0:04

This is Space Cats Peace Turtles,

0:06

the unofficial podcast for Fantasy Flight's

0:08

Twilight Imperium. Episode 332, 2024, season

0:11

episode, premiere, first episode, beginning episode.

0:20

Act 1, 2024. Music

0:23

by Ben Prunty, featuring Matt

0:25

Martin and Hunter Donaldson. Episode

0:31

2, 2024,

0:33

beginning ceremonies,

0:35

opening. Oh,

0:56

opening ceremonies, that's a fun... That's

0:59

kind of awesome. Is that

1:01

the opening ceremony? Yeah,

1:06

that's a new song I just wrote. Oh,

1:08

okay, great. Very

1:10

good. The

1:12

official Space Cats theme song. Werner,

1:16

bent, dupe, bop, hee

1:18

dee dupe, womp, beep,

1:21

werner, bwerny, wah,

1:23

womp, wah. Ladies and gentlemen, if

1:26

you'll please rise in your seats

1:28

for the national anthem. Get on

1:30

your feet. Get

1:32

on your feet. Do

1:35

not be sitting for this part of the show. You

1:37

put your hand over your heart. You

1:40

show a little respect. We

1:44

beep, wah, wah, wah,

1:47

wah, wah, wah, wah,

1:50

wah, wah, wah, wah.

1:58

2024 is gonna be different. Yeah, the

2:00

tone of the shows different I'll

2:03

say mm-hmm You

2:05

know what I'm gonna do for all of 2024 and

2:07

in you better believe I'm gonna

2:10

hold to this but the entire year

2:12

Anytime we record I'm gonna grip my

2:15

death. Oh, well we record

2:18

with kind of like a Like

2:20

I'm attacking like I'm on the attack like

2:22

it would tense I'm gonna

2:24

completely tense out my arm and

2:26

I'm gonna like grip my desk I'll

2:28

match that energy and I'll kind of

2:30

flout I'm

2:33

gonna get away. I'm gonna get me like really low. Yeah,

2:36

I'm like right now. I'm like that now I'm

2:38

down here. You're the weak soft

2:40

little baby. Yeah, okay I'm the weak

2:42

soft baby and my friend hunter is

2:44

my co-host This year

2:46

we will destroy Twilight Imperium. Yeah,

2:49

okay sure And me too. Yeah.

2:51

Yeah, you are I'm gonna

2:54

drag you this is this is the

2:56

year I drag you through it I'm

3:03

just gonna drag you through this year

3:05

Matt. You don't have a choice anymore

3:07

We're taking away your choices and

3:10

we're just doing my choices now and I'm

3:12

in charge and you know what same for

3:14

the listener Too yeah, I don't know what

3:16

we're doing each week, but you are

3:18

listening to every episode this year Yeah, okay You maybe

3:20

you're one of those people like you only watch the

3:23

guide episodes You know what I mean? Why you only

3:25

do that you watch them too and I don't know

3:27

where you found the video Oh, yeah, you watch it

3:29

now. So now the way it works is you have

3:31

to find a way I'm not even gonna do it

3:33

for you. You got to make a powerpoint of Everything

3:36

we say you got to transcribe it.

3:39

Uh-huh. Try not to focus on what

3:41

we're saying Just transcribe the words and

3:43

don't get meaning from it and later

3:45

you non audio watch it. Yes. Okay,

3:48

very good Wow, that was powerful

3:50

and good hunter. I've got a slew

3:53

of tournament qualifier

3:56

Winners that get to join

3:58

the prelims We didn't read

4:00

any last week because it was our

4:02

Christmas time saying you're doing it wrong.

4:04

You're doing it wrong Oh, no, the

4:06

2024 here's our work. Hey Matt. Yeah.

4:08

Yes, read off all the qualifier winners

4:10

that we haven't gotten to yet Yes, sir.

4:13

Now let me do it right now

4:18

The following qualifiers are as of us Sir,

4:21

congratulations, Mr. Raines Corwin frass horny

4:24

Lord Vader moric. Dr. Computer Chambeco

4:26

tore well boat Butler Jeeves space

4:28

ninja, sir Thomas flow him gnome and

4:30

flow 322 is that fast

4:32

enough sir? Was

4:35

one of them horny Vader? Yeah, is that what you

4:37

said horny Lord Vader joined the turn tournament this year?

4:39

And I don't know how to feel about it. Huh? well

4:44

Yeah, yeah They

4:46

wanted to win it too All

4:50

right, well if they wanted to win it It

4:53

wouldn't have been I was about to ask

4:55

them from the community right about to get

4:57

rid of them completely But they

4:59

did win his win. They were they were just horny

5:01

enough They

5:04

worked maybe bears bullet board or neither Well,

5:08

there you go. And and there's

5:10

that's that's our qualifier winners for

5:12

now. We still need qualifiers

5:14

to be played You

5:16

if you are in the patreon and you

5:19

are not playing qualifiers, you still you got

5:21

time get in there do it It's now

5:23

we're doing it right now Though the prelims

5:25

will be starting this weekend the qualifiers are

5:28

rolling over we need 64 more players So

5:31

we're just gonna let them keep happening I

5:33

have no idea it would be hilarious if

5:35

the prelims started to outpace the qualifiers And

5:38

I don't know what we'll do if that

5:40

happens, but I'm not worried about it I'm

5:42

not not really giving it any thought but

5:44

you can keep getting in games and just

5:46

keep playing and who knows if you just Stick

5:48

around long enough good things might just happen to

5:50

you because we need to fill out 10 more

5:53

slots You know what? I'm seeing wink wink. No, you

5:55

know what I'm saying You know what I'm saying when

5:57

I say if we just only need 10 more players

6:00

And there's like 10 of you left. I

6:02

don't know do the math Yeah,

6:04

yeah, what he's saying is with

6:06

my vice grip on the death.

6:08

I'm gonna break all my fingers

6:12

That's what he's saying. That's why

6:14

he's saying 10. I'm gonna break

6:16

them. It's unrelated. It's unrelated Man

6:22

we do have prelims though. They are

6:25

starting this weekend. It's January 2024 which

6:28

means tournament new year six 2020

6:30

for tournament can properly begin the

6:33

qualifiers are just the qualifiers That's

6:35

like this whole other ecosystem But

6:37

the single elimination all of your

6:39

bones are in this game and

6:41

none of them get to exist

6:43

beyond this day That's starts this

6:45

weekend buddy And I want to

6:48

give you the three times and we will talk about

6:50

them more at the end of the show But just

6:52

just to say it off the top come hang out

6:54

and watch the first three prelims games Saturday

6:56

at 10 UTC Uh-huh

6:59

Saturday at 19 UTC Sunday

7:03

at 15 UTC The

7:06

10 a.m. Or the 10 UTC one will

7:08

be on space cats peace turtle switch The

7:11

19 UTC will be on L

7:13

spits jail ear cam twitch and

7:15

the Sunday game will be on space cats

7:17

twitch featuring hunter Yeah, you go.

7:20

I'll be full weekend. Yeah full

7:22

weekend. We're gonna get through the first three

7:24

prelims games. It's the pace We're gonna keep

7:26

it up. Mm-hmm You know what maybe

7:28

we'll even I'm thinking about this right now

7:30

Maybe we'll just throw this in the episode

7:32

This is I'm literally thinking about this right

7:34

now if the qualifiers go on if they

7:36

keep happening Well, we just let prelims losers

7:40

that we were asking and I don't know

7:42

if I like that because This

7:44

it feels weird for like the first prelims players

7:47

to lose and just quickly put their hat back

7:49

in there I don't know. I mean, I guess

7:52

Maybe they could play another qualify like if

7:54

they can get through the qualifiers again, I

7:56

don't think they can they can't just yeah

7:58

They can't just play another prelim But

8:00

if they could win another qualifier, I don't want to I

8:02

don't want to say that right now I don't want to

8:05

commit to that right now. I think it'd be pretty cool

8:07

If somebody lost went back into the

8:10

qualifiers won a qualifier game and got

8:12

to try again Yeah, and considering there's

8:14

only 64 spots Like

8:17

how many people are even gonna be able to pull

8:20

that off right probably not that many But it would

8:22

be kind of really cool. I

8:24

just don't the only aspect of it that

8:26

I don't like is sort of the scheduling

8:28

nature Like some people are like I'm waiting

8:30

for a Monday game There's two total Monday

8:33

games for the all of the prelims and

8:35

I like I got kind of shafted because

8:38

Of that well, I don't know. This is also

8:40

a tournament That's all about just the having the

8:42

availability to do it is you

8:44

know I don't know what all within the tank.

8:46

We'll see how the numbers work out Listen

8:51

audience just to cut cut across Matt

8:53

real quick. I'm working on it Okay, y'all have

8:55

y'all have come to me and you've and you've

8:57

said hey Can we do this

8:59

and I'm said well have you asked your

9:01

mother and we are asking mommy right now?

9:03

I thought you were going to ask and

9:06

telling me how it is Listen,

9:08

that was the opening bit. Okay, you know,

9:11

a lot of people don't listen to that

9:13

part Okay, you know and a lot of

9:15

people actually how about this new patreon content

9:17

this year? We're gonna start

9:19

doing Episodes of the show with

9:21

all the jokes cut which is our

9:24

patreon is about to explode So if you're

9:26

in the patreon you get joke list episode

9:29

It's a one thousand dollar a month

9:31

patreon here. You give us

9:34

ten thousand dollars We will do a

9:36

joke list edit of every single podcast

9:38

where we take out anything that could

9:40

be considered funny And we will be

9:42

really strict on Like

9:44

if it could be considered funny by

9:47

anybody four minutes long Wow Joke

9:49

list edit. This is such a good idea.

9:51

That's like the best idea I've ever had

9:57

Also the only stuff I would ever put behind

9:59

a paywall Yeah, absolutely. If you hate is

10:01

what you're saying. I'll put anything I hate

10:03

behind a paywall. The things I truly don't

10:05

want to do at all, they go behind

10:08

the paywall. My spite plays. You

10:10

can pay me money despite you. Also, you

10:12

might be wondering, but Matt, I'm

10:15

in the prelims and I don't even know what

10:17

the slices are. How could I possibly get in

10:19

on a game for my prelims if I don't

10:22

know the slices? Well, go check

10:24

the YouTube Buster Brown. If you're listening to

10:26

this right the second it releases, maybe it's

10:28

not up yet, but today, January

10:30

3rd, the slice reveal

10:32

will be out and you get to see the horrible

10:34

terrible thing we did for the prelims. Yeah,

10:37

the horrible terrible no good thing. We actually

10:39

decided, so okay, I'm anticipating a lot of

10:42

heat for these slices. I want to go

10:44

ahead and get out in front of it. We've

10:46

been doing this a while, okay? You

10:49

person with complaints and you person that's

10:51

in the prelims being like, oh, what?

10:53

I don't like these. Guess what?

10:55

It's about challenging you this time. We've set

10:58

up a little puzzle and we're actually geniuses.

11:00

And if you can't solve our little puzzle,

11:02

then you don't get to be in the

11:04

semifinals, okay? You have to

11:06

look, we've actually hidden a secret message in

11:08

these slices. But if you're

11:11

not on that like ascended TI level, like we are,

11:13

you're not gonna be able to figure it out and

11:15

it's gonna look like the slices are sad

11:17

and have dumb stuff. But

11:20

that's not true. It's actually really great. And

11:22

guess what? We came up with a new

11:24

idea. That's cool. These are,

11:26

it's a different premise for slices. And

11:29

you know, it's what I'm really excited

11:31

about is the idea that the semi

11:33

slices are always meaner and stupider than

11:35

anything else in the tournament. The

11:38

finals map is always like a very nice

11:40

kind of honed balance, relatively good thing. And

11:43

the prelims are supposed to be kind of like,

11:45

uh, safe-ish territory, right? Qualifiers are like super safe.

11:48

If they're not just in previous years, sometimes they've

11:50

been the same slices. But I love

11:52

the notion that we've set up this for the

11:54

prelims, what we've done, this pretty terrible thing. And

11:57

that we have to go harder in this thang.

12:00

Yeah, I think the semi slices are

12:02

gonna be really messed up. I'm thinking

12:04

one planet in each slice I'm thinking

12:06

it's all empty. It's just one everybody

12:09

gets one planet So it's like we rigged

12:11

the draft we literally are just like if

12:13

you're sixth in draft order you win Yeah,

12:16

yeah, you're the winner. Yeah, we don't even play

12:18

this stupid game We because at that point all

12:20

I care about is getting six players You know

12:23

man if that that does make me want to

12:25

do a Franken tournament where there's no game played

12:27

Just you and I are judges and it's people

12:29

put together Franken factions and at the end of

12:32

it you and I just Crown

12:34

winners of draft like a dog

12:36

show Like a dog

12:39

show for TI factions where oh

12:41

my god. I love that I'm

12:43

writing it down the Westminster

12:45

Franken show We

12:51

set up little oh my god, okay So we

12:53

could make like little like Twilight Imperium like puzzles

12:56

You have to do where you just have to

12:58

do like one action and we have to see

13:00

how you do it Yeah, and then depending on

13:02

how you do it. We're like, oh, wow. That's

13:04

a good boy. Well, you know, yeah And the

13:06

best boy wins Wow. Love it. Oh, man And

13:08

one other idea to just while we're spitball and stupid things

13:10

that will never happen How about

13:13

just a a Franken draft that

13:15

is the race for the custodians? So there

13:17

is some gameplay but it's just whoever gets

13:19

custodians That when the finish the finish

13:21

of the draft and you just you see what you

13:23

can do It's kind of a funny idea for a

13:25

game as like if you can

13:28

get custodians you win Absolutely.

13:30

And you know, I think it's hilarious about it. Is

13:32

that like it? Well, yeah, cuz it's

13:34

Franken So really it's anybody's game. They're really just

13:36

like what abilities do you know? There would be

13:38

more like of a priority of like, alright get

13:40

all your cruisers above mek at all You just

13:43

got to run blocker until you can try to

13:45

get my you know, like all of the counterplays

13:47

would start coming out of The woodworks. All

13:49

right tournaments cancelled. We're doing this now. This is

13:52

what the whole show is about This

13:54

is actually better. So much time It's

13:58

gonna take like three hours We'll be like

14:00

done at hour three. We'll be like, all right,

14:02

and there we go. Tune in next year Westminster

14:06

Franken show Okay,

14:10

that was fun Wow, what a good energy

14:12

for this this this company meeting this thing

14:14

I'm excited for this this setup though. We

14:16

have a lot to cover today in our

14:19

season premiere our 2024 plans episode

14:23

Yeah, so this is a type of episode

14:25

that we do every once in a while. I've

14:27

sometimes talked bad on it But

14:30

also I think sometimes we just got to have

14:32

hangout episodes And that's really the point of this

14:34

is that we are hanging out today and we're

14:36

gonna talk a little bit about What

14:38

2024 is going to bring for the

14:40

space cats media Empire? All

14:44

the moves that we're planning on making There's

14:46

gonna be a lot of cool stuff. We're getting into

14:48

records and We're

14:50

opening record store chains because we

14:52

heard that vinyl is recession proof

14:56

Which is actually not really true But

14:59

we are going to get into that so

15:01

we're gonna start we're gonna start making records

15:03

very cool Yeah, I think it's just all

15:05

noise rock like it's just that's all is

15:08

that what we would I don't think that's

15:10

actually You have to

15:12

remember I'm not talking about the actual genre

15:14

noise rock I'm talking about whatever is inside

15:16

my brain that would be noise or I

15:18

like can you consider for a second what

15:20

I probably think No, yeah, like normal Sonic.

15:22

You're like It's

15:28

like craft work you're like this is noise rock. Yeah. Yeah

15:31

Actually, I say that but you've seen craft I've

15:33

seen I never had I'm really jealous about it.

15:35

Yeah Yeah, that was a good time. Yeah, let's

15:37

see going just anyways. We should probably talk about

15:40

space cats be started a little day All right

15:42

Do we want to lead with? the

15:45

sort of tenor of the year and the

15:47

sort of life the the the life changes

15:50

that are coming in 2024, ooh Yeah,

15:53

we can get a little personal

15:55

about it So um we are this

15:58

is one of the last episodes You

16:00

will hear of the show that is recorded remote.

16:02

I think like for at least

16:04

this year. Yeah Yeah, I mean

16:06

and when I say one of the last I

16:09

just mean in like a there's gonna be a

16:11

group of episodes Yeah, who knows how many it'll

16:13

be where we are recording in different rooms, right?

16:15

But I think the time for

16:17

that is maybe coming to an end. Yeah

16:19

pretty soon It's really exciting like the

16:21

best thing ever is gonna happen and it's that hunter and

16:24

I are gonna live in the same City

16:26

again, yeah, the show started with both

16:29

of us in Portland, Oregon and We're

16:32

going to Minneapolis baby. We're gonna

16:35

be there and we can talk

16:37

about why some other time

16:39

But for now, I tell you why for

16:41

now Just know that it's

16:43

very fun and that uh, yeah I'm

16:46

uprooting my whole family and hunters uprooting

16:49

his whole, you know, kind of whole

16:51

family I'm uprooting my entire family. It's

16:53

been very hard talking my copy of

16:56

doom on Super Nintendo To

16:59

go to Minneapolis. He's

17:01

furious. He's so furious

17:04

and it's very tough Yeah a

17:06

record collection very upset. I was looking

17:08

at my copy of the sonic 3

17:10

soundtrack on vinyl Yeah, which is something

17:13

I owned It just it just

17:15

hate saying goodbye to all of its friends in New

17:17

York and having to start school somewhere else You know,

17:19

that's the yeah part of looking forward to the least

17:22

Yeah, and you know what real quick sidebar because

17:24

this is what we're talking about right now I'm

17:26

so happy for Molly because I

17:29

think she was gonna kind of be a weird

17:31

kid I now she has like

17:33

a shot, you know what I mean? She

17:36

wasn't just being raised by you who's like

17:38

being raised in Northwest, Arkansas Which is

17:40

we can confirm kind of

17:43

makes weird kids. It's kind of a weird

17:45

kid machine Show is

17:47

proof. Maybe is that what you're is that the thing?

17:50

In Minneapolis, she's gonna have a real shot

17:52

at like a somewhat normal life. Yeah if

17:54

she wants that She's gonna be a hockey

17:56

player. That's what yeah, or a pro or

17:58

perhaps Perhaps she'll be

18:01

a professional curler who knows we

18:03

talked about curling right on the yeah,

18:05

we did we did we talked about

18:07

that already Yeah, I'll be continuing my

18:09

curling career in Minneapolis, Minnesota Hunter

18:12

I don't think we'll be doing the

18:14

same. I am what's called a one

18:16

and done with curling I have

18:18

I've had it. Yeah, if anybody brings up

18:20

curling, I'll be like I've had it. Yeah.

18:22

Yeah. Oh, yeah I had that and

18:25

that's it. Oh Yeah,

18:27

I had that Well, let's

18:29

get into what the actual show plans in

18:31

our but with just so everyone knows with

18:33

the context of all of this stuff We're

18:35

gonna talk about at a certain point in

18:38

this year will be with so much more

18:40

energy I don't know if people that like

18:42

today is a particularly energy-filled episode But if

18:44

you notice the energy shift 100 and I are in

18:46

the same room I'm excited for

18:48

the show to have that again because that's

18:50

how we that's where we started That's where

18:52

we got things like huge van, you know,

18:54

you don't get huge van as often When

18:58

you're when you're recording remotely, yeah, let's get

19:00

into the meat Let's talk about the show.

19:02

So first things first as far as things

19:04

you can expect from space cats this year

19:07

Is you're gonna get the rest of

19:09

the super guides. We have 12 factions

19:11

left Yep, our brek winu muat, sir

19:13

sardac mentac l1 barony It's our own

19:15

Hakan joll nar and soul you are

19:18

not getting them in that order Okay,

19:20

but you said so I think you

19:22

wrote this before we had just done

19:24

the soul guide So sold off the

19:26

list now apps actually which is hilarious.

19:28

We did soul you're right But

19:30

well the rest of them that does that mean we have

19:33

11 I guess so. Yeah, so actually it's 11 We

19:36

just checked because we we counted them. So

19:38

we just have 11. Oh, yeah super guides a

19:40

bunch more of those I have

19:42

a SAR one in pending around the

19:44

corner will be a SAR guide Also,

19:47

very fun thing that we are finally

19:49

able to do now Arcs

19:52

the new game from leader games that we're

19:54

very excited for and we've kind of been

19:56

pitching as the notion that the

19:59

leader game Games crew made this for

20:01

us and our audience, right? This

20:04

is a game made for people who love

20:07

Twilight Imperium and love, wish it

20:09

was a little bit stupider like with stupider art, just

20:11

that's it. Twilight Imperium

20:13

with stupider art is a pretty

20:15

good one second pitch

20:17

for ARCs and we're very excited

20:19

about it. We've been playing it.

20:22

The rule book was finally finalized for

20:24

ARCs which was kind of what Hunter and

20:26

I were mostly waiting on. We've been playing

20:28

what we call base ARCs for

20:31

a while, some people call small ARCs. It

20:34

is the original game which is kind

20:36

of a non-asymmetric faction kind of game

20:38

and what we're really excited for is

20:40

the campaign version of that game which

20:42

is as long as

20:44

Twilight Imperium and is way more involved in

20:47

the asymmetric of it all. Because

20:51

everything is kind of straightened out, we can start

20:53

getting really used to the base game and what's

20:56

called leaders and lore. There's a video on our

20:58

YouTube showing off some of the leaders and

21:00

lore gameplay. That's like a little asymmetric

21:02

flavor to the ARCs game. In

21:05

2024, we want to do guides

21:07

for the leaders and lore of

21:10

base ARCs or small ARCs and then hopefully

21:12

after we get pretty good at that and

21:14

have like a really good strategic head on

21:16

our shoulders, we'll start tackling the campaign stuff

21:18

which is like a way, way,

21:20

way bigger project that we

21:22

don't even know what it looks like yet.

21:26

Yeah, so expect ARCs coverage I would

21:28

say throughout this year. It's

21:30

going to be the 11,

21:33

I should say, super guides are kind of

21:35

your classic spine of it and

21:37

then your kind of new sort of core

21:39

where like Spirit Island was in the past

21:41

is going to be ARCs but I actually

21:43

think we are probably going to wring a

21:45

lot of ARCs stuff out more so than

21:47

we did Spirit Island. The

21:50

thing that excites me about talking

21:52

about ARCs is that it is

21:54

targeting us as far as like

21:57

this game was made considering us. and

22:00

the types of games that we like. But also,

22:02

it is a new game

22:04

that I feel like, one

22:06

of the things that I think made Space

22:08

Cats really fun is that we were talking

22:10

about Twilight and the Period 4 as it

22:12

was coming out and we were signed up

22:14

to talk about it for a long time.

22:16

Guess what? It's 2024 right now and we

22:18

started the show in 2017. We

22:21

were both 14 years old and

22:23

now we're old adult men. And honestly, it's

22:26

kind of how we started with Root. We

22:28

didn't start with Root as a brand new

22:30

game but it was still kind of the

22:33

new blood to the market and we were

22:35

jumping in relatively early to it where people

22:37

really hadn't worked out the higher level strategies

22:39

yet. When we were coming to it, we

22:42

got to still be on that ground floor

22:44

of like, what actually is good? And

22:47

I think a lot of our early Root

22:49

episodes probably wouldn't hold up these days in

22:51

terms of the big overarching strategies we

22:53

were recommending. But

22:56

at that time of learning a new thing altogether,

22:58

I think that's when it felt

23:00

the best. Dune never felt that way. Spirit

23:02

Island never felt that way. And that's what

23:05

excites us the most about ARCs is just

23:07

the actual opportunity to be on

23:09

the front lines of this thing. We're

23:12

going to be wrong about stuff but everybody's going

23:14

to be wrong about stuff and we're all just

23:16

going to be working things out together. I

23:19

do want to emphasize that we are going to be wrong

23:21

about stuff for sure. So

23:25

we're going to be wrong about stuff, which

23:27

is great because I think that that is actually kind

23:29

of something that was lacking in the Spirit Island stuff

23:32

is that there was so much

23:34

out there that was already so

23:36

well defined strategically and that the

23:38

game sort of had like a

23:40

base strategy that you could kind

23:42

of go after. There

23:44

wasn't enough room for us to mess up because to be

23:46

honest, I'd sit down, I'd play a game, I'd

23:48

be like, hmm, how does this faction work? And I would

23:51

kind of look at like, well, what does the community say

23:53

about it? And I'd be like, oh, okay, here's kind of

23:55

the community ideas. And I'd be like, okay,

23:57

well, let's kind of take a look at it. And then I would

23:59

kind of. do that and I'd be like, oh yeah, that

24:01

does work. Perfect. It works exactly.

24:03

I wasn't really sure what to add to

24:05

that. You know what I mean? Like sometimes

24:07

I would disagree on like the finer points

24:10

and be like, actually, I think this

24:13

type of card is probably better or whatever. But

24:15

honestly, that did not come up very much.

24:17

ARCs, we are making it up and the

24:20

points don't matter and we are going to

24:22

mess up. So get ready. All of those

24:24

people, which I know is 100% of the

24:26

audience, those of you that are really excited

24:28

about well actually, it's time. It's your time to sign

24:30

again. We are going to get back in the dumpster

24:32

and you are going to open up the lid and

24:34

throw the trash right on our

24:37

little heads. We are rodents.

24:40

We are little raccoons in there and

24:42

we eat garbage. Something

24:45

else we get to do that is very specifically something

24:47

we get to do in person is

24:50

last year, a long

24:52

time ago, we did a series of episodes

24:55

about Twilight Imperium First Edition and it was

24:57

always kind of a promise of like, and

24:59

we want to continue that journey and do

25:01

kind of a historical retrospective on

25:03

the different editions of the game. And

25:06

one trick to that that's actually been kind of putting things

25:08

off for a while is I

25:10

have yet to see any version of

25:12

Second Edition be like on our online

25:15

platforms. Nobody's really ever scanned it in.

25:17

There's just to throw it out there

25:19

again too, if you have a copy, please do

25:21

that or please find a way to do that.

25:23

If anything, just for preservation sake, can we please

25:25

digitize that old version of the game so that

25:27

people can just get to see

25:29

it more often? It's a very old thing

25:31

and I don't think Fantasy Flight would yell

25:33

at you for putting it on tabletop playground

25:35

or whatever. But on our own, we'll

25:37

be in person and we'll actually be able to get our hands on

25:40

an in-person copy of Second Edition and

25:42

we'll get to do some episodes about

25:44

Second Edition, which is sort of the

25:46

swan song, the final note of that

25:48

first wave and then probably

25:50

not this year, but maybe next year we'll

25:52

do Third Edition and it'll be like, oh

25:54

dear, let's look at how much things changed

25:56

between the two. I know that this

25:58

shifts from first to second. are not as

26:01

broad, but I'm excited to just take

26:03

a look at that and mostly talk about a lot

26:05

of the production upgrades and actually get to feel them

26:07

in our hands with a physical copy.

26:10

Yeah, and since we'll be living in

26:12

Minneapolis now, we could actually reach out

26:14

to Fantasy Flight and then come by

26:16

and then see that they actually have

26:18

locked the door and that we actually

26:20

won't be able to get in to

26:22

see anybody today. And then

26:25

when we look in the window, it

26:27

will look like no one is there

26:29

and that it's an empty building. I'm

26:31

so excited for how personal them ignoring

26:33

us is going to become. We're

26:36

going to be able to, don't worry y'all, part of

26:38

the plan is us going by there and seeing

26:43

all the different disguises they have. I'm

26:45

sure they'll disguise it as like a

26:47

Lowe's or as, you know, a Walmart

26:49

or whatever, you know. More

26:52

importantly, we can start going to the Games Center,

26:54

which is also like, oh, it used to be

26:56

FFG, but it is anymore. And we'll hang out

26:58

with Christian T. Peterson and we'll all three of

27:00

us. We'll all three walk hand in hand together

27:02

to FFG and just stand outside the window with

27:04

the original owner of the game. And I don't

27:06

know how weird it'll be. It'll be funny to

27:08

be right there by the Games Center and a

27:10

part of that community. That'll

27:12

be interesting. My plan on the first big

27:14

snow when I'm in Minneapolis, I'm just going

27:16

to go to Fantasy Flight and I'm just

27:18

going to knock on the windows and I'm

27:21

just going to be looking in and I'm

27:23

just going to be freezing my Nards off

27:25

out there. I'm just going to be so

27:27

cold. I'm not going to

27:29

be dressed for it. I'm going to be dressed

27:31

like I'm just wearing a t-shirt and I'm just

27:33

freezing out there and I'm just looking inside and

27:35

I just got like a little tear running down

27:38

my cheek and it freezes, you know. A thick

27:40

brown sock with your big toe poking through it.

27:42

Feel a hole in it. Please,

27:46

sir, please, sir, can I podcast for

27:48

you? Please wet me

27:50

in, Fantasy Flight. I think

27:52

we have taken the joke so far that they do

27:54

have a right to not ever want to be in

27:56

the same room as us. Right. Absolutely.

28:00

And it was like kind of on them, but like yeah,

28:02

I think we have we've gone pretty We creeped out at

28:04

this point. Oh, I don't blame them

28:06

at all. It's like we're at a party and I'm like these

28:08

people like are They don't

28:10

want to talk to me, and then I do something really

28:12

dumb, and I'm like I get why they don't want to

28:14

do stuff with me You know you're like digging around in

28:16

their bathroom like they got cinnamon potpourri in here I'm

28:19

like eating it you know Here's

28:24

another thing we would like to do and this okay this

28:26

one this one's been tough for me, okay? Another

28:29

series or or I don't know what it will

28:31

look like yet y'all we we People

28:34

have asked for more role-playing game

28:36

episodes And I and we hear

28:38

you and we see you and

28:40

we want to but it

28:43

is a question of How

28:46

because those episodes were

28:49

a much bigger task to coordinate

28:52

We very specifically only had the goal of

28:54

getting three in the can and that made

28:56

it more Attainable of doing that and also

28:58

made the finish line of like how big

29:01

the edits were on those episodes and everything

29:04

Something that was doable we want to do more

29:06

we want to do an arc that is not

29:08

necessarily even a finish line

29:10

to it Just like oh we start having a little

29:12

RPG show, but we have to figure out How

29:15

to do that and what that looks like

29:17

but I it felt worth it to say

29:19

like it is a thing we want Don't

29:21

don't think we're just like yeah completely ignoring

29:23

it. I think of it like I

29:25

mean this is oh We're just painting with

29:27

a broad brush right here. Oh a classic I

29:32

just want to say I think that it might

29:34

be really cool if it was like a video

29:36

thing Yeah, if it was sort of like think

29:38

like dimension 20 with a lot less money Less

29:43

charisma so much less less probably

29:45

like a practice like uglier Uncool

29:50

like you have it on good

29:52

authority that Aubrey I in guard

29:54

likes Twilight Imperium So

29:56

who knows maybe we sneak one maybe we

29:58

sneak one hit into although we'd have to

30:01

get her out of LA. So maybe that's

30:03

impossible actually. Maybe that won't happen. Yeah.

30:06

Yeah, I think definitely no celebrity

30:08

guest. Yeah. Besides EJ of

30:10

course. Besides EJ. Besides the one A-lister we

30:12

have access to. And then he of course

30:15

doesn't even learn how to play the game.

30:17

You know what I mean? He shows up

30:19

and he's got shades on and

30:21

he's like, what have you been doing? You know

30:23

what I mean? I smell weird. I do think

30:25

that's a big factor of making it a more

30:27

doable project for us is less of a podcast

30:29

or less of an audio only thing and an

30:31

opportunity to A, do something fun in person and

30:34

also doing things in person. There's

30:36

your own sort of slew of

30:38

editing tasks to take

30:41

on with that. But let me tell you,

30:44

four or five people improvving

30:46

at each other over latency

30:48

problems, that's what takes

30:51

editing. That's what takes

30:53

just sheer time is putting all

30:55

that back together basically. Yeah,

30:58

I feel like we've kind of, you're kind of spelling it out but

31:00

I just want to say it plainly. If

31:02

Twilight Imperium RPG happens in any way, shape

31:04

or form whether it be audio or video,

31:07

Matt will not be the editor. Yeah. That's

31:10

kind of the thing for it

31:12

to deal with basically. That was

31:14

not a realistic use of Matt's

31:16

time considering Matt's other responsibilities. And

31:19

that is like the thing that

31:21

we got to figure out. I think we can do it.

31:23

Yeah. Oh there we go. I think so too. We

31:25

also, I mean this is not like a, oh here's a

31:27

whole series of things we're gonna do. But

31:30

we are all still waiting on Codex Four

31:32

and we can promise you easily that if

31:34

Codex Four ever does come out this year,

31:36

nothing came out in 2023 in terms of codices. And

31:41

we, you know, Dana said there will

31:43

be a Codex Four many moons ago

31:45

but we are waiting for that. We

31:48

would obviously, and I'm not just talking,

31:50

oh we'll do an episode about Codex

31:52

Four. There's also anything that like is

31:54

a big sweeping change would get some

31:56

sort of like bigger follow up. So

31:59

you can expect. You know, I don't know to

32:01

call them super guides, but some sort of like, well, we

32:03

will have to talk about some things based on what is

32:05

in that codex and it might take a series of episodes.

32:07

Well, I mean, and that's when we'll probably start doing the

32:09

25 mega guide. You

32:13

know what I mean? Where we kind of take,

32:15

you know, just like another look at all

32:17

the things. It never ends.

32:22

I hope you all know that we

32:24

do harass Dane on your behalf. Yeah.

32:27

You never need to worry about like

32:29

trying to get a hold of Dane to

32:31

ask where codex four is like we

32:33

like, we're pretty hard on Dane and

32:36

honestly, we're pretty mean in

32:38

general. He's lucky he

32:41

moved away from Minneapolis before we got there.

32:43

It's astounding that he's not there and we're

32:45

going to be there. If

32:47

we can convince him to go back, which we

32:50

can't, but if we could, that would be a

32:52

new tier for the show. You imagine FFG ignoring

32:54

us, but Dane being in person on the show

32:56

all the time. That's hilarious to

32:58

me. That would be really hilarious. I

33:01

would really like that a lot. But

33:04

rest assured, no matter where Dane goes, he will

33:06

never escape us. Even if he

33:08

were to like do, I don't know,

33:10

there's no place Dane could go where he

33:12

could escape me. Basically.

33:17

Something I want to say on the record. Yeah,

33:20

that won't come up in a court case later or

33:22

anything. That's fine. Everything's fine. Hunter,

33:26

you still have the big Homebrewers project

33:28

this year of Twilight Imperium Zero edition.

33:31

Yeah, so we started this late last year. There

33:34

hasn't been a lot of discussion. We were kind of adjourning

33:36

for the holiday time. Holiday

33:38

time is over. It is now back to

33:41

business as per usual. I

33:43

would like to do this month, I'm going to

33:45

do the final draft of the last acts, the,

33:49

the Prophecy of Kings compliant

33:51

last acts, which has been

33:53

honestly really, really fun. The

33:56

test game that I did, I immediately saw some things

33:58

that like, oh, we could fix this. Wecker

34:00

proposed some fixes chat proposed

34:02

some fixes. We I think

34:04

we're going to get it into a lot better

34:06

place It is available by the way. I feel

34:09

like there's not a lot of people know this

34:12

You can if you are subscribed to

34:14

the Twilight Imperium for homebrew thing

34:16

on Tabletop playground

34:19

you can actually just select SCP T

34:21

lasax and throw it on in there

34:23

Yep, the graphic design is not great

34:25

because I'm not a graphic designer. Okay?

34:28

I'm still looking for somebody if you want to take charge

34:30

on it Otherwise I am gonna just have to do a

34:32

better job than I've done which is fine

34:34

It just means that there's a limit to how good

34:36

it will in fact be But

34:39

I am going to do the final draft

34:41

of that this month I'm hoping to do

34:43

a stream of it on either the last

34:45

weekend of January or the Not

34:48

the next but the one after the next yeah, we will see

34:50

how it times out and then from then on We

34:53

will be talking about the entire Twilight Imperium zero edition

34:55

thing you if you're new to that If you don't

34:57

even know what that is we did an episode about

35:00

it a little while back I would ask you to

35:02

go check that out and if you're interested Consider

35:05

subscribing to homebrew skilled because there's been a

35:07

lot of really good discussion And that's really

35:09

where I go to see like okay. Well

35:11

like how is this system gonna work? What

35:13

should we do about these various ideas? Yeah,

35:15

but yeah, I'm excited about it Yeah So

35:17

the homebrew is guild helps contribute to those

35:19

ideas and then hopefully we can do kind of

35:21

like Check-ins on the episode they might not be

35:23

full episodes, but it might become we were doing

35:25

homebrew segments before The homebrew

35:27

review was kind of my opportunity to let people

35:30

share like little homebrew components But it might be

35:32

an opportunity for essentially me as a reporter to

35:34

check in on the status of zero edition and

35:36

see what you know Kind of things have happened

35:38

Maybe not each week or but like every other

35:40

week or something to sort of check in on

35:43

the status of the project What will be I

35:45

think the tone of that? For

35:48

the podcast itself also here's

35:50

just a little one This is just a one-off

35:52

episode, but we were looking through stuff and we

35:55

found out we have covered every

35:57

player account so far Except

36:00

for 8 player. Now technically we've never done an episode

36:03

about 6 player, but also we've done, I think like

36:05

320 episodes. No, we have. We've done a lot. We've

36:07

done a lot of episodes about 6 player. We

36:09

are a 6 player 10 point podcast. But

36:11

we've, and if anything, too, we

36:14

could do, I wouldn't mind at some point,

36:16

probably not this year, but at some point

36:18

doing updates on all the ones

36:20

we did before POK. But we're

36:22

kicking that can down the road in

36:24

general. But we do, oh, just in

36:26

general, an 8 player game episode.

36:30

I know it's easier than ever for me

36:32

to play 8 player games because Async

36:34

makes that pretty simple. It would actually not be hard

36:36

to organize some 8 player games and just have those

36:38

going for a while. They certainly would go much longer

36:41

than even my 6 player games, but that's okay. This

36:43

is probably an episode that doesn't come till later in

36:45

the year. But I would love to

36:47

talk about 8 player. I think I used to think

36:49

I would really like 8 player, and I think I've

36:52

come to the idea that maybe I wouldn't love it.

36:54

We did the Alliance episode and did some 8 player

36:56

in our Alliance episode. And I thought that would be

36:58

the best sell, the best case scenario for 8 player.

37:01

And it still was long games

37:03

and tough to justify. Yeah,

37:07

so get excited about a future Space Cast

37:09

Be Certain episode where we talk about how

37:11

we don't like 8 player. But to

37:14

confirm that we don't like it, we will have to play

37:16

some, sadly. I

37:18

refuse to say I don't like

37:20

something without subjecting myself to it. So

37:23

there we go. Get excited about that. I

37:25

know a lot of people will love it. They'll

37:28

be excited to disagree with us at least. You

37:31

know what? You can just start your own 8 player podcast.

37:33

That's what I say. I wish someone would start the 14

37:35

point TI podcast. I don't know

37:37

who needs to do that. There is

37:39

an asynchronous. I think we've plugged it before.

37:42

But BLT does a wonderful little micro show.

37:44

It's a podcast but it's a nice little

37:47

digestible episode that are just about what's

37:49

going on in Async each week. And

37:52

people should absolutely check that out. It

37:54

is a fun little thing

37:56

to just see what's going on in that corner of

37:58

the world. Which I say corner. I

38:00

genuinely think is like a substantial part of the

38:03

playing populace at this point like a say out

38:05

has Async is maybe

38:07

almost outpacing tabletop simulator in number

38:09

of people playing games. So yeah

38:13

It's super easy to play you can just do

38:15

it anytime and actually we should probably do an

38:17

async update at this point Because

38:20

it's just always saying more always more and more

38:22

and more tools. Yeah, it's pretty noise more and

38:25

and honestly any kind of like Here's what the

38:27

community is doing right now. It just makes a

38:29

lot of sense to me Yeah, we have an

38:31

agenda phase post that should be

38:33

live if you're hearing this and you are

38:35

a galactic counselor or above You

38:38

should check out the agenda phase post because

38:40

we are gonna be looking for more questions

38:43

that we can answer Yeah, and even questions

38:45

we can't answer would also be good But

38:48

mix it up a little bit Yeah Let's do

38:50

all the questions of why is this Matt and

38:52

Hunter moving to Minneapolis and then we just won't

38:54

answer that for a while It'll be really great,

38:56

but everyone can ask it, you know Yeah,

38:58

I'd love to we were doing the agenda phase like

39:00

every episode and I'd love to do that But then

39:02

also I love I personally really liked when we did

39:04

the all agenda phase episode I don't know if Hunter

39:06

was I don't know if

39:08

you like that kind of thing I don't think

39:10

you like mailbag episodes with something you you you

39:13

sort of decried to me But yeah,

39:15

I mean, I think it's like it's just kind

39:17

of a lot of just answering questions And when

39:19

we you could spread that out a little bit

39:21

and it's bringing out as more fun A question

39:23

each week is actually a good time and a

39:25

good little ending to each episode Also,

39:28

of course as always we will have

39:30

Galactic Council episodes the Galactic Council is

39:32

our five dollar tier on our patreon

39:34

and in that tier

39:37

you get to Vote on

39:39

episodes that we put up it used to be

39:41

one per month last year It was one every

39:43

other month at this point It's kind of like

39:45

when we feel like it it will pull we

39:47

throw up the pole for a galactic council When

39:50

when when it feels right to have another one

39:52

when we have ideas for for all this stuff

39:54

You can also have access to the Galactic Council

39:56

discord channel where people very often propose ideas for

39:58

things that eventually go on Galactic Council

40:01

polls. So please come hang out on

40:03

that. That's one of the more active

40:05

discord channels for Patreon members. Yeah

40:08

and then our last topic that we want

40:10

to kind of tease here. This is you

40:12

know I mean this is been rolling around

40:14

for this is a big one. This is

40:16

the one a lot of this year is

40:18

gonna revolve around this but it is time

40:21

for me to do my mech tournament.

40:23

It has been a while since we've

40:25

done the last flagship tournament was after

40:27

Codex 3. Yeah. We had to tell

40:29

you and which is funny because I think we had just

40:31

done a flagship tournament and then we just had to turn

40:33

around and do another one. Well now it's time to have

40:36

all the mechs fight each other. Yeah.

40:38

And I hear you why and

40:41

I and I say shut

40:44

up. Alright I'm in

40:46

charge. Because you asked why we're gonna make

40:48

it longer. It's not gonna just be a

40:50

quick little 20-minute video. It's gonna be a

40:52

week long process brother. And let me tell

40:54

you something the rules are gonna be really

40:57

complicated. I'm gonna outdo myself. Honestly last time

40:59

when we did the flagship tournament thing that

41:01

was like well it was way too complicated.

41:03

Yeah. And this time I'm just gonna be

41:05

gunning for everything I got. Okay I'm gonna

41:08

be throwing it all in there. Absolutely. Yeah

41:10

and you know I think it's gonna have

41:12

like kind of a horse race aspect to

41:14

it. I'm thinking there

41:16

should be like a betting system. Sure. It

41:18

should be like camel up. Yeah. Basically we

41:21

gamble. You and I are not trying. We

41:23

are we are gambling on just

41:25

active rounds of mechs beating each other

41:27

and just trying to score our points.

41:29

It's not about the top mech because

41:31

it's NazRoca and nobody cares. But beyond

41:34

that how else can we

41:36

make the bets work out. I think that's a good

41:38

idea. Also I kind of want to roll all the

41:40

dice at once. You want to do that? Do you

41:42

want to do that? Yeah we're gonna roll

41:47

all the dice at once. Cool man that'll be

41:49

awesome for the video. It'll be like Dice Tower

41:52

man. It'll be awesome. We'll just dump all the

41:54

dice out. It'll be so cool. It'll

41:56

be in a bad slow mo. It'll be it'll be filmed

41:58

in 30 frames per second and then slowed. down to

42:00

12 frames per second. It'll be awesome.

42:02

Yeah. It'll be so cool. Yeah, so we're

42:04

gonna roll all the dice at once. So there

42:07

we go, back tournament. Those are the plans

42:09

for this year. Yeah. We should take a

42:11

quick break and then we're gonna talk a

42:13

little bit about Patreon stuff and we'll do

42:15

the rundown. Yay! SpaceCats

42:25

P-Circles is still proudly sponsored by Leader

42:27

Games and as 2023 comes to a

42:29

close, Leader

42:31

Games just wanted to wish everyone a

42:33

happy end of year and thank you

42:35

all for being the best fans ever.

42:37

You can keep an eye out for

42:39

eventual Ahoy, New Horizons, late pledges, and

42:41

you can also still take advantage of

42:43

ARCs late pledges through the end of

42:45

January. If you have any interest in

42:47

ARCs, you do not want to miss

42:49

out on these late pledges. It is

42:51

a great way to have massive savings

42:53

on what the eventual retail price will be

42:56

on ARCs and its campaign expansion. But

42:58

the most important news is the Riverfolk

43:01

expansion merch is back on the shop

43:03

at leadergames.com/SCPT. There is a lizard cult

43:05

beanie that was out of stock for

43:08

a while and I need you all

43:10

to know that it's back in stock

43:12

and you can get it and everything's

43:15

okay. Your Christmas is safe and I

43:17

just want to thank Leader Games for

43:19

a wonderful 2023. Welcome

43:29

back and hey, hey everybody. Let me level with

43:31

you. Let me level with you. We love you

43:33

and we just we want you to be a

43:35

part of this with us and the Patreon has

43:37

always been the best way to do that and

43:40

this is our time of year when we just like to do

43:42

a little pitch. It's not really a pledge drive. It's just our

43:44

chance to kind of talk about the Patreon for more than 30

43:48

seconds in the rundown. We can talk at

43:50

length of all of the things that our

43:52

Patreon contributes to the show and contributes back

43:54

to you hopefully. So we're going to go

43:56

through all the tiers and kind of re-pitch

43:58

them. We have the very

44:00

important announcement of what the new $50

44:02

tier will be called. So stay tuned

44:04

for that. You're not gonna wanna miss

44:06

a second. That's really

44:08

important. That's actually kind of the only

44:10

bit of content really in this whole

44:13

section. But yeah,

44:15

so we have five Patreon tiers. The

44:18

first tier is the $5 tier, which

44:20

is, we're not changing anything to do with the structure of

44:22

how much money we ask and for how many tiers there

44:25

are or whatever. Those are all staying the same. So

44:27

the Galactic Council, which is a $5 tier, it

44:30

gives you access to the Galactic Council polls.

44:33

There will be one up next

44:35

week for the January episode. January

44:37

is longer as far as Wednesdays,

44:39

so we actually have five episodes

44:42

this month. But we are gonna

44:44

do a Galactic Council episode for this month. We're just not gonna

44:46

do the poll yet. We're gonna give it about a week before

44:48

we do it. However, there is an agenda phase post that is

44:50

live that we were talking about in the earlier part of the

44:52

show. If you don't know

44:54

what an agenda phase is, it's this thing where we

44:56

just ask the patrons to ask us questions. And

44:59

then we use the questions and we

45:01

answer them fully. Truthfully we

45:03

don't even lie to you. We would love

45:05

to tell lies because we love lying. But

45:08

we actually don't do lies whenever that,

45:10

we lie in the other part. Never

45:13

lie to any agenda phase or the

45:15

demon gets you. And it's no fun.

45:17

You don't want Marvelviv to get you.

45:19

It's the worst. Ask your demon name.

45:21

Marvelviv? Yeah. You've

45:23

never met Marvelviv? That

45:26

just kinda doesn't have a demon vibe to

45:28

me. That just actually doesn't have a demon

45:31

vibe. He's an eight year old who

45:33

has a lot of snot on his face. It's the worst.

45:36

Ew. Yeah. Snotty eight year

45:38

old. That's gross. So clearly we

45:40

see people that you should ask random questions

45:42

to. So it was five dollars to ask

45:44

us a question. We're clearly

45:46

interesting, very intelligent people you can

45:49

tell. You can tell from that

45:51

exchange that we are very smart

45:53

and know a lot of stuff

45:55

and you are a big dumb child

45:57

and you should ask this question. You need our help.

46:00

Batteries, absolutely the home brewers guild

46:02

is our $10 tier

46:04

for $10 a month, especially this

46:06

year you get access to Contributing

46:09

to zero edition. There's a special

46:11

channel on the space cats discord

46:13

where people put together thoughts and

46:15

put forward Component ideas and work

46:17

on stuff. That's where we pull

46:19

for play testing games It

46:22

is also extended to other stuff as well Anytime

46:24

we want to just do homebrew stuff the home

46:26

brewers guild is involved. So if you are interested

46:28

in homebrew You know we this

46:31

show is not like about homebrew week after week

46:33

But this is our way of trying to get

46:35

a little bit of homebrew spice in each week

46:37

with then kind of bigger tent Pull moments here

46:39

and there Yeah, and

46:41

while I am still just working on

46:43

the final draft of the LazX Which I realized like

46:45

might not be very much fun If you feel like

46:47

you've kind of already gotten your ideas in on there

46:50

I will be scheduling the final play

46:52

tests for the LazX this month

46:55

Which means if you're in the home brewers guild you can

46:58

join in on that So it will

47:00

probably it will absolutely be like a weekend

47:02

game But I and

47:04

I will let you know in the

47:06

probably next week's episode whenever that is

47:08

scheduled and then bam You can you

47:10

can get in on that game if you have the

47:12

free time for it. Absolutely the

47:15

yinster hood of the traveling vans

47:17

What a what a thing that

47:19

that is That is our

47:21

$25 tier and that has traditionally been our

47:23

tier where we go to that channel when

47:25

we are looking to put together Games it's

47:28

taken a lot of different forms I did want to

47:30

say the biggest change from my perspective going into this

47:32

year's Like a sink is now

47:35

a regular part of my diet of TI

47:37

it is I constantly have games going on

47:39

now and if you are Interested

47:42

in playing with me. I'm gonna start pulling from

47:44

the yinster head for For

47:46

a sink games. I've been pulling from like a regular group

47:48

of people But I'm very interested

47:50

in opening that up to more folks And

47:53

now that I've gotten used to a sink and more

47:55

comfortable with it. I don't feel like

47:57

I'm the slowest player anymore so Now

48:00

I feel like it's okay to drag strangers

48:02

into the mix. So, yinsterhood,

48:04

especially if you are interested in

48:06

async, it might be a good

48:08

tier to get in on games. And who knows, maybe

48:10

I can get way too many going. Maybe I'll become

48:12

an eight games a month kind of person and I'll

48:15

just drown in Twilight and Peering. I don't wanna do

48:17

that, but if you force me to, I will. Okay,

48:20

and I've got this for the yinsterhood.

48:23

This Saturday, I am

48:26

going to play a yinsterhood research

48:28

game for the next

48:30

guide that I will be writing, which

48:33

is actually gonna be, I've got a ways

48:35

away from when that episode will be dropping.

48:37

So you also get kind of a tease as to a

48:40

Space Gas Speed Turtles episode that will be coming

48:42

out in a while. It's not

48:44

going to be a streamed game because it's

48:46

gonna be during the tournament game that is

48:49

happening, so I will not want to distract

48:51

from that in any way. But,

48:53

you know, if you're in the yinsterhood or you

48:55

wanna join, and you're free to play like

48:59

a Saturday game, probably starting around

49:01

like 11 a.m. Eastern, come on

49:03

down. That post will be

49:05

live in the yinsterhood Discord

49:07

channel if you are hearing

49:09

this and it's like on release. It's

49:12

like, they move, the spots move pretty fast. Yeah, they go.

49:16

Our next up is the very exciting moment,

49:18

the moment everyone's been waiting for. Team

49:20

C Sprouts, you gave us a beautiful year.

49:24

The pin order will be

49:26

placed soon. We'll

49:28

get them all gathered together. We'll ship them

49:30

out in the early months of this year.

49:33

And that's so wonderful. The art was

49:35

beautiful. But now you

49:37

all need a new name. Every

49:39

year, the $50 tier gets a new, cutie,

49:42

wittle name for who they is.

49:44

They've been to Space Kitties and

49:46

to Whittle Peace Totals and Momma's

49:48

Wove We Wava and Team C

49:51

Sprouts. And we've done four of

49:53

them. And Hunter, would you like

49:55

to present our friends with their

49:57

new name? Yeah, so.

50:00

So this one I came up with, I'm proud

50:02

of it, but it's also a

50:04

reference to something I like. But

50:06

to just some, a guy I like

50:08

said this one basically is what I'm

50:11

saying. But we, so as far as

50:13

like factions that we've done, versions that

50:15

we've done, Hakan, you know, Extra, Sardak,

50:18

Arborek, you know, and it

50:20

was like kind of a big question of like what is the next

50:22

faction that we should go with? And I was thinking we should do

50:24

a POK faction because we haven't done one yet. And

50:27

we were kind of throwing around ideas and now

50:29

as Roka came up, so for

50:31

the year 2024, the

50:34

Teensy Sprout tier will be

50:36

renamed to the Baby Child Big Friends,

50:38

which is of course what

50:41

we're, you get it, right? You

50:43

get it, Baby Child Big Friends. Honestly, it's

50:45

the one faction that almost needed no help

50:47

in being cuter, right? There, it didn't need

50:49

anything else. You just see the picture of

50:51

like, I don't know how Sun is going

50:53

to make pin art that is cuter than

50:56

what already exists, but I'm very excited to

50:58

see what comes out the other side. Now,

51:02

I can already hear Absol saying

51:04

that they are not babies and

51:07

like the Baby Child aspect, I don't think they

51:10

are chill. I think they are actually full grown

51:12

adult. They are. But they're always,

51:14

this tier is always the babies and

51:16

they do meet, they are conjoined as

51:18

babies. They're put together. So this is

51:20

a young, not a Roka pairing. It's

51:23

lore accurate. Nothing wrong with it. Wow.

51:25

So they, okay, well that's it. Baby

51:28

Child Big Friends, alright? That's it. I

51:30

love you all. We're done. I'm

51:33

very excited for you. I'm very excited for each and every

51:35

one of you. I'm not going to lie, it's going to

51:37

be our best pin. Like let's just be real. Like Mama's

51:39

Lovely Larva, that was a really good one. I like that.

51:41

As an idea, I really stand for that. I

51:43

think Baby Child Big Friend, we've really, it's just so

51:45

much fun to say. Just say it right now. Like

51:48

you're at work or whatever. I mean, you're definitely

51:50

at work. Everyone is at work.

51:53

That's the whole thing. Yeah. We

51:55

are making you worse at your job. It's like the whole reason we

51:57

even made this podcast. Right. And just try

51:59

saying it out loud. to yourself. Actually walk into

52:01

your boss's office and just say baby

52:03

child big friend. Yep. Yeah. If

52:05

you're driving in the city and you're on your way

52:08

to work just roll down the window and shout it

52:10

out the window. Baby child big friend. If you're

52:12

in the shower and

52:15

your family's in the house too, can you just

52:17

go ahead and yell that right now? Can you

52:19

just yell it from the shower? I need you

52:21

to yell it right now. Louder? Louder this time.

52:23

Baby child big friend. There.

52:25

Okay we did it. Anyways that tier

52:28

is fifty dollars. The

52:34

final tier, no big changes

52:36

but Weird Bears we of course always love

52:38

you. There will be some

52:40

sort of event. We love doing our Weird

52:43

Bear extravaganza. Usually right after

52:45

the tournament wraps up we try to

52:47

schedule something with Weird Bears that's either

52:49

home-proof focused or just stupidity focused as

52:52

best as we can. And

52:54

another wave of jersey orders will be intended

52:57

to come with the pin orders essentially. We

52:59

tend to do those roughly the same time.

53:02

So we can ship the pins at the same

53:04

time as the jerseys. And yeah

53:06

we just wanted to also say hey Weird Bears you

53:08

did it. Most of you already know this although not

53:10

everybody's on the channel. But fifty

53:13

we hit our fiftieth Weird

53:15

Bear this year. In 2023 we achieved our

53:18

fiftieth person to ever become a Weird Bear. When

53:21

you join the Weird Bears you actually join for

53:23

life. I don't know if we say this on

53:25

the show often enough but the Weird Bear channel

53:27

on the Discord you don't lose

53:29

access to it when you stop being a Weird

53:32

Bear. We have a special role called Legacy Weird

53:34

Bears and you just get added to it. You

53:36

are a part of the elite club of people

53:38

who were even if only for a single month

53:41

were Weird Bears and you just get to be

53:43

a part of that. So if you want the

53:45

jersey with your special number on it we would

53:47

now be starting with fifty one in

53:50

twenty twenty four. If you want that number on your back

53:52

and want to be a part of the channel

53:55

and just a part of an elite group of

53:57

wonderful people that get called upon to do the

53:59

stupidest things. we do on this show with

54:02

somewhat regularity, please come

54:04

be a part of that. Oh,

54:06

wow. We're only 19 away. I

54:11

hadn't even thought about that. It's

54:15

gonna be a really funny race. It's gonna be a really

54:17

funny race as we get like right up there next to

54:19

it. Yeah, you know. It's still gonna be chill for a

54:21

while, but I know when we get to like 65. Yeah.

54:26

Well, then suddenly we get five in a row. Everyone's

54:29

gonna be trying to be the one to get

54:31

it. I'm sure that's what's happening is literally everyone

54:33

is listening with like their finger on the trigger.

54:36

Like trying to get number 69. That's

54:38

the other thing is you get a number. You get assigned

54:40

a number in the order that you join. That's

54:43

your jersey number. And

54:45

yeah, we are 19 away. 19

54:48

till doomsday or whatever. And while we're talking

54:50

about them, I want to thank all of

54:53

our active weird bears. Big Al Capuchino, Squamishimu,

54:55

Brass Bird, Kabbalah Soul, Kaluwin, Darryl, Elspeth, Janine

54:58

Jedi, Carnel, Alice, Emelchefsky, Absol,

55:00

RYs, and Tang. And

55:02

I'm just so excited to thank

55:05

our Baby Child Big fans, Kraken,

55:07

Port Mandy, Kirkules, Relaxstan, and Vince.

55:10

You can rate this podcast on, I almost

55:12

said you can rate this podcast app. Oh,

55:16

that's a good one. Okay, rate it as an app.

55:19

Actually, yeah. Give it

55:21

five stars, but don't say anything about the show. Just

55:23

talk about the app that you're using. Just

55:26

be like, whether it's Spotify or

55:28

Apple or whatever, just the

55:30

body of it, just describe the app as

55:32

if you're like just like, I don't know,

55:34

like you're just confused as to like what

55:37

it even is. As if you're somebody that

55:39

has never listened to any podcast and you're

55:41

pulling up your podcast app and for some

55:43

reason you've clicked on Space Cats, Peace Turtles,

55:45

and you think without listening that this is

55:48

how you rate the app. I'll

55:50

go one step further too. The next time your

55:52

app is like, hey, you're using this

55:54

app right now, would you like to rate this app?

55:57

Can that be then when you rate

55:59

this podcast? That in their thing when

56:01

they give you the little bird you can you can give

56:03

their app I don't care what you start how many stars

56:05

you give their app You can give it whatever you want

56:07

and you can just say space cat's piece of rules is

56:09

my favorite podcast That rules.

56:11

Yeah, you're like using the stitcher app

56:14

or whatever. It's called and Crazy

56:17

about pods or whatever and and and they're like

56:19

who do you want to write this app? And

56:21

then yeah, give it whatever stars and give it

56:23

two stars and be like you or

56:25

both my buddies You Can

56:29

send us this Imperium life series at

56:32

space cat's penis peace [email protected] and let's

56:34

Reread out those streams for this weekend

56:37

because again the prelims start this weekend.

56:39

I can't believe we're finally there 36

56:42

games to get us 36 semifinalists

56:44

to give us six finalists the

56:46

journey starts now Prelim game number

56:48

one is Saturday January 6 at

56:51

10 a.m. UTC, which is uh, which

56:53

is 4 a.m. For

56:55

me, I'm gonna start that game at 4 a.m.

56:57

I'm very excited. That'll be on space cats peace

56:59

turtles twitch channel Prelims game

57:02

number two will be Saturday January

57:04

6 at 1900 UTC. That is

57:06

2 p.m. Eastern hosted by Elspeth

57:09

over on twitch TV slash

57:11

jail ear cam I will say just

57:13

so people aren't wildly confused But

57:15

we're gonna try to keep the games and

57:18

the prelims from stacking too much on top of each

57:20

other But and we spaced

57:22

them nine hours apart But yes prelims game one

57:24

might leak a little bit into prelims game two

57:26

But that's why they're on two separate channels So

57:28

you can just pull both up on the multi

57:30

twitch thing or whatever and prelims game three is

57:32

Sunday January 7th at 1500 UTC That's

57:35

10 a.m. Eastern hosted by hunter

57:37

bomb bomb Yeah,

57:40

I'm hunter bomb bomb and I will be hosting

57:43

that one But if you want if you Particularly just

57:45

want to watch the ones that I host and you

57:47

don't want to watch any ones that I know a

57:49

lot of people Are like that they

57:51

don't want to watch any the ones hosted by anybody else

57:53

They just want to watch the ones that I host. Uh-huh.

57:56

The reason is because of how how dedicated

57:59

I am Yeah, do

58:01

commentary right And

58:03

how I never get off Downer

58:05

never gets bored and always stays

58:07

on topic and is always right

58:10

there as a good calm I'm that guy.

58:12

You know what? I mean, I'm the one

58:14

if you want to get into dirt with

58:16

the numbers. Yeah, that's me Yeah, you don't

58:18

in there hunter and ej everyone's

58:20

favorite statisticians the the ti statisticians they call them

58:22

It's it's hunter and ej. I don't know if

58:24

he did. I don't even Sunday I don't I'm

58:26

gonna be able to get ej back. You know

58:28

what I mean like anymore. Yeah I

58:32

think ej might be gone. All right I think y'all

58:34

might have ruined your relationship with ej when

58:36

it comes to commentary if you if I

58:38

if you want ej to Commentate with me.

58:40

I think you should put some sorry's in

58:42

the chat. All right. I think you should

58:44

just say hey Sorry about that buddy. Yeah,

58:46

didn't mean to we updated everything

58:49

else with the patreon many times this episode

58:51

How about you? Thank you everybody for a

58:53

beautiful 2023 a and we are very much

58:55

looking forward to 2024 bringing Honestly,

58:59

like a new energy to the show a lot of

59:01

new a lot of new things We

59:04

a lot of the stuff we listed today is like yeah. Yeah, I

59:06

get it. That's that's the show I know I genuinely

59:08

do believe the kind of feeling of

59:11

the show is going to have like

59:13

a noticeable change Yeah,

59:15

when when we're both in Minneapolis and the

59:17

things we have access to in Minneapolis There's

59:19

just a lot of stuff that could

59:22

happen that we haven't even thought of yet because

59:24

we're not there yet Well,

59:26

there's also something that we have thought of

59:28

that we wanted to already

59:31

be moving on Yeah, we making happen.

59:33

Yeah, that is kind of a bigger Yeah,

59:36

sort of in-person type thing. Yeah, there's

59:38

a much bigger thing to talk about

59:41

Hopefully very soon There

59:44

was let me tell cuz maybe you can even

59:46

sense it. There was a big old

59:48

paragraph Outline of the script that

59:51

we had to highlight and then just press

59:53

delete because it's not happening But because we

59:56

have to move to Minneapolis for yeah

1:00:00

Minneapolis. Yeah. What

1:00:02

I had, I was set, and some people in

1:00:04

the know, some people in the community know what

1:00:06

I'm talking about because I've been having these private

1:00:08

conversations with the secret council. Yeah. The double secret

1:00:10

council, I should say, not the regular secret council.

1:00:12

Those people don't know about it. But the double

1:00:14

secret council, the people on the deep inside, the

1:00:17

sort of deep state of TI,

1:00:20

they know that there's some moving

1:00:22

and shaking happening behind the scenes.

1:00:25

But then the problem is that me and Matt have

1:00:27

to move to Minneapolis. Also, I was going to

1:00:30

ask, can

1:00:32

I throw some of my stuff in your

1:00:34

truck because I don't have a lot of

1:00:36

stuff, and you do, and I just

1:00:38

think that maybe you should have to take some of

1:00:40

my stuff. I actually feel like

1:00:42

that's, it's kind of the least you could do. It's

1:00:44

just like a few things. It's not like that many

1:00:46

things. It's like a thing or two. Hunter's

1:00:49

mooching off my move now is how it's going

1:00:51

to go down. Well, you know, I don't have

1:00:53

a lot of heavy stuff. I

1:00:56

just don't really. Okay. I

1:00:59

will do this. You have to babysit

1:01:01

Molly. Wait, do I want that? Is that something

1:01:03

I even want? Uh oh. Oh no, it's on

1:01:05

the record. Help! Yeah. Yeah.

1:01:09

And you know, you know how it would go

1:01:11

down if I babysat Molly. If

1:01:13

she asked, if she needed anything

1:01:15

that wasn't, well, actually she just

1:01:17

needed anything. I'd be like, no. You feel the

1:01:19

other side of the room and you just say,

1:01:22

what? What do you want? No,

1:01:26

I wouldn't be like mean to her. She

1:01:29

might be like, I need this. I'd be like, I don't know

1:01:31

how to do that. How

1:01:33

do I do that? How do I do that? It's okay.

1:01:36

She eats raw broccoli. I think you can get it. I

1:01:38

feel like you could at least get that far. Raw

1:01:41

broccoli, huh? That's actually, that's

1:01:44

pretty cool. I like

1:01:46

broccoli a lot and I definitely just eat

1:01:48

it raw. Maybe

1:01:51

we would get along because we could just both eat

1:01:53

like piles of raw broccoli. But

1:01:56

you just sit and watch her Spiderman show that

1:01:58

she likes and eat raw broccoli. And

1:02:00

I actually be totally chill with as long

1:02:03

as that's what it was looking on. I

1:02:05

mean I yeah I mean of seed if

1:02:07

you need some more complicated than raw broccoli

1:02:09

at our our and and to do with

1:02:11

experiment. Thank

1:02:16

you for listening to Space Cats piece Hurdles

1:02:18

and thanks to Bend Prunty for the use

1:02:20

of his music. You can find more at

1:02:22

Ben Printing music.com and been plenty.pay income. Tax

1:02:31

Magnificat Belem florio. Some.