231 episodes listed below
Myths, monsters, rolls, and table chatter.
Starter Set follows D&D play through improvised fantasy danger, especially a Beowulf campaign full of giant kin, strange dreams, bargains, monsters, and messy rolls. Around the play, it keeps a conversational buyer-guide strand about books, characters, campaigns, and life at the table.
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Starter Set is a Dungeons & Dragons podcast built around the texture of the table: the rules talk, the missed sessions, the running jokes, the character plans, and the sudden moments when a throwaway choice turns dangerous. Its recent Beowulf episodes frame play as a myth-and-legend remix. The party moves through strange places where giant kin may be guards, scouts, or messengers, old languages carry weight, and glowing points of power hint at deeper trouble. The fantasy can get sharp fast. Ghostly bodies stretch a character’s hand like impossible matter, bats spill from a neck gap, and a skeletal thing reshapes into a spider-like monster with dog heads. Then someone makes a roll. The show keeps that pivot intact, moving from grotesque imagery to rules calls, table laughter, and blunt tactical debate. It does not sand down the social side of D&D. Ed Sylvester and Oli talk about other campaigns, missed games, new players, boat campaigns, fast-moving characters, and the familiar thrill of discovering a mechanic that feels almost too effective. Sam Bradley appears in the buyer-guide strand, where the focus widens to adventure books, bolt-on books, character concepts, and what different kinds of D&D products add to a table. Those episodes are less about suspense and more about appetite: more books, more voices, more characters waiting in the wings. Starter Set works because the fantasy narration and the casual commentary are allowed to sit beside each other. A scene can become eerie, funny, tactical, or argumentative within a minute. The show is especially suited to listeners who already enjoy the rhythms of actual play and want the between-roll conversation as much as the adventure. Newer players can still find useful orientation in the buyer-guide episodes, but the real draw is the feeling of sitting near a busy table as a campaign mutates in real time. It is playful, sometimes grim, often silly, and clearly made by people who keep returning to D&D even when schedules, life, and technical problems get in the way.
Made for: For D&D listeners who enjoy actual-play storytelling with visible table banter, rules talk, and campaign-side conversation. It also suits newer players looking for informal book and character discussion.
What sets it apart: Starter Set keeps the messy human layer of D&D in the foreground, pairing vivid mythic encounters with casual post-game-style chatter. The buyer-guide episodes give it a practical companion strand beyond the campaign itself.
Starter Set is the podcast that takes you deeper into the pages of Dungeons & Dragons. If you’re new to the game and want to get started or have been playing and need something else all things DnD in your life, this is the podcast for you!
Based on 6 episodes we listened to · September 2026
Ed Sylvester and Oli make a myth-shaped campaign approachable through clear adjudication, responsive play, vivid encounters, and an easy comic rapport.
Starter Set turns a Beowulf-inspired Dungeons & Dragons campaign into an actual-play built around two clear roles. Ed Sylvester sets the scenes and adjudicates the rules, while Oli tests the world through character choices, tactical questions, and a readiness to follow an odd…
Giant-kin speak French, skeletal spiders have dog heads, and Ed and Oli still find room for axe chat.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
A loose, good-humored check-in that turns into a vivid ghost chase and keeps the campaign's energy moving.
Beowulf S2 Ep 14 / Safety? keeps a loose, good-humored pace, then slips into a vivid little chase as Ed and Oli track the campaign's latest beat and the appeal of a character built to move fast.
A scrappy D&D detour with injuries, giant speech, and a neat tactical save.
This episode turns a wrong turn into a tight stretch of table play, with a finger wound, an almost-faint, a run for it, and then a sharp shift into giant speech and improvised diplomacy.
A finale that ties up loose ends with combat pressure and a clear sense of goodbye.
Starter Set closes its second season by paying off the loose ends it set in motion, giving the earlier characters real weight in the larger world and folding that work into a final chapter that feels earned.
A loose actual-play hangout that drifts into a grim wooded scene.
Starter Set settles into the show’s usual rhythm: Ed and Oli catching up, working through scheduling gaps, and circling back to recent play that seems to be giving them a good run.
In the final episode of Starter Set, hosts Ed and Oli conclude their D&D campaign with a dramatic battle against Kagog and the resolution of Neohad's curse.
Normanda and Cald, chased by giant kin, take refuge in a forest valley where they encounter a forest spirit named Albia.
"There's a rift, a little, a small gap" as Neohad and the chasers close in behind Normander.
Oli’s omens say "woe," then NeoHad calls "Gogamog" three times and points at him.
Oli realizes the party may be crossing a dream world where nightmares can bridge different realms.
Neohad offers guidance about Gogamog and the Harvest, but demands the party take him with them.
Starter Set's Ed Sylvester and Oli Sylvester open with myth-and-legend banter, then drift into snack talk about energy drinks, Pringles, Haribo, and a tiger loaf dunked into two 20p pot noodles.
Edwolf arrives at Osberg claiming to be a trader, then introduces himself as the “Thane of the Whale Road” and “Champion of the nine.” He recruits Brynjolf as “number eight” and asks the village leaders for clothes, coin, and meals before his barge arrives.
The hosts discuss their week in D&D, including character development and silly voices, introducing a drunk wizard character.
The hosts discuss their recent D&D sessions, including a character's death and a necromancer creating a sock puppet simulacrum.
The hosts welcome listeners, discuss their week in D&D, and share updates on their actual play campaign Tales of Tarfish.
The hosts discuss their week in D&D, including recording a campaign called Tarthage and debating whether to watch the new Dune film.