Thanks for Listening to 10 Minute Marvel

I hope that you are enjoying the podcast. If you are, there are a few ways that I always talk about that you can support 10 Minute Marvel. Firstly, please consider sharing it with your friends. Word of mouth really is a great way to help more people find the podcast and personal recommendations are always great. As well as then subscribing or leaving a rating and review. Both of those make the podcast easier to find on the podcast services. You can find the podcast on iTunes, Google Podcast, Stitcher, and Spotify.

We also run a Patreon and that is another way you can help support. The Patreon, found here, goes to help improve the quality of the 10 Minute Marvel Podcast, pay for advertising and more. It also helps improve the Malts and Meeples YouTube Channel and Nerdologists.com website. Thank you for considering supporting us financially.

Comments or Questions

Let us know how you rank all of the 2023 Marvel projects? Which one are you most excited for, or which one seems like a miss to you? Plus, do you feel burnout from the number of Marvel shows and movies?

Plus, let us know more about Echo. If you made it through the list, you know it’s at the bottom for both of us. Why are we wrong about that? What is in Echo that we should be getting excited for. Bonus points if you can suggest a comic to read.

You can let us know all of those things down in the comment section below. Or tweet them to me @TheScando or by using #10MinMarvel.

Thank you again for listening, and I’ll see you next time.

Send an Email
Message me on Twitter at @TheScando
Visit us on Facebook here
Support us on Patreon here

Thanks For Listening

I hope that you are enjoying the podcast. If you are, there are a few ways that I always talk about that you can support 10 Minute Marvel. Firstly, please consider sharing it with your friends. Word of mouth really is a great way to help more people find the podcast and personal recommendations are always great. As well as then subscribing or leaving a rating and review. Both of those make the podcast easier to find on the podcast services. You can find the podcast on iTunes, Google Podcast, Stitcher, and Spotify.

We also run a Patreon and that is another way you can help support. The Patreon, found here, goes to help improve the quality of the 10 Minute Marvel Podcast, pay for advertising and more. It also helps improve the Malts and Meeples YouTube Channel and Nerdologists.com website. Thank you for considering supporting us financially.

Comments or Questions

Let me know your thoughts on Moon Knight episode 4, did you like it? Or was the twist too out of left field for you? And are you curious or have theories about what is going to be coming up in Moon Knight?

You can let me know all of those things down in the comment section below. Or tweet them to me @TheScando or by using #10MinMarvel. I always am curious as to what your theories are for the craziness that has happened and what you think might happen. And Moon Knight is offering a lot of different options for theories as to what could happen.

Thank you again for listening, and I’ll see you next time.

Send an Email
Message me on Twitter at @TheScando
Visit us on Facebook here
Support us on Patreon here

We see here two tweets that got me thinking about this topic. And it’s not a topic that I’ve been ignorant of, in fact, it’s one that I think about fairly often. And the first tweet is much more general than just board games, but Rodney Smith talks about how it matters with board games as well in his video.

The Golden Rule of Being a Fan

We start today in an interesting place. I won’t directly touch on the topic, because I think we as fans of things need to consider what I hope is what we all want.

We want more people to find joy in our fandoms.

Basically, the rule, as is said simply up there, we want more people to join into our fandom. We want more people to love and find joy in the things we love and find joy in. The more people who find joy in the things we find joy in, the more we have in common with people, and the more we can share the joys of our life. That is the ideal that I hold for being a fan and one that I hope that fandoms as a whole can agree upon.

Where It Goes Wrong

However, it often goes wrong. And Rodney talks about it with board games, and I’m going to talk about it in that light as well generally, but this covers a lot of things. It tends to go wrong when current fans expect other people to be fans in the same way they are fans.

A board game example, a person who loves euro games might look down upon a new gamer who likes lighter games like Munchkin. A television example, a Doctor Who fan might look down on someone who prefers Peter Capaldi to David Tennant as the Doctor. A movie example, a Star Wars fan might look down on a new Star Wars fan who enjoys the prequel trilogy.

You can see how it works, because someone doesn’t enjoy the fandom in the exact way that someone else does, it isn’t as good. Their enjoyment of the fandom is less valid than the person who has been the fan longer or is the fan in the “right way”.

How We Tackle This

I could have spent more time on the negative, because it gets me annoyed. Rodney Smith is one of the nicest people out there and you see how passionate he is about the issue. But I see too many other posts who will just talk about the negative aspect and not about how we can help change things. And honestly, we need to change things. We look at big aggressions or slip ups and they are bad, like the gamers who scoff at female gamers, or similar to that, and we point fingers and call those people horrible. But it’s extremely insidious and easy to step on someone’s excitement out of a place that looks like it’s better. It is equally as harmful though to getting new people into the fandom or hobby.

The most common example of this is, and again going to board games, a conversation on Facebook or Twitter that goes something like this.

Newbie: “I’m so excited I just picked up Munchkin, I’m so excited to play it.”

Person in Hobby: “Munchkin sucks.”

Person 2 in Hobby: “Have fun with that game.”

Person 3 in Hobby: “Munchkin isn’t a good game, you should play Scythe instead.”

Written out like this, you can easily see what the issue is. The newbie is excited for their new game, they are probably just getting into games and like lighter fare that is closer to what they have played before. The first response is just bad. If you don’t like the game, great, don’t step on someone else’s fun and excitement. The second response is probably fine, I through that one in there to make it look more realistic in responses. The third one is also bad because again it’s negative and ruining someone’s fun. It hedges itself in being positive by giving unsolicited and not useful advice. If this person posting their excitement is truly new to the hobby, Scythe is not a jumping in point, or whatever the person’s favorite game might be.

It might seem weird, but I’ve seen all of these responses and more negative ones. Why doe we like to be negative about things and ruin other people’s joy? As Rodney says in his video: “It’s not special not to like something.” Maybe it’s a power play, but honestly, I think most of the time it’s because people are excited or excited and disappointed might be better. They see someone say, “I got a new game” and they think it’ll be something maybe they’ve been interested in and then when it isn’t get they get disappointed. I think that this is where especially comments like “X isn’t good, try Y instead” come from. The person is trying to get their excitement back by getting someone to agree with them or to like their thing. But to the person who posted, it’s just negative.

So what’s better? To quote Thumper from Bambi: “If you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all.” Honestly, it’s that simple, there is nothing that requires you to respond to a tweet or Facebook post on something you don’t like. In fact, it’s 99% of the time better to ignore them and show support to things you do like. A newbie to a hobby or fandom will generally gravitate towards the parts that are positive and away from the parts that are negative, as most people will. But if there is too much negative, a newbie might just leave a hobby or fandom. If you do feel compelled to respond, let’s see a better response.

Newbie: “I’m so excited I just picked up Munchkin, I’m so excited to play it.”

Person in Hobby: “That’s awesome, I hope you enjoy it.”

Doesn’t say that you like the game, but you are wishing joy upon the person and eventually, maybe that person will agree with you that Munchkin isn’t great and they want to play Scythe, but let them get there and let them grow into the hobby instead of pushing away.

But let’s look at another situation:

Newbie: “I’m thinking about getting Munchkin, is it a good game?”

Person in Hobby: “Munchkin sucks.”

Person 2 in Hobby: “I used to like Munchkin.”

Person 3 in Hobby: “Munchkin isn’t good, you should get Scythe.”

Now, I went with all wrong answers here. Now, the person who started asked for an opinion on Munchkin, saying Munchkin sucks is an opinion, but doesn’t give any information nor is it said in a constructive or useful way. It’s aggressively negative for no good reason. The second one is saying the same as the first, just in a much nicer way. And the third one, the person asked for advice, but it was about Munchkin, not about Scythe or whatever the person’s favorite game again.

It falls into the same lines as the other example above and reasoning as to why those are not good responses. Let’s say that you really don’t like Munchkin, what is a better response?

Newbie: “I’m thinking about getting Munchkin, is it a good game?”

Person in Hobby: “I’m not a big fan of Munchkin, I don’t like how much take that there is in it. If your group likes that sort of thing though, it’d probably work for you.”

The big difference, it’s a nicely stated that the person doesn’t like the game. They only talk about the game the person asked about. And they gave a reason why they don’t like it. I even wrapped it up with an encouraging thing clarifying that for some people the game will work.

One final example that I see often as well:

Newbie: “I’m just getting into the hobby. I have Catan, Ticket to Ride, Munchkin, and Exploding Kittens, what game do you think I’d like?”

Person in Hobby: “Those games suck.”

Person 2 in Hobby: “I remember when I liked those games.”

Person 3 in Hobby: “Scythe”

Again, it’s fairly easy to see what is wrong with these. They are very negative, two don’t answer the question and they tell the person they are doing it wrong. At least the first two do, the third one is just Scythe again. And it might seem like I’m picking Scythe, but honestly it’s one I see a lot of people use, I could also say my favorite game as well, Gloomhaven. But it’s also not useful to suggest massive games that the person would struggle with. It’s possibly less hurtful than the other two, but can push people away because it’ll make them feel inferior if they try a big game like Scythe or Gloomhaven and are overwhelmed by it because of what they have played before.

Then answering a question like this, think of it as stepping stones. You might want them to play Scythe, but that means you need to help get them there, taking the same steps that basically every gamer did from Classic Games to Modern Classics to Hobby Games to Scythe. If you need help with that, here’s a bit of a cheat sheet.

So what’s a better response?

Newbie: “I’m just getting into the hobby. I have Catan, Ticket to Ride, Munchkin, and Exploding Kittens, what game do you think I’d like?”

Person in Hobby: “Hmmm… I think that Five Tribes or Small World could be interesting for you.”

Person 2 in Hobby: “Good question, what do you like about those games? Something like Potion Explosion could be interesting, maybe if you like the set collecting and completing stuff parts of Catan and Ticket to Ride.”

Pretty easy to see how these are better. They give suggestions in line with or a bit more complex with that the person has played before. I think it’s always good to ask clarifying questions as well. The second person asks the general question of what is liked, but then gives a specific element of both Catan and Ticket to Ride, set collection in their reasoning. That sort of engagement makes the new person feel more involved in the hobby and in the group.

Go Forth and Grow the Fandom

Now, we are all going to slip up on this. I know that I do it from time to time as well. For me, it is something I intentionally don’t want to propagate throughout a hobby or a fandom that I love, this negative response. And I truly believe that most gamers, most fans, they want their hobby to grow. With that, I do believe there is a bit of letting go of your fandom or hobby just like you hold it. That can be hard, but when you can do that, your hobby and fandoms will grow. You will learn new things and see things in a new way, and it’ll strengthen your own joy in a fandom or hobby. I hope in the upcoming years we see more fans of board games grow and more fans of every fandom come into light and that we can all enjoy those similar things in our own way remembering that just because someone likes something a bit different than you, it doesn’t have a negative impact on your own joy.

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Back again last night with another game of Pandemic Legacy. How did it go this time? And what is happening in the world that is probably going to cause me to lose?

Pandemic Legacy is a Legacy game where you destroy components, add in new rules, and generally change up the board so that each person’s play through is unique. While all of that is going on, you’re still trying to cure a number of diseases so that the world isn’t wiped out. You can find more information on Board Game Geek.

Last nights malt was from Goose Island out of Chicago. It was the 312 Dry-Hopped. A good tasty summer beer where you can really tell that it’s dry hopped with the hop profile.

Bottoms up!

This was actually my first idea for the series, to tackle what Pacific Rim, the themed meal or at least themed snacks would look like. However, after a couple of early ideas, got a little bit stuck with it. But it’s time now to get my brain unstuck and see what I can come up with.

 Pacific Rim

Drinks: 

Blue Margarita

Jagermeister

Tropical Punch (Kool Aid)

The reason behind both of these drinks is that they are just fun. When you think of the Pacific Rim, you think of oceans, so we are going with drinks that have that sort of tropical feel to them. Tropical Punch just makes a lot of sense as a non-alcoholic option. And adding Blue Curacaco to a margarita just gives it a nice ocean feel. Plus, there is a lot of blue going on in Pacific Rim in terms of color choices. Finally there is Jagermeister, because Jaeger/Jager obviously. Less themed, but a fun play on words.

Appetizer:

Calamari

Now, the monsters aren’t technically squid monsters, but they come up out of the ocean. So to keep that water theme going, deep fried (or baked) Calamari bites makes a lot of sense. You get into the head space of being near the water, and a lot of people are going to think about squid as being from Japan.

Main Course:

Crab (or Salmon) Cakes

Coleslaw

This is where I had gotten stuck originally. The blue margarita and the calamari just made a ton of sense, but what would make good sense for a main course? So as I’ve been typing out this post, what I came up with was crab cakes. This plays towards the monsters which are sea creatures and often times have some sort of tough outside shell. Crabs are just their tiny baby cousins and they must be destroyed before they kill us all (or something like that). But crab can be a little bit more expensive than getting frozen salmon and thawing it out and using that. So if you want to stick to a slightly lower budget, crab can easily become salmon, or if you want to go to an even lower level than that, you can make fish cakes out of swai or tilapia. Cole slaw is going to give you something lighter to go along with this meal. Sure, fish and calamari aren’t very heavy, but the crab cakes are going to be fried and the calamari might be as well, so you’ll want a slaw in a light dressing to balance out the main course.

Dessert:

Popcorn Balls

Now, there isn’t a direct thematic correlation for this, other than in my head. When I think Pacific Rim, I think of something that is really shiny. The visuals are really good, and it just seems very flashy and bright. So I’m thinking not of caramel popcorn balls  (though that would make a decent light desert), but of ones that as kids we’d make for Valentine’s Day. Where you melt down red hot candies into sugar and some other stuff to make it into a caramel, but when you tossed the popcorn in it, and as the caramel hardened, it had a really cool shiny red color to it. So in my brain, that is why red hot popcorn balls makes a lot of sense. I’d also say that because it is a movie, you’re probably going to want some sort of popcorn, and this is fun way to change it up.

So, what do you think on this menu? I don’t know that it pulls you into the theme quite as much as the first, but I also do know that I really want to eat it (partially because it’s near my dinner time as I’m writing it and partially because it just sounds really good).

We have one final menu that will be coming out next week. This one came in through a suggestion on Twitter from @BeskarTom, he had a board game that I wasn’t familiar with “Race for the Galaxy” but also suggested Dead of Winter, so I’m going to try and tackle that next, who doesn’t like theming a meal around a game where you could end up losing because you can’t feed the colony.

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