Aug 10, 2025, Season 9 Episode 3: Convention Prep and Strange New Worlds S3 Ep 5

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Welcome to WarpMyTardis, a podcast production of the Fandom Frontier Network.

(00:23):
And welcome once again to WarpMyTardis podcast, here on the Fandom Frontier Podcast Network.
I'm KJ The Comic Guy and I am joined on a sweltering August Sunday afternoon by Security Dan.
Aren't we glad we both have AC?
Oh, frickin' hell yes.
It's, I mean, on the one hand, we shouldn't complain about the heat living in the Great White North,

(00:50):
which is less and less, you know, snowy and, you know, but it's pretty bad outside.
I watched, I watched earlier this afternoon.
So my, my back lawn is, is nice and brown, other than the weeds, which are beautifully green.

(01:12):
So I happened to watch as a brown, probably about, you know, the size of a small house cat, rabbit, was eating dandelions.
And although I was tempted to go, "Look, Scarlet, bunny!" and have the dog go nuts, I'm just then sitting there going, "You can eat the dandelions. All you want, they're bunny, eat 'em up, eat 'em up."

(01:36):
Yesterday morning, I made the mistake of, "Well, wasn't a mistake, it was productive."
Of grabbing the trimmer and trying to clear out some of the trees, because we've had both brown grass and unusual growth for a lot of plants.
And some of the weeds are obviously wild foliage have been going out of control.

(01:59):
So it's more like a, "Get rid of that one, keep this one, get rid of that one, keep this one."
And I didn't go out with any sunscreen, luckily I was mostly in shade for part of that. But within half an hour, my shirt was disgusting.
And I sat there going, "Yeah, why, why did I do this?"
Well, you know, I had said to you this weekend, one of my plans was to get into the shop and do some stuff with the laser cutter.

(02:23):
Yep.
So I opened the door to the shop yesterday and took one look at the thermometer on the wall and when it said 40 degrees C inside of the garage, nope!
Shut that!
Yep, that's a, I will come back later.
That's not to say, that's not to say that I wasn't creative or productive.

(02:45):
Correct. Because you've seen the PDF file.
Yes, I have. I am excited. I want to see where it goes.
I don't think we should run it until later, unless you're going to run a different campaign at the same time.
Well, the thought on this one, so, you know, yes, we're going to talk about Rift Kickers later on because Rift Kickers is an ongoing thing that we do.

(03:08):
We're actually tempted to spin it off into its own podcast.
But the Rift Kickers D&D game that we've been playing is a very custom environment.
It's not following a lot of the standard monsters. It's a lot of homebrew. It's a lot of re-skinning to make this environment that we're in.

(03:29):
I decided to, since I...
The other thing is that the book has become very much an ongoing history of what the party is doing and then adding some flavor for alternate things that they could do.
So that books more of us up to date. So instead of trying to generate stuff that I know is never going to happen until you guys actually decide to do something.

(03:55):
So, you know, keep up with the randomness.
What I decided to do was I'm going to start a whole new world again from scratch.
And this is a five biome continent in a world somewhere in the Dungeons & Dragons universe with high fantasy with magic and creatures.

(04:20):
It's connected to the Fae Realms. It's connected to a lot of different existing D&D properties.
It's developing it based on the open gaming license, the SRD, the system reference document.
So it's actually in line with all of the D&D content, even though it's a new content that's a continent, content.

(04:44):
But all of the creatures that are being used are effectively in the monster manual.
There's nothing that's unique and different that's custom-skinned.
The major creatures and things, or even the human races, the humanoids are classic right out of the book.

(05:06):
Maybe renamed, but, you know, like we have cannibals. Well, that's the humanoids and you just use the raiders and change them slightly to change their names.
That's all in place. And that book in less than 12 hours worth of work is already up.

(05:28):
I think it's at 40, 41 pages, including the, the SRD document.
That's what I sent you in the PDF, I think.
Yeah. Absolutely.
And it was interesting.
So I took a look, I went online and I just did a search for what is the average length of a D&D campaign book.

(05:56):
And the Wizards of the Coast books and big campaigns by people like Matt Mercer and even Brennan Lee Mulligan, when they're formalized, those, Brennan, yeah.
And those types of books end up being about 235, 250 pages.
Now, Paizo and Pathfinder have done campaign books in about 60, 65 pages.

(06:24):
So my goal in this one is to get, if I get to 80 pages, that's it.
That's how big this book is going to be because it allows for all of the flexibility of the game master and the game players as they're playing the game.
And having to go through and create every little town and every little village and every little interaction and every possible step of a campaign.

(06:49):
So I'm staying away from the module aspect of this.
There's enough stuff in the political philosophy and the patriarchy or the pantheon of deities to create the tension and the hooks without going so deep as to, you know, preload the potential dungeon master who wants to take the book.

(07:18):
So it's, it's a much more open and clear. Here's the world. Here's the places in it. Here's some of the major cities and events.
And here's going to be that's what have to add in the next 20 pages or so.
Here's the major players with some background and some fun stuff.
And then it'll be just take it down into layout and get it to a point where they actually could go out as a book.

(07:42):
Well, it'll make it a lot easier, I think. I mean, it's running Coriolis in the same vein of if you don't know, you should stick to the book because it makes your life that much easier.
When you have a better idea of how to handle it, which way your players are going to go, I don't want to say throughout the rule book, rule book per se.

(08:06):
But you can start to ignore what's pre-ridden to make it more engaging.
Obviously, we've gotten that we've gotten to be pretty flexible with how running Coriolis.
Yeah, but that's what makes it work. And I think in some ways too, the Rift Kickers has been kind of that same vein where initially we had an idea of, okay, it's going to be a little bit more wrote

(08:35):
because we were expecting particularly brand new players that have never played, which ends up affecting how we're going to run the game.
We did not get that and then we discovered very quickly.
Oh, no, we have experienced players, typically forever DMs, that are now going to get to do different and bring their own brand of chaos.

(09:03):
Yes. And because of the nature of the chaos has ensued.
Yes, you know, high jinks, high jinks be around. And that's what that's what has been engaging.
And I mean, I could see where you could play a bit more of a traditional thing, right?

(09:24):
So given just the pattern of gameplay for a D&D game is kind of an interesting thing because everyone within the first, I would say two to three games, unless the experience and your jam is very comfortable.
Everyone's going to be very ginger about what they're going to do.
And nowadays given the proliferation of social media, given how many D&D outfits are there and what address this when we talk about the conventions coming up and what we're seeing in the D&D or at least tabletop landscape.

(09:59):
There's certain unpredictabilities that have become somewhat predictable in the best of ways. Like, you know, you have that one, there's, you're going to have that one NPC that the entire team really likes.
And all of a sudden we find out they're in trouble. And, you know, start playing Bonnie Rates. I need a hero while the entire team is rallying.

(10:22):
Or worse or worse is that, you know, the team really likes and you find out that they're actually the big bad.
Correct. There's always, there's going to be that, that one thing that someone's going to adopt and then end up with an army of adopted things because not that I foresee you having a mega transformation for a particular character is an ironic adopted pet.

(10:49):
But then again, hack, we've already experienced this in Coriolis where you right now literally have access to an army of, of humanoid cats.
Yes. Then again, the vast majority of the players and this was completely unintentional are cat. Well, sorry. I was going to say cat owners. They are not cat owners. They live with the cats. The cats own them.

(11:14):
Yes. Yes. They are cat caretakers. Anyway, like, subscribe. You don't like that's fine. But let us know by reaching out to us on our social media. That would be work my tartis on Instagram on Facebook and on threads as well as work my tartis to gmail.com because I didn't do it on the beginning of the last show. We're doing it now so we can get going.

(11:36):
Okay, our meat potatoes is going to be star Trek, strange new worlds which we're going to talk to it's going to be a long episode because there's a lot to unpack on it. But let's let's get through some of our stuff that's coming up.
We are two weeks away from fan expo. They finally released the schedule, the sorry, the draft schedule is not perfect. And the other thing is that there was another bunch of whole pile of more guests coming.

(12:03):
Comic creators, the cosplay guests, a number of other celebrities that hadn't been announced that all of a sudden are just slipping under the radar, which you and I were like, what?
But I think the one big one is that at the last minute this week they announced, Hayley Steinfeld is going to be on one day only on the Sunday, which is going to make things absolutely nuts in the main hall on the North building. Anyway.

(12:30):
Yeah.
We got we got the four day passes. We went for we went all out and got the four day passes with the plan that we're just going on Friday and Saturday.
Yes.
And then and then the schedule came out.
Well, it helps that we had leeway.
And also economic price wise, it was more it would make more sense to get the four day pass than the single day.

(12:59):
This time, yeah, the two single day passes for Friday and Saturday were within $10 of getting the four day pass, which gives you access for the Thursday from one o'clock on as well as the Friday Saturday Sunday.
Yeah. So it just it just made more sense.
The funny thing is I rarely went to panels back in the day.

(13:25):
So it wasn't because there's so much to see. Right.
Now, I know because of my own personal schedule, I'm not going to be going out on the Thursday. You will be probably, but it's just.
I don't plan. I've got visitors coming into the office. So I doubt it.
Oh, yes. So there is that.

(13:47):
So we. Yeah. So it's it's going to be an interesting thing, but we're looking at it going.
Oh, shoot. There's a lot more opportunities. And there's a lot more things that we didn't account for.
And then I completely forgot and I had to go back and double check the list of of of people that I remember when we started hearing discussions and they were starting to compile a list and they hadn't.

(14:14):
There's still kind of a glimmer type thing. I remember commenting, oh, I kind of would like to see this person.
I kind of would like to see that person completely ignored it. And then I realized, oh, shoot.
These people are going to be there. And that's that was more entertaining.
And then you take a look at the panels and the opportunities. Right.
Again, our intent was one thing. And then all of a sudden, oh, here's the schedule. And we're like, uh, oh.

(14:40):
So yeah, in terms of internal in terms of panels, you're like, okay, kind of I want to see if I want to take a look at a Superman panel, which happens to be on a Sunday.
I want to take a look at at a D&D how to or what to do.
Oh, it's 10 o'clock or you'll know the clock in the morning and it's cross reading with another panel that will be entertaining.

(15:01):
And I'm sure there's people who have have gone to the cons and they've had the exact same existential crisis of shoot, you know, I wish we could by locate, but at the same time, this would be terrible.
You know, been there, done that several times.
Yes.
Now, you know, in the past, I've been lucky enough to go with people where it's like, okay, you go to that panel. I'm going to this panel. We'll talk afterwards.

(15:25):
Um, you know, did that with Chulac and the way the archer when we were doing legends of the panel, quite often that we'd go to Charlotte and we'd all split in different directions and go sit panels.
Right.
And, and, you know, because you can do that and, you know, we did it because we were doing it to cover it for, you know, the legends of the panel comic book podcast.

(15:47):
Um, you know, now it's more a matter of you and I have a number of our interests are the same when we go to the cons, you know, both of us, you know, gun plot.
Now building Gundams is now a thing that we both do.

(16:08):
And, you know, I think that's the way I'm going to tell you, um, I, I, I security takes, Dan takes full responsibility for getting KJ into Gundams.
Okay. You know, the sketch duo, duels is more my thing because that comes out in my, my love for the, for the comic book stuff.
Right.
Yeah, I've got some books that I've got to get signed by different creators who are going to be there.

(16:33):
And, you know, I've got two photo ops. You've got two photo ops.
Yep.
I've got to still prep my belt for one of the costumes.

(16:56):
I've got a, I've got a fake weapon to be put together so that I can look reasonably close to the actual screen accurate.
Yes.
Um, no, we got to do so.
We are doing cosplay, by the way. So yes, you will, you'll probably see us.
And we're, we will come with cards.

(17:19):
Are usual for now. We're still working on warp my Tartus, uh, merch, but that will be a development in the near future.
Well, and the one thing that I will have because it's arriving tomorrow, I will have our work, my Tartus information will be available to, to scan using a near field RF ID.

(17:43):
So I will be wearing an RF ID tag that they'll say scan me.
There you go.
So things are things are the pipe. And yes, we do look forward to meeting you at the conventions, whether this one or Hamilton or others in the future.
There's, there's, it's, it's going to be a thing. So expect this.

(18:07):
Yeah. Anyway, um, okay, let's, the, the stuff that's going on, there's been a, there's a lot of stuff. We're two weeks away from the show and they only just gave out the draft schedule.
Yes. They still have not put out the map for the show for.
I am really disappointed in, in, in form of, because again, down to the last minute and not providing the information in a timely way so people can plan.

(18:31):
GenCon had the four plan for the show out a month before the show. People could plan how they were going to visit.
GenCon is the largest gaming convention in North America.
It's held in Indianapolis. It was two weeks ago, two, three weeks ago, two weeks ago.
And actually it was right at the end of San Diego Comic Con. It was last, it was last weekend over the long weekend was GenCon.

(18:57):
And it's very well put together. It's been going for a lot of years. It's not just tabletop because if you just want, you know, tabletop from real time strategy like Warhammer and games, games like one page rules, then you go to adapt to con.
Because that's really what that one's about. This is games. This is board games and, you know, it's Wormwood who's there with their tables and it's, it's the whole, you know, Darington press.

(19:28):
We talked about this last week. Huge announcements from Darington press and, you know, the live show that they did, you know, again, Brennan Lee Mulligan is going to be taking over, you know, campaign four.
So that Matt Mercer actually gets the play instead of just DM as he has for the last 10 years. So there's stuff like that. But, but planning is a critical aspect of how you attend a convention.

(19:53):
And right now I can't plan anything because number one, I don't know when my photo ops are. I know what day they're on, but I don't know what time and what sessions and what I'm going to have to give up because I've booked those photo sessions.
What am I not going to be able to see, which is the critical part is, what am I going to miss? Yeah. And the catch is this just, I will say to theirs.

(20:20):
There's a weird crisis in the world of conventions where you want activities and that's great. But the fact that it doesn't balance what you can do.
It makes it so that, you know, if that fight or flight response of, are we stuck or can we do this? Right. And that's, that's the thing that, I mean, like I said, until recently I never went to the panels.

(20:50):
Not because I didn't necessarily like the subject matter. It's the, but I'm stuck on the other side of the building and it's going to take me two hours to walk from the north end to the south end or vice versa. Right.
And I know that's a privileged complaint, but at the same time, a very real issue when you're, when you're doing a convention and you can't really move because just traffic will not.

(21:14):
Well, traffic and people in just the, the sardine canning of things will make it extremely difficult to the point where I like, it's better that I just stay here.
And it's, it would make it just easier and less headache. And I will have to skip this in service of sanity. So, you know, it's, it's, it's, it's going to be a thing and until someone figures out a better algorithm for organizing flow in a convention space.

(21:53):
And you can problem and unfortunately it's just particular. It feels very particular to informa and fan expo. But again, I'm not sure if that's just my take on it or if genuinely other people have noticed and it might be something that that people, especially the visitors can influence in the future.

(22:15):
Yeah. Anyway, so beyond that, the, you know, not having the, the format about not having the schedule out.
You know, we're going to end up having to go in through the north building because they're not going to have, you see, pre tickets arriving through the south.
Other than check in when you already got your passes. So, you know, we got to do that. But, um, I want to get past the cons. I want to start, you know, I'm actually looking forward to Hamilton now.

(22:49):
Yeah. The Hamilton Hamilton's just released the photo ops that are about 30 to 40 dollars cheaper than what they are for fan expo. So Anthony rap photo is 75 dollars, which is quite reasonable.
Oh, yeah. So that might be an option to add to my Star Trek collection.
It's going to, I'm going to call it now, even though I don't know the layout for it, that it's going to be a heck of a lot easier to move around at Hamilton.

(23:20):
I think we will find that Hamilton is very similar to Niagara.
Yes. Which again, we had our criticisms too in fair play, but it was also, I mean, an easier setup that you didn't feel smothered.
Yeah, you can see what you need to see. You can move around just the only advice. And this is just true of every single con.

(23:43):
Get there early. Get or at least at the very least get there on time and then you'll have a better easier lay of the land.
Right. And, and, you know, and I know people have other schedules, but it's, it's, it was definitely an easier time when we got there. We actually moved around.

(24:07):
Yeah, absolutely. Okay. Let's move on. So this week in streaming services Wednesday season two first part arrived.
I've already seen the first episode and we had a conversation pre show here. You've only just started episode one of season one of Wednesday.

(24:32):
So you're well behind. Yes. Okay. Understand. I for a lot of properties Wednesday among them. Unfortunately, I am more than culturally aware.
I've seen the memes. I've seen the, you know, the dance number. I'm aware of the, the interesting romantic or romantical entanglements of that.

(24:58):
I've seen the VFX breakdowns of how they did a thing in the TV show visa V the movies and the leaps in technology that they've come up to.
So I, for a lot of these properties to I will become so culturally aware and yet I would never have either played the video game or at least seen an episode in full.

(25:24):
Is that Harry Potter? Yes. For those who are just turning in now, I have never read the Harry Potter books nor have I actually seen in full the movies.
I've seen clips of it. I'm aware of the actors. I really enjoy Daniel Radcliffe in his roles, whether he's playing a villain, whether he's playing a beleaguered person dealing with the end of times in a TV show, whether he's a zombie or non zombie.

(25:58):
He's been a lot of fun and it's been a joy where he's, you know, it's one of the few actors that I would actually like to meet without being culturally aware of or at least being culturally aware, but having never actually seen in full.
The series that made him arguably famous.
Yeah. Now it's funny because we then give a lot of grief to one of our D&D players who, you know, admits she's never seen Star Wars.

(26:30):
Yes. I mean, she's cult. Like here's the catch she she she's this particular player is culturally aware of Star Wars in the best of ways.
But boy does it make the table feel very, very old.
Sometimes it's intentional because you and I and a couple of others of this of similar sci-fi generations will throw out references to what we're going to call old sci-fi.

(27:02):
And half a table will look at us and go, what are you talking about? And then there's moments where we'll say something that's a little bit more current.
And we could also feel like, you know, oh, there's another white hair growing. Oh, there's another wrinkle forming.
So yeah, spots bursting on the back of my hands.
Look, I have nothing to do. Yeah. And then in 1969 we had Woodstock God damn it.

(27:28):
As I am appropriate, you know, Billy Crystal, where's Bowser from Shana? No.
Sorry, it had to be said, but think about it. No, no, no. Wonderful, wonderful. Thank you for that wonderful music.
Those who know, no, anyway, yes, sadly, I know. But like it's just.

(27:53):
And it wasn't necessarily for me to be contrarian when it came to the Harry Potter series.
It's just it was something that I was like people were doing and other folks knew what I preferred. And I was like, I was I was a star wars.
Now extended or expanded universe or legends kit, right? Where that was my jam. I wanted the laser guns. I wanted it.

(28:20):
It's like, yeah, yeah, we were talking pop culture games. And luckily I've played Dragon Age.
But I was I would gravitate more towards mass effect and virtually the same game. It's just that one of them is high fantasy.
And the other is science fiction. Yeah, right? They're just futuristic versions of the same story to be reduced pretty much pretty close pretty close anyway. Yeah, but it's like.

(28:47):
But back back to, you know, we're going to be covering Wednesday. There are a number of things. It is so pertinous.
It is just so typically Tim Burton. And he does such a wonderful job. He did a fantastic job in season one. I can't wait for you to see season two.
I mean, I've already given you some spoilers about some of the actors who were involved in it. And you know, how their characters look. And it's like, my God, it's going to be fantastic.

(29:14):
Well, I mean, what what surprised me about Wednesday was I knew actors who had been announced in the series.
What I didn't expect. And I think mainly it's a byproduct of the go back going back to the original Adams family.
It was comedy with that sort of gothic horror as sort of overlay. Even the movies that came out. It was what Adams family and Adams family values. Right?

(29:49):
Yes, there is that weird thing of yes, there are cemeteries possibly with live people that have just been dropped in the cemetery. I believe the first movie spoiler.
But it's you had implied violence. You had that implied darkness incoming and yet in that Tim Burton way.

(30:14):
But one of the things that struck me that was shocking about Wednesday is you have way more explicit violence.
And that was just like I said, this is coming from just watching the first episode where I was like, oh, you didn't I, you know, you think you think that this one person is going to go join the school.

(30:36):
No, something else happens to him. And all of a sudden, he ain't going to do so well.
You know, he is literally beside himself. And you're like, well, what are you? What are you doing?
And yes, I realize you're going to say, well, wait a second. Come on. You're talking about a property that has a disembodied hand that can run around. What did you expect?

(31:01):
And yet no one expects a kind of Spanish in position.
That has brought upon a lot of the characters and where the twists and turns are. But either way, I'm looking forward to it.
We will discuss that at the future episode.
But the meat in potatoes today is start and and it's funny because keeping along with the semi horror line.

(31:23):
Yes, we go into Star Trek Strange New World's episode five.
Holy crap, this one is an edge of the seat. The whole episode.
Yeah, it was a doozy, wasn't it?
And the red shirt didn't die.
No, no, he did not. But it was killed, they killed the medical kid anyways.

(31:47):
Yeah, but it was, it was.
Let's, let's, let's start from the beginning.
So you have an episode title through the length of time. They're doing callbacks to the growing quadrangole that is who's going to go with who.
We have.

(32:11):
It seems to be jumping forward a bit, a bit faster than or a little bit further than the last episode, a space adventure hour.
Mainly because it seems that everyone knows that Spock is sort of with lawn as a dance partner.
The meat cute of lawn turning to chapel and say, yeah, don't, don't make this weird. We're cool. We're all cool.

(32:46):
Everything is cool. It was kind of fun.
So you find out that Corby is on this, is leading this expedition down to this planet. He is not part of Starfleet.
He is not. Yeah. And they're trying to, he's, he's apparently trying to figure out what's going on with regards to this archaeological expedition, which could unlock eternal youth or, you know, the ability to live forever.

(33:20):
Well, there's, there's some edge towards immortality. This is an ancient race that could be progenitors of humanity as we know it in our universe and our solar system.
And, you know, it's, it's, it's medical archaeology. It truly is.
So he's super excited. Chapel is super excited. And it's not just because of Corby. She's like genuinely, they're both nerding out about the possibilities.

(33:52):
You have lawn and Spock being lawn and Spock. And they're very, you know, they're being very, you know, awk about it.
You have our, our fun junior medical officer, Dana Campbell, who was introduced after chapel left the ship to go on her three month sabbatical slash, you know, getting to know Roger Corby,

(34:21):
who's been showing up in the last four episodes, I think three to four episodes at least.
And, you know, he's doing the job. He's, he's very enthusiastic. He wants to get out there. He's, is very much starfleet through and through.
Oddly enough, I enjoyed his character as he shows up. And I was getting very,

(34:52):
well, ever since the crossover, I was getting very lower deck vibes. Yeah, he was, he's, this character was definitely, you know, Ensign, give you the, the, you know, it's kind of a whore in the first season where she was still an Ensign and had been made.
Lieutenant yet, so you're, you're still dealing with, you know, where you dress, where you dress uniform to get in my heart and they do it nicely. Yeah.

(35:22):
And I was getting very like just as enthusiasm in the first half of the episode was very tendi, ask.
Yes. Well, in science officer, so it makes perfect sense. Yeah. So, you know, he's very much nerding out. And was really interesting is watching the interaction of him and Benga, which is basically the big, the big thing for that storyline in the episode.

(35:54):
Right. And the fact of the matter is, Benga is, has been like, it's interesting that I will say in the last five episodes. It's the secondary or tertiary characters that have become more stars or features compared to the old bridge crew.
Like, it's almost like Pike and when it's in Riley are there, but not there because they haven't really, aside from the first episode.

(36:23):
And some casual drama, we've like, we didn't see a lot of them. Oh, in between that, too. That's. Yeah.
I think it's necessary at this point in the series. Yeah. To be able to try and figure out how they're going to wrap up.
Like they have to wrap up. Yeah. Joseph Omega, they have to wrap up.

(36:50):
Well, which was speaking of our take us. So in the second episode, you had, you have the introduction of Bito or take us, the younger brother of our favorite, our favorite pilot.

(37:19):
Yeah. Which was interesting because he became a bit more of a feature and by my episode reckoning reckoning or take us only shows up once.
Which was. So she shows up in hegemony. No, in this episode.

(37:42):
Yes. Yeah. There's there's an interaction between her, her brother and Neoda.
Okay. No, it's twice then because she does that. And then they, there's a moment where they're talking about the crisis on the planet. And she's like, my, my kid brother is there.
Type thing. And that was it. Yeah. That's right. It's, there's two sequences. Yeah. So in terms of what's going on, Bito is documenting everything that's supposed to happen with the air.

(38:11):
And he's completely into Neoda. Yeah. Which again, they were playing it up in the second episode. Yeah, feel like it's an ongoing thing. It felt organic and not forced, despite the limited episodes.
So either way, the McGuffin is the, the doctor, which a Corby, that is, is leaving this expedition.

(38:39):
Yeah. Is leaving this expedition. They go down to a planet. They're associated with this ancient race that's there and they have an observer with them.
And when they're doing the, the, when they go down to the planet, they're using some Federation tech. They clear out some rocks and you see an ancient temple.

(39:00):
Very much in the vein of, well, the real world temple, but probably best known in Indiana Jones in the last crusade as a setup.
Because you know, the temple carved out in the rock was kind of a very obvious, obvious thing. So they do that. They're dealing with that whole thing.

(39:25):
And so they go into the, they go into the temple and whack, well, actually, they try and get into the temple.
Chappel goes up and they do some translations and they figure out, oh, they need a blood sacrifice.

(39:48):
Which, you know, they do raise a good point of, why is it that whenever you hear blood sacrifice, someone takes out a knife in there, but cut someone's hand or do something?
Which gets very, it's a Harry Potter thing. We just leave it that.
Yeah.
Which they end up with a whole situation of, okay, let's go to this probably super advanced scanner and they take a sample of Chappel's blood because she volunteers as tribute.

(40:13):
Yeah.
So our way party plus an alien goes in to investigate and everything seems to be fine. They find an ancient tablet. They're looking around and lo and behold, the not red shirt, red shirt looks over and realizes, oh, I thought that was a pile of rags. That wasn't a pile of rags.

(40:40):
Yeah. Look what I found. Kaboom. Yes. Well, no, not quite. So you see the oscillator. Yeah. You see the pile of bodies. They go in and take a look and they're like, well, what killed them?
Because they've been here for a while and they deduce that we're going to need a bigger ship.
So, so, Spock and Lion come down and they're dealing with the whole situation and they figure out that, oh, wait, what killed the aliens?

(41:09):
It wasn't, it was a constriciation rather than anything else. They were locked in this room.
Yeah, they starve to death.
Yeah. Meanwhile, Gamble decides to take a look at a box, he finds something, he hands it off and then inside the box he sees this weird glow and crystal thingy.

(41:31):
Yeah, don't touch the glowy crystal thingy. It's not treasure.
Yes. Which of course, what did he do without gloves? Cause smirtness. He picks it up and it explodes in his face.
And this is where the episode goes from Indiana Jones with, with a Star Trek twist to, oh, my God, it's Doctor Who by way of cube.

(41:58):
Yeah.
Because all of a sudden Gamble's faces messed up and his eyes are missing and he's screaming and still in pain.
They get him out of the place. Surprisingly, the other way team members decide to stay in while Chappell and Lion go out.
And then Gamble gets sent back to the enterprise and some weaners starts to happen there.

(42:27):
And as opposed to saying, hey, we just saw someone just get horribly messed up. We should probably be a lot more cautious.
What do they decide to do? Continue on.
As they're going through, they're doing more and more translations. The alien with them realizes, oh, my God, it's death, it's evil.

(42:53):
As he's running away, Zip Bam Boom. He has a tragic end. And the rest of the crew is like, oh, crap.
That's not just one, but two people just got wiped out. What do we do?
Now what?
Yeah. So they start talking about, okay, what's the best way of going through this? Who can do that?

(43:17):
We can't get in. We can't, or sorry, we can't leave this place. And they go into another room where they, well, sorry.
And then young Bito uses his cameras and he says, hey, there's another associated room. It has a similar console.
It has a weird artifact floating in the middle of it.

(43:39):
And since we can't get out, maybe like the only way out is through.
And as soon as they step through the threshold to the second room, even more weirdness happens because couples literally get separated.
They're in the same space, but not.
Yes. And effectively, oh, by, when I say couples, I don't mean necessarily romantic partners.

(44:06):
I mean the fact that because they went in two by two, they decided maybe the safest option based off of whatever advanced computer, we should follow the same sort of group order.
Don't split the party. Oh, we didn't try to split the party, but the party got split.
Yes. So any D&D GM looks at the, would look at this scenario and go, you had to split the party.

(44:35):
Well, it's so you have, but they didn't, but they didn't split the party. They didn't realize that they were walking through a dimensional door.
Correct. So our couple, blame the party. It's not the party's fault for once for once. It was totally the GM's manufactured direction.
But we have a chapel and a hurrah. We have, sorry, no, we don't have chapel in Laon.

(45:00):
We have chapel in Laon. We have Bito and a hurrah. And we have, of course, Corby, Spock and Corby. Spock and Corby together, of course.
Right. And it's kind of interesting because watching chapel and Laon interact, they don't dislike each other. They're still friends.
It's interesting though, because there's definitely now tension there. Oh, yes. 100%. But it, it's more the, let's not make this weird. Let's go with it.

(45:29):
Let's go with it. Type thing. Oh, no, we've made it, we've already made it weird. Let's face it. It's weird.
Well, see, here's the catch. I feel like chapel is way more self conscious about it than Laon is.
Well, it's an interesting point because it demonstrates, and this is true from TOS, although she's with Corby.
Yes. She still cares deeply for Spock and is very much a romantic interest in, at least season one of TOS.

(45:58):
Well, I mean, here's the, here's the thing though, up till had Gemini 2. Laon has been emotionally constipated.
Right. Yeah. It's interesting where we went from, I have no sense of fun, but we have the funniest sense of fun,

(46:20):
as, as per season one, where they try knock off the scavenger hunt.
And even then it was, even then you watch that, and as much as they have a lot of talents, we know that Laon is really exceptional when it comes to sharp shooting and fighting.
But we don't see any of our personal life and all of a sudden she's an expert dancer.

(46:47):
You know, to the point where she, but she explained that she explained that as that she had been taking ballet for years before the Gornin.
Yes. So, you know, her plan was to actually not go to Starfleet and not become an officer.
It was to actually go to ballet and be a dancer.
Yes. But ballet doesn't translate to the type of dancing that they're doing.

(47:11):
No, it did not.
So that's kind of an interesting take on things.
Either way, they're going through, they find out that the teams have gotten quantum shifted.
And the some wacky fun, sciencey stuff occurs where they have to come together to find a solution.

(47:33):
Meanwhile, on the enterprise gamble is having a day because midway through conversations he starts talking weirdly about personal facts that he shouldn't know.
And, you know, it gets steadily and more and more disturbing because he can't see it yet he could still move around and do stuff.

(47:56):
And Mabenga is losing his mind because he likes the kid. He's been a mentor to him.
And when they're doing some brain scans, he's apparently brain dead.
Then you find out that some other entity is controlling him. And yeah, it gets more and more disturbing as it goes on.

(48:20):
And then Marie walks in. Yes.
And the gorn in her goes nuts.
The fact that she had a near total transformation with one of the best choreographed fights we've seen in a Star Trek show.
Where you actually don't have close camera, you actually have it where you actually see them do stuff.

(48:42):
Yeah. So by the way, that's still the ongoing storyline of not only has Marie Battelle survived the gorn infestation.
And now is dealing with the not only Una's blood in her. And also the fact that the chimera plant that they're using is doing other things to her.

(49:05):
At first she walks in and she feels under the weather and counters gamble who is completely possessed.
And they go all crouching tiger hidden dragon.
It was an amazing battle scene. It was really well done choreography.
Yeah. Well, my YouTube, Mabenga gets tossed through a wall.

(49:30):
Which is a fun Star Trek trope of, oh, that's got a hurt. And keep in mind, we know Mabenga's history.
He's not some soft pushover. I mean, the way that they played it up is he is the John Wick of the Star Trek.
That is trying to find a better life.

(49:55):
So that was kind of an interesting interplay either way they go through he gets confronted.
He agrees to go to to the brig has a clearly nothing as well and no one's monitoring and what the heck star fleet.
He ends up killing another guard running through and the only solution is unfortunately gamble has to be taken out.

(50:23):
Well, and it's who takes him out. Yes.
Mabenga shows up with a phaser on him is ready to take him down.
Here's the kid's voice and it was Pellia that said, I don't think that's him in there.
Yeah.
And then it's Pellia that takes him out.
Carol Cain plays a phenomenal role in this one.
Not just her normal comedic, she plays scared so well.

(50:49):
Oh, yes.
But and that's one thing that perhaps we haven't obviously discussed.
It's very rare to get to see an actor go full range because she's playing the cocksher Pellia.
She's wacky type thing.
And then she gets to that point where genuinely she's afraid of what they are dealing with.

(51:15):
And if it's enough to trigger a not so gorn gorn in Battell, clearly things ain't right.
And then meanwhile, too, that sequence towards the end of the episode where she says it's ancient, it's malevolent and I'm frightened.
Yeah.

(51:36):
Well, I was going to say too, there's a bit of a weird mood whiplash because earlier on you find out that Bito or Tegas is doing that document.
So it wasn't just a document, the expedition, right?
So or at least it was, but just to do the start of it, he's in the briefing with everyone to the point where they have a comedic moment where Pike stops mid-sentence because the camera is getting close to his face.

(52:06):
And they haven't even better was Pellia with the side shot.
And then the side shot is this is my better side.
Oh, she totally pulled like it's the you can see Carol Kane do that in real life just because that's just that's just her being her.
So you have her doing that where she says something.
Oh, I didn't like that take let's do it again.

(52:29):
Yes, I did a bit of I did get a bit of a princess donut vibe from her when she did that.
It's a call back where she says something profound and then it's like, oh, should I repeat that for the camera and everyone's like, no, no, we're good.
We get it like this was this was a category disaster.
Show thoughts. This is by far like I thought the Gorn introduction back in the day where they went alien was creepy.

(53:03):
This one made me feel uncomfortable in the best of ways that I haven't felt in track for a long time.
Mainly because again, the whole gamble storyline was creepy as heck because you're watching it and it's a classic trope of, oh, I don't think that's that that's who you think it is in there.

(53:30):
Especially if you know the the character in question who's clearly possessed is is facing away from the main character and then you see the shot of the main character over the person's shoulder and you know something is going to go down.
It made me go back and watch clips from army of darkness and the evil dead movie series, whereas like they've done that is a classic it felt like a classic horror trope.

(54:00):
Yeah, with three of because I was midway through the episode when we were discussing it before the room, the alien room that they go to.
And the fact that there's all these traps and the stakes are raised I was like it starts our cube it's like the old sci-fi horror movie cube where you know is the best thing to do is just stand there do nothing and you'll get out alive or you go through the next room take your chances and all the sudden someone's face gets melted off with acid.

(54:38):
And that's kind of the vibe that it was getting and I very much.
I think when we're talking about this earlier you had mentioned that if it was mood with flash of funny episode dramatic episode funny episode dramatic episode.
It was going to be an issue and I said this thing no this one went darker in in in such a way that.

(55:03):
It's it's it was a horror movie with Star Trek elements yes.
So I don't know how I feel about it. I'm still like as an emotional thing right.
So because all the overall yeah yeah as an overall production value the story the character portrayals it's like an eight and a half almost a nine.

(55:29):
Yeah I personally give it a day to the half as a fit into the season as I said we've had an up episode a down episode an up episode a down episode it's a sorry a down episode an up episode so it's like we're we're
going to stream back and forth with these capsules yeah which still have an over arc but it's not as obvious and that worries me as to what we're going to see because you know if we said we have been so used to the the

(56:07):
consumption of materials that we now have that you know seeing this and watching it this way it just feels so disjointed.
Yeah well notice to though that this season and I said it earlier this one felt like this particular season feels more like a

(56:32):
doctor who season and I don't know why crossing streams in that respect but hadgemony one and two if we count them as a single
episode which we can is very much aliens and there's the horror element in sci-fi right and then you get you know wedding bell

(56:54):
blues which is a lot more whimsy and comedy with with surprised guest appearances I mean and you know that Riz Darby was was was chewing all of the scenery oh yeah
should I can for you gave us the Zed word and they're doing horror very well right and and then space adventure hour had the mystery the holodeck and that's very much your

(57:26):
Dixon Hill episode because it yeah in all but name and character it's a Dixon Hill episode and then this one is sci-fi horror I mean just not to count our
chickens here I'm looking at the last of the back half of it you have the salad who ate its tail you have what is starfleet for and a half
falcons which was teased very early on it and we know that's a comedy we know that's a comedy one yeah well no it's couch says that it might not be but who

(57:58):
knows we have to rarium and then we have new life and new civilizations so I'm wondering how much of mood whiplash are they going to give us
right yeah but you know we'll see it's a tricky tricky balance but I mean that being said it's not like we're going to stop

(58:27):
watching is not like we're going to cost not cosplay as as things from starfleet over the next couple of weeks absolutely yeah but flipping streams though we should as usual
let's talk about rev kickers yes which you gave us some interesting things and I thought you were going you were going to lead my particular

(58:53):
character in a very different direction okay so rift kickers we arrived in emberus we had the the adventure or miss adventures with with Quinn

(59:15):
and it was in which it was a lot of fun and I'm glad that our friend from the UK was able to join us when she gets home here more permanently maybe we can make it more permanent
we got through that we then did a bunch of little side quests you know hey there's a sign in the tavern that says we can go and find a cat and we took care of all that stuff but we we we gave you guys then a I'm going to call it a short side adventure

(59:49):
yes which is you know guarding a caravan that's going to a town half a day away from the city and you know yes the the ta the caravan leader his name was Kevin Baycon
and yes we we played it up completely you know and at the end you know you guys did receive more than what was originally planned for your your share there were six shares of Kevin Baycon

(01:00:27):
we did we did keep our feet loose and no one had any tremors and we did dispassion them quick as silver so works out because we needed a few good not quite men
no they were X men fair enough fair enough there we go there we go we've gone into all pretty much a good amount of enough echoes were stirred enough of that discography okay so yeah well you know you guys were all guardians so what's at that in there too okay so we get to the village

(01:01:11):
now getting to the village and we talked about this last time you guys had a batch of dire wolves had to deal with and a crew of brigands the brigands were low level guys which you guys were able to dispatch really quickly and you guys kind of got the hint that something else is going on here when you guys were able to more or less take out these guys with one shot yeah

(01:01:33):
when the dire wolves appeared now the dire wolves were a little more complex but they still were not super complex and that was intentional so it was a matter of getting some battle in place getting some fun in place without you guys being completely overrun and overwhelmed with what was going on as far as the game play goes
and then we had a couple of very heavy RP related yeah you know sessions and it was also good to get get some of the again it the biggest problem as a player you can get is main character syndrome

(01:02:11):
much as you are the main characters it's plural it's so it's I mean as a player I get more concern I was like okay because I'm doing a fair amount of the talking just by the nature of the character there which is funny like you're putting me into these positions where I'm doing that I'm like and I'm looking to the people I'm associated with or next to it I'm like you should talk or ask but they don't know

(01:02:40):
but it was good to kind of see that you let or at least merilia in the last session not the last section the second second last session stretcher legs a bit and well it was time for her to shine a little bit we needed to see what she was able to do and what she was able to come up with
and she did really well she really did fantastically so that was really cool to kind of see where I was like okay good I don't have to smash something you did most of the work

(01:03:08):
and that was that was great but the last session you gave us more of a story time thing where we're now in the village we've settled up the accounts there and we're in a new environment so we're now looking around and seeing what's what
well and you're you're in a you're in a new village it's only half a day away from the city so you're not that far away from the city which is where you're you're going to be going back to but I think the key point

(01:03:36):
here was this was we created the first interaction with the underground organization known as the scarlet talent
and are you confirming that so that so that I well I won't be able to bring it in game this particular week but I mean be careful
no we problem okay dare a vein gave you specific you know talking about the talent she talked about the scarlet talent and if you guys ran into them you're supposed to contact her and tell her

(01:04:10):
yes so you already you know who the scarlet talent is from her you don't know anything about the scarlet talent and are they actually the bad guys or not that you don't know
yeah but again so effectively KJ has built a village that we're going around what it takes to our resident alcoholic has gone off in search of ale

(01:04:36):
a few of the other party members have gone with him not necessarily to search explicitly for ale but just to deal with those shenanigans
I was thinking more about merelia and our resident major magic user and when you pointed out that there's a runescribe I was like maybe she can get a bit more magic stuff because I mean if I follow the typical build tropes of D&D

(01:05:06):
magic users can do amazing things but they're usually fairly squishy in physical attacks and we've made her more reasonable than it sounds like we've not made her perfect yet but you know she's yeah
she's got more to her than most yeah so I'm I'm like so it's it's kind of an interesting take on things where at least my internal logic and maybe I should have

(01:05:35):
told it to her in game and I did actually where I was like well wait a second let's go and interact with this thing and maybe see if we can get you something because and I think I forgot which which magic user uses books typically
wizards wizards are learned sorcerers are natural warlocks gain their powers from their demonic patrons yes and it's kind of deal with the devil

(01:06:03):
yeah in which case merelia is a wizard and I figured maybe if she can access those runes it might give her a hand not that she needs one but just in case
but in and she got four books out of the deal so that's okay and in four books well no she got four books there are four extra books oh yes so we went in we spoke to the person you left us enough

(01:06:36):
to the world the rifts and all that other fun stuff and we had an unusually generous green scribe who on the promise of returning the books possibly we take them back to the academy back in red haven

(01:06:57):
which also ties us back to you have to go back yes so with the concern I had
and I'll say this say this for my part in the game right was again luckily simmy is not terse
um to ask okay what's what and I kind of felt bad because I thought you were going to jump to the tavern a lot sooner than you did to kind of see the hijinks there

(01:07:27):
now the tavern was fine only because I knew I was going to make a certain character our rabbit folk go nuts yes I knew I planned this for I've been planning this for the last six sessions of how we were going to introduce bard con
so yes so the shenanigans are simmy and merelia we're dealing with a runescribe on the way out we see in big bold red one of the flags for that cult that may or may not be evil but we're going to count as we might have been bad

(01:08:05):
boozelled we know that the rest of our party has gone to the tavern but it or was it an in or a tavern that you said was ever ever green mug in right has a tavern on the main level right so when you that the rest of our party had gone to the
end we took a look around the town interact with some of the folks obviously we had dealt with what you had called the riff born these unusual relatively pale creatures who have glowing blood vessels or veins on their skin we're not sure

(01:08:44):
so we end up going to the tavern and on the way there we get to see some hijinks and sue inside the tavern you had sweet pea land bubbles who unfortunately the player wasn't there but was bubblesing up as it were going into interact with the in

(01:09:13):
in you gave here gave an interesting tribute to you're not you're gonna prognol to sayers from Beverly Hills cop
my little Bronson Pincoe yeah which was a lot of fun where I was like so are you are they flirting and that was kind of a fun fun take on as I oh finally he's actually Barding it up which is again the uniroticness of our characters and the players and how they've chosen to go non traditional with their path

(01:09:57):
they are told that there is a band that's performing and immediately our bar takes some slight to this because you have the band the unstrung heroes who have apparently won barred con three years in a row with their famous song

(01:10:22):
and now sweet pea has to he feels unintentionally that his honor has been burst merged and he has to do something about it and initially when you set that up I'm looking at you going is he gonna go Scott pilgrim are we gonna have like you know sex bomb interacting with with the twins

(01:10:49):
because god help you if we're gonna do this now and then I realized if I say this out loud either he's gonna do it or it's gonna happen at Bob car barred con either way since bubbles was away and or bubbles the player was away sweet pea had to roll for them and they tried to give chase and they failed miserably

(01:11:17):
yeah that was a while meanwhile lent has ordered ale he has made a new best friend and ogre breeze ordered food and apparently that the tavern proprietor took offense to this and gave them an unusual amount of food

(01:11:42):
so yeah it's been a doozy so while bubbles and sweet pea were outside merilia and see me walk up and we go in and we are now looking for information
to what you gave us an interesting interaction with I guess your own creation riftborn I have made them so vague and so unique and you guys are just struggling to even figure out what the heck they were saying it was priceless

(01:12:23):
yeah well again I was like the accent gets funny and then what are they saying from there so I had to lean in and I had to hear so I mean yeah yeah it was it was challenging in the best of ways there's enough vagaries and then the the accent didn't help
the reason for the garreries yeah anyway in however well whatever we want to see yeah so is like is he doing doing the aliens for galaxy quest or is he doing karma the frog but higher we're not sure

(01:13:00):
but you gave us some interesting things with regards to a crystal or navigation crystals they use and the way that they see the rifts and the interaction with the world
yeah so that was that was an interesting thing either way fully intentional yes now part of me wishes that I had give it the semia was a lot more brush like his player in real life

(01:13:27):
and would have said what if I touch the crystal to the artifact what would happen and I to this day still regret it but you know you never heard of the yawning portal in yeah well the fact that I I said it out loud and breeze immediately is like I like to be far away you can do it but you're going to be an open field on your own was kind of a fun thing

(01:13:56):
right but yeah it seemed like the the riffboard were not faced by the unusual creatures that they're running into they themselves are seen as weird and you left off with us having to travel north of the village to find out more
yes and that's where we ended the game so it's going to be interesting pretty much that's the entire round of the session

(01:14:23):
but for a d and d campaign it's going fairly well right there's a lot of weirdness involved with the worse than they're going okay where else are you going to take us and we're going to do next
well and I think that's the biggest part of the game is is where else are we going and what's next and it's giving you guys the flexibility to be the ones to choose that yes I think that's that's been the critical part of this is that I am not leading the game I am giving you I'm giving you ideas

(01:14:52):
and I'm throwing you into situations but you guys are taking the game the way you want it to go and as long as that remains fun we're going to continue doing it yes sir and that's how it works
but if you'd like to know more about riff kickers or tabletop gaming by way of warp and those associated with it where can they find us
you can find us on our discord server the link is in the show notes on your your podcast apps then you can also reach out to us directly on e-mail

(01:15:21):
that would be wortmytardis@gmail.com or on our socials on Facebook on Instagram and on threads work my tardis all one word yes but for now I have mostly been possibly KJ the comic guy possibly and you have mostly been

(01:15:46):
what's that Dan of the security Dan of the security and we will see you guys next week with more fun and high jinks and shenanigans and one week to go until fan expo
yes bye everyone bye

(01:16:07):
you've been listening to warp my tardis here on the fandom frontier podcast network music is provided by pond five network dot com
all original content is copyright warp my tardis 2025 all rights reserved

(01:16:32):
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