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Conversations with Mayday Roleplay

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Today we’d like to introduce you to Mayday Roleplay. There a perfect example of why our city is such an amazing place – there are always people coming together to launch new projects doing interesting things that probably are unlikely to happen anywhere else. Check out our conversation with the Mayday team below.

Alright so I think first can you start by introducing yourselves and telling our readers a bit about the concept and how this all came about?
Mayday Roleplay is an actual play podcast group who creates stories through the medium of tabletop roleplaying games. We are a group of seven, all storytellers in their own rights; Zakiya Goggins, Amanda Domenech, Sergio Crego, Eli Hauschel, Caleb Miller, Aaron Pabst, and Allegra Rodriguez Shivers. The day before Los Angeles went into pandemic lockdown for the first time, we, among others, were called into an audition. The project was not dissimilar from what Mayday ended up being. Auditions were held at a local game store, Geeky Teas and Games, and by the following week, we were all in on the project. The chemistry between the seven of us was unexpected but incredibly exciting. From the get-go, we all seemed to be on a similar wavelength about storytelling, characters, and what was important to us in a game. Unfortunately, there were some irreconcilable differences between folks running the project and the rest of us. After a few months, we parted ways. But that wasn’t the end for us. Even in the midst of leaving the old project, we realized that our bond was strong and our desire to tell stories together held, even through tough times. As Sergio said, “We wanted to keep working together because we like each other too much.” From there, it was a lot of figuring out what we had at our disposal and using it effectively. Eli is a professional sound designer, Zakiya makes commissioned art, Aaron composes all of our music. Everyone has something to bring to the table, in addition to loving games and creating characters. Sergio suggested we play Delta Green, a modern horror TTRPG, for our first campaign. It was a new system to almost all of us, but after one session we were hooked. Over the last year that we’ve known each other and worked together, it’s been a process of learning and growing together, not just as friends but as professionals and storytellers. We’ve been well-received by others in the TTRPG community and it’s a kindness we’d like to pay forward and grow. All of us at Mayday walked into the initial audition as passive participants who enjoyed TTRPGs but weren’t necessarily looking to take it any further than that. Through each other, we’ve found a will to create and share stories that have a meaning to us. We became active creators.

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
Mayday was almost over before it started. The original project scared us and, for a while, we were waiting for the other shoe to drop. Who would we lose, who would decide they didn’t want to keep going together? The first couple of weeks after we decided we were moving forward together were a little nerve-wracking. Eventually, though, the trust that was broken in the wake of the project we had to leave strengthened our bond to one another. It brought us together but also made it easy for us to come to the others when there was an issue. We trust each other to be open and honest. One of the biggest obstacles for us since then, as I’m sure for many others, has been the pandemic. We have never once all been in the same physical room together. Even though we’re all in the Los Angeles area, the stay-at-home orders and social distancing have kept us disparate (though we would much rather be apart and cautious than risk the health or safety of one of our own). It’s taken us a lot of trial and error and finding creative solutions to problems in order to create our show. TTRPGs thrives on chemistry and the energy of a room. It’s incredibly challenging to find a flow over the internet when one person’s audio is lagging, another has a helicopter flying overhead, and a third person’s computer crashes. The internet is basically our only link. Thankfully, through redundancies and some pretty good luck, we’ve rarely had any major data loss. We’re a small group who puts all of their energy into making the content they’re excited about. Our resources are fairly limited and nearly everything we’ve put into this has been what we’re all willing to give. Maybe more than that sometimes.

Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
You can find us in all places that you listen to podcasts! In all of our games, there is a heavy emphasis on compelling narratives, flawed characters, and a cinematic set up. Our first campaign was Doomed to Repeat, played in the Delta Green system. Delta Green is a modern, Eldrich horror tabletop roleplaying game. In Delta Green, a shady organization of the US government by the same name, tasks agents with protecting the general public from all the unnatural threats that pose a danger to the world. Doomed to Repeat is set, mainly, in 2020. The pandemic has just shut the country down and Delta Green has tasked a team of six government agents to unravel the history of the agency for which they begrudgingly work. The catch? There is no centralized database of cases for Delta Green, even though it’s been around for nearly a century. As the agents find their way to old cases, our players are transported back to play through the historical scenarios that their 2020 agents are reading about. For us, setting Doomed to Repeat in 2020 was cathartic. Helplessness and fear were rampant, especially during those early months, and the idea of being able to go out and fight, protect, learn, do something appealed to all of us. Sergio runs this game as our Handler, while Amanda, Aaron, Eli, Caleb, Zakiya, and Allegra play as agents of Operation Perennial.

Ashoka: Precious Cargo is our second campaign. A Dungeons and Dragons game set in Eli’s homebrew world, a continental archipelago called Ashoka, six strangers must escort Precious Cargo from the Northern Border Isles across the South Seas before the summer ends. Eli runs this game with Zakiya, Aaron, Sergio, Allegra, Caleb, and Amanda playing as the six scrappy nobodies sent on an impossible mission. At the start of 2021, we began streaming on Twitch as well. On Mondays, Aaron plays through his favorite video games on The Sheep Farm. Tuesdays, Sergio leads a random Mayday member through another TTRPG, Ironsworn; Eye of the Storm, about a tribe of nomads trapped in the eye of a deadly storm. On alternate Wednesdays, Allegra sits down with a guest on Heroes You Should Know. They research a lesser-known historical figure and then turn them into a TTRPG character. On Fridays, things vary a bit. When podcast episodes are coming out, we stream those and join the chat. When we’re on a break though, there are unique one-shots like Escape From Wizard Prison and Visigoths VS Mall Goths, run by members of the team. Everything in the backlog can be found on our YouTube page.

We’d love to hear about any fond memories you have from when you were growing up?
SERGIO: Running our first Delta Green one-shot and seeing everyone lean into the dramatic horror elements. It was the first time I truly knew our group was capable of great things.

ZAKIYA: The first time seeing a notification on iTunes with our name and our logo, hearing my friends’ voices through the official Apple podcast app?! Very real tears happened that first episode of Doomed to Repeat dropped.

AMANDA: I think my favorite group memory was the first late night hang out we did. I just remember laughing so much that night. I won’t go into details about what was said and what we were doing but it was amazing. As a group, I knew that we were forming more than a business relationship but an actual, genuine friend loving relationship.

AARON: That afternoon, we were filling out all that paperwork and registering names because that’s when I realized this was going to work.

CALEB: My favorite memory totally has to be the first hour before we started our very first recording for the podcast. We were all so amped up on the possibility of what this project could be, so nervous over the performances we were about to give and the knowledge that we had no idea what was going to happen. Through all of those weird bundles of emotion, we were just uniquely aware that we loved being around each other and that we were ready to start creating.

ALLEGRA: I hate to say I don’t have a favorite memory. Every minute spent with these dorks makes me feel hopeful and excited and heard, even when our characters are in mortal danger and some of us are crying. It’s a safe danger and one of the best feelings I’ve ever experienced. ELI The day we sat down and bought our copyright and the first DG game I got to play.

Pricing:

  • Twitch Subscription ($5.99)
  • Patreon ($2.00 and $5.00)

Contact Info:

Image Credits
Photos of our faces are all personal photos, All artwork is done by Zakiya Goggins

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