Have whip, will travel
Hello and welcome to episode 270 of Effect. Have whip or will travel. I'm Dave.
Matthew:And I'm Matthew. And we are truly going to rush you through a packed program in this episode.
Dave:We always say we have a packed program, and we usually do, actually. But we have a really packed program today.
Matthew:Well, I think, interestingly, in the last few months, it's been a little bit quiet on the world of gaming front. You know? I mean, I'm not to say that there haven't been lots of lots of things happening in the world of gaming, but not much that we are interested in. And therefore, because our listeners are interested in what we're listening in, what our listeners are interested in either. But this time, there's loads of things we need to talk about in the world of gaming.
Matthew:And we've also got some Old West news, which is quite exciting.
Dave:We do. We do.
Matthew:And we have got a feature on a celebrity of the Old West whose name shall remain for the moment secret.
Dave:But if you know anything So we
Matthew:better crack on.
Dave:But if you know anything about the Old West and the gold rush, the the title of the show might give you a clue. So you've got about
Matthew:give you a clue.
Dave:You've got about forty minutes probably or thirty minutes to to to get in before we tell what
Matthew:years we're talking about. Exactly.
Dave:If if you care.
Matthew:There's a there's a quiz. A prize for anybody who tells us the answer before they no. That's not gonna work.
Dave:It's not gonna work. Well, no. It's that's fine. We can have a the prize is a, all expenses paid cruise around the world, because no one's gonna be able to answer it, because no one's gonna know about this until after the prize has ended.
Matthew:After we've said it. Exactly. Good point. Well done.
Dave:So we offer the best prize ever.
Matthew:And an all expenses paid cruise roundabout and a million pound. Confidently saying
Dave:that. We'll
Matthew:probably get done for
Dave:For some kind.
Matthew:Gaming fraud now.
Dave:Yeah. Yeah. Well, we're not
Matthew:There is no prize, gentlemen. That's not even a competition. Forget it ever happened. Thank you, though, to our new patrons. We've a new patron to say thank you to.
Dave:Excellent. Yeah.
Matthew:Well, in fact, we technically have this new patron in time for the last episode if we hadn't recorded the last episode a week early.
Dave:Ah. Yes. So it's our bad then. Yeah.
Matthew:Charlie Creek, you are actually now not such a new patron, but but welcome aboard nonetheless.
Dave:Yes. Welcome.
Matthew:It's a real pleasure having you.
Dave:Thank you again for as with all. But thank you, Charlie, for joining us and supporting us. That's that's brilliant. Thank you so much.
Matthew:Yes. So cracking on with the world of gaming. We what we got in the world of gaming? Well, first of all, let us start with the AI controversy at UK Games Expo.
Dave:If if we if we if we must.
Matthew:I think I think we should address it.
Dave:Okay. Know you've got some thoughts on it, haven't you?
Matthew:Yeah. But would you do you wanna tell us about what the controversy was?
Dave:So the controversy in brief was UK Games Expo were criticized for having some promotional material or doing some promotion of a role playing game called Gates of Crystalia, not Knights of Cydonia as you
Matthew:We should have been a fan of game, don't.
Dave:Gates of Crystalia. But the the the the issue around it was, however, it turns out that they've been using AI imagery. Now I don't know a great deal about this in detail, but I understand they were being quite open about using that imagery, which, I mean, I guess in itself is, you know, there's a debate over kind of the ethics of doing that, whether you're being open about it or not, I guess. But yeah. So that in brief, that was it.
Dave:There was there was some comments on Blue Sky and elsewhere on the socials criticizing or expressing disappointment with UK Games Expo. But that's about as much as I know about the the controversy.
Matthew:And I've gotta say, I'm I'm gonna I'm gonna I I you know, I'm anti AI generally, but particularly anti AI in the creation of art because I feel, you know, the large language models of all these AI, they are stealing other artists' work, not in a way that, you know, they're they're copying exactly the rights, but they're putting they are effectively doing that. And I Yeah.
Dave:I mean, they're they're they're using the the work of myriad other artists as a basis for their work. And they and they can't do it or they don't do it well without that foundation. No. So that's the issue.
Matthew:And this is and and so Japanese anime style illustration. So, you know, it's a particular style of illustration, which I know there are loads of artists out there who can do. It's not one that I can do. Well, I can't. Despite spending four years in art school, I can't really do any art, but there we go.
Dave:You've done some very good stuff, mate. So Well,
Matthew:yeah. Yeah. I was only fishing for compliments, so thank you very much.
Dave:I fell for that one. You can tell it's early on a Sunday morning, can't Yeah. Scrub that. Now you're fucking shit.
Matthew:Very good stuff I might be able to do, except when it comes to doing anime. And so a lesser me might go, alright. I'll use AI to help me draw this, but it'll be my designs because I know what I'm wanting. I'm gonna script this out. And I think that, you know, there is gonna be this issue with with AI as it gets simply so prevalent.
Matthew:Prelevant? Prevalent. Prevalent.
Dave:Prevalent. Is what I'm
Matthew:looking In the know, in the workspace. So, you know, now every time I turn on my computer, Windows is offering me a blooming co pilot to help me do every task at work in, you know, in my day job. There's, you know, there's gonna be an AI strategy in the IT department at work. So, you know, AI is becoming a fact of life. And although I hate it, particularly in the generation of art, I think we might be fighting a looting battle.
Matthew:But quite apart from that, I would love it if nobody bought this game because it was full of AI art. I'd love people to take a stand against AI. I don't think that it's right for UK Games Expo to be the ones who take that stand, actually. I would be very upset if they started using AI art themselves in promotional stuff. I went to an Essen Spear Essen a couple of years ago with Free League, And they had used not only AI art, but bad AI art.
Matthew:You know, that sort of thing where
Dave:Oh, Essen the Essen organizers did.
Matthew:Yeah. So so, you know, they had a little cartoon logo of people enjoying a tabletop game. But, you know, it wasn't so quite so bad that one had six fingers or something. But, you know, there were there were actual you could see where the glasses were kind of superimposed by an AI system that thought that people might grow glasses out of their nose, as opposed to actually put them on their face. You know?
Matthew:So it shit AI art. But the AI art is getting better. I don't think we can stop people doing it. There are loads of creators out there who can't draw and can't afford artists. I would always say go and get some blooming copyright free art or, you
Dave:know Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Matthew:Like like what what anyway
Dave:Some stock. Some Yeah. Stock Exactly.
Matthew:At least I don't think it's UK Games Expo's idea. So that's the other thing, of course. Spoilers for an item that's coming up in World of Gaming in a moment. We're coming to UK Games Expo. I've just booked the stand.
Matthew:The booking process, for us old lags, now that we're not newbies and we we don't get the half half price stand that we got last time well, last time we got a massively more than half price stand, that's that's by the way. Yeah. So I go through a booking procedure that says, do you want to add this package on? Do you wanna add this package on? And one of the packages they do is a social media package, which is we will do a social media post about your game.
Matthew:And I thought we didn't need that. We didn't need it last year. I'm not paying for it this year. But these guys obviously wanted to pay for it. And they paid for it and they got their contracted social media page post.
Matthew:That's that's a commercial deal. And I don't think it's up to UK Games Expo to go, oh, these guys have paid us £250 or whatever it was, I can't remember, per social media post. Oh, let's go and check out their game. Oh, shit. They're using AI.
Matthew:We're gonna have to refund them the £250 because I'm morally obliged not to not to share info about that. Leave it to the purchasers to make the decision about whether they buy or not. I'm never gonna buy this game. I don't like anime anyway. But Yeah.
Dave:It is I mean, it's it's a tough one. I I can see it from both sides. I think, you know, UK Games Expo, I suspect if you ask them, would say something along the lines of we would want to promote the the use of of of creative artwork, human artwork rather than AI artwork. But on the other on the other hand, I mean, they're they're gonna be quite busy. And if they had to check every game or everything that they were, like, booked to promote for anything that was questionable, they'd probably never get anything else done.
Dave:So I think there's I can see both sides of it. I think you're absolutely right. The the the real power here, the real driver is gamers, like what's the word? What's the word I'm afraid I'm looking for? Like voting with their feet, voting with their money.
Dave:So if if people don't want to buy a game with AI art in it, then don't buy a game with AI art in it. You know? Some sometimes it's not always going to be easy because I guess there are there are games out there that have probably got some AI art in it that, you know, the the producers haven't been upfront about it. So at least, I guess, in Gates of Crystalia's case, they have been upfront about it. That makes it whether that makes it better, because you're still you're still, you know, falling foul of the ethical imperative to support real human creators rather than put put those people out of work because because AI can do it quicker and, you know, cheaper.
Matthew:Yeah. You know, so we use Adobe Creative Suite. Of course, they're offering me AI at every instant. Sometimes it's Yeah. You know, let us let us make a picture for you.
Matthew:Describe the picture in words, and we'll we'll do the art for you. But also, there's really subtle stuff. So even on Photoshop, I've got a picture of a certain size. I need a bit of bleed on it because you need, like, three millimeters over the sides of the page. Now, generally, I just, you know, make the picture a bit bigger and lose a tiny bit of detail off the edge or risk losing a tiny bit of
Dave:detail off
Matthew:the edges. But you could you know, there's a thing here that will look at your picture and use AI to create those extra three millimeters. Yeah. I don't use it, but, you know, it's there. And so I think it'd be really hard even for us.
Matthew:We, you know, we say to our artists when we send them a commission agreement, we say we don't want you using AIR.
Dave:Yeah.
Matthew:But, you know, at the end of the day, is that, you know, is that going, oh, now I need to put I better put a bit of bleed in for the guys and just pressing the the button that gives them a little bit of extra bleed. And then they've used AIR in in a tally, really insignificant way, but still, they've used AIR. You know, I don't wanna do that. So Yeah. It's gotta be really hard.
Dave:Yes. And I guess also things like, you know, AI will be will be good, I guess, at some point for doing things like layout and getting all that technical crap done, which has taken, you know, for for Tales of the Old West, it took you and Stefan, you know, months to get all that right. And that was that was hard work, but it was it was good work. And, you know, obviously, the quality of the product at the end of it is is really solid.
Matthew:And I would like to say that AI can't do that as well. But there may be a time when it can.
Dave:But I bet that yeah, I suspect you're right. I suspect now he couldn't do it. But I suspect at some point, there'll be a button that will say, lay this out for me, and you press it, and it'll do it in ten minutes that would have taken you three months. Yeah. And then how tempting is that gonna be for creators who, you know, don't have the money to spend on a professional layout artist or don't have the skills themselves.
Dave:Like you said, I think there's there is an almost an inevitability about it that, you know, particularly for small producers or indie producers that don't have much money behind them or don't have, you know, a business behind them effectively. The temptation to press that button, save themselves two months work and £3,000 gonna be is gonna be too strong. But then, you know, the professional layout artist is gonna become, you know, an endangered breeze. Yeah. But I also I kind of think that's that one is an trying to get my words right here so I don't say some don't don't make people think I'm saying something that I'm not.
Dave:That is an easier one to slip through the lines, I think, than the actual creation of the art itself. So I think when you see the art, you could
Matthew:Right. Okay.
Dave:I might be wrong.
Matthew:I'll let you say it. Yeah. Might suck my teeth at it.
Dave:No. No. Fine. But I mean, it I don't know. I mean, just for my I'm no expert on either.
Dave:But my my thinking is may is it easier to detect AI influence on a piece of creative artwork than it would be to detect it on a good bit of layout?
Matthew:Yep. No. You made me That right
Dave:was that was kind of where I was going. But
Matthew:But there is a sense of inevitability about this, and actually, we have lived through a time when let's look at layout. Yeah. The Apple Mac, broadly speaking, transformed how layout was done. And a whole class of worker disappeared almost overnight. They went on strike a lot, but they in the end, they disappeared.
Matthew:They were we used to have typesetters living in London
Dave:Yeah.
Matthew:Working at presses, setting the type in what's called hot metal, and that disappeared. Yeah. Today, the the newspaper called Today was the first one to do it, but then Murdoch Group newspapers did it. There was a massive strike. Massive strike.
Matthew:Massive disruption, but it was inevitable in the end. And a different sort of person got a job. And, of course, you can bet your bottom dollar that the person doing the layout on the computer took the jobs of probably 20 people doing it when it was a manual task.
Dave:Yeah.
Matthew:But, you know, that is the inevitability that we're facing here. And I guess, if we're gonna end this item on a more positive note, I think my advice to everybody going to UK Games Expo well, first of to artists. Because, you know, a lot of people say, hey, you know, I I UK Games Expo is a I support it by coming and paying for my stand and selling my art at UK Games Expo. I don't think there's any point in you
Dave:protesting.
Matthew:Protesting by your absence, by withdrawing your booking. Because you're not getting an opportunity to sell your art. And I think those of us who really don't want everything to be overrun with AI slop need to support actual artists. So, yo, this year, don't buy this game. Unless you want to buy the course.
Matthew:I mean, you know, maybe AI anime art is your bag. But choose not to buy this game and instead choose to buy a print of a living artist or or something. One of their products. Okay. Rant over?
Dave:Yeah. I think that's that's fine. It's such I mean, it's such a difficult situation and I feel bad almost kind of saying, you know, it's an inevitability. But you're right, it almost certainly is. It's inevitable that it's inevitable, if that makes sense.
Dave:But we can do what we can, like you say, and support real artists and real creators wherever we can. And at least perhaps, you know, delay or reduce the impact of it over time.
Matthew:No, absolutely. Absolutely. There will be a time when we're all reduced to, you know, going into space and doing risky jobs for big mega corporations. But even that job is gonna get taken over by AIs with milk for blood at some point.
Dave:It's Yeah.
Matthew:It's all all inevitable. Just bringing it back to gaming franchises for a moment.
Dave:Yeah. And and and obviously a positive a positive end to that piece. Not anyway, we are going to YouGamesExpo. You've already said that. We're gonna be at the same stand as we were last time, which is great.
Dave:Woo hoo. Woo.
Matthew:I hope. I hope. I I spoke with Paul who books the stands last week, and he said, yes. That stand's still available, go through the booking procedure, and then see if you could afford it. And I decided, even though it's a lot more money than we paid last time, because last time we got such a good deal for reasons.
Matthew:Yeah. I I booked the same stand, but, you know, I'm hoping Paul doesn't screw up. Because we got that stand because he screwed up last time.
Dave:Yeah. Exactly. Yeah.
Matthew:And double booked a stand.
Dave:So maybe we hope if he does screw up, and then he's forced give us an even better stand this time.
Matthew:Yeah. Yeah. I think you can't push out like that. No. So back at the same stand, and we'll be there.
Dave:Think that's
Matthew:all we need to say today. We'll have lots of stock. We will, of course. This gives us the opportunity that we missed last year because we booked us down too late. But this year, we will be in time to submit a game for Rewards.
Matthew:The UK Games Expo Awards.
Dave:Yeah. Indeed.
Matthew:And I think I'm gonna submit Tales of the Old West.
Dave:Well, I'd I'd be interested to know what else you'd think be thinking of submitting from Effect Publishing. But Yeah. Cool. We're also going to tabletop gaming live next year. So that's in February.
Dave:That's up at Doncaster, Doncaster Racecourse. But we would be going there as Effect Publishing. This is possibly going to be jumping over to another bit of news. No.
Matthew:No. We don't to spoil that, but in news that can safely
Dave:Saving that for later. In the
Matthew:Old West news.
Dave:There would have been a great segue there, listeners, and you will know what it is when we get to that point on the Old West news. Anyway
Matthew:Yeah. But there's simply too much world of gaming news to talk about.
Dave:Yeah. True. True. Okay.
Matthew:So we're going. Is gonna be a risk for us because we have, on FX behalf, looked at Turbotrop Gaming before and decide so not on FX behalf.
Dave:On Free League's behalf. Yeah.
Matthew:Free League's behalf. Looked at it before and decided we weren't convinced that there was enough of an audience there to make it worthwhile. In fact, we had that conversation again with Free League
Dave:Last week.
Matthew:This year. Yeah. For next year. Last week. And, again, we've decided with them well, they're gonna see how it goes for us, I think, actually.
Matthew:So they may be there in 2027 if Yeah. 2026 proves Seth for us. Yeah. It's gonna be in Doncaster, which is nice. So we're spreading you know, we're going across the
Dave:London. Nation Yeah. Which is cool. Yeah. But not as far as Edinburgh, which is also cool.
Matthew:And I yeah. And but I honestly don't know how it's gonna go. It's gonna be at Doncaster Race Course.
Dave:Yeah.
Matthew:I think I still need to book accommodation for it, but I'll do that shortly.
Dave:But yeah, that would be interesting. That would be interesting. Yeah. There are there are reasons, which we will come to later, why we have decided that we will give it a punt for next year. That's in February.
Dave:February Yeah. I think it's the weekend of Valentine's Day. So
Matthew:It is Valentine's Day weekend. So if you are a lonely geek gamer with no partner, then you know where to come.
Dave:If you but you if you're not a lonely geek gamer and you've got a partner, come along anyway because it'll be a fun day out.
Matthew:But surely, all there are no gamers that have got partners.
Dave:Pardon?
Matthew:I'm just I'm just going over an old trope here. I know that you and I both have partners, as do most of our most of our patrons. But Yeah. But yes. We'll we'll look forward to seeing you there Yes.
Matthew:On Valentine's Day.
Dave:Cool.
Matthew:And also, while we're talking conventions, there's one coming up in a week or two.
Dave:Dragon meat is in three weeks from now. That's at the Excel for the first time this year, so that'll be an interesting interesting vibe change from the Novotel in Hammersmith. I can see why they've done it. I totally get the reasons behind it. It's it gives them space to expand and become bigger.
Dave:There's a bit of me that is is is sad at the demise of dragon meat at the Novatelle, because that was just a lovely for for for an exhibitor or participant who was staying in the same hotel as the convention, that was that was lovely. It was all really easy. It was all really cozy and friendly. You'd see people in the bar. You'd, you know, you'd chat, you'd have a good time.
Dave:There was a lovely little pub down the road that served lovely Thai food for Saturday night. So I I shall miss that actually because that was really nice. It was different from conventions that are basically held in a giant warehouse. But Mhmm. I've been to, you know, I went to Salute last year, which is which was also held in the XL, and it was a good show, and it was well organized.
Dave:So I suspect, despite the vibe change, it will still be an excellent excellent convention, and obviously it gives Dragon meat and our mate John, who's organizing it these days.
Matthew:Who owns it nowadays.
Dave:Yeah. He is. He's the man. And yeah. Hello, John.
Dave:If you're listening, it gives it gives him the chance to expand it and let it grow, which is great. So, yeah, that'll be good. Looking forward to it.
Matthew:I gotta say there was a lovely interview with John in the latest issue of Tabletop Gaming magazine.
Dave:Was that?
Matthew:Campopoe of nothing at all. Yeah. Oh,
Dave:I have to believe that. I got I got that magazine.
Matthew:Have you got you've you've got the latest issue? That that's very interesting. For
Dave:reasons.
Matthew:For reasons.
Dave:Which we'll come on to in a minute. No. I I I haven't read it, though. I just I just read a part of it for reasons.
Matthew:No. I just read the one page. Booked, like, two or three times, did you?
Dave:But but, yeah, no. I I should have a look. I should I should read that.
Matthew:Yeah. There is a quite good interview that talks about some of the reasons for for the move and things
Dave:like that. Nice.
Matthew:And in fact, yeah, in fact, you and I are on that, in that article.
Dave:Are we? In Cool.
Matthew:No. But the top of your head is, I can tell by your shiny bald paint. And the top of my head is, I can tell, by my luxurious mane of hair.
Dave:You know, we record this, as as as regular listeners know, on a Sunday morning, I'm usually a bit tired and weak willed. And just to yeah. I don't have the I don't have the minerals I'll
Matthew:take advantage of that.
Dave:To resist laughing at those sort of ridiculous comments. Anyway, so, yes, we should Yeah.
Matthew:So We're on page 11, if you're interested. I do. Okay.
Dave:I will.
Matthew:Have to look. If you're buying. And where were we? Yes. So we are going to Dragonmeat.
Matthew:So that's all the convention news that's fit to print. You have some exciting news about some work you did a while back.
Dave:Well, yeah, exciting news that you told me just before we started recording because I hadn't heard about it. But, yeah, it seems that Cohorts Cthulhu is now out on retail, I guess, is it? It's for the first So that's Modiphius' two d 20 next game in their Achtung Cthulhu series. It it takes Actum Cthulhu and places it in the time of the Roman Empire, at the time of Marcus Aurelius. And I did a bit of work on that.
Dave:So I've done I've done a fair bit of work on it, actually. I've written a number of scenarios. So there are there's a Germania book that comes with it, and there'll be at least two of my scenarios in that, which are great fun to write, really good fun. There was a couple of others I worked on, but I'm not sure where they are where they're coming out, But I suspect they'll be coming out they're now, but just I'm not sure what the whole range of books is. And there is going to be a Rome expansion that they've been working on, and I wrote the mini campaign for that one, which is really good fun as well.
Dave:So, yeah, it's great to see it, you know, come out and be out in the world. And as always, it's it's it's always very exciting when, you know, stuff that you've worked on is is there in print, you can you can grab it and look at it and and be proud of what you've done. Yeah. And hope people hope people enjoy it.
Matthew:And just a little sideline on that one, of course, you received your copy of the starter kit for Alien. I did. Yeah. Evolved as well.
Dave:I did. Which
Matthew:that the only part of Alien Evolved you backed?
Dave:I also backed Building Better Worlds. Oh. Because so I wanted to get baked. Because I was the because I was the leader writer on that. I was keen to see what they did with it.
Matthew:Alright. Okay.
Dave:But I didn't baffle the rest.
Matthew:No. No. So I only baffled the starter set. I haven't got it yet because, actually, I forgot to do the pledge banter a bit.
Dave:Oh. Noob noob error, mate.
Matthew:So there's there's me moaning at all those people who didn't do the pledge banter, Jeff, for our game.
Dave:And then you didn't do it. Yeah.
Matthew:Didn't do it for the
Dave:Well, I can't I can't Having your
Matthew:name in print in a lovely box set is gonna be a treat, isn't it?
Dave:It is lovely. Yeah. Yeah. And we are we are credited. So that's great.
Matthew:I should bloody well hope so. We wrote that adventure.
Dave:No. So I can't take the high ground on completing pledge managers. I've I've historically been terrible at it, as Craig could tell you, and as Shep could tell you. And but I'm I'm determined. Every time now I see a pledge manager email come up, I'm straight on it, so I don't ignore them anymore.
Dave:Because if I ignore them, I then forget about them. And then Yes. Three months later, somebody comes up to me and says, you haven't filled out your pledge manager.
Matthew:One of the things I've got to check out, I think I filled out a pledge manager for Versen, and I haven't got that.
Dave:I'm just For checking Carpathia?
Matthew:I can't mem to be honest, I can't remember what I backed in that campaign. But, yes.
Dave:Yeah. Yeah.
Matthew:I need to go back to pledge around you, look at my receipt, and then call Get free call free say, oi, where's my things?
Dave:Because
Matthew:I'm pretty sure I actually paid postage. Anyway, I'll I'll have to show all that. That's by the by. Cohorts Cthulhu, there will be a link to the Modiphius webpage in our show notes.
Dave:Cool.
Matthew:Kickstarters. A whole bunch of Kickstarters happening. I thought of particular interest to our listeners might be Apocalypse World Burned Over.
Dave:Okay. What's that one then?
Matthew:So you haven't played many Powered by the Apocalypse games, have you,
Dave:Dan? Not loads. No.
Matthew:But it's called Powered by the Apocalypse because Apocalypse World started that old system off. So this is a third edition of Apocalypse World. So if you wanna get in on where it all began, this is the one to look at. I'm not sure I'm not to back it. I'm not going to back it because my favorite version of Powered by the Apocalypse is the Warren.
Dave:Yeah. Yeah. Still quite I'd still quite like to play that at some point, actually.
Matthew:Yeah. We should we should get a game going. Maybe I'll do it at oh, I did promise Spectaculars. Well, if you want if you want to take a brief one adventure stop on Spectaculars, I could play it at our gaming weekend in Norfolk.
Dave:Well, let's see what the others think.
Matthew:Yeah. I'll I'll send them an email. But yeah. So the Warren I love, Other ones well, yeah, night witches, we were enjoying until the Russians invaded Ukraine.
Dave:Mhmm. Mhmm.
Matthew:And that was really good fun, but about Russian pilots over Ukraine, which slightly slightly dampened our spirit somewhat when it became a thing. Yeah. Yeah. So, anyway, this this is OG Apocalypse World. I will put a link in the show notes.
Matthew:Now the other thing I wanted to talk about, there's loads you know, every Bloomin' episode, there are more Morkborg titles to to talk about. I saw one based on Balearic legends about pigs called
Dave:Porkborg. Oh, fucking Porkborg.
Matthew:I saw another one which I thought was vaguely amusing, but can't remember. But actually, the one that really caught my eye on Kickstarter this month isn't for you, Dave. It isn't for me. It's the Japanese edition of Mortborg.
Dave:Okay. Japanese language version.
Matthew:Yeah. Yeah. Cool. So I'm very happy for that happening.
Dave:That's alright. I'm I'm happy with that, you know. Yeah. I think, you know, that that's cool. The original game being being translated into lots of other languages is is great.
Dave:I think, you know, we've we've we've rolled our eyes, or I've rolled my eyes many times on this show about various new bogs coming out and where, you know, where will it ever end. But yeah. So no. That's good. That's good.
Dave:I I approve of that one. I I I approve less of pork borg and stalk borg, I don't know. What else can we think of that rising?
Matthew:Mork Soul Mork Soul was the other one, which is obviously dark sun, and that's a space adventure one. Right. Right. I may put links in the show notes to them, but frankly, you know, just throw a stick at Kickstarter and you'll hit a
Dave:Morkborg You can't fail. You can go through the landmine filled field of Morgborg games. But actually, space games The one but the one thing I would say though is it it is a wonderful testament to Pella and Johan for the originality and how good the original Merk Boya is. That it is so ripped off. Ripped off, wrong way of putting it.
Dave:No. Not ripped
Matthew:off. Greenly licensed.
Dave:So homaged by others. It just demonstrates how good it was in the first place, didn't it say?
Matthew:Yes. Talking of Soul, Solar Games, Pioneer
Dave:You've been working on that segue for about five minutes, haven't you? Sorry, mate. I'm gonna keep screwing it for you. Pioneer. I screwed it up again.
Matthew:Pioneer from Mongoose Games. Takes, I think, broadly speaking, the traveler system and sticks it into near space and near future stuff. So if you wanted to do For All Mankind the RPG or Terraforming Mars the RPG oh, sorry. No. Terraforming Mars the RPG has got another RPG coming.
Matthew:It does. Yeah. If you wanna do near future, near space type adventures, then Pioneer is gonna help you do that. Are you gonna back it? Because you're a bit of a Traveler fan and a bit of a
Dave:I like space fan. I like Traveler. I very much like the idea of of like a near future space game. I I might, I might not. So this is the kind of thing that I've very much wanted to try and do as a space gamer myself.
Matthew:Mhmm.
Dave:Because I think there's a lot of gaming potential in, you know, doing things a little bit different, you know. The Kickstarter here I'm just looking at talks about, you know, you'll be the first to build a moon base, the first to mine an asteroid, that kind of stuff. I always thought things like, you know, setting up colonies or colonies or outposts on planets like Mercury, for example. Things like that. So, yeah, and I still don't have tonnes of money at the moment, even though I've got got a new job.
Dave:So I'm still being careful about what I back. But I I yeah, I might I might back this. I'll have I'll have a look at it. It should be right in my wheelhouse, really. What I don't quite know why I'm not getting that little thrill of excitement about it.
Matthew:Well, can tell you why I didn't. Because because I I'm I'm a big fan of Full Mankind, and I thought initially, this is right up my street. It all, and this is pertinent to your last point, it all seems a bit expensive. And I'm not sure
Dave:pledge levels yet. So
Matthew:Yeah. I'm not sure that I won't just pick it up in retail later.
Dave:Yeah. Yeah. I'm just looking at them now. So you'll receive so the virtual footsteps on Mars level is £85.
Matthew:For PDFs?
Dave:And it says you will receive the Pioneer core rule book, mission control, Pioneer referee screen, and Ares ascendant. These all come in PDF format along with unlocked PDF stretch goals. It's a lot of money for a bunch of PDFs. I mean, how much does it cost to get the actual books? Okay.
Dave:So a £100. No. No. No. Actually, it goes up to a £140, think, it looks like to get them in the book form.
Dave:And that yeah. That look. You're right. That does seem quite expensive. I mean, it looks lovely.
Dave:I do love the sample pictures they're giving us, and I like the style. Actually, style is very clean, which I like very much. But that's a lot of money, I would want the books. I don't want PDFs only. So I think maybe
Matthew:I
Dave:Maybe don't like you.
Matthew:Grudge them charging that amount, and I speak as somebody that's just done our company accounts with Fett Publishing. Mhmm. And it's notable that we have not paid ourselves any money. Yeah. You know?
Matthew:We have got the money that we put into it out. So we
Dave:Yeah. So we're we're we're breaking the company. We're breaking even at the moment as individuals are.
Matthew:Broken even. And there's a little bit of profit there. But, you know, that's profit that's gonna get
Dave:Spent for the next book.
Matthew:Next game.
Dave:Yeah. Exactly.
Matthew:That will save us putting our money up for the next book. But, yeah, we've not got any money out of that yet. And, you know, we we did quite good sales. I mean, we're not in mongoose level, but we we made more than we were expecting to make, and we are not bathing in our riches like Scrooge McDuck.
Dave:No. So
Matthew:if people wanna charge more for RPGs, that is fine. I might just wait. I might Yeah, it's up front.
Dave:I might it's entirely up to them what they want, what they want to charge. Yeah. I just wonder how many I guess there is, as a producer, as a publisher, there's a very fine line between making the judgement about getting the price at a certain level so you are, you know, going to get the kind of financial support you want. But without putting it too high, that you get a lot of people sucking their teeth, and then just not backing it, even if they were And I guess every every publisher has to make that calculation for themselves. And this is where they've landed.
Dave:I mean, they're doing well. I mean, they've got twenty days to go, and they've blown past their goal of 20,000 significantly by four times almost. Yeah. So it's doing well.
Matthew:So they haven't discouraged all that many people from
Dave:No. No, they've they've got 600. They've got over 600 backers so far, I say with three weeks left to go at the point of recording. But I'm not sure I'm going to pledge a 100 or a £140 right now. No.
Dave:So the £100 level you get the Pioneer core rule book mission control, which I guess is a supplement.
Matthew:GM's guide.
Dave:GM's guide and the Pioneer's reference referee screen. And you get both physical and PDF for that, and you get all unlocked stretch goals for a £100. So, yeah, that's it still feels a little pricey, but it's it's not it's
Matthew:not out It of the is effectively two books then, I guess, or or three, given that the GM screen probably comes with a book for VAT purposes?
Dave:For tax purposes. Yeah.
Matthew:These are things that we didn't understand when we made our case. Yeah. Well,
Dave:we we we sort of did, but we were we understood it too a little bit too late be adding in pamphlet to the GM screen. So we had the opportunity to try and do it at the last minute, we decided not to. But we'll be able to make that decision in advance this time, because we now know at a better point in the process. So yeah, so I'm a bit torn. It looks lovely.
Dave:I suspect it would be good. Traveller system is fine system. I'll have to have a think. I've got three weeks. So we'll see Yeah.
Dave:How it
Matthew:And an interesting one that I threw in, partly because of the people behind it, but a big fuss was made a couple couple of weeks ago about the Godzilla RPG.
Dave:Yeah. If this if this was on on TV, I'd be face palming at this moment. Alright. God's sake.
Matthew:It's got some Games Workshop stalwarts behind it whose names I can't remember suddenly now that I'm talking about it. But it's it's gonna be launched by IDW Games, I think. IDW are a publisher of comics, and obviously, they have the comics license for Godzilla currently. And so there's loads of art there already sitting in their hands. But the interesting thing is it's got Jervis Johnson and Gav Thorpe and Mark Latham from Games Watch them.
Matthew:Yeah. From Warhammer
Dave:effectively. It's experienced people in there.
Matthew:It's a card based randomizer, Dave, which I know will piss you off.
Dave:Well, that's the yeah. So number one, I mean okay. The Godzilla role playing game. What are you gonna do with that other than run away from or try and deal with Godzilla or the things that Godzilla's fighting? It just feels for me that it's such a narrow limited role playing game.
Dave:It doesn't appeal to me in the slightest. Secondly, yeah, I mean, fuck it. Card a card deck for running a game? Yeah. No.
Dave:I I don't mind cards for initiative. I don't mind cards for, you know, information and for reference, like, you know, like with Forbidden Lands or Alien, where you've got a weapon or a magical item or something. That's that's fine. But running the game
Matthew:You don't like cards as a randomised
Dave:event, No, it just feels like a what's the word I'm looking for? It's Pain
Matthew:in the glass.
Dave:It's not that. It feels like an affectation. People is I think people it feels to me anyway, and I'm happy to be shot down if people disagree with me. Or not shot down because this is my view, but people are more than more than happy to disagree with me. It just feels like you're doing it for the hell of doing it and for the novelty value.
Dave:Whereas actually, using DICE gives you so much more, you know, utility in in your randomization. It just feels like it's a an unnecessary affectation done to be in be novel and be different.
Matthew:Okay. I'm gonna I'm gonna take issue with you here.
Dave:Yeah. Thought you would.
Matthew:Yeah. Point of view. We have and we we like in our Western game a thing we've done with our dice. It gives you a bit of a choice about whether you spend faith, whether you spend extra faith to avoid trouble. And so there's a bunch of choice making over what is essentially a basic die roll.
Matthew:So it's not just roll a d 100 and you've got 28.
Dave:And see what happens.
Matthew:Chance of success. See, there's a bunch of stuff there. We have created all of that about giving the player choices over what happens in the narrative. I would argue that I don't know what the how the mechanic here is gonna work, but in a card game, you have a set of choices because you know exactly, effectively, what all the probabilities are, depending on how often you shuffle. You know what's in your hand.
Matthew:You vaguely know what's in the deck. You've got choices when you play a card, I'm guessing.
Dave:Just had a sudden sudden blast of Bruce Forsyth on Play Your Cards Right going, hi, Roy. Hi, hello. And yeah.
Matthew:Good game. Good game.
Dave:And again, I think that's part of my problem. It it for me anyway, using cards makes it start to feel like a card game. And I don't want the thing to feel like a card game. I want a role playing game to feel like a role playing game. And that might just be a a peccadillo of mine.
Dave:It might just be something that that is, you know, I should perhaps try and get over. But it
Matthew:just is an enormous peccadillo of yours, and I should try and
Dave:It's talking about my enormous peccadillo. Yeah. Sorry. It's bit early.
Matthew:Sorry. Couldn't be just the opportunity to say enormous peccadillo. And I noticed neither could you.
Dave:Oh, dear. Sorry, listeners. We're now
Matthew:Is this maybe the time for the end of the world again before we descend into Du Blanc And Tundra? Possibly.
Dave:Yes. Anyway, it's it's what is it? Coming to Kickstarter? Yeah. Next year.
Matthew:It's gonna be March. March 26.
Dave:They're looking to kick start that. So if you're interested in all that, then great. I won't be backing it. It's not my thing.
Matthew:Okay. Right. Old West news, Dave.
Dave:Old West news. Well, the first thing I'm gonna go to is well, there's two really exciting things actually. One is the reprint is on the way. We've done that order. We've spent that money.
Dave:A standart are churning their way through new books as we speak, I hope, and we should hopefully get that delivered. Well, I'm guessing it's probably gonna be early December, isn't it?
Matthew:Really? The the plan was late November.
Dave:I know it was, but I'm just trying
Matthew:to The fact that we've not heard anything about, oh, right, you know, we're actually doing the printing now yet, is making me think maybe it won't be late November, and it will be early December. It all happened really quick surprisingly quickly when we did the first print after after the starter. Yeah. But I'm now realizing that's because that was after Christmas. And maybe there's loads of companies saying, we want to get these books out in time for Christmas.
Dave:Yeah. Yeah. Quite possibly. But we never I mean, they might be they might be on it. So we can we can we can check up and see.
Dave:I think it's unlikely that we're gonna have lots of lovely stock for Dragonmeat, which is a slight pity. But you never know.
Matthew:This is a good point. Yeah. If you're coming to see us at Dragonmeat, if you are coming to Meat in the hope of buying Tales of the Old West, and I hope you are, you may only be able to get the deluxe version because we've got some of those left over. We're down to currently five copies of the standard version. And I don't know how many we're gonna have by deluxe by Jagged Meat Time.
Matthew:You and I need to put our heads together and think of some offer for the deluxe version, maybe to soften them blow a bit.
Dave:Yeah, exactly. I think we can do that for sure.
Matthew:Yeah. Free GM screen or something like Yeah. We'll we'll work on something.
Dave:Yeah. I mean, it's still possible, with a bit of luck, we might just get some of the recent
Matthew:And fingers crossed. Yeah.
Dave:Fingers crossed. But, yeah, it's yeah. We'll see. We'll see. We'll see.
Dave:But that's great. So we're getting that. We've got so we'll have plenty of stock before Christmas, ideally for Dragon meat, but we'll see. And the other bit of news is we had a fabulous review in Tabletop Gaming Magazine this last month.
Matthew:Oh, couldn't we?
Dave:It was and well and I mean, I'm just I'm just so delighted. They actually they actually did us a lot of favors. So the game, they they talk about the reviews, and they they mention eight of the games that they reviewed out of 21 on the front cover. One of them is Tales of the Old West, which is superb. If you then go to the the the the contents page, bottom right of that double pro sped is a big picture of Tales of the Old West advertising
Matthew:Mhmm.
Dave:Those reviews, which is, again Guiding
Matthew:you straight to page 78, which is the most important page in the
Dave:whole magazine. Brilliant. And then page 78 is a full page review of the game, which is very, very, very favorable, given a must play rating, which is superb. So thanks so much to Chris who who wrote it for for giving us such good such good review. And I know there's a there's a couple of quotes out of that you are particularly happy to to keep repeating, aren't you, Matthew?
Dave:So I'll leave those But to it's a brilliant review, and we're so delighted to get in the in the magazine in the first place, but also to get such a great review is superb. So thank you so much for everybody involved.
Matthew:Yeah. They don't hand out must play ratings willy nilly. They ration them to among their reviewers. And in this very issue, there are so, basically, for for those of us maybe who are in other countries who don't get tabletop gaming in your local newsstand, it's worth pointing out, you do get tabletop gaming here in The UK in normal estate a in normal news agents.
Dave:Estate agents?
Matthew:Don't try and go to an estate agent.
Dave:You can try, but might not do very well. Yeah.
Matthew:Yeah. You can find it in normal news agents. And it so, you know, it's it's on the newsstands, genuinely. It's a mass market magazine. I mean, how how the mass market magazines are nowadays in the Yeah.
Dave:In the
Matthew:age of the Internet. But they have a play it rating at the bottom of every single review they do. And those span from no to must play. And there are reviews in this very issue of the magazine that say, no. Don't play this game.
Dave:Exactly. And and maybe. Yeah. So about a third of the reviews come up with a must play on this one. I'm just looking through it.
Dave:So so seven or eight are are down as must play out
Matthew:of 20 others are maybe. So the other RPG game that is only a maybe is His Majesty the Worm. And others are a yes, which is, you know, a pretty good review, but it's not a must play. No.
Dave:So that is superb. Yeah. That is superb. So that was another thinking about us going to tabletop gaming live to try and take advantage of of of this fabulous review and see if see if that's something we can leverage into a bit more, you know, a bit more publicity and a bit more, you know, a bit more sales, get more people playing the game.
Matthew:Yes. And so the other thing about being a must play is next month's issue. If you find that somebody has been to your local Forbidden Planet, for example, and bought every copy of tabletop gaming there was in Forbidden Planet, and you haven't been able to get a copy I'm not saying that's what I did, but that's what I did. There are only three copies, but I did buy all three copies. If you can't get a copy, next month's issue in December is their best of 2025 issue.
Matthew:And that will be all the must plays they've done throughout the year. So we get we're in there again next month. Yeah. Yeah. It's Which is very exciting.
Dave:Yeah.
Matthew:So so that's good. And I I've always said, every episode of this podcast, I've been telling people that they really should go out to newsagents and buy the latest issue of Tabletop Gaming, haven't I, Dave?
Dave:You have.
Matthew:Yeah.
Dave:I don't remember you doing that, but, yeah, fine. You have. Yes. Yes.
Matthew:So definitely, though, buy issue 108, and then you can read the nice things they said about us. Although, since you foreshadowed it earlier, I will read just just one quote. The savvy mix of lightweight core rules with these thematic modular add ons makes this the best Wild West RPG I've encountered. And it's also my favorite implementation of the Year Zero engine. It does add so far to that, but I'm
Dave:I praise indeed. Yeah. Yeah. No. That's superb.
Dave:I'm just so delighted that that that Chris Chris Chris felt compelled to Chris.
Matthew:Oh, I've got his name.
Dave:Larry. Chris Larry. Yeah. He felt compelled to write those words. I mean, brilliant.
Dave:Thank you so much. Hurrah. You know? Yeah.
Matthew:And and yeah. So actually, I'm just realizing Chris Lowry has written a Morkborg game called Mork Org, I think, which is about Morkborg in a corporate environment, which I urge you to get. You know how much we love all the all the veils.
Dave:A lot of people like them. It's just my view that we've had too many. But it's fine. It's fine. Particularly when it's Chris's, and Chris has said such nice things about us.
Dave:So Yeah.
Matthew:Cool. So that is the end of our world of game no, not world of gaming. Old West. Old West news. But we are not out of the Old West.
Dave:We're not. You're gonna do a little bit of research and talk to us about I don't know if I'm gonna say the name now or whether you want it to come out in the piece, about a a a famous infamous potentially character from real character from the Old West.
Matthew:Indeed. I do feel that it has to be said that we are becoming a bit like Ken and Robin talk about stuff, actually, with this little potty biography. But that's quite a good podcast that a lot of people listen to, so I'm not ashamed.
Dave:Well, let's listen then.
Matthew:As we put together our first supplement for tales of the Old West, I am trawling art collections and photo libraries for images of the eighteen fifties. Gold country will look in detail at California and Nevada, but also explores an earlier period, the gold rush, twenty years before the time described in the core book. I want to be able to give our artists a resource, a library of images that shows how fashion's changed in those last twenty years. Don't let me start a rant about how centuries, millennia even pass in some fantasy franchises, and everyone still wears the same clothes. But back to the topic.
Matthew:There I was looking for images of people from California in the eighteen fifties, and I came across one person that really excited me. I told Dave, but he had not heard of her. And so, in the expectation that you might not have heard of her either, it's time to tell the tale of a woman of the West whose life story is so ridiculous that it reads like that of a player character. Let us start though with the Crabtree's. John and Mary Crabtree had come to The United States from Britain, and John set up as a bookseller in New York.
Matthew:There, Mary Anne gave birth to a daughter, Charlotte, in 1847. Four years later, her father joined the gold rush. He was joined by his wife and child two years after that, in the boom town of Grass Valley. Gold had been discovered in Gold Hill in 1850, and the settlement that sprung up around the mine was called Boston Ravine, then Centerville, before settling on the name Grass Valley when the post office opened. The Crabtree's ran a boarding house in Grass Valley, but little Lottie had a passion for performance.
Matthew:And she attracted the attention of a neighbor who took her under her wing and taught her how to sing and dance. That neighbor is the subject of this essay. The woman known to the crab trees, and famous across the world, as Lola Montez. That wasn't always her name. She was born Eliza Rosanna Gilbert in County Sligo in 1820.
Matthew:The first and only daughter of a young couple, Edward and Elizabeth, nay Oliver, Gilbert. Edward was an English army officer. Elizabeth, the daughter of a local MP. Eliza was only three when Edward's duty took the family to India. But shortly after their arrival, her father died of cholera.
Matthew:Elizabeth, her mother, who is only 19, quickly remarried. Her stepfather, another officer, adopted Eliza as his own daughter, but decided it would be better for her to be brought up in Scotland with his family. By the time she was 16, her mother had found an husband for her. But she did not like the idea of marrying a man in his sixties, and so eloped with a friend of her stepfather's who was, I hope, a might younger. She traveled back to India as missus Thomas James, but the marriage was not a happy one.
Matthew:After a few years, she took a ship to England on her own, and it is said, had an adulterous encounter on board. This gave Thomas James the excuse he was looking for to file for divorce, claiming to be the wronged party. And under the terms of the divorce, she was not allowed to marry as long as James was still alive. This was a problem for a young woman still in her early twenties, and she went into hiding in Spain. And a year or two later, all the talk in London was of a Spanish dancer called Lola Montez, who made a point of explaining that her father was a Spanish officer and her mother of Irish descent, and that she had never, never changed her name.
Matthew:Why was this Spanish dancer the talk of the town? Well, it said her dancing was scandalously revealing, and it proved a passport to theaters across Europe. And romantic partners, including the composer, Franz Liszt, and the author of The Musketeers, Alexander Dumas. In Potsdam, she was hired by king Frederick Wilhelm the fourth to dance for czar Nicholas the first of Russia. Later in Berlin, she managed to inveigle her way into a parade in the czar's honor.
Matthew:And when a policeman tried to stop her entering an area reserved for the nobility, she set about him with a horse whip. This did not seem to harm her reputation, and she took to carrying a horse whip around and indeed using it on people who got on the wrong side of her. In role playing terms, we might call that a signature weapon. Most famously, she captured the heart of king Ludwig of Bavaria, became one of his mistresses, and eventually, countess of Landfelt. You could write a whole play on her time in Bavaria, but let's just say she made friends and enemies.
Matthew:By eighteen forty eight, she was back in London and married to the wealthy young officer George Trafford Heald. But then disaster struck. She was identified as the ex missus Thomas Jane, and by the terms of her divorce, forbidden to marry, which brought Lola, in the end, to American shores. You know I said you could write a play on her adventures in Bavaria? She did, and performed it all along the Eastern Seaboard.
Matthew:She was becoming an expert at turning her life into story. When booked at the Walnut Theater in Philadelphia, she realized a delegation of Cheyenne, Sioux, and Arapaho were also staying in the city on their way back from visiting president Fillmore. She contrived to have an early photograph or daguerreotype of her and a lights on a cloud, a high ranking Cheyenne seated together. She used the image to put about the story that the natives had come to Philadelphia to see her, and that her lights on a cloud was in love with her. A story was which was refuted by a native American who managed to get the New York Herald to publish the true story.
Matthew:An incident with the police in New Orleans saw her traveling west to San Francisco. On the journey, she met newspaper owner Patrick Purdy Hull. After a short marriage, which involved her throwing his clothes out of the window and him down the stairs, they divorced. Giving up on men, she adopted a bear cub as a pet. Her performances in California were not about her life in Bavaria, but an act more appealing to all the men in the cities and towns who had left wives behind.
Matthew:Her spider dance began with her pretending a spider was crawling up her dress, Then the spider possessing her. And finally, with, shall we say, lifting her skirts in a moment of revelation. She proved popular enough with the miners that they named a gold mine after her, it said. I can't find out which mine that was, which means it might be a ripe location for an adventure in the new book. She lived for about two years in Grass Valley, and her home is now the Nevada County Chamber of Commerce and a museum in that town.
Matthew:After a trip to Australia to take the spider dance to the gold fields there, she ended up in Philadelphia, suffering from syphilis, giving lectures, and writing. She died in 1860, just 39 years old. Would your Tales of the Old West characters have as many adventures in such a short space of time?
Dave:Thanks, man. That was really interesting. And as you said right at the top of the show, this is a character. Lola Montez was somebody I'd I'd never heard of. It was a name I hadn't I hadn't ever come across in in my research and my reading.
Dave:But it's interesting that I got a secondhand book a few weeks ago now called They saw the elephant, and it's about women in the California gold rush. And that's been sat on my on my shelf waiting for me to read it. And I've been I've been slogging my way through Stephen Ambrose's transcontinental railroad.
Matthew:Yeah.
Dave:Which is which is which is good, it's been interesting. But it's it's he basically goes through kind of, you know, in too much far too much detail, and it it actually gets it's got quite boring.
Matthew:So tell us about They Saw the Elephant because that's got a a better title.
Dave:So They Saw the Elephant. So this is a book, say, it's about women in the California Gold Rush, which is why I bought it. And I hadn't read it, but having seen your article and knowing what you were gonna talk about, I picked it up. And there's loads of information in here about about Lola Montez. And that's that's really, really interesting.
Dave:She's a bit of a she's I mean, she's quite a character. She she wasn't uniformly liked. No. And I think actually, some of the stuff I've been reading here kind of implies that the the dance, other than being titillating, wasn't actually that good.
Matthew:I never said she was good at dancing.
Dave:But she I but she was successful, you know? Yeah. But then, yeah, she she then yeah. In here, says she she died age 42. I think you said 39 year old piece, didn't you?
Dave:But there or thereabouts.
Matthew:There is a there's an issue about her birth date.
Dave:Yeah.
Matthew:Which I didn't cover in great detail. I I went for the date that is the most recently documented one, but that was only discovered that document was only discovered relatively recently.
Dave:Can't remember. Right. Yeah. This book is definitely an older book. So 1990, this book was published.
Dave:But, yeah, it says that she died from a stroke, which is very sad at that such a young age. But the other thing that was really interesting is they this book talks almost more about the character that you mentioned, but then don't really talk about, which was Mary Crabtree.
Matthew:Or Lottie Crabtree.
Dave:Oh, or Lottie character. Yeah. Yeah. Talking about her
Matthew:She is Yeah. A bit later than the period we're looking at for the Goldrush, of course, because she's only, like, six in 1950 1850. But she becomes a dancer and celebrity in her own right in later.
Dave:So it says here, in November 1856 for Lotter Crabtree, the diminutive red haired performer appeared with the Chapmans in a mixed program at San Francisco's American Theatre. So she might have been there as a child performer, I think she was. And then said, add You '17
Matthew:said '18 when, did you say?
Dave:1856, that was.
Matthew:Yeah. So she's about eight then I think.
Dave:Yeah. Right. Yeah. Yeah. And then she went on and had lived a long life and died at 77 in Boston in 1924 with her estate valued at $4,000,000.
Dave:Yeah. So now that was but I thought that was really interesting. It was somebody I hadn't heard of, and it it sent me to this book, which I will start reading very soon as soon as I finished. I'm on the epilogue now for the transcontinental railroad. It's good book.
Dave:It's got lots of information. It's got lots of good information.
Matthew:Every railway company's accounts and profit
Dave:There loss is a bit of that. There is a bit of that. And there's also I mean, Stephen Ambrose is is is painfully a US patriot. And so yay, US. It's all brilliant.
Dave:Yeah. I mean, it's it's not all brilliant, but there is a lot of harp hyperbole about the the greatest thing in the world, the eighth the eighth wonder of the world, all this kind of stuff. And it was obviously a a huge achievement. But yeah. So I've enjoyed it.
Dave:It could have been half the length. I I got a book of his about Lewis and Clark, but that's even longer. It's massive. And I started reading it
Matthew:Well, they walked. At least the guys on the transcontinental railway went by train.
Dave:Well, when it was running. Yeah. But, yeah, so I started reading that and then gave up after a couple of chapters because I thought, this is just too mammoth. Too mammoth a book to get through. But, you know, They Saw the Elephant is nice and compact, and I'm looking forward to reading that.
Dave:Again, all for all for background information to go into the the gold country. But, yeah. Well, we've this has been quite a long show so far, hasn't it? So I think we probably wanna wrap it up for today. Unless you've got anything else there, Matt?
Matthew:No. Not at all. I yeah. I just think we need to decide what are we doing in the next episode.
Dave:Well, I'm quite interested to take a look at how we might take what we've done with Tales of the Old West and slip that into a Firefly universe?
Matthew:Tales of the new verse, you mean?
Dave:Tales of the new verse or tales of the verse. Yeah. So I think
Matthew:it's But it's a something new verse because the old world got used up.
Dave:That is true. Earth that was. Tales of the not anymore earth that was. That doesn't really ring a doesn't ring a good bell, doesn't it? No.
Dave:No. But, yeah, so I'm I'm happy to give that a go if if that's if that's something that would be interesting.
Matthew:Let's have a listen to some first thoughts on that.
Dave:Cool. Good stuff. Alright then. Well, have a great couple of weeks, everybody, and it's goodbye for me.
Matthew:And it's goodbye from him.
Dave:And may the icons bless your adventures. You have been listening to the effect podcast presented by Fiction Suit and the RPG Gods. Music stars on a black sea used with permission of Free League Publishing.