Why is Anubis our god of death? What infernal god did Brandon pray to for those Nat 20s? And does climate change still exist in the world of LTC? All that and more on the Afterparty!
Housekeeping!
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Cast & Crew
- Dungeon Master, Co-Producer: Eric Silver
- Co-Host (Milo Lane), Co-Producer, Editor, Sound Designer, Composer: Brandon Grugle
- Co-Host (Aggie O’Hare), Co-Producer: Amanda McLoughlin
- Co-Host (Val Vesuvio), Co-Producer, Editor: Julia Schifini
- Multitude: multitude.productions
About Us
Join the Party is a collaborative storytelling and roleplaying podcast, powered by the rules of Dungeons and Dragons. That means a group of friends create a story together, chapter by chapter, that takes us beyond the tabletop to parts unknown. In the first campaign, we explored fantasy adventure, intrigue, magic, and drama. In the newest story, we tackle science, superpowers, a better future, and the responsibility to help others.
Every month, we sit down for the Afterparty, where we break down our game and answer your questions about how to play D&D and other roleplaying games at home. We also have segments at the beginning of each campaign to teach people how to play the game themselves. It’s a party, and you’re invited! Find out more at jointhepartypod.com.
Transcript
Amanda: Hey, hi, hello and welcome to the After Party. Guys, when you wear pinstripe clothing and you pull a pin of color off of your blazer/pants/whatever, what does it do, because mine, it makes me 5% taller. Only 5%
Julia: What is that? Do the math for me.
Amanda: I'm 5'10 but nothing is a base 10 system. So, I can't do that math for you.
[Everybody laughs]
Eric: 12 * 5 + 10 is 70 inches?
Amanda: 70 inches, so that's 3.5 inches.
Julia: Wow.
Amanda: That's pretty good.
Julia: Look at that.
Amanda: I've always wanted to be over 6 feet. I feel like [stutters] I, whenever I reach for something and I can't get it, it's like an inch away. So, that's always what I've asked for just the universe. So, that's... that's helpful to me. Then I can reach for my watering supplies on top of the kitchen cabinets without precarity.
Eric: I mean, you're not just telling people that you're six feet like all the men out there.
Amanda: No.
Eric: Am I right?
Amanda: No. I'm not.
Eric: Am I right, fellas?
[Brandon laughs]
Amanda: I prefer to under-promise over deliver.
[Eric laughs]
Eric: Hold on, the fellas-- the fellas said it back to me, those... those are the fellows from Hey y'all, apparently.
Julia: Mhmm.
Eric: Hey, hey, fellas, what's cooler than being cool?
Brandon: Ice cold.
Eric: Alright, alright, alright, alright. Yeah. Thanks, fellas. Appreciate it.
Amanda: Julia, what does your pinstripe do?
Julia: Oh, it makes me a foot taller so that I can be normal human size.
[Brandon laughs]
Amanda: I love that. Brandon, how about yours?
Brandon: Oh, it makes me a foot shorter, so I can get into smaller places that I need to get into.
Amanda: This is so far sounding like a really well-rounded team. Eric, are you our healer?
Eric: Apparently. Unfortunately, Mr. Pinstripe has been gashed or gashed to whatever we have not really decided what it is. He's been guest away. So, [stutters] I... I can't say for sure what his pinstripes do.
Amanda: But in the fiction, what would your pinstripe do?
Eric: Oh, it would probably make the buzzer... the buzzer sound.
[Amanda laughs]
Eric: The buzzer handshake thing.
Julia: Sure.
Eric: As it did in the thing.
Amanda: Oh, that's very good. Well, guys, welcome to the after party. We're... we're chilling. This was a heck of a start to an arc. Players, how are we feeling?
Brandon: I'm feeling good.
Julia: Yeah.
Brandon: Alive.
Julia: Yeah.
Brandon: Very alive.
Julia: We are alive, that is something. We're, like, waiting for the shoe to drop for everyone else. And I think that is why we're kind of like, "Yeah, yeah, we're doing okay. Uh-huh. Yeah."
Amanda: So far, it's fine. I mean, Brandon went into death and returned. And someone who definitely was not our friend showed up and is now gone. So, we're just like, "Is this winning roleplay?"
Eric: Badly summarize your D&D podcast.
[Amanda and Brandon laugh]
Eric: It's funny, it feels like it's been a very long time since we've started a new arc, and especially, I feel like we were a little bit behind because we used the entanglements for join the paper. So, I feel like Episode 1 was kind of, like, the entanglements part that we usually do with... with a lot of that stuff. So, it's a little bit of a slow start, and especially because the last one was joined during the loop, which was so like, I spent so much time trying to figure out exactly what it was. So, I'm just like, "Yeah, yeah. We're just... we're out here. We're out here playing Dungeons and Dragons.
Amanda: We're falling asleep, we’re waking up. It's another day.
Eric: Yeah, we're ...we're sleeping. We're planning a party. That's... that's really it. I don't know. I don't know what you're talking about.
Amanda: Well, there's a ton to discuss with these two episodes, despite the... the feeling of slight anticlimax that we are not currently in a time loop. Brandon and Eric, please tell us what the hell was going on with Join the Committee 1? Julia and I just showed up, and then that stuff happened. So, what was that process like for you both behind the scenes?
Eric: Mmh.
Brandon: I don't... What did we do, Eric? I don't remember. Did I... Did we just play - ?
[Eric cackles]
Eric: I had a bet with myself of whether or not you... you remembered. So, I won $5 that I'm going to... gonna buy a frosty beverage with.
[Brandon laughs]
Eric: So, I think that this all came from me talking to you through your level 10 bonus thing.
Brandon: Yes, I think you're right.
Eric: Because we... we had talked about just a lot of, like, how are we going to get you and Tuna back together?
Brandon: Mhmm.
Eric: Because Tuna has kind of been separated from you ever since the Youtubers, like, kind of severed the link between the two and you've had this 25% damage penalty this entire time. And we're like, "Well, we got to do something. Like, I think especially in Join the Loop, Tuna, there were some opportunities, maybe, to reconnect and because of hilarity and other things and Tuna lost her keys, that didn't happen. So we're like, "We have to do something." And then we're like, "Oh, this Level 10 thing is happening." And I felt like I needed to introduce it to you because the Circle of Spirits is something that we've homebrewed together and then that's where it came from. At one point, I think you slacked the Join the Party's Channel and was like, "LOL. What if I died like... like in this movie that you might not know?" And I'm like, "That's a terrible idea." And I'm like, "Oh, this is actually very fun.”
[Brandon laughs]
Brandon: Yeah. I'm looking back at our DM slacks, and I don't know what... when we talked about that because you just slacked me, apropos of nothing on Tuesday, June 15, and said, "So, for JTP stuff. So, Flatliners, you have the ability to do that.
[Brandon and Eric snickers]
Eric: Yes, that's right. I think you said at some point, you're like, "What if I did this," and then I'm like, "Oh, you can actually do this."
Brandon: But the important thing is that my mom introduced me to Flatliners many years ago.
Eric: How old were you when you watched Flatliners?
Brandon: I was an adult, but she loved it when she was younger, and so I watched it. And it was... it's a good movie. It's a weird... it's a fun thought process.
Eric: For sure. Please, can you explain it better? I felt like I do or did a bad job of doing that in the episode. What is Flatliners about?
Brandon: I don't think you did, I think you did. It's... it's basically just like a bunch of med students that one of them has a, I took it a long time, so I might be like, paraphrasing poorly, but one of them has a near death experience or something and, like, sees, you know, something on the other side. So, they tried to, like, recreate that without actually dying.
[Eric hums]
Brandon: And it's kind of cool because it's... it's fairly hard science fiction for the time. So, I forget what a cocktail of, you know, medicine they used to, like, go under, but then they have. like, ice blankets, and then heat blankets.
Amanda: Mhmm.
Brandon: Like to bring them back. It's cool. But Julia was right. It is very much like a horror sci-fi kind of thing.
Julia: It's spooky.
Eric: Just like Join the Party, obviously.
Brandon: Yes.
Amanda: That reminds me of a... in the flesh, one of my very favorite zombie media of all time. It's like a two-season zombie show from the early 2010s BBC 3 made it and it's all about, like, the zombie sort of Apocalypse happens, but it's very short lived. And afterward, or there is some kind of mechanic to end up reinstating kind of consciousness and, like, bringing back alive the zombies, but there is a lot about the mechanics and physics of, like, sustaining your body after it goes through these changes which makes me very happy.
Brandon: Yeah, that's good stuff.
Eric: I did not tell you that Anubis was waiting for you on the other side.
Amanda: No. This is... actually have a whole Anubis corner of questions here. So, let's begin with: "Why Eric was Anubis chosen as the God of Death?" is a question from Allie. "Was it a Milo specific thing or would it be the same for anyone that died?"
Eric: Yes, Anubis is the only thing waiting for you when you die. Sorry, every other religion.
[Brandon and Eric laughs]
Eric: Yeah. I've... obviously I don't know if you knew this about me. I've been thinking a lot about how Christian, all of our pop culture is. So, I think that there are a lot of fantasy stories where you would assume that the either the fire and brimstone of hell, which I mean, like those of you who know actual Dungeons and Dragons lore. Like, those levels of hell, that's just like Dante's Inferno mashed up with the fucking deadly sins, the two incredibly Christian creations. So, I thought it was really interesting thinking about, like, what does happen to you when you die? Especially in the comic tradition of like, LAWL The Sandman is there when you die or...
Amanda: All of Norse mythology is real.
Eric: Yeah, exactly.
Amanda: Marina as well on the discord who was like, "Yeah, it's very... it's very comics canon to be like, 'Oh, yeah, like, just this mythology is correct.'"
[Brandon laughs]
Eric: It certainly helps because we have the host of Spirits on the show. So, I like thinking about the stuff that y'all have covered. And I'm like, you know, that's... it's kind of interesting, it's just like, you have the scale, you see what happens and then either, like, your soul gets to chill, or something bad happens. I guess, like, I do like the idea that, you know, there's some sort of objective scorekeeping somewhere where it's like, "Oh, you are a good person, you are a bad person." And, you know, whatever humans say is good or bad is... it doesn't matter, like there's some sort of objective... objective weighing of all that. And I feel like Anubis is a pretty... is pretty much the closest thing, so I thought it was funny. I had known about Anubis for a little while. I didn't know, Brandon, when you were gonna try to do this, so I knew this probably starting at the end of Join the Loop, because I don't know if you remember, but when you got on the pirate ship that went on the seas of time, the pirate flag, which had the skull and crossbones had a jackal head.
Brandon: Yes. I do remember that.
[Amanda laughs sinisterly]
Brandon: But I didn't think about it, yeah, but that's smart. Foreshadowing!
Eric: Foreshadowing!
Amanda: Julia, is Val okay after learning about Anubis? I also just must say that's the most hilarious bit of improv I've ever heard.
[Brandon and Eric laugh]
Amanda: It's your final line for Join the Committee 1, I screamed and cried and my throat still hurts.
[Brandon laughs]
Julia: Thank you. I think Val is fine because, you know, Val is convinced that their religion is the true religion and their--
Eric: Yeah.
Julia: --essence in the afterlife are going to be the ones that they were taught and believe in and does not care what Milo says is, "Real."
Brandon: Are you saying that things that Milo is say are not important to Val?
[Amanda laughs]
Julia: It's not that thing that Milo is saying are not important to Val, it's that things that Milo says are less important than Val's personal religious beliefs.
[Brandon laughs]
Eric: That's very funny. I'm trying to remember; where did we end up?. Did Anubis say? Anubis was very ambivalent about whether or not you told people that that was the truth, because I don't... I don't remember if it ended up where it ended up.
Brandon: Anubis kept saying that, like, "You can tell people but no one will believe you" or... or "You won't remember, or something like that."
Amanda: Ain't that the truth.
Julia: Which I wanted to treat canonically as accurate as well.
Eric: True, I think it's very funny. So, it's just like it is what... it is what it is, Anubis just chilling down there. No one's gonna believe you. The other thing, oh, man, I want to talk about fucking Brandon's dice rolls, though, because we really had the ups and the downs in Join the Committee 1 and Join the Committee 2. Let's start with the bad ones, which was rolling so poorly to figure out who could help you in this... in this scenario. I think you rolled, like, a 6. And I remember saying like, "Oh, fuck, you rolled so bad."
[Brandon huffs a laughs]
Eric: And figuring that out. Part of the reason why you weren't able to, "Kill yourself," was that the actuary kind of like because you rolled so bad the actuary stepped in and was like, "I'm the only one who can help you, so you're gonna go play by my rules." It just so happened that you rolled two Nat 20s, so none of that really mattered, ultimately.
Julia: Incredible.
Brandon: And I think it's important to say, obviously, Milo is not trying to die by suicide. Just important to point that out, but yeah, I had a whole plan. I forget exactly what the like, spells I was gonna use, but I had a... I think I was gonna use Icon of Decay and, like, you know, make a TV remote, drain the vitality from me or something.
Eric: Sure.
Julia: Explain that spell to me--
Amanda: I love that.
Julia: --because I've never heard of that before.
Brandon: It might have been the one... of the ones that we got from that, like, third party additional index thing. But you basically just like, touch an object, and then that thing becomes an Icon of Decay. And it like you can--
Amanda: Ooh.
Brandon: --put it near someone or, like, you know, throw it at someone whatever, and it, like, drains HP from them over time, if they're, like, within the area of effect so...
Amanda: So, you'd, like, lay back on a couch or something and just be like, "Excellent, this is all going to plan."
[Julia snickers]
Brandon: Yes, exactly.
Amanda: I love that.
Julia: Yeah.
Amanda: It's such creative spell casting.
Brandon: Or for a second option, I was going to see if Eric would make a whole new superhero. Like, a whole new healer and put them in the game, but...
Julia: That's what I was hoping for as well.
Eric: Who says that I didn't and you rolled like trash so you didn't meet?
Julia: You did roll like trash, so maybe we just didn't meet them.
Brandon: Yeah.
Amanda: That's a good question too. Ellie in Discord wanted to know, Brandon, what other questions did you consider asking Anubis, and why did you choose the one that you did?
Brandon: I panicked.
[Amanda and Brandon laughs]
Eric: I did throw that at you. So, the way that your level 10 thing works was that, like, you could ask a question, but it was a yes or no. So, then, because you rolled a Nat 20, I'm like, "Oh, ask a more detailed question," and I don't know if that shook you.
Brandon: Yeah, I [stutters] have thoughts of like, you know, I was thinking in the moment of, like, meta-gaming, meta-podcasting, I guess, is it more fun ask a silly question, is it more fun to ask a real question, and then what would that blablabla. And I tried to think of what mysteries we still don't know about, much about and so I asked about my parents but...
Eric: It's a good question, man. I also encourage min maxing when you're podcasting. I don't encouragement min maxing because you're playing D&D. Brandon, that's why you put all of your stats in editing?
Brandon: Yes.
Eric: And your constitution is really low?
Brandon: Yeah, I put all my stats in my ears.
Eric: Yeah. What... what are the six stats for podcasters?
Brandon: Ears, mouth?
Eric: Ears? I think constitution still counts.
[Brandon laughs]
Amanda: Yeah. I would say market research?
[Amanda and Eric laugh]
Brandon: I do also want to finally just say that there's not going to be, like, a shitty adoption story where everything is, like, super sad and, like, the, you know, the adoption person is, like, horribly sad about everything, so don't... don't stress about that.
Eric: Oh, your parents are the Joker.
[Brandon gasps]
[Amanda laughs]
Brandon: Exactly. So, this is the best possible scenario.
Eric: Oh shit. That's a spoiler. I shouldn't have said that.
[Julia snickers]
Eric: Both your mom and your dad, your birth parents are the Joker.
Brandon: Yes.
Eric: Is that... should I not have said that? Was that too... was that too much?
Brandon: No, I love it.
Eric: That's why Milo is so twisted.
Brandon: Yeah.
Eric: And Milo's also wearing the Joker makeup at all times.
Brandon: Mhmm.
Eric: All fan artists, please adjust. He’s the Joker.
Amanda: You know, that's actually the perfect segue that I could not possibly have asked for.
[Eric huffs a laugh]
Eric: Oh no.
Amanda: Because Jules 2.0 in Discord wanted to know, transitioning into Join the Committee 2 but our favorite fictional galas and I thought both Brandon and Julia, you might have examples of this being so familiar with superhero media. I just know this is a trope that I love. Like, the gala crashing is just a thing that I love. I love our goat party, where we got to go to the Met Gala. And in our masks game, Eric and I were heroes at a gala where we had to kind of, you know, figure stuff out and, you know, collect clues. So, that was in my mind when I was thinking about this potential sort of set piece.
Brandon: I was gonna say my favorite was goat party so...
[Brandon laughs]
Julia: I don't think I have a fictional gala that is my absolute favorite. I worked on a documentary team for a non-partisan government documentary series, and part of the perk of doing that job was they would take us to a lot of, like, political galas, and galas are not as fun as you think that they are.
[Amanda and Brandon laugh]
Julia: Like, there is an open bar and a lot of good food but that's it. Everyone else there is boring, probably. It's just not a good time.
Brandon: If there's an open bar, why are you talking to people, Julia?
Julia: That's fair. There is an open bar, that is, I want to clarify, Definitely an open bar would not have gone otherwise.
[Brandon laughs]
Eric: Now would it have been different if you knew how many people had knives strapped to their either upper or lower leg?
Julia: Yeah, that would have raised the stakes a little bit. Otherwise, it's just a lot of boring white people all in a room talking about foreign policy.
[Brandon laughs]
Eric: I'm sorry your DM was so boring for that Gala, in particular.
Julia: Yeah, it sucked.
Amanda: Well, we're not yet in Spoil-ey corner, but this gala, I think it's safe to say, is going to be more eventful than that.
[Brandon snickers]
Amanda: But before we get too far into gala prep, many questions had to do of course with Mr. Pinstripe, which was just a thing that I don't think any of us saw coming. And Eric, I feel like all of us fucked up your plans real bad in this episode. Is that true/your welcome/I sorry?
[Brandon and Eric laughs]
Eric: Okay. I've been thinking about this a lot lately in terms of, like, what... how DMs plan and then, like, DMs revealing what your notes were later. And I really like telling you all just because, like, I did the work, I want to show it to you, whatever. But, like, honestly, I think it's like, "Wow, look at my china shop hoping nothing happens even though I built it right on the... this... the San Andreas Fault. I hope you like my china shop. It's a San Andreas china shop," you know?
Brandon: And then, like, Natural 20 rolls into your shop and destroys everything.
[Amanda huffs a laugh]
Eric: But... but like, I don't care. Like, it doesn't matter. Like, I just fucking...
Amanda: Oh, it's for the insurance payout, I see.
Brandon: Oh!
[Eric laughs]
Amanda: Oh!
Eric: This metaphor has gotten away from me.
Julia: Very, very quickly. Can we go back to the fact that we kept fucking up what an actuary was and we kept talking about the thing?
[Brandon laughs]
Eric: Oh my gosh!
[Amanda laughs]
Julia: That's my favorite part of that episode.
Eric: I didn't know. Was that true? What... Did you? Were Bran -- because I... Amanda knows what an actuary is.
Julia: I genuinely kept forgetting what an actuary did.
[Amanda and Eric laughs]
Julia: It's like, so who's gonna take care of my taxes?
[Amanda laughs]
Eric: That was so funny.
Brandon: I initially... I just made the mistake. And then Amanda said something that was like, "Oh, whoops, I just made a mistake." And then I just kept playing with it, but there was that moment of time, I forget the question, it was like a beat of silence, and then me and Julia said, "But those are the same thing, right?" at the same time.
[Amanda laughs]
Brandon: That is not edited. Me and Julia said that at the exact same time.
Eric: So funny.
Amanda: Listen, being a child of the mob, I mean, how... How could Val possibly know anything about taxes or how to submit them?
Eric: Right.
Julia: Val doesn't know about taxes? They don't get paid actual, like, money that the government can track. You don't know.
[Eric laughs]
Amanda: That's how they get you. So, if you never pay them they can't get you, right?
Eric: Right.
Julia: That's true.
Eric: And Val... Val's dad, someone asked on Twitter, "How Val's dad is remarried," because we had made the joke that Val's mom and Val's dad never got divorced. They're just, like, separated because they didn't want to say at the church. I was thinking about that, I'm like, "Oh, Val's was dad just, like, knows a guy who, like, fucking scrubbed it from the records."
Julia: Mhmm.
Eric: "And just like moved it over."
Julia: And Rosa was fine with it.
[Brandon laughs]
Amanda: Oh, yeah.
Eric: Yeah. And then... then that way, you don't have to tell the priest. I think I called him priests. Like--
Julia: I knew Chi , I think.
Eric: --Father I... I knew Chi.
Julia: Yeah, that's a good one.
Eric: Yeah. And I thought that that was so funny. So, similarly, like, Val doesn't know anything about taxes at all. It's like generational.
[Amanda laughs]
Julia: Who would have taught them? No one.
Amanda: No. No one.
Eric: Absolutely not... not our school system.
Brandon: Yeah, for real.
Amanda: That's right.
Eric: Because that's what Join the Party is actually about. The school system [stutters].
Amanda: Redlining and climate change.
Eric: Yeah, exactly. That was so funny. Something that also I thought was really funny from the first episode was I made a very conceited effort because I wanted to thread in the gala in the first episode of Val and Aggie talking to Dr. Morrow while Milo was dead.
[Amanda laughs]
Julia: It was a lot of fun.
Amanda: It was a lot of fun.
Eric: So, I enjoyed that very much and I hope that you all enjoyed that. But like, you know, there are things I can do as a DM, but I... I, more just want to tell you all what I've been planning, but like, it doesn't really matter. I'm not mad. And I know that the thing that you say when you're not... when you're mad except you're not mad. But like, truly I don't care. I... it's more just funny for me. So, like, I built this china shop, it's my fault I built it on the San Andreas Fault, but let's just... let's just make it happen and see what the story is.
Amanda: So, what do you think the story would be?
Eric: I thought because of [stutters]. We all talked both in Join the Committee 1 and off... and off mic, was that Aggie was going to talk to Emily Slaughter, Val was going to deal with the venue, and Milo was going to do one of those other things that we had talked about. Either trying to invite people working with Carmen, and January or getting your hands on some stuff to sell at the... at the auction.
Brandon: Yeah, things that famous people do.
Amanda: The things that--
Eric: Right, because Milo's famous.
Amanda: --you think people do. Yeah.
Julia: I think the problem was that, like, in the moment, we started talking it out and we're like, "Oh, no, it would make more sense for Milo to--
Brandon: Yeah.
Julia: --secure the venue because we could use the MMFK or, like...
Eric: Right.
Julia: Val can go talk to... because I think I rolled extremely well on my intimidation I was like--
Amanda: Yes.
Julia: I think I can intimidate Emily Slaughter finally .
Amanda: And I'm like, "I'll do whatever. There's no consequences for my choice here."
Julia: Exactly.
[Brandon snickers]
Eric: Yeah. So, that's what I had planned and then everything... God.
Amanda: Like, shifted to the left.
Eric: Everything got shifted one to the left. And I'm like, "LOL. Alright, let's see what happens. That's fine." I mean, again Emily Slaughter starting from scratch talking to someone that they don't talk to a lot. I guess it's like Aggie flailing while trying to plan and then what did happen with Mr... Mr. Pinstripe I think MMFK just wasn't going to be viable. I had thought about it when... when he moved I almost like, "Oh, that could be really cool, but I feel like you rolled really poorly as well, and oh my god no. It's... it's out and also the Giga bear fucked it. Fucked every second.
Brandon: Yeah, I was gonna say I think it made perfect in game-sense. I didn't even, like, it didn't, like, smell as odd to me at all. Like, of course, there would still be construction going on. They can't hold a gala when there's, you know, a Giga bear just tramples through it, like, a couple seasons... a couple months ago.
Julia: It's in six months though.
Brandon: I mean, it's a museum. They don't have a pot of money, you know?
Amanda: Canonical LTC resident Jake has very high standards, okay? Of building inspections and we need to make sure that everything's okay before it reopens.
Eric: So funny.
Amanda: The only thing that read as suspicious to me was that, Eric, you built a lovely encounter for Multitool to perhaps show off her stretching powers.
[Brandon laughs]
Amanda: To deal with two things that are exactly 100 feet apart, and instead poor Julia had a trolley problem on her hand.
[Brandon and Eric snickers]
Julia: Brandon did such a good job cutting because I spent at least five minutes trying to figure out the best, like, mechanics and also a way that I could do as much as possible with, like, bonus actions, actions, reactions, that kind of stuff.
Brandon: I get a lot of your thought process in there because I thought it was fun to watch your brain work but.
Julia: Yeah.
Brandon: Yeah.
Julia: Yeah, but there... there was, like, probably, like, a good two minutes of silence as I flipped through my... my cards trying to figure out what to do.
Eric: As I turned to you both to Brandon and Amanda and I'm like, "Oh, it's the trolley problem." Get it?
[Players laugh]
Eric: Yeah. I mean, we can get into it more about, like, what my intentions were, but I think that it ultimately was just very... all of it was very fun.
Amanda: It's so fun. Yeah.
Eric: Yeah. I didn't even think about it being that far away. I just did it so that we could get introduced to Multitool's moveset in general. And that--
Amanda: Unclogging the toilet?
Eric: --was my... that was my hea-. Milo's my -- head in my hand; that's my DM moment where I'm like, "The first thing we see Multitool will do with... with her powers is, like, clean the toilet."
Julia: Classic.
Brandon: I legitimately thought you were just setting up that situation so you can have Emily Slaughter save the day and, like, sort of, you know, push herself onto the team.
Amanda: It was a really good use of that scene.
[Julia hums in agreement]
Eric: Yeah. I think that... so again, like, this is why it doesn't matter is, like, I kind of set up that there was going to be a trolley problem of some sort, and Emily Slaughter was going to do that. I'm glad that you picked up on it, but it like, it didn't really matter who it was. Actually, here's a confession. Shannon Redwine wasn't going to be in the Upcountry Keepers but I needed Emily Slaughter to have something on Val. So, I had this shift, so I shifted it. I wanted Shannon Redwine, nay, Tuff Stuff to be involved. I came up with Tuff Stuff on the fucking fly.
Amanda: Whoa!
Eric: Because I wanted her to be involved in some other way later in the campaign, but I was like, "Boom! Now Tuff Stuff is in the Upcountry Keepers." Like, Emily needs to have something on Val or just gonna be Val growling at Emily Slaughter the entire time.
Julia: Oh, I'm so mad.
[Brandon laughs]
Amanda: Oh, man! That felt so well planned and slid in there. Oh gosh!
Eric: Thank you! I was... again, like, it doesn't matter. Like, I... it's... everything is about, like, thinking on your feet and doing something fun for who gets to interact with. Emily Slaughter wouldn't have been like. "Oh, can you send the... the smart one? Can you send the one who I've been talking to? Like, that wouldn't have happened. Emily Slaughter gets the... gets to Emily Slaughter gets and she girl bosses her way through regardless.
[Brandon snickers]
Julia: Fair enough.
Amanda: And I thought Brandon's interaction was so fun and mysterious as well. Sam asked in Discord: "Brandon, were you so proud to effectively deal with the Pinstripe man?" And Eric: "What was he going to do with the ducks?"
[Eric snickers]
Amanda: I also have a question here from A Brandon in Slack? Eric, tell me more of your duck knowledge and use that frozen peas, you know all the duck knowledge.
[Eric laughs]
Eric: I was... we're recording this early, so like, hey, [stutters] we might not have enough questions for everybody, please make sure that you send some stuff and Brandon's like, "Tell me about ducks." And I'm like, "What?" Brandon is like, "You told you just had new stuff about ducks. You know everything about ducks. Just... just do it."
Brandon: Yeah. What do ducks like to eat?
Eric: I actually know this from, there's a sign near my grandma's house who; she lives near a duck pond. And like recently, I guess, like, the people who run these small towns are being more concerned about what people are throwing as food to the ducks, so you shouldn't be throwing bread because it's actually just like filler. It's not healthy for the ducks, so if you throw frozen peas, they really, really like that. And it's nutrition because it's a... it's a vegetable. They... It was like I was on a sign in Merrick, Long Island.
[Amanda and Brandon laugh]
Eric: So, I don't know everything about ducks I just learned it, but I'm sure Brandon has... has Google it and he's gonna tell us all about it.
Brandon: I did. Obviously, this is a place that I don't know that you should trust or not, but, you know, they like fruits and vegetables, apparently. Seeds and grains, and other things that you can't get like insects.
[Brandon huffs a laugh]
Eric: There you go.
Julia: I mean, you can dump a bag of crickets into a pond--
Brandon: Yeah, that's true.
Julia: --if you really want to.
Amanda: That feels like the beginning of an ecological horror movie.
[Brandon huffs a laugh]
Julia: Did you know that Mallard ducks mate for life? Fun fact.
Brandon: That's so cute!
Amanda: Cute!
Eric: I want to go back to the moment when someone's pouring a bag of bugs into a lake.
[Amanda laughs]
Julia: No!
Eric: It's like, well, you told me not to do bread so this is my only other idea. Poor crickets.
Amanda: It's kindness.
Brandon: I just wanted to state for one more time fuck geese.
Julia: Mhmm.
Eric: Fuck the geese!
Brandon: It's the call out for all geese. Fuck you.
Eric: Yeah, fuck geese. The geese are actually the big bad of... of this campaign. Canada geese coming down from Canada and messing with them.
Amanda: Yes. And Hakuna also asked back to Mr. Pinstripe, "Eric, did you have a backup plan? If not, how much did you curse Brandon off mic?"
Eric: No. Brand -- Brandon, what were you thinking? I want to know.
Brandon: I felt so fucking good. This is the first confident thing I've done in all of my D&D.
Amanda: [Laughs victoriously] I saved this item from seven months ago!
[Brandon laughs]
Eric: Yeah.
Brandon: No. I just rolled well and, because I love that, like, you asked me on mic where I would... where Milo would take a break. And so I was like, my grandpa had a duck pond next to his place too, so I was like, "Duck ponds are nice." And then.
Eric: Yeah.
Brandon: Yeah, I rolled a Nat 20 and I was like, "Alright. Well, I own the situation now. Mr. Pinstripe is mine."
[Eric and Julia laugh]
Eric: Yeah, you roll. I think I asked you to roll a perception check just to see if something weird was going on, and the Nat 20 let you notice Mr. Pinstripe before he did anything else. And he's just like, this fucking 1950s Al Capone looking gangster just, like, sitting on a bench in a duck pond.
Julia: So, very quickly, because everything shifted over one, was Val supposed to get Mr. Pinstripe in your game plan?
Eric: Yes!
Julia: Okay.
[Brandon laughs]
Julia: Interesting. I wouldn't have handled it so neatly as Brandon did.
[Brandon laughs]
Eric: 100%. I also agree that using an enchantment spell to tell him to get the fuck out was very neat, but then, listen, I can't tell you anything more... more about Mr. Pinstripe because he's... he's fucking gone.
[Amanda hums in agreement]
Eric: So.
Brandon: For one month.
Eric: Yeah, for one month he's in New York City trying to find an apartment on the Lower East Side. Like, I don't know what to tell you.
Brandon: I just love that, like, I have a reputation, let's say for... for not maybe being the most conversationally appropriate in... in our campaigns. But I would... Milo is the nicest -- nice person. Just talking... talking to Ms. Pinstripe and Mr. Pinstripe just revealed his hand, you know?
Eric: Yeah. There was a moment where you... when you asked, like, you... you shook his hand and I'm like, "I know what you're doing."
[Amanda laughs]
Eric: Like, you know, there's no reason why Mr. Pinstripe would. And also, Mr. Pinstripe made his hand into his... into a buzzer as well, which really just kind of dunked all over Milo when do you really think about it.
[Brandon laughs]
Eric: It was really cool and good when he got buzzed.
Julia: Yeah. If you really compare, you know, getting buzzed and then being cursed to walk the streets of New York City for 30 days, you know?
[Brandon laughs]
Julia: Mr. Pinstripe won that.
Eric: Yeah. Mr. Pinstripe definitely came up on top, that's what everyone's saying on the boards.
[Brandon laughs]
Eric: Yeah. I... Listen, you made... you made the choice that was really, like, superhero choice, I guess. But now like, who knows why it was there. Who knows what he was doing? He's gone.
Brandon: Got to protect the ducks. And I did Google it pretty in-depth afterwards and it is gash.
Eric: Oh, Good!
Amanda: Nice! Good. Question Surgeon Michelle Spurgeon would like to know, "Did the group get to hear the last scene before the next recording?" Friends, we did not. And, you know, we might have handled some things differently if we have.
[Julia hums in agreement]
Amanda: Eric, what was your thought process? You haven't done, like, a coda before?
Brandon: Hey, Eric. What the fuck?
Eric: Yeah.
[Amanda and Eric laughs]
Amanda: Oh, yeah. I just... I filter those out of the after party questions, by the way, but lots have those.
[Eric humms]
Eric: Delicious.
Amanda: So tasty.
Eric: So good. Yeah, there was something that I wanted to tease. I definitely wanted to tease that something was going to go on with whatever is gonna happen next in the campaign, but I didn't think that would make sense to tell the players that.
[Julia hums in agreement]
Eric: Listen, we talk about dramatic irony all the time, how the players need... no might know something that the characters don't, but I do think that it's human nature. It's very difficult to keep your... your two minds split in that way. So, I was like, "I very much want to tease this for the fiction, but I want to wait until after, maybe, the first stages of whatever is going to happen, what I've alluded to in that final scene," I wanted that to have been actioned already. So, like, we are three or four sessions ahead, and only then did I then write the scene, give it to Brandon, and then Julia, and Amanda heard it as Brandon put it together. So, I thought it was fun. I wanted to tease it. Like, I very much see this campaign as, like, the... the Teen Titans. Like, this campaign is so much like the Teen Titans cartoon from the early 2000s, and I thought that having, like, a little tease like that would be kind of like very apropos for the genre.
Amanda: Ev and Ralts would also like to know, "Evil slack??"
[Brandon laughs]
Brandon: That was so funny.
Julia: For all your evil.
Amanda: Very good decisions.
Eric: Exactly! So, not that slack. You don't do evil things on regular slack, but evil slack is being marketed directly towards villains.
Amanda: I love that.
Julia: Every time you send a message it automatically @s everyone. That's what evil slack does.
Amanda: The only react is the Shrug emoji.
Eric: That's... If ever.
Julia: No.
Eric: That and the... that and dusty stick. Those are the only two choices you have. Slack bot is just the Joker.
[Brandon laughs]
Amanda: Oh.
Eric: So fucking twisted, man. It's so twisted.
Brandon: I don't know why you're besmirching my parents like that Eric.
Julia: Gosh.
[Amanda and Eric laughs]
Eric: Maybe Milo's parents -- birth parents invented evil slack.
Brandon: Maybe.
Garbled talking:
Eric: That's why... that's what Anubis was alluding to.
Amanda: Major bisexual in discord would like to know. "We know that Danny sent in vague paintings like landscapes," which I thought was a very funny description of landscape paintings. "But what did Erin send in? My head canon, so Erin is a tattoo artist. She lives in Berlin. Her name has always been Erin. She is married. She has kids as well. Holly wanted to know what her life was like, and she is just like a jet setter. I think her spouse is from Canada. And so, they split their time between Montreal and Berlin. And Montreal is not that far from Laketown City so they can make it down for holiday things. But she is very, very just, like, the hip tattoo artist. Not just to the stars, but just, like, has a very specific style, so I like to think that she sent in, like my tattoo artist does, a lot of drawings on wax paper. There's, like, a tracing of your, you know, your area, of whatever area of the body you want to put the tattoo on and then, like, does, you know, like the kind of pencil drawing at first. And I think Erin does a lot of, like, photorealistic tattoos.
Julia: Very cool.
Brandon: I want one.
Eric: It was in my head, Erin did, like, good Ed Hardy tattoos.
Amanda: Oh, yeah. No, no, that's -- that's very, very cool as well. Like, very classic style.
Eric: Yeah. Very classic and just, like, but not covered with rhinestones and Bret --, and Bret Michaels has one of them. Yep.
Amanda: Guys, I went to Trader Joe's recently, I got a bunch of, like, dried fruits and seaweed snacks and trail mixes. So, I'm going to go fill up a whole little tray with a bunch of those guys, and I'll be right back.
Julia: Ooh, yum, yum.
Brandon: The dream!
[Midroll SFX pings]
Eric: Hey, it's Eric. I'm gonna see my good friend Jeff for the first time in person in a very long time, and I'm very stoked about it. We're gonna hang out, and we're gonna make food, and we're gonna go to restaurants, and play a bunch of video games, it is going to be time to tell. So, you know, if you're -- if you're up to it, see a friend you haven't seen in a while. I know it might be awkward, but, you know, the only thing that's making it awkward is time and the realities of the universe, so it's not really either of your fault. It's more like that. Welcome to the Midroll. Jeff's gonna make me ramen. It's gonna be delicious. Shout out to all of our patrons and all of you who have joined patreon.com/jointhepartypod over the last few weeks. We love you. We know you. You're the best. I'm doing this midroll quite early in the week, but you wouldn't have known that thanks to podcasting editing magic, so I don't have the names right now. But I know all of you out there are doing the damn thing. This show is made possible by all of our incredible patrons and we could not do it without you. For just $5 a month, you can get access to excellent bonus content and join the best place on the internet--our Patron only Discord--so, support join the party, get good shit. Go to patreon.com/jointhepartypod. Hey, I don't know if you knew but we're doing a digital live show at the end of this month. JTP Live 3: LTC Drift is a brand-new one-shot set in Laketown City on August 26 at 8pm Eastern. Now, is it actually going to be about drifting and neon motorbikes and then Knight of Mirrors who has a neon motorbike? Or did I just make all of that up, because I know all of you nerds love the Fast and the Furious? Who can say? You gotta get a ticket to find out. Get your ticket now, because it also includes a VOD copy of the show that you can watch afterwards, whether you're attending live or catching up, or you're somewhere on the other side of the world, and it's too late, and you're gonna watch it later because we want you to sleep and we care about you. Get your ticket at jointhe partypod.com/live. August 26 8pm Eastern, or afterwards with the VOD, jointhepartypod.com/live. Oh, baby, it is our favorite time of the year and Multitude. It is Multitude’s Survey summer time. Go to multitude.productions/survey, or check the link in the episode description you have right there to help us learn more about you and decide what's next for the collective. The survey takes 15 minutes, has tons of emojis, and ends with a cute photo of everyone in Multitude. I think you'll enjoy that. Also, there are some specific questions for every single one of the shows, especially the ones for Join the Party, we really want you to answer them, you'll get to that part where it asks you that and some questions and give feedback on Join the Party. We definitely want you to do that part and you have to do it by doing the entire survey in total. Seriously though, we have one of the best communities in all of podcasting, and this survey actually does help us figure out what we're going to do for the next year. So, help us make sure we're doing the stuff that you want and love. Go to multitude.productions/survey today. This podcast is sponsored by BetterHelp. Is there something interfering with your happiness or preventing you from achieving your goals? I don't know, maybe just, like, the way that the world is right now is a lot to deal with and you need to talk to someone who's kind of like outside of your world and might not have stakes in the things that you say and don't -- might not take something personally, you need an outside observer, or BetterHelp can help you with that. BetterHelp is customized online therapy that offers video, phone, and even live chat sessions with a real therapist. You get timely and thoughtful responses. Plus, you can schedule weekly video or phone sessions, so you never have to sit in a nasty waiting room like with traditional therapy. And there's, like, highlights there. And you're like, "Do they still make highlights?" And then you look at it and it's from 97. Wild! The best part is it's also more affordable than traditional offline counseling, and financial aid is available. So, you can visit betterhelp.com/jointheparty. Better H-E-L-P and join over 1 million people who've taken charge of their mental health with the help of an experienced professional. This podcast is sponsored by BetterHelp and Join the Party listeners can get 10% off their first month at betterhelp.com/jointheparty. That's B-E-T-T-E-R-H-E-L-P.com./jointheparty. And now, back to the after party.
[Midroll SFX pings]
Eric: Alright, I'm back. But save some little mini mandarins for me. Those are my favorite.
Julia: Yes! Of course.
Eric: I want to point out how Amanda and my life has changed now that there is a Trader Joe's, like, decently--
Amanda: God.
Eric: --close by.
Amanda: It's so this. It's so different. It's like a 15 minute walk.
Brandon: They opened one up in Brooklyn?
Amanda: Long Island City.
Brandon: Oh.
Eric: There's one in, like -- there's one in, like, downtown Brooklyn, which is, like, a trek very much so.
Amanda: It's like two buses away. Yeah.
Eric: But now it's like just on the other side of the bridge that connects Brooklyn and Queens from where the Multi-studio is and where... It's just... it's so nice. Like, we don't have to buy $200 worth at a time when we, like, get our hands on a car and we find ourselves in Long Island. It's fucking beautiful.
[Brandon laughs]
Julia: Getting an apartment that is walking distance from a Trader Joe's was revolutionary during the pandemic.
Eric: You gotta.
Amanda: We have some questions here about the game and our characters in the world of Laketown City. Let's just start with Climate Change as my day does most days. "I would like to know Eric, during Join the Committee 1, I heard a reference to climate change still happening but I thought the whole premise was the world has a cool funky renewable source of energy now. Is it exclusively for Laketown City? Is capitalism capitalism and particularly rude? Have I misremembered the premise? What's the deal?"
[Brandon hums curiously]
Eric: No. Very, very good. I think um.
Amanda: And climate change would still have... the stuff would still have happened even if we discovered this great source 20 years ago.
Eric: Yeah. I think that... that a lot of shit has still gotten fucked on the... on the Earth. Even starting in 1985 when Dr. Morrow first discovered Diaphragm. I think something that I... we had talked about a lot when we were building the world was the timeline. The reason why Company Tin existed was that Dr. Morrow tried to, like, force companies to make factories in Laketown City. And like, that was the only way that they could use Diaphragm, and then it was a very slow acceptance by the United States to use it as some sort of, like, renewable energy. I mean, I... it really does feel the same way that, like, I think people use solar power or nuclear power now in 2021. It's like it's better --
Amanda: Just because we have it doesn't mean that it's, you know, immediately ubiquitous and easy to use and, you know, reverses everything that's happened before.
Eric: Right. I also think that Laketown City is still like a futurist city in so many ways that it was allowed to explode, that it has skytram, that it has a bullet train that goes from Laketown City to New York City, but at the same time, it's like New York City doesn't have skytram instead of the subway now. Like, there's no skytram to the airports. There's no, like, bullet train from New York City to Austin or New York City to Chicago. It's still just, like, it is still Laketown City surrounding but it was, yeah. I was feeling just real bad about climate change, so I put that in. You're totally right. A very much combination of, like, the world we live in and also, yeah, me thinking about it and in the long term but when I was writing that, I was just like, "Man, it's fucking hot. I can't imagine there's ever going to be a summer day that's, like, below 90 ever again."
Brandon: Yeah.
Eric: When I was writing that. So, good... good... very good noticing. Thank you for... for thinking and asking a question.
Brandon: I'm sure in the same way that, like, nuclear power now. Like, people are scared of it too. Like, I'm sure some people will be scared of diaphragm as well.
Eric: Oh, for sure. For sure.
Amanda: Jules 2.0 would like to know, "What does Hitomi think Val is doing when they're on a superhero duty? And when is this double date/double reveal happening?"
Julia: First off, Italian emergencies.
[Brandon laughs]
Julia: Yes. That's the answer to that question.
Amanda: Haley also asked, "Have Val's mom and Hitomi met?" which I am dying to know as well.
Julia: Yeah, they met at the Christmas party.
Brandon: Was your mom there?
Julia: I think she showed up at one point.
Eric: When Taylor Swift shows up everyone shows up.
Julia: Everyone shows up.
Brandon: That's true.
Julia: And it's, like, across the lake. So, she knows that it's there. She knows the party's happening. She showed up.
Eric: It's like, "Well, who wants hard eggnog and boombox?"
Julia: Yeah, exactly.
Amanda: All of us.
Brandon: Not a Christmas party without the--
Amanda: All of us do!
Brandon: --eggnog and boombox.
[Julia hums in agreement]
Eric: I assume that that's a Christmas tradition.
[Brandon hums in agreement]
Julia: And if it's not, it should be.
[Brandon chuckles]
Eric: I was... Truly, is that a Christmas tradition? I don't know. That's why I eat my Chinese food out of boob mugs, though it must be different.
[Brandon laughs]
Amanda: Delicious! Bray whose birthday is today by the way -- the day we're recording.
Brandon: Happy birthday!
Amanda: Happy birthday Bray! Also asked what is the ship name for Multitool and Tegan? Is it Meghan? Is it Tultitool? People need answers. I don't know, but I do know that at some point, something's gonna have to happen where we talk about our identities, and I'm just gonna keep pushing that off.
Julia: Just keep doing it. Just keep doing it.
Eric: It's so funny. I literally set this up during Join the Committee 1 and I'm like, "Hey, so like, you -- y'all have significant partners? Are you doing anything with it? Do you want to pratfall like Milo? Would you like that? Is that good for you?" And instead, you too are just like, "No."
Julia: Yeah.
Eric: We're...
Julia: Tell them we're good.
Eric: We're sticking with emotional conversations and Italian emergency.
[Julia hums in agreement]
[Brandon laughs]
Amanda: Well, folks also pointed out like, I mean, both of them are very smart. Like, [stutters], you know, people are speculating kind of in discord and stuff like that. Like, is it you know, is it... is it possible for them not to know, and I think part of this is the kind of like hand waviness of secret identities where, you know, Vulcani is the only Vulcani-shaped person in Laketown City specifically, but also, you know, there's a certain amount of... of superhero hand waviness, but this is a thing that we are, like, aware of and we'll deal with.
Julia: Here's the thing that I was thinking about, and it was the idea of what would be harder to figure out. If you're dating a superhero, what their, like, civilian personality is? Or if you're dating a civilian, what their superhero personality is?
[Eric hums in curiosity]
Julia: I think it's way easier to figure out, like, "I'm dating this regular person, but they look exactly like that superhero that everyone sees on the news." It's much harder to go from, "Here's my superhero girlfriend. I don't know who she is in real life, because there's hundreds of thousands of real life people in the city.
Eric: Yeah.
Brandon: That's a good question.
Amanda: That is... that is a good question. I um -- I watched the imminent reality show Big Brother. And every year, inevitably, people will lie about their careers because they think that saying they're, like, a lawyer makes them sound too smart. And so, like, one person this year is lying and saying he's a bartender, which he did do in law school, but is now a full time lawyer. So, I feel like I would constantly be looking and, like, people in the... in the Big Brother house as well are like, "Is he a lawyer? Is he a bartender? Are you a doctor? Are you an actor?" And I think that I would constantly be doing that in the scenario you described Julia, where the my-girlfriend-is-a-superhero-but-I-don't-know-her-civilian-identity. I'll be like, "Oh, you mentioned, like, this gas station you like to go to." Like, I would... I would try to like fucking dox her. And so, it wouldn't work for me and is, you know. Sydney, in Discord also asked, like, "Would you date someone who's a superhero, but you don't know who they are under the mask? How long would you let them wait before they told you?" And for me, that would be very challenging.
Brandon: I would not do that. Yeah.
Julia: I think it's more dangerous to date the superhero than it is--
Amanda: It is.
Julia: --to date the civilian, you know what I mean? Because now in public, people have seen you with that superhero and, you know, if someone wanted to get to them, they could easily get to you.
Eric: Yep.
Amanda: Yeah. I think... I'm not... I haven't decided kind of in my head canon when exactly Tegan and Multitool started dating, but I do think that whenever Multitool, like, accepted, you know, Tegan's invites because I don't think Multitool would have done the invite or, like, they kissed for the first time whenever Multitool, like, realized later that she was in costume. It was like, "Fuck, damn! This is gonna be so much harder."
Brandon: I think it has to depend on your costume, right? So like.
Amanda: Yes.
Brandon: If you're the Hulk, then it would be harder to figure out Bruce Banner's superhero identity but I'm--
Julia: Sure, because they don't look the same
Eric: Sure.
Brandon: --that is the opposite. Yeah,
Julia: How did -- how did you get kisses in with the cowl?
Brandon: Yeah.
Amanda: I think maybe she has, like, a domino mask or sunglasses that she wears instead.
Julia: I think -- I'm basing it off of Sarah Barrows of imagery.
Amanda: Oh yeah. Or the goggles.
Julia: The goggles, Yeah.
Amanda: Yeah. I think --
Eric: It's goggles and then you're zipped all the way up, so you just like, "Just, like, give me a little bit of a mouth."
Amanda: Yeah, yeah. I think as... as the trust goes on, or maybe it's dark.
Brandon: Or it's just like.
Amanda: But in a movie theater or something.
[Players laugh]
Julia: Gently kiss your fingers and press them to Tegan's lips. Cool, cool, cool.
Amanda: Cute. You then later realize she's in costume, fuck.
Eric: Yeah. Yeah, I'm sure that these questions don't... don't come up at all.
Julia: Nope. Not at all.
[Amanda and Brandon laugh]
Amanda: Everybody, also, very concerned for Carmen and Soup Dumpling would like to know, "Can we please establish another good coffee shop for Carmen?" Carmen definitely in my mind has, like, a Google map of the best independent coffee shops in every single neighborhood. That way, if she is, like, two and a half blocks from--
Eric: Yeah.
Amanda: --this one but the other one, their sidewalk construction making her three blocks away, she knows exactly where to go
Brandon: I just got that, Julia. When you were referencing --
Julia: That,... that my comment to Carmen being like, "You seem off but I'm not sure why."?
Brandon: Yes. I just -- I thought... I thought she... you were just, like, being like, "You have had bad coffee recently, but it's because I charted all the coffee shops in the salt water taffy shops."
Julia: You did. You did do that.
Amanda: You did.
Eric: You did.
Amanda: You did that. Yes.
Eric: You did... You did in fact do that.
[Brandon sighs]
Eric: Yeah, I think that Car -- It's more like Thornhill was a reliable local chain that exploded out. Like, I can only imagine this is like what Starbucks was like, in the Pacific Northwest before it got massive. We're like, "This is good coffee. I'm going to have this coffee. And it's here." And that's what Thornhill was like, but now, yeah, I 100% agree with what Amanda said is like, Carmen is very... is no longer always incredibly caffeinated. There is a very much more hit or miss, so Carmen struggles a lot more where they are like, "Oh my god, I didn't have... There was no good coffee nearby, so I had to have, like, fucking Timmy Hose. Like, it was... it was terrible.
Brandon: Timmy Hose.
[Brandon snickers]
Amanda: Timmy Hose.
Eric: That's what people... That's what Canadians call it.
Brandon: I like that.
Eric: I've been to a bunch of [stutters] -- a bunch of Ontario--
Brandon: Ontario Bros--
Eric: And everyone called it.
Brandon: --called it Timmy Hose?
[Amanda hums]
Eric: Timmy bros indeed. Give me those ice caps. Ice caps, baby. Oh, we just got this... this question on Twitter and I wanted to know if we can.
Amanda: Breaking news!
Eric: If we can thread this in. @_TangSoo asked, "Was Eric fully prepared to let Milo die if the dice could decreed it?" 100%. 100%, that's what that... I had some mechanics go in there. It was going to be out of Milo's hands a little bit more because the actuary was the one controlling that, but because you rolled so well and your relationship with Tuna was patched up pretty quickly. It was like, "Alright, well, you're fine."
Brandon: Yeah.
Eric: You're good.
Brandon: There was no world in which Milo was going to be conquered by death. Milo conquers death.
[Julia and Eric hums]
[Brandon snickers]
Brandon: You should see Julia's face on this.
[Amanda laughs]
[Eric hums]
Eric: Well, you have your best friend Anubis. Also, wait, sorry, we didn't talk about this. Hey, was it a fun reveal that Anubis and Tuna sounded the same?
Brandon: Yes. It was hilarious.
Julia: That's--
Amanda: It was fun.
Julia: --incredible.
Amanda: It was very fun. No question.
Julia: No question.
Eric: Okay, I just wanted to, like, give a little bit of dopamine. Just like a little... give you a little bit of that. I was very proud of that.
Brandon: I like it because I panned it left and right, so it's just like there's cats surrounding you.
[Amanda laughs]
Amanda: We have a couple items of clarification corner, Laura and Antonia wanted to ask if we could explain a little more about how Milo's spirits surge works?
Brandon: So, my Spirits surge is just basically a wild magic surge or a spell surge. I forget what it's called properly but it's basically just a wild magic table where every time it's sorcerers, and I think, is it every time you do a spell and you roll?
Julia: Yeah. Any... any spell that's not a cantrip for a wild magic sorcerer.
Brandon: Yes. You roll and if you get a one, you have to roll on that wild magic table. And it's, like, my favorite one on there is like you turn into a potted plant or something like. They're just, like, funny or, you know, buffs or debuffs. But then, Eric wrote his own basically wild magic table, and you guys got the permanent build up of numbers from dimension 20, I believe?
[Julia hums in agreement]
Eric: Yeah. I wanted to make it a little bit different because this was Milo's, like, very inhuman feats. Milo got +1 to wisdom, but also we added the Spirits surge on top of it, so ordinarily, you would just roll one, you get wild magic, but we get the build up. So, that's why it's 1, 2 then 1, 2, 3 every single time. And then, I wanted to, like, have a more balanced or... or some good, some bad instead of like, fucking random shit, which is very much what wild magic is. But I think it's like Milo has to... has to deal with the fact that he's very powerful, but it gets out of hand a little more, which is why, like, the Spirits surge became a feat instead of just, like, the wild magic stuff.
Brandon: Yeah.
Amanda: Thank you! Jai would also like to know that when Aggie's subclass got yanked by the time ocean, did it also remove her superpower.
Eric (in a high-pitched tone): Time shark!
Amanda: If she still have that.
Eric (in a high-pitched tone): Time shark in the time ocean. Yeah, gonna yank your powers.
Amanda: I basically still have superpower, but it has a little bit different of focus because Aggie's job now has to do with being outside and not with, like, home repair. I now have the exact same thing, but to the exterior of buildings and seeing when stuff is out of place in the natural environment, so that's something Eric and I discussed during the... the re-skinning. The rebuild.
Eric: Yes. We haven't had a chance to do it, but it's, like, very similar. It's more, like, instead of being able to look on the inside of buildings, it's being like, "Hey, what are things look like when I'm up high and looking on the outside," which is like what Aggie would be doing as a forest ranger.
Amanda: And Eva would like to know in a kind of podcasting clarification corner, in the after party, when I say let me get a refill, do we actually take a break or do I just immediately continue it and we're back? The second one.
Brandon: Usually.
Eric: Do... Do you want to lie?
Brandon: Go to the bathroom or something.
[Brandon snickers]
Julia: Yeah.
Amanda: We sometimes take a break if somebody has to, but other times, I'll just say, "I'm gonna get some Cheetos," and we're back.
Julia: I wish we got Cheetos.
Brandon: I know. We never actually get Cheetos!
[Brandon snickers]
Julia: It just wouldn't be, like, a nice sound for you guys to listen to; us chomping down on Cheetos in between questions.
Brandon: Yep.
Eric: There's a postmates outside both of your doors right now.
Julia: Whoa!
Eric: And the fact that you haven't let him in for the last 20 minutes is rude.
Julia: He's not knocking.
[Amanda snickers]
Julia: It's not my fault.
Brandon: You let your postmate into your home Eric?
Eric: He... to give you the Cheetos.
Julia: You just leave him out there contactless delivery bro.
Brandon: Exactly.
Eric: Well, I didn't do that. He needs to come into your apartment. Let him in.
Amanda: We did get a very interesting question about DMing from Ginny via email. So, this references back to Campaign 1 which I think is very fun. No spoilers, though. Don't worry, guys. So, Ginny writes, "I've been looking into developing D&D to use for teaching English. In Political Party, as the party took the orb and are setting off home, Eric levels everyone up and ask them all some amazing questions that really made me stop and think. And just has a couple examples here from our transcript, which is very helpful. Thank you, Ginny. So, one of the questions was, "Tracy, you can see fish skipping up in the air and nearly high enough for you to grab them right out and your wonder senses are just on fire. Has it ever been this easy?" Your question to me was, "In our from up there in the rigging, you can see the entire skylight out in front of you. When was the last time you saw this much sky?" And so, Jimmy's question to us is, "Is there a name for the style of questioning? As a teacher it reminded them of Bloom's Taxonomy, which; that was very fun. Is it coming from psychology therapy as a teacher? Like, is it something that you were working with? You know, is there a name of this? Is it common? Like, what's the deal?"
Eric: I remember this moment.
Amanda: Me too.
Brandon: It was the moment where I was like, "Oh, shit, Eric came to DM!"
Amanda: Yeah.
[Eric huffs a laugh]
Eric: Thank you.
Amanda: I was like, "Oh my god. Wait, you mean character-based questions, decisions, and reactions?"
Eric: Yeah, um, I talked about this a lot on the show, but I spent a lot of time thinking about the medium of the actual play or real play D&D show. A show that is a storytelling show that's guided by Dungeon & Dragons, or a tabletop RPG thing of your choice. And I think that since this was already back in Political Party, this is when I was like, Oh, you can do a lot of shit. You can just, like, ask questions. You can just, like, have conversations and think about it, and I realized we hadn't had a lot of interiority with the characters then. So, I'm like, oh, let... I'm just gonna ask some questions. And I... I remember asking the three of you these questions. There is not a name for it. I think it's just, like, there was a quiet moment, and there were a lot less quiet moments in Campaign 1. So, I saw this as an opportunity to really flesh shit out and I just kind of jumped on it. It's just a reminder that whenever you're playing a tabletop RPG game and there are people playing characters, there are always opportunities to hear more about their interiority that doesn't have consequences. You can always just ask, like, "What are you thinking right now?", "What is this?" And it doesn't have to be as high concept as like, it's like, "You failed the charisma roll and this psychic damage is made taking you back to a memory," which I think is very nice, but I think there are also opportunities for you to just ask simple questions, and I thought it was really fun. I think about it now that how like; we spend our... our downtime, doing scenes more than anything, and we don't ask questions, which I think is fine. And I think that, like, we all have a lot more experience playing, so you reveal your intentions a little bit more. But all the way back in Campaign 1, I'm just like, "You know what, I'm gonna ask these questions, and I want to see what happens."
Amanda: And a question from Juju, also via email. I've occasionally had problems with my players wanting to all have really edgy characters with dark backstories.
[Eric laughs]
Amanda: I know it's very common for new players to want to play rogues or characters looking for revenge, but it is very tough to run a team campaign when every character is like a mean, brooding, standoffish lone wolf. Do you have any advice for dealing with this or convincing my players to play different tropes? So relatable.
Brandon: I know, that's definitely something that a lot of beginning players do. I did the same thing.
Amanda: I mean, you guys know and are.
[Everybody laughs]
Brandon: I would say be more active in their sort of creation process, like maybe suggest some fun combinations and like, what the possibilities of the combination of... of that character is. Like, someone who is a... might play that character might also like the wild magic sorcerer, or something like that. I would also say, if you can be creative about your campaign, like, take that and spin it to your advantage. Maybe like, if you have a team of four people who are all Harengons, then like, think of some setting where, like, that spins it on its head, and it's like, can't think of it right now. But like, think of that and... and play it that way.
Julia: I think it's really interesting. I've been thinking a lot lately about the, like, character trait tables, where you roll a D10 or something like that, and you get a randomized trait for your character. And I think maybe.
Eric: Yeah, yeah.
Julia: Not enforcing that, but suggesting them for your players as like a, "Here's, like, one section where I want you to roll this one trait and incorporate that into your character." And that might loosen them up a little bit and make them be like--
Eric: Yeah.
Julia: --okay, well, my character apparently can't cook well, so how do I incorporate that into my character is like, this is a something that is a little trait that isn't just like, "Oh, my dad died because of orcs."
[Amanda and Brandon laugh]
Eric: Hey, you could just, like, end this campaign and do another one. Same people, but like, start with a different story and make them roll new characters. I think that very much this is like a impulse. Like, yeah, I do want to murder someone. I very much do, and let them do it, and then get to roll new characters. If your whole party rolls edgy characters twice, then I think you need to start having a conversation, but I think that sometimes you just need to get it. People need to get it out of their system. Something to consider is that a campaign doesn't need to be 100 sessions, a campaign can end more abruptly, like, honestly, endings are good. We could get -- Let them end. Let them kill and then see if they can... if they'll roll something else. Do some one-shots. Do some in the universe one-shots as well. Give them excuses to roll other characters.
Amanda: Yeah. Just giving them an opportunity, even if it's a one-shot totally disconnected from your story in a different game system to play a different kind of character might, you know, make them a little better able to put their head in that place and to realize that more options are available to them. And I know, it's you know, and that's frustrating, but, like, having a conversation about your intentions for the campaign is also very useful. There's a ton of good advice out there about, you know, session zeros and kind of how to do that. And so, even if it's partway through the campaign, you know, you talking to each person or even to the group and saying like, "Hey, I want to make sure I'm running the kind of game that you guys want to play. And I want to make sure that we're making something that I think is continuing to be fun to put a lot of time into."
[Eric hums in agreement]
Amanda: You know, what are you looking to do? Like, what do you find fun? Kind of all of those useful questions, because if they want to, like, slash and burn, then maybe it's a more sort of farcical feeling, you know, like a rogue's gallery of like, you know, we're a notorious Assassin's Guild.
Eric: Yeah.
Amanda: And you know, maybe it's... it's much higher stakes and people might die and you might get, you know, thrown in jail -- in fantasy jail. There's lots of ways you can kind of roll with it, if it's important to them or maybe they just haven't thought about it. And they're like, "Yeah, to be honest, I'm a little nervous. I don't know what to do.", or "This is my first thought, like, do you have any better ideas?" It's hard to know what they're thinking or what they want unfortunately, without asking those questions.
Eric: Yeah. There's nothing wrong with having... with having it be a bloodbath. I was like... I was like, "Oh shit, they're all assassin rogues, aren't they? Like, fuck." Like, that's the scary thing to me.
Brandon: I think that there is also, like, just a lot of baggage around D&D of, like, it's a very bloody.
Amanda: I'd be very serious with my axe.
Brandon: Yeah.
Amanda: And, like, use my attacks.
Eric: Yeah.
Brandon: So, they might just not literally not know the options are there, you know?
Eric: You could also play Monsterhearts that might or that might really loves them. They're out by making them team monsters.
Amanda: It's so fun.
Eric: The Monsterhearts fucking slaps. I played Bigfoot. His main thing is... is being stinky.
[Brandon giggles]
Eric: True story.
Brandon: A stink ape!
Eric: It's a great game.
Amanda: Well, that brings us everybody to spoil-ey corner. So, we'll start off with a question here from Espith May. "When everyone's talking about the bear spray, January said 'We thought it just worked on powers?' Does that mean it was originally meant to take powers away from powered people?"
Julia: Who can say?
Brandon: Who can say?
Amanda: Who can say?
Eric: Who... who can say?
Amanda: Lip balm in 12, "Will the gala be crashed by three goats, one of which worships Tilda Swinton?"
[Julia giggles]
Julia: I hope so.
Amanda: Who can say?
Eric: Yes.
Brandon: I hope so too.
Eric: The answer is yes.
Amanda: Question Surgeon Michelle Spurgeon, "Is Shannon Redwine actually powered or is she just taking supplements?"
[Julia hums]
Brandon: Oh, who can say?
Amanda: Who can say?
[Eric hums]
Amanda: Are we sure Emily and her crew are heroes? Truly, Michelle, who can say?
Brandon: No. I'm sure, no.
Amanda: Are our heroes in danger of having their powers stolen?
Brandon: Who can say?
Julia: Who can say?
Amanda: Who can say? And finally, Eva, "How does the government agency that Dr. Morrow created not know about powered people?" Eva, who can say?
Brandon: Who can say?
Eric: Who says that they don't?
Julia: Yeah, I was gonna say. Do we know that for sure?
Eric: Who says? Who says? It's all a lie. It's all a smokescreen.
Amanda: Someone could say but it's not me.
Julia: Fair enough.
Amanda: And I... I really... that's all I got.
Eric: I don't think... They wouldn't even want to say it to you.
Amanda: That's true.
Eric: They might be able to say but they won't say it here on the spot.
Amanda: They write down on a back of an envelope and push it over to me and then I'm like, more of that salary negotiation. Sorry. I was... I was reading my girl-boss in Emily Slaughter.
[Brandon laughs]
[Eric snorts]
Eric: Aman -- has -- Have we ever seen Amanda and Emily Slaughter in the same room?
Julia: No.
Brandon: No.
Amanda: Alright. Well, thanks coming to the after party. That's really all we have time for right now. I gotta keep the trains running on time and do a tight 60 here. So, everybody, we'll see you later.
Eric: Bye.
Brandon: Bye guys.
Julia: Later.
Amanda: May your rolls trend ever upward.
[JTP Outro Music]
Transcribed by: John Matthew Sarong
Edited by: Krizia Marrie Casil