Where did Join the Paper come from? How do we balance homebrew mechanics on the show? And what were our wildest work experiences? All that and more on the Afterparty!
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Find Us Online
- website: jointhepartypod.com
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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 Afterparty, where life is content; content is life; and, ah—
[Eric laughs]
Amanda: —friendship, particularly, is content.
[Brandon laughs]
Julia: That’s true. This podcast wouldn't exist without friendship! Hello!
Eric: I'm also glad that this was the third time that we've tried to do this intro, and you finally got there. So, like—
Julia: Proud of you.
Eric: —listen, we're really just revealing things behind the curtain. Edits can't mask this. This is how the sausage is made, baby!
Brandon: Nailed it. We are professional podcasters!
Eric: That's why I'm going to open up this bag of chips right now. [Mimics chip bag crumbling]
Julia: That’s why I opened my soda before we started.
[Brandon laughs]
Eric: That's why I'm gonna invite my good friend, the train in Long Island, to come on to the podcast about halfway through—
Julia: [Overlapping] Rude!
Eric: God damn–it demonstrates industry!
Amanda: Julia, if Rose Gold had to write a listicle about the Long Island Railroad, what would she write?
Julia: It would just be rating the various branches of the Long Island Railroad.
Amanda: Yeah.
Eric: Sure.
Julia: And, all of the ones that are grade level? Pieces of shit.
[Everyone laughs]
Julia: Just terrible. So much noise! So much honking!
[Everyone laughs]
Amanda: Ah, this is very good.
Eric: There's just a vibe section, like unrelated to it, it’s like, “What vibes is it give off? Is it good? When do you need to interact with the vibe?”
Julia: “Long Beach? Too much party vibe.”
[Brandon laughs]
Amanda: Now I am thinking about the branches of the Long Island Railroad as a star signs. Brandon: That's good. I like that.
Julia: There's nearly enough.
Amanda: What's the most chaotic one? What's the most chaotic one?
Eric: I'm surprised that there's not like a Long Island-specific content mine, content farm.
Amanda: It's Patch.
[Everyone laughs]
Eric: Oh, okay. Yeah.
Julia: I have found a lot of like, Long Island-specific Instagrams recently, where it's, like—
Eric: Sure.
Julia: —jokes about Melville. I'm like, why, though?
[Everyone laughs]
Amanda: For the, I guess, the 2 million people who live there?
Julia: Yeah, I guess—
Eric: I will say, I do follow an Instagram called “Hudson Valley Memes” –
[Brandon laughs]
Julia: Yeah, see that’s Long Island memes…
Eric: So, like, if we want to talk about an even smaller place, where it's like, “Yo! Let's fucking bag on Poughkeepsie!” And, like, six people think it's hilarious. And, I'm one of them.
Julia: That's exactly what this is. I'm pretty sure it's like “Nassau memes” or “Suffolk memes”.
Eric: Oh my God. Oh, God. Well, we love content creation, which is why we've brought it into our content creation lives.
[Brandon laughs]
Amanda: Exactly. And we have a few questions finishing up, “Join the Loop”. But, I'm gonna save those for after our refill, where we can talk about the game, the character kind of bigger vibes questions about the story. But first, like, we got to get into the content, it is breaking news, it's fresh, fresh content! If you put it in the fridge for even 10 minutes, it'll wilt!
[Brandon laughs]
Amanda: Let's talk about joining the paper. Anybody else just like, thrilled and reinvigorated and you know, serotonin boost from just doing this episode? Because, I loved it.
Brandon: Absolutely.
Julia: I really like doing one shots, in particular, because I feel like I get to be the most chaotic entity possible.
Eric: Mhm.
Julia: It's very funny to me, because I look at Val, and then I look at Rose, and I look at Moxie. And I'm like, Moxie and Rose are just not good people.
[Brandon laughs]
Eric: Mhm.
Julia: Like, I try to play, like, as likable a terrible person as possible, whenever we do a one shot.
Eric: There's a very funny push and pull with a one shot, because it allows the players to be as chaotic as possible. And, there's no like, canon, surrounding it necessarily—you're like, “Yeah, it's fine, whatever.” Like, it's not necessarily part of a campaign, even if you string a bunch of one shots together, but it is definitely the most on-rails thing that you do as a DM. So, it's very much like “Well, I'm gonna drive you from point A to point B, but like you can play whatever music you want to the car, you can eat whatever snacks, you can do what—all that stuff.” So, I think there's like a very much a, this is the most route thing you're going to do or at least the most guided thing you're going to do. But, it's going to happen in the most wild way possible.
Brandon: [Chanting] Hot Cheetos and ice cream! Hot Cheetos and ice cream!
Eric: And I'm like, that's fine. I only have you for 30 minutes, random child, eat whatever you want. Not my kid.
[Brandon laughs]
Julia: I feel like it's doing a road trip with a bunch of just, like, eight-year-olds in the back of a minivan. And, you're just driving the car. You have no control over what happens in the back of that minivan. You can only determine the destination of the minivan.
[Brandon laughs]
Eric: Absolutely, absolutely.
Brandon: You two, particularly, but I think all three of us have, like—I don't click into some character creation wellspring that's just fucking brilliant. Like—
[Brandon and Julia laugh]
Brandon: I just love the characters that we make. They're just so fun and ridiculous. I love them so much.
Julia: Yeah, if I can make a new character every week, I would.
Amanda: Let's go back in time to the origin of this idea. Now, Eric, the way you presented it to us was like, “Hey, I want to try something a little different for entanglements?” But where did this idea come from? What was the—what was the idea? And, like, how did you kind of face the prospect of zooming away and doing a bottle episode outside the main campaign, 33 episodes in?
Eric: Sure. Well, first, Brandon, can you say “Join the Paper: Origins,” for me?
Brandon: Yeah. [Dramatic voice] Join the Paper: Origins. [Makings loud, high-pitched noise]
Eric: That’s when—that's when Todd becomes the Joker.
[Everyone laughs]
Eric: It’s just so twisted, bro.
Julia: That's weird, because Todd isn't the Joker. So, the fact that he becomes the Joker in Origins, is, ah—
[Eric laughs]
Julia: —interesting.
Eric: Todd was the Joker, and now he is a manager.
[Everyone laughs]
Julia: That's like that Harley Quinn animated series storyline, where the Joker, like, loses his memories and just becomes a normal dude.
Eric: Yeah.
Julia: That's just Todd.
Eric: Todd becomes the Joker after this, actually, after he gets laid off, he becomes the Joker again. Yeah, so, I guess, this was—after the big run of one shots that I had been planning for, which is the, now that we're on the other end of it, which was the one with Brennon Lee Mulligan, the one with Three Black Halflings. And, just, all I was—I felt like I was running a ton of one shots that I was prepping for like, in a row—
Amanda: And our live show.
Eric: And our live show! Our live show, as well. And, I was like, oh, I kind of… this has been something that has been really scaring me for a while, because of what I said, is that players are incredibly chaotic. But, I'm still letting go of the fact that, one, it doesn't matter, and two, I can just wave my hands eventually and end the one shot, at some point, like, “Oh! And, we're done.” Like—and you guys are like, “Great! We had so much fun!” And I'm like—[exhausted panting]
Brandon: And Todd’s on top of a skyscraper, with a shirt half-off, and there's like, wild animals around…[Laughs] “Oh, we’re done? Okay…”
Eric: And I'm like, “Oh, good, we're fine. Great. We're done.” Um, so I was really coming to the other side of that. And, I was thinking a lot about the interview that I had done with Sentinels of the Multiverse, that those guys, who have the board game, the card—the cooperative card game, where the superheroes are representative of an entire, like, universe of superhero comics, right, which we've talked about a lot. It's really interesting seeing how superheroes go from, you know, the Golden Age through the Silver Age. They got super extreme, than the 90s made them super grungy, and now we're kind of, like, dealing with like the way that the world is right now and dealing what it means to be a superhero, etc. So, I always thought that was really interesting. And, I—I really loved that trope of then doing an issue of a comic that didn't really have anything to do with the superheroes. It was just set in the world of the superheroes with regular people. Julia, I'm sure you can give, like, actual examples. But, I have a thing here from, “The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay,” I have a quote by Michael Chabon—my favorite author, one of my favorite books—that I had stuck in my head here. At this point, in the story they—they invented a superhero called The Escapist, who was like a Harry Houdini superhero. And then, this is after, like, The Escapist has gotten very, very popular. And then, they start to do different types of stories. “There were stories that dealt with the minutiae of what Mr. Machine Gun, at home in the pages of Triumph, liked to call ‘the hero biz,’ told not only from the point of view of the heroes but from those of various butlers, girlfriends, assistants, shoe-shine boys, doctors, and even the criminals. There was a story that followed the course of a handgun through the mean streets of Empire City, in which the Escapist appeared on only two pages.” Uh, and then we skip forward. “And there was ‘Kane Street,’ focusing for sixty-four pages on one little street in Empire City as its denizens, hearing the terrible news that the Escapist lies near death in the hospital, recall in turn the way he has touched their lives and the lives of everyone in town (only to have it all turn out, in the end, as a cruel hoax perpetrated by the evil Crooked Man).” So, being able to do that, in our superhero Dungeons and Dragons podcast, I'm like, “Oh, well, this is still comics!” We're doing comics, and like, we're not doing movies, which is what, I think, a lot of other actual plays do. Where you, you know, there's the classic quote from TAZ, “And we pan up, to see that—”
[Everyone laughs]
Brandon: I have that on a coffee mug. [Laughs]
Eric: Yeah, yeah.
Amanda: Yeah.
Eric: Like, and you remember that, like, they're trying to create a movie or TV, but something that I remembered from Masks, that I've been trying to do in our campaign, is that we're doing a comic book. And, I wanted to do that kind of fiction building, and I wanted to do something in New York City, because I'm like, “Oh, it would be so wild, for us to figure out what the hell is going on in Average Bear.” Because, I've been thinking about that a lot, especially as reintegrating Teagan into the story of this campaign, especially during “Join the Loop”. And, making Gutenberg's reach seem bigger, because for now, you—y'all have been interacting with him on like, a very, like P2P basis, like person to person. It’s like, “Oh, he's gonna come and fuck my shit up, like, me as a person, but not like the entire world or like even entire city—” or how much consequences he has and how much reach he has. So like, I was thinking about a lot of the stuff, and I—jangling all my head, and I was like, “Hey, y'all want to play a game as Average Bear employees?”
[Julia laughs]
Amanda: To which we all answered, yeah!
Julia: Ye-ahh!
Amanda: Yeah, we do!
Brandon: I have a very important question for you.
Eric: Mhm?
Brandon: Was Cam fired?
Eric: Uh, no Cam was not laid off.
Brandon: Okay, good.
Eric: For those of you who've listened to “Next Stop,” Cam is still at, like, the introductory writers— [laughs] writers’ level, because he just went from being a fact checker to a writer—
Amanda: He’s so cheap…
Eric: But, now, he had that viral story go, so he's like, “Oh, we can still run this guy ragged at like $52,000 a year.”
Brandon: Love it.
Julia: This is “Next Stop”. Go listen to “Next Stop”.
Eric: Yeah, go listen to “Next Stop—”
Amanda: [Overlapping] Listen to “Next Stop”!
Eric: But—
Amanda: And, ah, the Question Surgeon Michelle Spurgeon also wants to check in on how our friends at “Next Stop” are doing during the Average Bear resizing. So, don't worry, Michelle, they're good.
Eric: But yeah, I thought about this a lot. And, I'm really excited that we get to do this. This was one of the most fun things I think we've done the entire show. And, I also want to say I was a little inspired by Dimension 20, as always, seeing what Mice and Murder—what you can do with the D&D system, that doesn't necessarily have to do with violence, but can be an action story in a different way, was how I was pushing on it. Because, this wasn't necessarily, like, offices and bosses being like, “Oh, these are dragons playing humans!” Like, we're using the D&D system to do something action packed, that’s more of like an office thriller.
Brandon: Yeah.
Eric: Where the worst thing that can happen is getting laid off by a VC company.
Brandon: I—sort of backtracking—I love the idea of an Escapist. I might—I might do that in a future campaign. That's such a great little power set.
Eric: Yeah.
Amanda: Also, you should read Kavalier & Clay! It's really, really good!
Eric: It's very good. It's very much like—yeah, oh, no, I could—
[Amanda laughs]
Eric: I'm not gonna—that would be too long. But, no, The Escapist is an incredible, incredible superhero.
Amanda: I'm also realizing how much you love media that takes place in its own media universe.
Eric: I do, I really do. I say that my favorite genre of stories are superhero stories that are not Marvel and DC.
[Brandon laughs]
Eric: Ah, so like The Boys, Kavalier and Clay, The Regional Office is Under Attack, Sentinels of the Multiverse, that's like my favorite genre is playing with the comic tropes, but being able to exist outside of them and subvert them and mess with them. Including, Campaign 2, Join the Party!
Julia: Ooo, yeah.
Amanda: And now, it's time for previous bad media jobs corner. Brandon, Julia—how did you approach making a character for this campaign? Eric basically just said, like, think of a person working at Average Bear, and—and tell me about it. So, we really had free reign here. Where did you all start your planning?
Julia: So, I approached it as what would be, like, the most interesting skill set that I could play as a character who works in, like, an office setting. And, specifically, like Average Bear as a, you know, a news reporting kind of website. And, originally, I was just scrolling back before because I wanted to see what my original pitch to Eric was—
[Eric laughs]
Julia: —and, I originally was like, “I want to do College of Lore, cutting words is too good to pass up.” And then, we were chatting a little bit about what kind of character would use something like cutting words—which is so iconic to that class. And I was like, “I was thinking like, maybe editorial, but what about HR?” And Eric goes, “Ha! Oh my God, that is fucking dark.”
Eric: [Laughing] Yeah…
Julia: I was like, I really want to lean hard on this idea of like, HR is not your friend. They are there to protect the company from legal liability, and that is it.
Amanda: Yeah.
Julia: But, I also knew that neither of you were going for kind of like straight up reporter. and then I was like, “Okay, I have had experience doing editorial work at a small publication before, I can probably get away with like, reporter or content creator or something like that.”
Eric: Yeah.
Amanda: And I'm glad you did, because you're role playing as Rose was incredible.
Julia: Thank you!
Amanda: Brandon, how about you?
Brandon: Um, having been a middle manager once, I can confidently say—
[Everyone laughs]
Brandon: —that middle managers are the least important employee in any company, and it is my firm belief that they should not exist.
[Everyone laughs]
Eric: Incredible.
Brandon: So, I liked the idea of playing someone who's, like, completely irrelevant, and figuring out how they make themselves integral to the story is just fun. Also, being a cis-white-straight man, it wasn't really that hard to, like, tap into it, you know?
[Everyone laughs]
Eric: The wild thing was that no one knew what Todd was saying.
[Brandon laughs]
Eric: And, I would love to know, you, audio professional, head of production at Multitude, and editor of this—[Laughing] of this later, why are you doing this? Why are you doing this yourself?
[Brandon laughs]
Brandon: Honestly, I didn't think about it until the moment of, and I panicked. And, I had just listened to an episode of—I can't remember it was Main Few; Hey, Riddle, Riddle or Clue crew—their, like, Patreon feed—but, JPC from the podcast Hey, Riddle, Riddle, did a voice of—I forget the sketch now, but he did, like, yes, some kind of like boss or some kind of like, you know, non-essential white guy, and he just did the best voice possible, and it was that like monotone sort of, like—
Julia: Yeah.
Brandon: —weird, funny thing. And, I stole it completely [Laughs].
Eric: Good. Perfect.
Brandon: [Overlapping] And, his—his is much better!
Julia: [Laughs] Brandon and I have been bonding over Hey, Riddle, Riddle, and I appreciate it.
Eric: Perfect.
Amanda: It was an inspired choice.
Julia: Amanda, tell me about your class and picking June?
Amanda: Yeah, I was also—I mean, for once, thinking very tactically about what could be useful in this—in this one shot for us. And, I was like, there's definitely going to be a time or one of us has to like look at someone's desk and, sort of, take from their notes any possible clues. And, having, again, watched Mice and Murder with Eric, I really loved what Sam Reich was doing with the mastermind rogue. And, I think just being able to like assess paper-detritus, is like, a—a very assistant type thing, where your boss is like, “Oh! The note it's over there on the place!” and then you have to be like, “Okay, well under your third cup of coffee of the day, because you have that at 10:30, you know, is where the note that you doodled on your paper after this conference call—” so, that that is both more kind of like character work, and also a thing that I thought might be relevant.
Eric: And, getting to play a rogue again, with actually relevant subclasses.
Julia: Woo!
Amanda: [Overlapping] I know, I didn't get to use sneak attack damage, but guys, I studied up on it. I was ready.
[Brandon and Julia laugh]
Eric: Uh, Amanda—hey, do you have any connection to the way that June secretly runs everything from an operations perspective?
[Amanda laughs]
Julia: Oh yeah, what was that like?
Amanda: Ah, yeah. No, my, ah—before starting Multitude, I worked at a startup as like the—the first employee, doing everything from, you know, getting a business license, to an office, to business insurance, to hiring people. And, the experience of needing to anticipate your boss's needs and when your job is—when you're doing your job well, being both invisible and also, like, constantly at hand—and, like, the—the person, ultimately, on whom anything inconvenient or bad falls, ah, is tough. [Laughs] And, someone else asked in the—in the discord, how close this is to my particular corporate experience. Um, June says things that I wish I could say. June is, you know, has the energy that I wish I could have brought, whereas in reality, I'm like, “Yeah, no problem! I'll figure out how to stop the person downstairs from drumming in his drum business.”
[Everyone laughs]
Eric: [Still laughing] That's right.
Amanda: And, um, that was a, that was very cathartic for me to be able to channel a little bit of, you know, girl boss-ism, but in a way that doesn't harm others [Laughs].
Brandon: That one's easy. You just go, and you take a couple nuts out of the drum kit, and then when he—when they go to play it, and they hit one strike, it just falls apart [laughing] to pieces…
Julia: And then they definitely don't know how to put back together the drum set.
[Brandon laughs]
Amanda: I wish I knew that. I wish I knew that—
Eric: Professional drummer—
[Brandon laughs]
Eric: —who doesn’t know how to put it together…
Julia: Yeah, Rose was definitely inspired by said-content job, a less nice version of my boss at that job.
Eric: Yeah. I want to give a special shout out to Sally Tamarkin, who I DM on discord all the time, and we talk about D&D stuff. Sal used to work at BuzzFeed and Self, and all of those places. So, I asked for their help putting this together, which is where, like, the Jonesy Mocktail came in, like, there's always—because it was Average Bear, which is the BuzzFeed equivalent, is that BuzzFeed is such a name, other reporters want to report on your shit.
[Julia laughs]
Eric: Like, they want to do journalism-ism. And, that was like a big thing. And, really making sure to slot all these things in correctly. That feels true to the whole thing, but also like gave you a little bit more peril and made you feel a little bit more suffocated by all the things that were going on around you.
Julia: Mhm. Mhm.
Eric: I will say, yeah, Julia, that would have been way too dark for you to do HR [Laughs].
Julia: Yeah, and I realized it wouldn’t have worked with the plot that you were planning, either, because the HR person would have known that all these people were getting fired.
Eric: Exactly. So, that was—that’s—yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I also, like, I like that Todd represented the management in that way. But, I—you—you two could have worked together, because Todd—and I loved this so much about—what was Todd's job? It was manager—
Amanda: Manager of Cross Platform!
Brandon: [Overlapping] Cross platforms.
Eric: Cross platform.
Amanda: Cross platforms! In every meeting, responsible for none of them!
Brandon: Which was an Amanda pull, and it was brilliant.
Amanda: Yeah [Laughs].
Eric: It was so brilliant.
Amanda: Thank you.
Julia: Yeah, I feel like we should mention, we did a session zero with these characters just to get a feel for them.
Eric: Oh, that's right!
Julia: Yeah!
Eric: We do that!
Julia: We totally forgot about that! God, I wish that was recorded too, it was so fun.
Brandon: We did?
Eric: Yeah.
Brandon: Why am I forgetting this-
Amanda: Yeah, remember? We had—we had a little, like, round robin getting to know you exercise. Eric, wanna describe where you got those mechanics from?
Brandon: Oh, yeah!
Julia: [Overlapping] It was, how does this character know this person, and Eric was giving us prompts being like, you saw this person at this place, and you don't know why they were there. Something like that.
Eric: Oh, my God, I totally forgot about that. Yeah, I created like, a D-10 table of prompts for people to ask each other about the relationships between all the PCs. I was using, like fiasco rules, the way that you—you need to like set up relationships between characters before, like, the Coen Brothers movie starts. And, that was just really fun, I just wanted to make sure. Because, you all work together. So, I wanted to make sure that you had some sort of relationships there.
Brandon: I have my notes on that. If you want to hear that.
Julia: Yeah, no, please.
Amanda: Oh, yeah.
Eric: I have the questions table, I can share—I can share that with you.
Julia: Please!
Brandon: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Amanda: Yay!
Eric: Okay. So, you would roll a D-10, and then whoever, like, whoever’s turn it was, you either would, like, we all went in a circle. And then, it was like, “Rose, say this about your relationship with June,” and then, “June to Todd,” and then, ah, and then back around. So, here's the whole table. “We worked together before, at blank. We’re both part of the internet community, blank. I've seen you in my neighborhood at the blank. I've tried to help you do blank. I know that you're secretly doing blank at work. Oh, my friend's friend said that they saw you blank. I told you how to get blank. We've run into each other at the blank. I need you, because you're the only one in the office who can do blank. And, everyone in the office knows you as the blank.”
Amanda: Incredible.
Julia: Yeah, we did two rounds of this right?
Eric: Yeah. You—you all did, um—
Amanda: Everybody initiated to everybody else.
Julia: Yes.
Amanda: We did, like—we did two rounds of that.
Brandon: Do you want to hear the—the answers that I have written down for this stuff?
Julia: Yes, please.
Amanda: Yes.
Eric: Yeah.
Brandon: So, I'm gonna go down in no particular order, but Rose gave Todd dating advice—
Julia: Mhm. Which we found that Todd has a wife and six children.
[Everyone laughs]
Amanda: Incredible
Brandon: Todd tried to give June advice when she started, but it was all bullshit. And, now, we have a passive aggressive competition for attention from the CEO.
Amanda: Mhm.
Julia: Mhm.
Amanda: I’m winning
Brandon: [Overlapping] June came too Todd to create a paper employee, to catch someone who is embezzling, so June owes me a favor [Laughs]
Julia: Nice.
Amanda: Yes.
Eric: Yes.
Brandon: Apparently, Todd lives in Murray Hill [Laughs].
Julia: Yes, yes.
Julia: Because, that's where you saw Rose at that bar—
Brandon: At Brother Jimmy’s!
Julia: —that was terrible.
Brandon: After my kickball game, uh huh.
[Brandon laughs]
Eric: Right, right.
Brandon: Apparently, June is known as, “The Dealer,” because –
Julia: Yeah.
Brandon: That was—her quote is, “Okay, that was your one.” [Laughing] Which was the best thing you've ever said.
Amanda: Yeah, I am so sad I didn't get a chance to put this in the campaign. But, I was like, I feel like June's catchphrase is like, someone—someone does something, and she's—she takes a beat and stares at them and says, “Okay, that was your one—your one fuckup. You used it.”
[Eric laughs]
Brandon: And then, finally—yeah, Rose which we did get to, Rose and Teagan Murphy have hooked up in the past.
Eric: Oh, god, that was so funny!
Amanda: [Overlapping] Tell us everything!
Julia: Do you want the details that I worked out in my head?
Eric: Yes, please.
Amanda: We, and the audience, do.
Julia: So, like I said before, Rose is not a particularly good person. So, I think Rose is, like, a power dater.
[Brandon laughs]
Eric: Sure.
Julia: As in—
Amanda: Nice.
Julia: —Rose will find the person who has the most influence and the most power and, like, ingratiate herself to that person. So, in this case, it was Teagan, star reporter. And, they started dating—I don't imagine that it lasted more than six months?
Eric: Sure, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Amanda: Makes sense.
Julia: And, I feel like it was at least over a year ago, but Rose, you know, still wants all of that like—she wants someone to be emotionally, like, attached to her. So, I feel like that's why there's like the wall of text, of just Rose keeps texting Teagan, and Teagan doesn't reply.
Eric: So funny. That was so funny that the last—the last thing, like, before that coda right at the end, when Teagan texts Multitool, was you saying—[Laughing] you reaching out to Teagan, and Teagan saying, “Rose, I have a girlfriend!” So funny!
Julia: [Laughs] It was very good. I just wanted to set it up that like maybe we'll see Rose in Laketown city? Who can say?
Eric: Maybe. Maybe.
Brandon: I want to say I thought Teagan would have better taste, but I guess not [Laughs].
[Eric and Amanda laugh]
Julia: Excuse you?!
Eric: No, I agree with Brandon.
[Everyone laughs]
Amanda: Bray wanted to know if June and/or Rose were in an MLM, and if so, what do they sell?
[Brandon laughs]
Amanda: June, I think, is way too smart for an MLM.
Julia: Yeah—
Amanda: And—and to ethical to, ah, to like have downlines.
Julia: Also, like, most MLMs are just not stylish enough to really get involved with them, like—
Amanda: There you do.
Julia: —those tights that everyone was wearing for like a hot minute? They were all so ugly.
Eric: I love that Rose probably thinks that they're not an MLM, but like, buys things that like, Caroline Calloway a caulks instead.
Julia: Probably.
Eric: Yeah. For sure.
Amanda: Yeah. We—we respect an influencer.
Eric: Yeah, like she definitely buys like Goop stuff, and is just like, “No! This Jade egg does help my cuticles, what do you mean?”
Julia: [Overlapping] Um, excuse you, she gets them for free because she's reviewing them.
[Brandon laughs]
Amanda: There it is.
Eric: [Laughing] That's right, yeah, that's right, that’s right.
Julia: I owned Moon Juice for a hot second, because I got it sent to me to review it, once.
Brandon: What is Moon Juice?
Eric: [Overlapping] Moon Juice is the wildest shit. Oh, Brandon—
Julia: It’s just, the moon powder, or whatever the fuck, like, ugh…
Amanda: Wellness scams.
Julia: Yeah, wellness scams.
Eric: Yeah, Brandon you would love this one. You should listen to episode about Moon Juice on Maintenance Phase. The creator of moon juice is wild, she's like—she's something else.
Julia: Brandon, you—you know that I worked for a spa and wellness media company right?
Brandon: I don't know if I did know that.
Amanda: Before Spirits. It was like pre-wellness as a—as a trend, even.
Julia: Yeah.
Brandon: Oh, wow.
Amanda: All right, guys, don't buy moon juice. We're gonna give Brandon some space to research this thing. And, I'm going to go into the kitchen to get regular tap water, because that's fine.
[Brandon laughs]
Amanda: I’ll be right back.
Julia: [Overlapping] Can I get it filtered?
Amanda: I'll be right back.
Eric: Can you put Moon Juice in mine?
[Brandon laughs]
Amanda: No. No.
[Transition music]
Amanda: Hey, it's Amanda. My elementary school growing up did not have air conditioning, which, at the time, even as a child, I was like, this seems wrong. And, looking back, even more surprising. But, I remember when it was really hot outside, we would come into class and leave the lights off. I don't think it was that cost effective or making it cooler in there, because they were LED lights, but, you know, who can say. But, that feeling of leaving the lights off to make it feel just a little bit cooler, even if it isn't actually, is something that I find very nostalgic and very indicative of summer. So, welcome to the midroll. It's a little cooler, if you close your eyes.
Firstly, welcome to everyone who joined our Patreon in the last week: Leigh, Jake, Daniel, Jenna, & SLuRian. Thank you so much! It is such a wild gift and joy that our full-time jobs involve playing Dungeons and Dragons, during the [laughs], during the 9 to 5 workday, and we can only do that because of your support on Patreon. So many of you make room in your budgets each month to support indie creators, us included, and we are incredibly grateful. If you out there are able to support Join the Party, for as little as $5 a month, you get access to all kinds of excellent bonus content, and, of course, you get access to the best place on the internet, namesake of Jonesy Mocktail, that’s our Patron-only Discord, and Jonesy Cat is very beautiful You can do that for as little, again, as $5 at patreon.com/jointhepartypod.
It is also a great day to check out some more shows for a Multitude. That's the way to support us and our work that doesn't involve any money. And, this week, I think you'd really enjoy HORSE. This is a podcast about the ridiculous stories, internet drama, and some of the biggest and baddest personalities out there today, all from the world of basketball. Hosts Adam Mamawala and Mike Schubert want the world to know how unbelievable the history and culture of basketball is. They're here to fight gatekeeping and prove that it's entertaining for everyone to follow, from superfans to people who have never cared about sports before, like myself. Whether it's a shot by shot breakdown of, “Get your Head in the Game,” from High School Musical—which is excellent—or a thorough discussion of the best and worst food at NBA arenas, the HORSE hosts have got you covered. New episodes come out every other Monday, so just search HORSE in your podcast app, or check out horsehoops.com. We’re sponsored this week by Inked Gaming. Inked is a company built both by gamers and for gamers, and it has been at the top of the game in supplying customers with world-class products, since they first launched back in 2011. From playmats to dice bags and sleeves to dice themselves, they are your one-stop-shop for quality gaming gear. They believe every gamer is an individual, and it is our mission to help you customize the way you play, all in an easy and affordable and quality way. All artists and creators featured on Inked Gaming receive a commission from products sold with their work, which is rad and ethical, and I think every site should be doing. And as part of their sponsorship of this episode, Team Inked has given us a special 10% OFF discount that we’re passing along to you! Just head over to their site at inkedgaming.com/jointheparty, pick out some items and when you’re ready to checkout, use the code: JOINTHEPARTY to receive 10% OFF your order.
This podcast is sponsored by BetterHelp online therapy. Even if you’re not feeling down and depressed, or like you’re at a total loss, life is full of stressors. And, if your stress is high, or you feel like your temper is short or your patience is short, you could probably use the chance to unload. You can unload that stress, get it all out, talk to someone who is unbiased about your life who won’t judge you or take sides, and just help you out. So, when you feel like there’s things you can’t tell anybody, or like you feel like you can’t unload to family or friends, and you need to unload, that is what therapy can be. BetterHelp is customized online therapy that offers video, phone, and even live chat sessions with your therapist, so you don't have to see anyone on camera if you don't want to. It's much more affordable than in person therapy, so you can start communicating with your therapist in under 48 hours. Unload the stressors, get some unbiased feedback, and you'd be pretty surprised at what you might gain from it. See if it is for you. This podcast is sponsored by BetterHelp, and Join the Party listeners get 10% off their first month, at betterhelp.com/jointheparty. That's B-E-T-T-E-R-H-E-L-P dot com, slash, join the party. And now, back to the Afterparty!
[Transition music]
Amanda: All right, I'm back with—with wonderful New York City tap water, cooled to your liking.
Brandon: Guys. I have a beautiful opportunity for all of you to embark upon—
Amanda: No, Brandon, and I'm not going to invest and work from home and be my own boss!
[Eric laughs]
Amanda: We already do those things!
Eric: We already “be our own boss”!
Brandon: Oh, no! Is podcasting an MLM!
Julia: Podcasting is an MLM.
Eric: Oh, no. We're gonna—I’m just gonna say this very, very quickly before we spiral off into Julia's wild ass old jobs, and we'll get to that. Podcasting is also kind of at the crux of media stuff. Like, the stuff that we do in podcasting feels very resonant to all this stuff that we do here. Podcasting is like very much, like, part media, part tech, part entertainment. So like, a lot of the stuff that we were doing in “Join the Paper” felt really real to me.
Julia: Yeah.
Eric: That's all I want to say.
Julia: I agree. One thing that I do want to say, about “Join the Paper”—my favorite part was, we did this session zero where we introduced our characters to each other. And then, Eric asked us how we spelled our characters names, and our classes like just, in Slack. And Eric, didn't realize that Rose Marie Gold was a pun on rose-gold.
Amanda: Nor did I.
[Brandon laughs]
Julia: Guys!
Amanda: It was incredibly fun.
Eric: Man, you punned me, and you're a bard. Get out of my fucking face, Julia Schifini.
Julia: You love me!
Brandon: Guys, I'm selling Sex Dust. Would you like to partake in Sex Dust? [Laughs]
Julia: No, I want the moon dust—
Amanda: No…
Julia: —that's it! Beauty dust? No. Sex dust? No. Moon dust? Yes.
Brandon: The number one ingredient in this is organic cocoa powder, which I think is funny [Laughs].
Julia: Sure is!
Eric: Brandon, I'm glad you're looking this up because this is a major inspiration for the one-up mushroom.
[Everyone laughs]
Eric: So, this is very funny that you're looking into this now.
Amanda: Marlina would like to know, Eric, how do you feel about bards now, besides afraid?
Eric: [Laughs] So, after talking over with the Three Black Halflings, I, now, extra think that it's only for creative people, who want everyone to know how creative they are. However, this worked incredibly well for this session. Like, I don't know, I still think that, “Creativity is my magic!” is very wild in a fantasy and superhero setting. But, I think that this worked very perfectly here. I also want to say that like we were doing D&D, but like, these folks aren't powered. Like, they’re just—they're just like regular people who, you know, we're playing a game, so they have to have skills and stuff.
Julia: Yeah.
Eric: So, like they're not super powers anyway. So that's why I kind of liked how Julia was playing it, because Bard demonstrates like a force of will through speech, which I thought worked well for, for a quote unquote, regular person.
Julia: Yeah. And we very specifically, when I was picking out my spells for this episode, we talked about, I wasn't going to choose anything that I couldn't, like, validate—
Eric: Yep.
Julia: —by a normal person being able to do it. So like, I was like, “Maybe sleep?” and you're like, “I don't think sleep,” I was like, “But what if I just like tell a really boring story and the person falls asleep?” And you're like, “yeah, maybe.”
Brandon: Like Jigglypuff!
Julia: Like Jigglypuff. I sing a very cute song, and then I dropped mustaches on their faces.
Eric: [Laughs] Yeah, regular person Jigglypuff.
[Everyone laughs]
Julia: I don't know what you're talking about. That's a regular person.
Amanda: Bray would like to know, is Todd a good father?
[Eric laughs]
Brandon: Todd's a fucking fantastic father, Todd is—
Amanda: Okay—
Eric: Wait, wait—I need to follow up with this. Brandon, do you know who Todd reminded me of in that?
Brandon: Who?
Eric: Do you remember our old boss, who he treated us like we were all in The Office, but really, it was just a way to infantilize us? And like, because we were all millennials?
Julia: Wuh oh.
Eric: When we were working at the old—at the place where we worked at together? [Name of former boss bleeped out] Yeah, [again, bleeped out]?
Julia: Oh, cut that—
Amanda: Can we do my favorite podcast trope where you bleep—where you bleep out his name?
Julia: Yeah, I'll do that.
[Eric laughs]
Amanda: Thank you.
Brandon: I mean, good luck finding [Bleep] at the job that no one knows that we were at [Laughs].
Eric: Yeah, right.
Amanda: Except your public LinkedIns, but yes.
[Brandon laughs]
Julia: Some people remember six years ago.
Amanda: That's true.
Eric: Yeah. But, yeah, he totally, like, treated us like he was—like, he was only a few years older than us and treated us like we were his kids. And like, I bet he was a really good dad. But, he was a terrible fucking manager who was manipulating us to, like, not give him problems while he accelerated up the corporate ladder.
Brandon: 100%. Yeah, he did not give a shit about, like, his employees or his position. He just was trying to put his dues in in this particular role, so he could move up. Yeah.
Eric: Yeah, but—and he pretended to be Michael Scott. So, while he was doing that, it was like, nefarious, so that's how he felt about Todd, as well. It’s like, Todd was just like, “Don't fucking talk to me,” but then he goes home and then he hugs all six of its kids.
Julia: Give me the names of those kids, Brandon. Give me those names.
Brandon: [Sighs] Okay—
Amanda: In descending birth order. Quickly as possible.
Brandon: Well, Todd, Jr. was first, obviously.
Amanda: Yep.
Brandon: And then, there is, um…I'm gonna say Elizabeth. And, then, ah, Junior.
Julia: Those are three children!
Eric: That’s three!
Julia: And you said six!
Brandon: That's all that Todd’s aware of.
[Everyone laughs]
Julia: What?!
Brandon: I don’t know—
Julia: Good God. Good God. Chad, Mary, Susan! There we go. Three more children.
Eric: Well, they're—the last three are the triplets, so you got to just like group them all as the triplets.
Julia: [Overlapping] Of course. This is the second set of triplets in this universe.
Eric: Yeah, twins and triplets are hilarious.
Brandon: Veni, Vici, Vini, or whatever.
Amanda: Yeah, that can Veni, Vini, and Vici.
Eric: Yeah—[laughs] This after party is nonsense.
[Everyone laughs]
Amanda: It's a good one. Violet would like to know, how would Rose, June, and Todd feel about meeting Aggie, Val, and Milo? Would they stan? I think Aggie would be incredibly intimidated by June and Rose, both, and just kind of like nodd at Todd, as fellow, you know, members of a bureaucracy.
[Brandon laughs]
Julia: Are you asking what Rose would think about her ex-partner’s new partner? Excuse you.
[Everyone laughs]
Julia: I don’t think that would go well.
Eric: Cutting words, baby.
Amanda: I think—I think that June would complement Val’s jacket and whole look.
Julia: Hell yeah. I think Rose would actually like Milo—
Brandon: Oh, they would hang!
Julia: I think Rose would think Milo's whole deal is very ironic, and in the best possible way, even though none of it is ironic to Milo.
Brandon: Honestly—if they’re the same age, which I'm not sure how old Rose’s—they might date for a hot second, and then everyone around them is like, “This is a terrible choice you're both making!!”
Julia: “What is happening!?”
Eric: Yes—
[Amanda laughs]
Eric: 100% dating, for like, three months—
Amanda: I love that.
Eric: And they have nothing in common. Fucking hilarious. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Amanda: And then like, anytime somebody brings around a new friend or partner, they're like, “You know those guys used to date?” And you're like, “No, that can’t be true.”
[Eric and Brandon laugh]
Eric: It’s like, (mimicking Rose) What? He works at a museum! It's very hot.
Julia: Mhm.
[Eric laughs]
Eric (mimicking Rose): It's a science museum! You can touch things!
Julia (as Rose): They have to have, like, galas or something at some point!
[Eric laughs]
Amanda: I like wearing a gown. Here's my insta.
Brandon: I think Todd is one of those people that, if he were to meet superpowered folks, and like, you know, Milo would like make something outrageous, right? And, then Todd would just be like, (as Todd) Oh, that is a very neat skill you have.
[Julia laughs]
Brandon: And then everyone's like, “Todd, these are superheroes. What are you doing?”
Julia: Todd wouldn't, like, understand that that is what was happening, I feel like.
Brandon: Yeah.
Eric (mimicking Todd): True. Yeah. And, I integrated TikTok, so we all do impossible things.
[Brandon laughs]
Amanda: Incredible. Murica on Insta asks, what could we have done to keep Teagan from losing their job? Or were they doomed from the start?
Julia: I think they were doomed from the start. Right?
Amanda: Me too.
Eric: Oh, great question! Like I was saying, like, we have seen media, and this stuff happen a lot around us. And like, honestly, the best part about working in Multitude is no one can lay me off. Like, we can fail. But like no one can—
Brandon: Except for yourself!
Eric: —fire me. Yeah, I'm laying myself off, because, like, the world is bad.
[Brandon laughs]
Eric: So, I was thinking, I was like, man, the worst possible thing would be layoffs, because they seem so uncontrollable. And, it's just like an inevitability. It's like, you know, at the end of the game, the planet blows up. You know what I mean?
Amanda: Yep.
Eric: And, ah, there was a way to work around this.
Julia: Dammit.
Eric: I had some ideas about how you could have stopped it, but I think that if you had figured it out before the day of, and then got to either June's boss or do Carlyle Carlyle, which then got you to June's boss, then you would have been able to get yourselves and/or Teagan off of the layoff list. Like, the layoff was mandatory. But, you could have saved yourself.
Julia: Like, if I had rolled higher than that 21, when you rolled a 22, and I gotten up to the office?
Eric: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Julia: Fuck. All right.
Eric: Yeah. You got—you were super, super close. You were circling what was happening, but you didn't put together what exactly was going to happen the next day. And then, you waited the next day. I think the thing that ultimately sunk you, was June setting up and being like, oh, I'm going to catch him before it comes in the office. But then I forget, but fucking Scottsdale knew that you were on his tail, and he just—and he was just ducking you, just as hard as possible.
Brandon: On his Scotts-tail.
[Everyone laughs]
Eric: Nice. But yeah, there was 100% a way to save yourselves. But, you were not—not the day of.
Julia: Bummer, but I think it was for the best.
Brandon: It's weird that Todd's power of being a cis straight white man wasn't enough to save him. But, here we are.
Julia: You did—you did insult the—[laughs] the two guys pretty hard.
Eric: Here's the interesting thing, Todd was not on the list. Todd was put on the list after ignoring the—
[Brandon laughs]
Eric: —after ignoring the transfer.
Julia: Yeah.
Eric: 100%. 100%
Brandon: [Overlapping] Oh, that’s great.
Eric: If Todd had taken the transfer, he would have just been transferred to Mumbai. And, he would have made a ton more money, and whatever, but that was the—that was the thing, is that you, Todd decided to not do it. And then, he was put on the list.
Brandon: If anyone—if any fan artists are out there, if you could draw Todd in the Mumbai office, whatever that means to you, that would be delightful.
[Eric laughs]
Julia: It's funny because it looks exactly the same as the New York office.
[Brandon laughs]
Amanda: Yeah, it’s the same, but their lunches are better.
Eric: 100%.
Brandon: It’s just a blank—it's just a beige wall [Laughs].
Julia: There’s just a sign out the window that says, “Mumbai”.
Eric: Yeah.
Amanda: WhistleGK says, “Did Average Bear release the pixel bears? Was it a clever marketing scheme?”
Julia: No…
[Brandon laughs]
Amanda: I wish, I love that.
Eric: Who can say? Who can say?
Julia: [Overlapping] It’s all connected.
Amanda: And, Paula would love to hear more about the way initiative worked in “Join the Paper”! They write, “I love how Eric is always doing creative stuff with initiative, because I sometimes get bored when listening to initiative scenes in other actual play podcast, so it keeps it fun and fresh.”
Brandon: Same!
Eric: Paula, I feel this way about my own podcast, so—
[Amanda and Eric laugh]
Eric: —I'm fucking on top of you there. But, yes, I really want to keep initiative fun and flirty. The way that I did initiative here, was the way that, like, D&D tells you to do traps. So, the way that you run a trap is like you're not fighting a person, but you're fighting like the trap activating on a certain part of the initiative order. So, like, oh, the spikes come up in initiative Count 10 and 0, like after everybody goes. So, that's how I ran this. First of all, did not know June was gonna get in the fucking mix.
[Everyone laughs]
Amanda: Sorry, I just said that as a power move, but sometimes power moves get your actual powers, so!
Julia: [Overlapping] Power mooooove!!
Eric: [Laughing] Exactly, sometimes a power move is actual power.
Amanda: Yeah!
Eric: So, the way that the Q&A was going to work was that, you could go whenever you—that you had to roll initiative, there was a Q&A question at Count 20, 15, and 10. Then, there was a roll for whether or not the question was planted, or was actually going to be allowed by someone like randomly in the audience. So, whether or not the, the VC guy was going to, like, make the question like super, super softball to him, or he was actually going to try to get his way out of it. But then, I do charisma rolls for whether or not June got in the mix, and June would do that as well. If June could, like. overpower it and call on whoever, ah, whoever she wanted—which was super, super fun. And then, I only did like one round, because there was only one round of Q&A. Which I thought was really fun.
Julia: Yeah, I knew what my move was going to be, as soon as we talked about the Q&A and the fact that we were going to roll initiative, and then I rolled so low. And then, Brandon also rolled so low, and then did the thing that I was planning on doing anyway, which is roll zone of truth.
Brandon: I read your notes, and I stole your ideas. I'm sorry, Julia.
Julia: Yeah, I secretly messaged Brandon, being like, “Zone of truth, time…” That's not true.
[Amanda laughs]
Eric: Yeah. I think it's super funny that Amanda went first before the Q&A, and Brandon and Julia both went after—after the questions [Laughs]
Julia: Incredible. Truly, incredible.
Eric: My initiative is Amanda, 20, 15, 10, Brandon, Julie.
[Everyone laughs]
Amanda: Yep.
Eric: Incredible.
Amanda: Well, that was a hell of a time, I enjoyed it, so, so much. Any final thoughts on “Join the Paper”, before we move into a broader campaign game, character, and DM-ing questions?
Eric: Oh, yeah, I wanted to talk about all of our bad jobs. I didn't want to—I want Julia to talk about job.
Julia: Oh yeah. So, like I mentioned, I used to work for a spa and wellness company, as a content creator. It was like my first job right out of college. And, legally, I can't say that it was a money laundering front…
[Eric laughs]
Amanda: You absolutely cannot say that.
Julia: I cannot say that, legally—
Brandon: I can! It was a money laundering front.
[Everyone laughs]
Julia: What I can say is, about two months before I left that job for another job, they had moved me to sales for some reason, question mark?
[Eric laughs]
Amanda: Wildest shit I’ve ever heard…
Julia: Which is terrible, because I'm terrible at sales, and then fired the only other two employees that were left in the, like, editorial content creating part of the office, and it was buck wild because for like two months before I left that job, I was the head of editorial.
[Brandon, Eric, and Amanda laugh]
Amanda: And, roughly every other day, we would meet up at the Times Square Jekyll and Hyde Club to drink two-for-one mixed drinks.
Julia: No, that's when we started going to the Herald.
Amanda: Oh, then the Herald. Yes, that's right. RIP the Herald. That's for all of us first met!
Eric: RIP the Herald.
Brandon: And the one good thing that came out of that job!
Amanda: The one good thing in Midtown. Yep.
Julia: I showed Amanda some emails where it was like, all caps, and for some reason, my CEO turned the font to red, to just express how upset she was about a thing—
[Eric laughs]
Amanda: Yes, that happened. And, her husband would just like, say things about how the office should run.
Brandon: Good God.
[Eric laughs]
Julia: Yep.
Eric: Wow…
Amanda: Yeah.
Eric: Um, let's see. Brandon and I have talked a lot about our old job, that—where I met him. So, I want to talk about a different job that I had before that, I used to work at a weather app company [Laughs].
Julia: Oh?
Eric: It was like, a tech startup, that was—
Amanda: It was a real—real app boom era.
Eric: Yeah, yeah. It basically like send you a gif and like, a customized fun forecast, depending on wherever you were in the United States, just like—and it was all delivered from the perspective of a cat who wore a rain slicker. And, I was actually pretty good at it, because I just like, liked—liked to write, and it was like content adjacent. And then, someone was—was promoted, and then she started hiring all of her friends from improv. And, then the job became a comedy writing job, which I'm bad at, because she wanted to pretend like it was a fucking late-night show and not a weather app company. And, I was very bad at it, because I don't know how to write jokes. And then, I got fired, because, ah—
Brandon: I disagree, but okay.
Eric: I—no, like jo—like, capital J, Jokes. Capital J, Jokes. Like, Brandon, believe me. I thought I could do it, too. But, I am not a fucking UCB person, so I got iced out. They talked about improv all the time. I remember like, wow, maybe we shouldn't, like, talk about improv, and I got yelled at—at least once. And then, I got fired because I was not good at it. And now, she is on a very popular podcast.
[Brandon laughs]
Julia: Whoops! Uh oh!
Eric: Yeah. Also, I realized that the startup, they were bought by a, like, high-end beverage company in 2018. Because, they wanted their high-end SMS structure that they’d put together for sending out the forecast.
Amanda: Jesus.
Julia: Wild.
Eric: It was terrible.
Amanda: What a dystopia we live in.
Eric: Yeah.
Amanda: Brandon, any other insights?
Brandon: Um, I've been lucky that even in my terrible jobs, because I have a tech background, I somehow weaseled my way into like, not being part of the generic crowd, you know, um…
Eric: Boo!
Brandon: So, uh—
Eric: Fucking boo, as your coworker!
Brandon: I know, but it’s true—[laughs]
Eric: I know what you’re talking about. It happened. It happened, and it was—[laughing] it sucked.
Brandon: Yeah, so I've been lucky. But, I've really only had like, one bad job, in the sense of bad management. All my other jobs have been, like, either, you know, boring or not fulfilling. But, I worked with a lot of good people. So, those are all good. [Pauses] Actually, sorry, I had two jobs with bad management, but one, I was given a lot of freedom, so I didn't really have to deal with it too much.
Eric: And, that's why Brandon has as many sound plugins as he does now!
[Julia laughs]
Brandon: No, I did not—this is—no, I did not steal or take anything!
[Julia and Eric laugh]
Eric: We read another—
Amanda: You wipe your own hard drive, voluntarily, after leaving every job!
Brandon: [Laughs] I actually do, do that—[Laughing] I try to do that…
[Eric laughs]
Brandon: I tried to do it at [Bleep], but they wouldn't let me.
[Eric and Brandon laugh]
Julia: I'm gonna cut that.
Amanda: Incredible.
Julia: I'm protecting all of us—
Amanda: No, you are.
Eric: [Laughing] Lots of beeps, lots of beeps, Julia.
Amanda: Our life’s in your hands. And then, before that startup, I worked—my first job was in an investment bank. I was an English major. And then I was like, oh, shit, I'm a Junior, I guess I have to have a job at some point. And, there were no paying internships, except at a bank. So, I worked in recruiting at a bank. And, it was extremely strange, because I was like a 20-year-old English major on the phone with like, MBA graduates being like, “Yes, and how are you qualified to do this finance job?” And, be like, “Hey, just as a thought experiment, like, could you just explain what this job is to me, as if I knew nothing about finance?” And, ah—
[Eric laughs]
Amanda: That’s how I learned about finance and accounting [Laughs].
Brandon: That's incredible.
Julia: Woo!
Amanda: Yeah, it was incredibly fun. I had a very good boss in HR—who was also an aspiring TV writer—and so both of us were like, clearly we shouldn't be here. But, we're just going to try to help each other. And, ended up working there for like three and a half years, working for the head of a department of like several hundred, like, accounting nerd researchers, and they were all extremely nice. And, it was the most formal work environment I could possibly imagine. Like, I could imagine myself working at, like, a five-star hotel or the White House, because of the expectations for kind of, like, how you set things up for a meeting, and, like, how to send out emails where, like, nothing is wrong, and you anticipate all people's problems and questions. And, you know, I have to like talk to five different teams to get, like, a recorded conference line ready for, like, a meeting—
Eric: Good God.
Amanda: All the things I hate, which is, public embarrassment, pressure, and, like, fucking up someone else's event. So, that was my whole—my whole deal.
Brandon: Seems like a very healthy environment for you, in particular [Laughs].
Amanda: Yeah, no, as soon as I left, I like cut off my hair, and moved to Queens, got a bunch of tattoos, started dating Eric—it was great.
Eric: Ah—
Julia: Hell yeah!
Amanda: But, yeah, it was—it was interesting. I feel like I have the skills to do things a certain way. And now, every time I forgive myself for being less than 1,000% perfect, it's like, “Haha, fuck you, finance!” [Laughs]
Eric: Did you spend, like—like, seven hours in Boston once, as part of that job?
Amanda: Yeah, I had to go to a bunch of recruiting events, to like represent the department, and like, talk to students who wanted to work there. So, I did a lot of like, flying to Boston on the 5 AM, like, Delta shuttle—or Philadelphia, or Stanford, or, you know, a bunch of different schools.
Julia: Wow, companies that have money, huh?
Amanda: Only finance. It’s only finance.
Julia: Mhm.
Eric: What, you mean multitude? You didn't take the shuttle from Long Island to Greenpoint? [Laughs]
Amanda: I did, yesterday, buy us a TV stand for our studio video monitor, instead of the plant stand from my grandma's garage we have been using, so…
[Brandon laughs]
Amanda: We are—we are coming up in the world.
Julia: It functions the same way.
Eric: Moneys, baby! [Laughs]
Amanda: Let nobody say any different.
[Everyone laughs]
Eric: This Afterparty’s wild, guys.
[Everyone laughs]
Amanda: I'm having a great time.
Julia: I feel like we're still channeling our characters from “Join the Paper,” so everything is chaos—
Amanda: I’ve also been listening to a podcast, that’s just, like, two and a half hours of this, like, extremely charismatic older millennial, just like, talking unfiltered—just her, no co-host—about, like, various trends from the 90s and 2000s. Eric's eyes are so scared right now.
Brandon: Yeah, that sounds horrible…
[Eric laughs]
Amanda: It's like my only guilty pleasure—she's very good! Like, she can anchor it—
Brandon: Sorry, it sounds horrible to do [Laughs].
Amanda: Oh yeah, no. I would never in a million years do it. But, she—she really—she really carries it out. But, she likes to kind of—I feel like I was channeling her kind of persona when I was doing June. And I—I'm grateful for the sort of inspiration. Julia and I—or rather, I have the worst kind of accent creep into whatever Julia is doing near me. So, I just—I did my best here, but, you know, it happens. We're from literally the same place. It's hard.
Julia: Yeah. No, I think, I tried to go a little bit more millennial-Harley Quinn—
Eric: Yeah.
Julia: So like, you'll hear me kind of go a little Jersey sometimes. But, Amanda, you kept yours pretty strong.
Amanda: Thank you. Thank you.
Eric: Sure. I want to shout out Jonesy Mocktail, who exists in the 20s. And, I want to shout out Carlyle Carlyle, for giving me the ability to call Brandon's character pond scum—
[Brandon laughs]
Eric: —as if I was Chuck Bass—
Julia: It was so funny.
Eric: Chuck—that was all my Gossip Girl Chuck Bass I was funneling into Carlyle Caryle.
Amanda: Oh and let's visit the—the clarification corner real quick. So, Aggie received the text to the Multitool phone, by the way.
Eric: Yes.
Amanda: Eric, you said “Aggie” at the end of the episode, but it was to Multitool’s phone, so, don't worry.
Eric: I meant—I meant, like, Aggie, the person—
Amanda: Yes.
Eric: —like—like Amanda’s—Amanda, you are getting a text, but I said Aggie.
Amanda: Yeah.
Eric: No, it is to the Multitool phone, because Teagan is only dating Multitool.
Amanda: And, I gave contradicting answers, because one I gave several months ago, when we were recording the episode, that Pizza’s like a pitbull mix. And then, in the Afterparty, which, you know, we recorded just before it came out, I said more like a Wishbone-y, terrier situation. Just picture the cutest mashup of both. It's—it's a real kind of, like, dense, small to medium dog. Cute fur, little pity face—super cute.
Eric: Yes.
Brandon: Maybe pizza is now two dogs, and you have twice the love.
Julia: Double slice.
Brandon: Double slice! It’s cheese and pepperoni [laughs].
Amanda: No, it'd be Pizza and Calzone, those would be my dogs.
Brandon: Those are—that’s good.
Julia: Those are very good. Calzone’s the pitbull mix, Pizza is the terrier mix.
Eric: Oh, for sure.
Amanda: Yeah.
Eric: 100%. Why would you even say otherwise? That's fucking bananas.
Julia: [Laughs] I was just clarifying for everyone.
Eric: Oh, good, good, good. Someone suggested doing a pin that had Sushi, Pizza, and
Tuna on it. And, I liked the idea of, like, Tuna on both sides of the time stream, and then—then Sushi and Pizza on the other side. So, like, maybe we should do that [Laughs]?
Brandon: Yeah, that’s a good idea.
Julia: Maybe—?
Amanda: That sounds great. Hey, Zoey?
Eric: Hey, Zoey? If you’re listening, wanna fucking do this?
Amanda: [Overlapping] Zoey, wanna draw some dogs? And then, finally, we have some kind of bigger gaming character questions. So, Bray on discord says, “How is Danny feeling emotionally after creating a painting of one version of a sister fighting with/against another version of his same sister?”
Julia: Yeah, did he text Aggie being like, “Hey, I saw this version of you—”
Brandon: He doesn't know that—he wouldn't know that. The other version is his sister. Right?
Julia: Right. But he's seeing an image of his sister in two different superhero outfits, I feel like I would—I don't have siblings. But, I feel like if I had a superpower that allowed me to see the future and see through time via my paintings, I would let her know, “Hey, I painted a version of you that I know very well, and then a different version of you that I don't know very well?”
Amanda: Gotcha.
Eric: There's a trope of, like, the Cassandra character not sharing the information that they have.
Julia: And it infuriates me!
[Everyone laughs]
Eric: Yeah. But, I think that—
Amanda: [Announcer voice] Welcome to the Thunder dome, Julia!
[Julia laughs]
Eric: But, I also think that Danny knows that he—whatever he paints, he has no idea what it fucking means. Like, this could mean literally anything. And, I know that we know it, dramatically, because it's dramatic—the dramatic irony of it all. But, like, I didn't think that Danny would tell Aggie, because Danny doesn't trust the things that he paints, and also doesn't share his emotions and thoughts with anybody else. So—
Julia: Listen, Danny is your character, and you could do whatever you want with him. But, also, in every movie and TV show, I scream at the characters, “Communicate!!”
[Amanda laughs]
Eric: Sure.
Amanda: Yeah.
Eric: Yeah.
Julia: Because, it would solve so many problems!
Eric: And, we are playing into that trope, and you're yelling at Danny. Sorry, dog.
Julia: Mhm! Mhm!
Eric: I—I think he was freaking out on the inside. He's like, “What does this mean?!” But like, so calm. Doesn't say anything.
Julia (mimicking Danny): If only I could speak to my sister, and she could provide some insight into what this could possibly mean!
Eric: I mean, she—I don't think you'd be able to provide some insight. No one—no one can provide any insight on this. I don't think anyone would be able to speak to it, like, wow, this is weird.
Julia: Yeah, but at least we'd know about it.
Eric: That is true.
Julia: We'd have that information.
Amanda: Andy Noel asks, “Is Val gonna get a pet named after food? And, are they upset that Pizza’s now taken?”
[Brandon laughs]
Julia: No, we already talked about this—Val doesn't feel like they are, like, emotionally in a place where they can care for an animal 24/7, and so they're not going to get an animal. That is why Val walks dogs, because Val enjoys the company of animals, but does not want to care for one full time.
Amanda: Very smart.
Julia: And, if Val got one, it would probably be named Cannoli.
Amanda: Very cute. Andy also wants to know, “What is on Hitomi and Val's new place wish list?” Also something that I want to know. I think, as a fellow tall lady, a bathtub tall enough for those bones is what I would say.
[Eric laughs]
Julia: Correct. Also, this is kind of a, who can say? Because, we do get into it in the next episode.
Amanda: That's true!
Eric: [Laughing] That’s right, we do—
Brandon: But if Hitomi has bird bones, does Hitomi just float?
Eric: Yes.
Julia: Yeah—
Amanda: [Overlapping] Yeah, but either you can float laying out, or you can float all scrunched up—
[Brandon laughs]
Amanda: It’s much less fun to float all stretched out—
Julia: You want to float stretched out, not scrunched up.
Amanda: There you go.
Eric: A big bathtub, claw footed tub is never out of the list.
Julia: Listen, as a person who takes a bath every morning, and not a shower—
Brandon: You take a bath every morning?!
Eric: Really?!
Julia: I take a bath every day—
Brandon: Julia James, what are you talking about?
Amanda: What is your hair washing routine?
Julia: Every, like, three to four days is when I wash my hair—
Amanda: Sure.
Julia: —and I will do a shower the night before.
Amanda: Oh, okay.
Julia: But, every morning, hair goes tied up, take a bath.
Brandon: Fascinating.
Amanda: [Overlapping] Incredible.
Eric: I love it.
Amanda: Wow. Power move. June would approve.
Julia: You know what? It's an energy thing for me. Like, I wake up and, like, the last thing I want to do is, like, put myself in water that will slowly get warmer as I take a shower, because our plumbing is weird. But, if I fill a bathtub and like ease myself into the morning, it's easier for me to, like, have an energy—
Brandon: That makes sense.
Amanda: Love that.
Eric: Sure.
Amanda: Bray says, “How public our Multitool and Teagan about their relationship? It seems oddly, uh, sparkles, suspicious eyes, sparkles, that Gutenberg would target Teagan, unless he knew that they meant something a Multitool?”
Eric: Hmm.
[Brandon, Julia, and Amanda laugh]
Eric: Hmm…
Amanda: Shall—shall we—shall we have that spoiley corner, aperteeth?
Eric: Yeah, that's—that's a free spoiley corner. I would say, enough on, like—y'all aren't secret about it, I think—
Amanda: No, they've been—like, they've been, like, spotted on, you know, LTC memes Instagram, like, getting ice cream [Laughs].
Eric: Yeah, cuz that was like the eating—that was why the eating problem—
Amanda: Like, the boba through a straw, yeah.
Eric: The boba through the straw, they had to go out and get boba.
Brandon: Do you think there's ice cream flavors based on our superhero characters? Like, was—
Amanda: Ooo..
Brandon: —Multitool eating the Multitool flavor?
Julia: I would say that there would be, if we hadn't had our first, like, big boss that we had to fight the, like—
Amanda: Mas?
Julia: Yeah, Ma from the Ice Cream shop…
Amanda: Maybe there's taffy blends.
Julia: If she liked us, then maybe.
Eric: There's probably like a fudge blend from what Thornhill is now.
Brandon: There definitely is. 100%, Yeah.
Amanda: [Laughs] And, these are two questions that I think get at the same thing for all of us, which was very fortuitous. So JohnJIBT said on Insta, “You use a lot of different game mechanics in Join the Party. How do you make it balanced/does that, like, matter to you?” for Eric. And then, Moss said, “How do you treat limited items and spells like luck rolls? I always hoard them, because I'm worried on need more leader.” So, in terms of, like, kind of balance, like using what's in front of you—I'm just curious if anybody has thoughts on that.
Brandon: I like to burn my stuff, because, um…
Amanda: Brandon, “Use a fifth level spell slot for a joke,” Grugle.
[Brandon and Eric laughs]
Brandon: But, I have the same instinct to like hoard stuff, because I might need it later. But, so, I've learned to just, like, actively go against that instinct and just burn stuff when I—when I get it.
Amanda: As we say on Spirits, use the good olive oil now. Just use it.
Brandon: Mhm. Mhm.
Julia: Yeah. Yeah, I'm not particularly precious about Val’s rages, because I feel like, when Val needs them is when Val needs them.
Eric: Yeah.
Julia: And also, I have like five at this point—I think, or something like that—four or five. So I'm, I'm good.
Eric: Yeah. Rages—rages—I mean, listen. The stuff in Dungeons and Dragons is already not necessarily balanced in so many ways. So, like, you know, it doesn't really matter in that way. But, to talk—I have a whole thing about balancing. So, what do you think about your luck points and stuff?
Amanda: Well, one of the reasons I was drawn to monks is that I love the idea of using key points as I need them. And, it's something that does reset. So, I think spell slots are—I don't know, they feel too high stakes for me. But, because key points are the same as your level, it's like, “Okay, I have nine shots! I could do some of them as a joke, or I could do some of them in a way that I'm, like, you know, think it might not work and it might.” So, just that kind of like an economy of being able to choose, kind of, when I have extra juice and when I don't, I really enjoy. It's the same reason I chose the luck points as a feat. During the Time Loop arc, I was extremely mad that I used the luck point on something that, looking back, was kind of inconsequential, because I sure could use it during those Sands of Time, huh?
[Eric laughs]
Amanda: But, um, but I was out. But, no. I, as a person, know I'm also a hoarder. So, I try nice things, and then never end up using them. So, I try to, you know, use it when it feels right.
Eric: Yeah. And, I think that you should. You should—the players should be able to play with reckless abandon, because, remember, we're making a media property here. So, like, feeling not—feeling like you need to conserve yourself, like you're playing Dark Souls, or you're playing a video game, is very, very important.
Amanda: Oh, yeah, like those first few days of Stardew Valley, it's like, don't break a rock, if you don't have to you man, because you're not going to have enough energy to water your turnips. If you don't do that, you're never going to get ahead of the cycle.
Eric: That's exactly what I was saying.
Julia: [Overlapping] It’s true.
Eric: So, just like that. In terms of homebrewing stuff, I have two things that I keep in my head at all times. One is, I want to tell a good story. And two, I am a fan of the players. So, I'm probably not going to drop like a Tarasque, or like a giant dragon in our campaign. Because, like, that's just not interesting. It's not going to be fun. So, when I'm homebrewing stuff, it's more like how does this form follow function? And, are the players and the audience going to understand what I'm trying to do, both narratively and mechanically? So, that's why I would rather do that. For example, let's talk about the Seas—the Seas of—the Seas of Time. The narrative thing I wanted to do there was, I don't want to kill you, because that doesn't really make much sense. The Time Shark is the defender—
Julia: [High pitched voice] Time Shark!
Brandon: Oh no…
Eric: [Singing] Time Shark!
Julia: [Time Shark] Time Shark!
Eric: The Time Shark followed you to Seattle—
Brandon: Oh no—
[Everyone laughs]
Julia: That was quite a crap.
Eric: [Singing] Time Shark! Time Shark! He's the defender of the Time Deep! (Normal voice) Um, I think that narratively, that made sense to me, because there was like a monster defender in the Seas of Time. But, the thing that—about, like, the splashing of the water on the characters, that wasn’t damage, that was to mess with you and to make you do narrative work. But also, I was underplaying that, because it's like, oh, then you get splashed by water, no problem. It's not a big deal.
[Julia and Amanda laugh]
Eric: So like, that was gonna to be more interesting, and I wanted to surprise you and try to make you all have fun here. I very rarely want to just, like, fuck you up and try to kill you. Because, like, listen as a DM, you can just kill people, man. You can just say, “Oh, I quit. 62 damage, you're done.” It's not fun as a DM, and it's not fun as a showrunner or someone doing a fiction podcast to just kill someone. So, like, honestly, I don't want to say that I'm pulling—pulling back, or that I'm pulling punches, but like, I'm doing the thing that makes everyone have fun and have a good story, whether you're talking about the players or the audience.
Brandon: I love that you say rarely, because the small instances in which you do want to kill them is when I'm pissing you off [Laughs].
Eric: Brandon, that—no. No, I want to say, you get yourself into a bad situations—
[Brandon laughs]
Eric: —and they have consequences. Every time, I promise, I promise you I can justify every single time that you fu—that you have done something that is fucked you. And, the dice have also done something that have fucked you. It is a combination of me and chance.
Brandon: Mgm. That's fair. That's fair.
Julia: Yeah. But going back to that, Eric, I—that reminds me of some advice that I got very early on, in terms of writing, where it's like—especially if you're writing something, like, horror, for instance—
Eric: Yep.
Julia: The worst thing that you can do to a character is not killing them. 99% of the time.
Eric: Yeah.
Julia: You know? There are things that you can do that raise the stakes, that are more interesting than life and death.
Brandon: [Dramatic voice] Death is the easy way out!
[Julia laughs]
Eric: Sure. Brandon, if I—if your character was pissing me off, Milo would be dead. Milo wouldn't be walking around with 75% hit points, Milo wouldn't have had a panther running around the city that he gets asked about all the time.
Brandon: I know. I've read your fanfic, where Milo is dead [Laughs].
[Julia laughs]
Eric: Yeah, Milo just becomes the Grim Reaper, and there's another—there's another powered person, just in there.
Amanda: I—I would be pretty amazed if I died and met Milo.
[Brandon laughs]
Amanda: I think, no matter what the circumstances, all things considered, that would be pretty shocking and kind of fun.
Julia: Yeah.
Amanda: And our final question—speaking of the Time Waters, from Clairaline on Insta, “How would you implement the Waters of Time changing traits for home games? Also, is it a good idea to try?”
Eric: Hm…
Julia: Do it!
Amanda: Do it.
Eric: You could do it. Remember, that was like Episode 30-something. So, we had a lot of time with these characters, and then, going from there. So, like, make sure that you've, like, there is something to change. Like, there's—you've spent enough time with the characters that it would be fun enough to change. Also, like, make sure that there's a way to avoid it, and make sure that it's as loose as possible. Remember, I didn't say to Amanda, change your class, I said there is a major thing different about your character, what is it? And, make sure to take the time, working with both the DM and the character together, to make that change. And, to make it something that's, like, an opportunity to do something interesting and different. Also, figure out a way to put—like, you have to justify going to a Time Place. Like, I didn't just be like, “Hey, you pull a card, and actually, it's the timecard and you're a goblin now!” Like, you can't do that. Make sure it's justified both in world and in the action, and make sure that your players would actually find that fulfilling.
Amanda: And now, finally, we arrive, the circle, the dream of the spoiley corner. All right, this one comes from a different Eric via email, “Will Todd, June, and Rose—and maybe Teagan—make their own truth finding team?” And, then, he said, “If this goes in spoiley corner, I'll take it as a yes.” Listen, other Eric, whatever you need to happen in our head happens, but other than that—who can say? Who can say?
Brandon: I'm into it. Let's do it.
Julia: Yeah, no, I think as part of my background, I said that Rose used to work for, like, TMZ or something like that. So, Rose would be into that.
Amanda: Um, several, several people also said, will we get more Average Bear episodes?
Eric: [Pause] Who can say?
Amanda: Who can say?
Julia: Well, none of us work there anymore. So, we can’t—
[Eric laughs]
Eric: It’ll be called something else!
Brandon: It will be—we'll make, ah, our own company called, Above-Average Koala, or something—Above-Average Kodiak.
Amanda: Oh!
Julia: Yeah. I like it.
Eric: Brandon, you're gonna have to play a different character, because Todd has no skills. So, I don't know how Todd would get there [laughs].
Brandon: Because, it's Todd. He'll get there [Laughs].
Eric: Alright. Todd just gets there. Todd just shows up.
Julia: He’ll make a new pact with something else.
Eric: [Overlapping] I was thinking that. What I really wanted to do was, like, Brandon, you lose all of your powers—[laughs]
[Brandon laughs]
Eric: —because you got laid off. I wish that I’d remembered to do that.
Amanda: Andy Noel said, “How is Aggie/Multitool/Preserver gonna live with Teagan and hide her face?” Who can say?
Brandon: Who can say!
Julia: Who can say?
Eric: Who can say…
Brandon: Showering with a mask on— [Laughs]
Amanda: [Laughs] Clairoline, “Is the hockey guy the Knight of Mirrors? And, when will we find out?” Who can say!
Julia: Oh, Fritz…
Eric: Oh, Fritz…
Brandon: God, I want to say, I want to know. I want to know the mystery!
Julia: Yeah, I just really want to know what's up with the Knight of Mirrors…
Amanda: And, Question Surgeon, Michelle Spurgeon, “What would happen if Dr. Mayor Morrow stepped down politically? And, would Gutenberg be satisfied?”
Brandon: Who can say!
Julia: Ooo! Who can say!
Amanda: Dr. Spurgeon, who can say….
Eric: Yeah. Well, now you got to figure out who this John Press guy is. That's—that's…
[Everyone laughs]
Amanda: I—even I, notorious person who doesn't see twists coming in Scooby Doo, can see that one coming.
[Everyone laughs]
Eric: Yeah, who's this guy running this VC? I don't know who he is. You have two—now you have two problems.
Amanda: Well guys, not only are we in this—in this lifeboat, in the content oceans together, we've also made our way through a one shot, we've made our way through an Afterparty, and we voyage forth into even more content mining for all of you out there to enjoy.
Eric: Yes, new arc in one week from now! Let's go!
Brandon: Oh no, my toe, it dipped in the water! What happens next?!
Julia: You don't have glasses, anymore.
Eric: Brandon's a goblin now, we decided—[laughs]
Julia: Ooo! [Pauses] It was just a toe! It was a little thing!
Amanda: Well, we'll see you next week with a brand spanking new arc, we hope you enjoy it. Until then, see you later.
Eric: Bye!
Brandon (as a goblin): Bye, guys!
Julia: It’s Goblin Brandon!
Eric: Goblin Brandon! With no glasses! He has contacts in!
Amanda: [Laughs] May your rolls turn ever upward.
[End music]
Transcript by Sarah Patt