More Evil Genius Fan-Generated Content: An Interview with Lee Anderson

We want to feature our Everyday Heroes’ Content!

Over the last couple of weeks I’ve been interviewing some of our awesome creators of Everyday Heroes fan content to let you know who is behind these projects. And more interviews are on the way.  Hopefully, these conversations are not only interesting but perhaps spark your interest in doing something yourself. And on that note, if you have an idea for something, let me know (ego@evilgenius gaming.com) and let’s talk! Next week I will be getting back to some more exciting company news, but more ideas for and interviews with fan creators are coming.  

Last week I interviewed the four creators of the wide-ranging REDEMPTION HQ podcast and today, I’m interviewing Lee Anderson, who is actually four creators (at last count) in one. Besides being an active GM for Everyday Heroes and REDEMPTION, Lee keeps busy teaching Everyday Heroes to GMs and players on Discord and through The Academy, a YouTube series of mini-lessons. He also creates some of the maps for E.G.O. adventures, and produces faux-commercials for Everyday Heroes and REDEMPTION. I’ve asked him on the blog to talk about some of these projects. Let’s see what he has to say. 

Evil Genius Kilts and Cons

Hey, Lee, thanks so much for coming on the blog interview.  

[LRA] Great to be here.

I have given folks a bit of an idea about some of the many things you do, so let’s start with how you came into orbit with Everyday Heroes in the first place. 

[LRA] Well, back in May of ‘22 I spotted an ad on Facebook for EDH’s Highlander Cinematic Sourcebook, and my first thought was “SOLD!” 

Yeah, I think Highlander caught the interest of a lot of people. I loved the movie and was really excited to get to work on editing our Cinematic Adventure. So, what happened next?

[LRA] After that I started following y’all through social media, and when I saw a post asking for GMs to run “Night at the Museum” for GenCon 2022 I jumped on it. 

We have some great convention adventures for sure, and our convention GMs are just awesome. How did it go? 

[LRA] It was Amazing. The players and I had so much fun. The most popular character was actually one that wasn’t in the movie.

Which one was that?

[LRA] That would be “Gramps”; he was created just for the Con. 

Nice! Then what?

The next year I wrote my own adventure based on the Scoobynatural episode of the show Supernatural. 

Ah, yes, that’s what got Harlan Reaver of REDEMPTION HQ  hooked. We talked with them last week.  So, we can thank you for that.

Then in 2024 I wrote a game based on Goonies, and ran the REDEMPTION special multi-table adventure, Doors and Shadows, as well as working the Evil Genius Games booth for a few hours.

I heard! You were suddenly everywhere.

 [LRA] I guess you can say I got hooked right off the bat and just ran with it. 

Teaching Everyday Heroes through peer-to-peer tutoring and The Academy. 

And we’re very glad you did. So, you and I have discussed you teaching or mentoring of folks who want to learn more about how to run or play Everyday Heroes and REDEMPTION and I’ve already sent a few people your way. Tell me a bit about the kinds of things that you can help people with. 

[LRA] Most of what I’ve had to help people with, thus far, has been dealing with Roll20 and character creation. 

And this would primarily happen on our Discord in the E.G.O. EDH Classroom channel, right? 

[LRA] Yes, the classroom is an easy place to locate without having to join multiple different channels.

And, going along with your teaching, you also have The Academy on your YouTube channel. How did the idea for that come about?  

[LRA] A: Growing up in a small town the 80s it was difficult to get into gaming. You had to spend a lot of time and money buying and reading books just to figure out enough to play one game. 

Our little town didn’t have a game store. There was a bookshop that you could order books through, but it was during the great “Satanic Panic” and there was a lot of stigma surrounding D&D. As a teen, if some folks overheard you asking for D&D they looked at you like you were trying to buy condoms or something. 

And gods help you if you were dyslexic or had other issues. 

For sure. There were the issues of access to the books themselves, but then also some real challenges for people who had other accessibility issues. 

That’s the reason for The Academy. Gaming should be accessible to everyone. I try to make my videos in such a way as to make them useful to the largest number of people. It’s a bit slow going, making the videos and taking topics one at a time, but Rome wasn’t built in a day.

No it wasn’t. And what I especially like about your short format is that you don’t have to search—or send someone else to search—through the whole city in order to find the one little thing you need. You just look at the title of the video, and—Bam!—there it is.

[LRA] Exactly, you don’t have to deal with me telling you all about what ancient Egyptian dice were made out of just to find out about Charming Heroes.

Making Maps and Zombie Arms

So then, how you come to do some of our E.G.O. cartography? Were you doing maps before, like for your own games or the games of others?

[LRA] I’ve made more than a few maps for games over the past 30 years. In the past few years, however, I started toying around with making digital maps because I game almost exclusively via Roll20. When I saw Bryan asking for people with experience making maps I figured I’d give it a shot and showed him some of what I had made. He gave me a couple sketches and asked me to show him what I could do, and liked my results. My test maps were the two published in “Unexpected Retreat.”

Yes, I remember looking at those with him! Have you gotten any feedback about them from folks other than us?  

b

About Those Arms…  [LRA] So, fun story: I’ve heard that a few people think that the arms for the cage fight look odd. You mean the ones that are reaching out from all around?  [LRA] Yeah. But Arkenforge, you see, which I use for my maps, doesn’t really have arms…or zombies for that matter.  So…?  [LRA] So, I wound up using my own arms to make that map.  Ingenious. And now you’re also a Zombie Arm Model as well. I’ll bet you could make some money on OnlyFans this time of year, you know.  [LRA] That’s a fantastic idea. An OnlyZombs account would definitely help cover my dice habit.

Nacho Haüs Commercials to Everyday Heroes Operettas

Well, keep that in mind. In the meantime, tell us about the different production spots you’ve done. I think there’s at least four, and you also got your newphew Skylar to do one. 

[LRA] Back when I was in Cub Scouts we did a tour of a radio station and we got a chance to make a few faux radio spots and that’s the energy I try to bring to the things I create. In fact the Walt DeWalt spot is an homage to the old “Bob Evans” commercials. 

Careful. You’re dating yourself. 

We have been having great fun with these. I love the vibe created by the Marvin Gaye background in Skylar’s. 

[LRA] I’m also a giant “Weird Al” Yankovic fan and have messed with songs over the years, so when Dave was making the Evil Genius pitch commercial and you made an off-hand comment on Discord about having “I am a very model of a modern Evil Genius” (from the old Gilbert and Sullivan song), it popped into my head and I couldn’t stop messing with it. 

I love what you came up with. And when you showed me, I was wondering out loud if there might be karaoke music that could go with it and, lo and behold, you found some. 

[LRA] Fortunately, I found some. I don’t have the skill to produce a full musical ensemble…yet.

Maybe we can enlist the help of some other Everyday Heroes out there? So, looking out into the future a bit, are there any other kinds of projects you have in mind? I know you’ll continue the teaching and The Academy, and I hope that you will continue making maps, but any current or future ideas for productions that are rumbling around in your head?  

[LRA] I’ve been kicking around the idea of producing some expansion books. The ones I currently have in mind are: Everyday Kids, a book specifically designed to introduce EDH to preteens, and Paranatural, an IP-neutral sourcebook for various supernatural settings with character options for Angles, Demons, ghosts and stuff. I heard there was mention of a potential Ghostbusters book, and I’d love to help with something like that.

You heard it here first, folks! I’m really excited to see what comes next. 

Next time, I will feature more of our fan-generated content and the creative people behind it. Now, if this is what you also do, or you have an interest in doing, I want to hear from you ([email protected]). I have a stack of ideas I want to pursue, and I want to know yours. In the meantime, check out The Academy and REDEMPTION HQ. And don’t forget to like, subscribe, and share these resources—not only supports the creators, but also to spread awareness of Everyday Heroes and REDEMPTION. 

Because the world needs more Everyday Heroes.