Start with a cinematic cold open, add 9,000 fathoms deep in a dungeon, fold in professional comedians and performers, sprinkle in a dash of evil capitalism, heart, and a moose. Despite my southern roots, I’ve never been much of a Western fan, until now. Deliciously described as a “Wet Western,” the Misfortunate 4 is a fast-paced tale of an island “outcast in a shallow sea” that houses the entrance to a dragon’s hoard deep in a dungeon. The promise of treasure produced prospector-adventuring parties who continue to pick the dungeon clean while those who got to it first enjoy lives of splendor. Millennials in particular get it.
This dewy new season for the award-winning podcast Unbalanced Encounters tells the tale of four fools who answer a flyer “promising fortune, fame, and near-certain death. “ Odion Osprey-Heronshaw (Craig Pate) had just been fired from his internship in an adventuring party, but now he wants to build his own party. He finds the down-on-her-luck Cal Ironwater (CausticPhoenix) just as she finds herself in desperate need of a lot of money. Luck will have it, Odion’s sister, Arianna Floridia “Flo” Osprey II (Emily Greymoore), also finds herself in need of a job to prove herself to her family. They are joined by the eager Weevil Woebringer (Cinderblocksally), who gets the job after they express the explicit desire to slay a dragon. Leading the fools into the dungeon is Game Master, Patrick Perini.
At a Glance:
Audio: Professional Quality (headphones recommended)
Vibes: Dungeon Meshi, Gold Rush Westerns, Comedy, Narrative Rich
Number of Episodes Review is based on: 1
System: Tales of the Valiant, Kobold Press
Average Episode time: 90-120 minutes
Accessibility: Content Warnings in episode descriptions
Platforms: Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Patreon: UnbalancedEncounters
Language: English
Uploads 1 episode biweekly. Total of 12 episodes. Premiere is October 28, 2025, at 6 PM ET or 3 PM PT
The first episode features the first of several cold openings with guest voice actors: Renee Juneau as Coloursby, Adrian C. Lawrence as Johnnie Rowe, Noir Enigma as Jareth Woodfoot, Sara Roberts as Valnise, and Aram Vartian as The Dream Devil. This scripted addition to the show mirrors what I imagine when I think of classic Western films. This kind of framing is rare in Actual Play, where the audience has information that the protagonists, and possibly the players, don’t. The opening concludes with a coin toss, a signal to the listener that fate is still up to chance. The rest of the episodes will start with more cold opens, but the premiere notably has the longest of the series (about 10 minutes). Additionally, a mid-roll news cast will expand the world beyond the perspective of the player characters. These non-playable scenes add tension specifically for the audience and allow us to participate in the world outside the players. This framing could give the audience clues to the real corruption in the city and who is pulling the strings before our protagonists, and that kind of tension inspires you to root for our players more.
Using the Tales of the Valiant system, Perini hopes to ease their audience into TTRPGs beyond D&D. The story of the Misfortunate 4 will conclude in 12 episodes, but they already have plans in the works to expand the world of the shallow seas into more TTRPG game systems and new characters. Perini describes, “They feature very similar characters. We’re bouncing around in time a little bit. We’re explaining some backstory. We are showing what happens next in a couple of different ways.” Using multiple systems in the same setting is a growing trend in Actual Play that I can get behind, as the community begs for less D&D supremacy in the space.
When asked what drew them specifically to the gold rush sub-genre of Westerns, Perini explains, “A lot of early westerns were sort of these uncomplicated, unnuanced hero features. Films featuring characters very much like our superhero films, where it’s an unambiguous good guy in service to American idealism. What the latter-day films, like Sergio Leone’s films and the spaghetti westerns, and eventually things like The Treasure of the Sierra Madre and so forth did, they made it about anti-heroes, right? They made it about these very fundamentally flawed characters that sucked, but they sucked because it was the product of their circumstance.”
As our first victim of their circumstance, Cal represents blue-collar hard workers stuck in the Sisyphean task of working their way out of debt forced on them by a greedy group of insurance brokers. These debt collectors are like celestial Pinkertons, according to Perini, as a contrasting visual that Unbalanced Encounters likes to bring into their stories. Cal is a Nature Domain Cleric, accompanied by a small griffon-like familiar. CausticPhoenix plays her as a stubborn stablehand for giant moose, a trait that may prove to be useful as they descend into the dungeon of a beast.
Another product of their environment, Cinderblocksally’s character, Weevil, inspires more questions than answers. What is haunting their dreams? Why is their shadow moving independently? How are they so chill about it? He is full of naive hope and eagerness to fulfil his dream of being an adventurer of legend — a prime target to be crushed under the weight of the brutal reality of a broken system. Weevil is a high-intelligence/ low-wisdom wizard whose subclass is a custom homebrew called the Mote Tamer. His abilities are tied to his control of his shadow as if it were a familiar. The subclass will be available for supporters of the show once the show premieres.
A gold rush in the shape of a dungeon delve alone piqued my interest, but there is another layer in its depths. While talking to Perini, they revealed how the gold rush setting is a self-insert of the time they worked in Silicon Valley, “I fell in love with San Francisco, but I was surrounded by these people that were these crazy laissez-faire techno capitalists. And throughout the whole arc, you’re gonna get a lot more of the people that I knew in that ecosystem… I very specifically brought to the table was this fuck you breakup letter to this period in my life that I have such complicated emotions.” World-building as a self-insert is a bold move and, so far, has led to a story that is much more focused on a unified message and clearly has a heavy impact on character building.
What metaphor for Silicon Valley is complete without a couple of nepo-baby half-siblings? Odion and Flo come from the Osprey family, a name that carries significant weight in the city, both in gold and legend. The two of them could not be more opposite of each other — Odion is shy and lacking confidence, while Flo is a loud socialite who is used to getting her way. Pate plays Odion similarly to the character Laios, the party leader in Delicious in Dungeon, which gives me a strong hunch that there is a lot more to Odion than what we see in the first episode. He is a Weapon Master Fighter with high wisdom and strength. Dice-depending, Pate could lean more into his status or push this character to recognize the responsibility and weight of his position.
Flo, however, lays it all out on the table from the start as the unwilling adventurer as well as the character you will love to hate, as I do. Embodying a character much like Georgette (Oliver & Company) or Stella (Hell o’ a Boss), Greymoore’s performance is so striking that the entire table seemed to have a visceral reaction. Perini (Greymoore’s spouse) even joked about a divorce, “after the first episode we had a real relationship conversation where I was like, we are gonna need to have some aftercare after this because I hate Flo so much.” I am specifically eyeing the “infernal” part of her subclass, as well as the question marks after her lineage in her character art. There are secrets to Flo that maybe even she doesn’t know yet.
A notable aspect of this party is the built-in tension and class divide. Social media features many conversations about building parties that want to work together, but Unbalanced Encounters is setting up numerous possibilities by pairing the haves with the have-nots. There is only so much I can infer from a single episode, but it will be telling to see if the development of these characters is affected by the rolling of dice or if they have a pre-ordained story the players hope to tell. I personally hope for the former, but even preplanned character arcs can be drastically affected by the dice. Will the class divide cause their doom, or will they find common ground against the powers that be? This is what makes narrative Actual Play exciting, only the dice truly know.
Make sure to follow to see updates on this series and more — Bluesky (@uepodca.st), YouTube (@unbalancedencounters), TikTok (@unbalancedencounters), Instagram (@unblncdencntrs), and Patreon (UnbalancedEncounters).
The first episode of **The Misfortunate 4 will air on October 28th, following a pre-premiere talkback with the cast. Similar YouTube premieres will occur fortnightly for each episode release, and viewers will have the chance to win merch and a copy of Tales of the Valiant’s Pocket Edition Players Guide, courtesy of Kobold Press!
Images via Unbalanced Encounters
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