been let go, other examples around the industry and, yes, a bit about “cancel culture.” Sorry, it had to be done.

It’s another big show. Probably the longest episode ever, but it’s chock full of goodness so give it a try. Thanks for listening!

WARNING: This episode contains discussions about COVID-19, mental health, self care, quarantine and trauma. We understand not everyone is in a place to talk about or hear discussions surrounding these issues. Please do what’s best for you. Stay safe everyone. If you need help, please reach out. Here’s some places to call.

National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-TALK (8255)

SAMHSA Treatment Referral Helpline: 1-877-SAMHSA7 (1-877-726-4727)

As always, if you have comments, questions, critiques, offers of sponsorship or whatever, feel free to hit us up in the comments, on Twitter, Instagram or, yes, even Facebook. Or shoot us an email. We don’t mind.

Artwork: Jakub Masłowski  – Characters: Disney/Marvel

Opening and end music by Kevin MacLeod under Creative Commons License

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It’s a brand new episode of The Flickcast. Still going strong. We’re doing this!

On this episode Chris and Joe get deep into all-things Dune as they discuss the new trailer for the highly anticipated film, casting highlights from the film, Ridley Scott’s Raised By Wolves, the basics of sci-fi films and tv shows, Amazon’s The Boys, the negative effects of not being able to binge watch, cancel culture and, most importantly, the return of Rick Moranis. 

They also manage to talk about a certain world event (but just a little), further developments in film and television production and how great it is to see so much Sci-Fi programming these days. Plus, of course, the usual more. 

WARNING: This episode contains discussions about COVID-19, mental health and quarantine. We understand not everyone is in a place to talk about or hear discussions surrounding these issues. Please do what’s best for you. Stay safe everyone.

As always, if you have comments, questions, critiques, offers of sponsorship or whatever, feel free to hit us up in the comments, on Twitter, Instagram or, yes, even Facebook. Or shoot us an email. We don’t mind.

We’re back baby!

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That’s right, it’s time for a brand new episode of The Flickcast.

Still making ’em as fast as we can. Thanks again for your patience.

On this week’s episode Chris and Joe discuss Suicide Squad, the latest episode of Mr. Robot, movies, TV and probably complain a bit. Plus, the usual more.

No beer for Chris this week (he’s on meds) but Joe’s “beer” pick is the Root Sellers Hard Root Beer. Picks this week include Chris’ pick of the movie Hell or High Water and Joe’s pick of the new Amazon pilot Jean-Claude Van Johnson.

As always, if you have comments, questions, critiques, offers of sponsorship, or whatever, feel free to hit us up in the comments, on Twitter, at Facebook, Google+ or shoot us an email.

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That’s right, it’s time for an all-new episode of The Flickcast! Finally, right? We had some issues last week but we think we’ve got ’em sorted out now. Well, at least the ones having to do with the podcast anyway. What are you gonna do, right?

On this week’s episode Chris and Joe jump into the new Fall TV season and discuss some of the shows they’re looking forward to seeing (and some they’re not). The shows you should probably check out include Blindspot, Minority Report, Supergirl, Ash vs. Evil Dead, Con Man, The Man In The High Castle and The Muppets. Shows you should probably avoid include Quantico, Life In Pieces, Heroes Reborn and The Bastard Executioner. There’s also quite a bit of talk about how great the show Longmire is. In fact …

Picks this week are unanimous in that both Chris and Joe pick the 4th season of Longmire, which recently arrived on Netflix. How’s that for consensus?

As always, if you have comments, questions, critiques, offers of sponsorship, or whatever, feel free to hit us up in the comments, on Twitter, at Facebook, Google+ or via email.

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Hey, we know you’re upset. We are too. But sometimes, things just can’t be helped. So, this episode is a bit late. We’ll try not to let it happen again. But you know what, it probably will.

But until then, we’ve got a brand new episode of The Flickcast for your listening pleasure. Please try to enjoy it.

On this week’s show Chris and Joe jump right in and talk all about the new cast announcements and leaked set picks from Star Wars VII, set pics and more from Terminator: Genesis, the relentless darkness that is Game of Thrones, the Stargate reboot, Val Kilmer’s career, recent Apple announcements and a whole lot more.

The guys also made picks this week. Chris’ pick is one of his favorite gadgets, the iPad Mini with Retina Display, and Joe’s pick is the new album from former Bourgeois Tagg member Brent Bourgeois called Don’t Look Back.

As always, if you have comments, questions, critiques, offers of sponsorship, or whatever, feel free to hit us up in the comments, on Twitter, at Facebook, Google+ or via email.

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Microsoft knows that Halo is a system seller. That’s why last year at E3 we saw the TBD titled Halo get a tease. But without knowing when the next Halo would be coming out, they needed to keep the appetite wet for gamers before the hoopla of this year’s E3 kicked in. What better way to do so than open up preorders to the world. If you head to Amazon you can place your preorder on Halo 5: Guardians which is set to ship by end of year 2015 (no doubt, this will be more formally announced with an actual release date at E3 or at least a quarter).

There are two things that stand out about Halo 5: Guardians based off the current cover artwork. The first is the name. Since Halo: Combat Evolved, this is the first proper Halo title to have a suffix attached to it. This leads one to believe it is either because they feel just another number isn’t enough of a differentiator to keep motivating new purchases or these new Guardians are that essential to the plot.

That whole “getting back on track” thing we were harping about before? Yeah, well, it worked this time. Sorta. We did get two episodes in a row, they just came out a day late each time.

Well, what are you gonna do, right? At least there’s now a brand new episode of The Flickcast for you to enjoy. That’s what counts.

As you would expect, this week Chris and Joe take on some new topics and revisit old ones. Some of these include the new season of Game of Thrones, casting news from the world of movies and TV, new trailers, a bit about the new Captain America movie, 3D movies, the beauty of language, safety on set and the dangers of helicopters.

Just listen. You’ll enjoy it.

This week’s picks include Chris’ pick of the new Fire TV from Amazon (see his written review here) and Joe’s pick of actress Scarlett Johansson. Why? Not why you think. Well, a little why you think.

As always, if you have comments, questions, critiques, offers of sponsorship, or whatever, feel free to hit us up in the comments, on Twitter, at Facebook, Google+ or via email.

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As we told you before, Amazon has come out with its own version of the Apple TV or Roku. It’s called the Fire TV and it’s an Android-powered black box that allows you to stream content from various sources including Amazon Prime, Hulu Plus and Netflix.

But is it any good? Well, our own Chris Ullrich decided to take it for a spin and made his initial report over at his personal site. As with other times he’s done this in the past, we’re still not sure why he doesn’t just write his review, or whatever, here.

Whatever, he’s the boss. Anyway, check out his thoughts and if you end up getting a Fire TV for yourself, let us know what you think of it in the comments.

In a bid to compete with devices like the Google Chromecast, Roku and mainly the Apple TV, Amazon today announced the Amazon Fire TV. According to chairman Jeff Bezos, the Fire TV “is a tiny box that plugs into your HDTV. It’s the easiest way to enjoy Netflix, Prime Instant Video, Hulu Plus, WatchESPN, low-cost video rentals, and more. With instant access to over 200,000 TV episodes and movies, plus all your favorite subscriptions and streaming services, you can watch what you want, when you want.”

In addition, if you’re a Prime member “you get unlimited access to thousands of popular movies and TV shows, including exclusives like Downton Abbey, The Americans, Alpha House, and Under the Dome.” All in 1080p, of course.

Bu wait, there’s even more. “Fire TV has voice search that actually works. The old way of searching with a TV remote—scrolling and clicking one letter at a time on an alphabet grid—is painful. With Fire TV you simply speak the title, actor, or genre into the remote and you’re done.”

The internal specs of the Fire TV are impressive as well. The device features a quad-core processor, dedicated GPU, 2 GB of memory, and dual-band, dual-antenna Wi-Fi. It also features a new buffering system which will supposedly help eliminate any streaming lag. Of course, your mileage may vary.

The device also plays games. Titles at launch include Minecraft, The Walking Dead, Monsters University, the Amazon exclusive Sev Zero, and many other free games available to Prime Members.

The Amazon Fire TV is $99.00 and ships today. The optional game controller will set you back another $39.99.