Space Cats Peace Turtles

316: Playing Against the Emirates of Hacan

The Space Cats are a domineering force when it comes to Twilight Imperium. They're the closest thing the game has to a mascot and when they're in game a lot of things seem to revolve around them. They've also often been accused of dramatically slowing the game down. Today we evaluate what it means to sit down at a table where the Hacan are playing, but not BY YOU. How can you utilize their wares to improve your own position? Are there things you need to do to slow them down? Is Quantum Datahub Node a death sentence for the table?!
1:05:14 - Homebrewer's Guild: Barony of Letnev Heroes!
1:21:02 - The Agenda Phase: ncurry asks “In a vacuum, would you rather have Naalu's 0 token or draw Obsidian?  If you chose the 0, what about it versus a custodian point?  If you instead chose Obsidian, what about the 0 versus Classified Document Leaks? I guess more generally, it comes down to do you value locking down R5 speaker order or the potential for an extra point more?”
Music provided by Ben Prunty. Find more at benpruntymusic.com or benprunty.bandcamp.com
Additional Music and Sounds by Brian Kupillas. https://wanderinglake.bandcamp.com/
 
To learn more about our Discord, Patreon, Merch, and more, visit https://spacecatspeaceturtles.com/

315: Async [w/ the 9 of Spades]

We did an episode about the Async Twilight Imperium discord (https://discord.gg/vY3nBkegkn) a while ago, but it's had a slew of major developments over recent months and it was well worth revisiting. Not to mention we wanted to have a conversation about our first Tournament Champion, The 9 of Spades, and it's his newest fascination. So it seemed best to wrap it all up in one episode together! 9 of Spades also finds himself trapped in the Dadlands with Matt and playing TI asynchronously has been a welcome return to everyone's favorite board game!
45:37 - Homebrew Review: Let's Talk Twilight Imperium Zero Edition
50:53 - The Agenda Phase: Craiken asks “Can you tell us more about the TI dream video? Has there been any progress on that front?”
Music provided by Ben Prunty. Find more at benpruntymusic.com or benprunty.bandcamp.com
Additional Music and Sounds by Brian Kupillas. https://wanderinglake.bandcamp.com/
Also....Sanctuary by Utada Hikaru...
 
To learn more about our Discord, Patreon, Merch, and more, visit https://spacecatspeaceturtles.com/

314: Tournament 6 and the Rest of 2023

We JUST finished Tournament 5 but TOO BAD, it's time to talk about Tournament 6. We've got details on the structure and process on how to play in the 2024 tournament that starts in October of 2023. Once our website is up again we'll have the details typed out for you to pass around to your friends and hopefully I'll remember to come back and change this episode description when that link is available. Until then, listen to this to learn how radically different the tournament will be from years prior!
After that, we give some details on the episodes to expect for the last few months of 2023.
1:16:12 - The Agenda Phase: Brassbird Asks: “I've been listening for a long time and I love a lot of your old content. Which old school SCPT episodes are your favorite? Which ones do you think are deserving of a reboot or revisit?”
Music provided by Ben Prunty. Find more at benpruntymusic.com or benprunty.bandcamp.com
Additional Music and Sounds by Brian Kupillas. https://wanderinglake.bandcamp.com/
 
To learn more about our Discord, Patreon, Merch, and more, visit https://spacecatspeaceturtles.com/

313: Spirit Island Wrap Up

Early this year, we set out on a goal, (well a few goals really, but one of them was:) to learn GreaterThanGames' Spirit Island and hopefully help you learn it as well. We tackled the 8 spirits provided in the base game and have learned a lot along the way. It was the first time for this show to try and tackle a cooperative game, so today we're going to kind of rate and reflect on how we did and what it means to cover a game like this! Also there's a very extended edition of the Homebrew Review where we discuss many iterations of Yin's Impulse Core tech.
For more Spirit Island content check out:
Kindred Spirits Podcast: On Spotify or plenty of other podcast platforms!
Kalen Noreth: https://www.youtube.com/@kalennoreth
1:17:29 - Homebrew Review: Impulse Core Homebrew Royale
Music provided by Brian Kupillas. https://wanderinglake.bandcamp.com/
 
To learn more about our Discord, Patreon, Merch, and more, visit https://spacecatspeaceturtles.com/

312: Leder Games at GenCon[feat. Lord of the Board]

We went to GenCon, had a live show, then checked out what our friends over at Leder Games have been working on. Sam from Lord of the Board (https://www.youtube.com/@LordoftheBoard) joined us to demo a base game session of Arcs and chat with Cole as well as a demo of and chat about the "pre-alpha" build of Patrick Leder's "working title Blok." It was a splendid time with wonderful people and we hope you love our little conversations.
7:38 - Arcs with Cole Wehrle
36:40 - Blok with Patrick Leder
Music provided by Ben Prunty. Find more at benpruntymusic.com or benprunty.bandcamp.com
Additional Music and Sounds by Brian Kupillas. https://wanderinglake.bandcamp.com/
 
To learn more about our Discord, Patreon, Merch, and more, visit https://spacecatspeaceturtles.com/

311: 2023 GenCon Live Show

This episode was recorded LIVE at the Helium Comedy Club in Indianapolis, IN during the week of GenCon 2023! If you want to hear all of the stand-up, you'll have to come in person yourself someday, but this recording includes Old Gamer's Almanac playthrough of an old Sonic the Hedgehog Choose Your Own Adventure book as well as the SCPT Live show.
Music provided by Ben Prunty. Find more at benpruntymusic.com or benprunty.bandcamp.com
Additional Music and Sounds by Brian Kupillas. https://wanderinglake.bandcamp.com/
 
To learn more about our Discord, Patreon, Merch, and more, visit https://spacecatspeaceturtles.com/

310: Twilight Imperium: The HBO Mini-series

The Galactic Council went chaotic evil this week and wanted us to provide you with the sequel to everyone's favorite episode: TI The Movie. This time we have to design a mini-series set in the Twilight Imperium universe, meant to be released on HBO circa 2010. We totally took the prompt really seriously and this is a very earnest attempt at that. There's no funny business, there's no references to the Watchmen, and there are absolutely no Muppets.
Agenda Phase: RockPaperLizard asks “Would you be interested as content creators in recording games specifically oriented for ‘Listenability.’”
To check out the Community Plays TI Discord: https://discord.gg/FXWFN6g5Q
Music provided by Ben Prunty. Find more at benpruntymusic.com or benprunty.bandcamp.com
Additional Music and Sounds by Brian Kupillas. https://wanderinglake.bandcamp.com/
 
To learn more about our Discord, Patreon, Merch, and more, visit https://spacecatspeaceturtles.com/

309: Super Nomad Guide

We've done it! After today, all of the Prophecy of Kings factions will have been revisited on this show as part of our Super Guide series! Don't talk to me about Council Keleres! We finish up with the Nomad, which is the first faction we ever learned about on this show and we've come a long way since then. Nomad has had some high highs, but they feel like they're slowing down a bit in their performance. What made them so good before and why have we seen that change over time?
Come see us perform live during GenCon at the Helium Comedy Club on August 3 at 8:00 PM! https://indianapolis.heliumcomedy.com/shows/218650
Music provided by Ben Prunty. Find more at benpruntymusic.com or benprunty.bandcamp.com
Additional Music and Sounds by Brian Kupillas. https://wanderinglake.bandcamp.com/
 
To learn more about our Discord, Patreon, Merch, and more, visit https://spacecatspeaceturtles.com/

308: Spirit Guides - Lightning’s Swift Strike and Shadows Flicker Like Flames

It's our last venture into the base game Spirits for Spirit Island! And we didn't do it on purpose, but we're each going out of spirits that didn't click with us quite as much, but that didn't stop them from being engaging to learn!
Also we've got a lengthy Homebrew Review and Agenda Phase as well as a big important announcement at the end regarding our upcoming Weird Bear Exhibition "Tournament."
0:00 - Lightning's Swift Strike
56:14 - Shadows Flicker Like Flames
1:32:49 - Homebrew Review: William's Willard's Mentak Coalition Abilities
1:40:36 - Agenda Phase: DragoThaxton asks “Describe your dream TI4 IRL gameday"
Music provided by Brian Kupillas. https://wanderinglake.bandcamp.com/
 
To learn more about our Discord, Patreon, Merch, and more, visit https://spacecatspeaceturtles.com/
 
Tickets to our August 3rd show in Indianapolis: https://indianapolis.heliumcomedy.com/shows/218650

307: Super Titans of Ul Guide

We're nearing the end of our super POK faction guides and today we get to tackle the first faction we ever dug deep into in POK, the Titans of Ul. They're a powerful faction that has always performed very well in our tournaments, but this year had a bit of a decline. (into the middle of the pack, so don't freak out) What makes this faction so strong and how can you make the most of their toolkit?
1:25:36 - Agenda Phase: OfficialDaveAcct asks “You mentioned in your Empyrean episode that you thought that faction was a great faction for a new player. What other factions would you recommend for someone's first time playing Twilight Imperium and why?”
1:33:57 - Homebrew Review: Simple's Vuil'Raight Idol Action Card
Music provided by Ben Prunty. Find more at benpruntymusic.com or benprunty.bandcamp.com
Additional Music and Sounds by Brian Kupillas. https://wanderinglake.bandcamp.com/
 
To learn more about our Discord, Patreon, Merch, and more, visit https://spacecatspeaceturtles.com/