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Episode 236: Wait... Mira Grant is actually who?? image

Episode 236: Wait... Mira Grant is actually who??

Goblin Lore Podcast
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Welcome back to another episode of the Goblin Lore Podcast... and the return of Hobbes!! Today we have the honor of talking Duskmourn Story with Seanan McGuire who lo and behold is also Mira Grant!! This was an an exciting opportunity to have Seanan back to talk about the world that is Duskmourn. In last week's episode Taya and Alex dove into the story, here we are focused on the process and the design of this Horrorrery (it's a word) plane.


Remember to Check out of all of Seanan/Mira's work and also go over to her blog to read the DVD Extras for the Duskmourn Stories


We also finally have a Linktree with all of our discounts/resources

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As promised, we keep Mental Health Links available every episode. But For general Mental Health the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) has great resources for people struggling with mental health concerns as well as their families. We also want to draw attention to this article on stigma from NAMI's site.

If you’re thinking about suicide or just need someone to talk to right now, you can get support from any of the resources below.

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Opening and closing music by Wintergatan (@wintergatan). Logo art by Steven Raffael (@SteveRaffle)

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Transcript
00:00:03
Speaker
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00:00:09
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00:00:29
Speaker
Hello Podwalkers and welcome back to the Goblin Lore podcast and welcome back to me, HobbsQ. I am back recording. I have had my sabbatical, my break off to kind of just reassess my mental health and kind of see where things had been. Summer's been kind of rough in general, as is the last six months and Taya and Alex have been holding down the fort very well recording and getting out episodes and I am very excited to be back. um I was gonna be back last week just wasn't quite there yet and I'm just saying thankful that we were able to push off to today because I am excited to ah have Seanan McGuire back on the show. I was a little bit confused. I know that Seanan's like the number one
00:01:15
Speaker
Tyvar fan, I guess mainly you're wanting to hear I i guess we had you on because I don't know a lot of it what's been going on. And I'm guessing Taya set most of this up that we're having you on to kind of see how another author like Mira Grant handles characters such as Tyvar that are so important and close to you.
00:01:32
Speaker
Yeah, they let her write him and I was very miffed. Yeah. And that's I like, I don't know how much it's going to turn into that, but that's why I was I was had to be here. I saw your name and was like, OK, great. Tyvar connection. But beyond that, I was kind of confused. So mira and I have a long established rivalry. She keeps getting projects I want because somehow she's more horary. OK, more horror. Horror. Horror. read horia Yeah, that's a word now. I'm not sure. Yeah. Yeah.
00:02:02
Speaker
Um, there's at least five hours in it. Yeah, but yeah, so I am joking with people if you don't for some reason know Mira Grant is the ah pseudonym, the horror name of Seanan, uh, and all of the stories for Duskborn, including all of the side stories were written with that alias. So with that, that, that pseudonym for you. And then I, that's actually something I have questions about. I'm really, I'm excited to talk more with you about, but welcome back to the show. Um, I just had to introduce that way because I did not want to take a chance of missing out on a really good, horrible joke about that. And yeah.
00:02:46
Speaker
But I'm back, Taya. Now you're kind of regretting that, probably. No, not at all. And it's not like you were completely gone. You were doing our editing for us. You were still involved. I was. We did miss you on the show a lot, though. So I'm glad you're back. I'm i'm glad Seanan is back with us, too. Always enjoyed the episodes with her.
00:03:05
Speaker
ah So I might as well introduce myself because Hobbs, I don't think you actually introduced yourself. So I'll, I'll go. i I'm Taya. I'm Taya transcends on blue sky. Uh, and we're going to go with the same question that we used in last week's episode for Hobbs and Sean in the answer, because I ah thought it was a really good episode. You've already heard my answer. Uh, but what other than a person or pet would be used to lure you through a spooky doorway to an unknown plane?
00:03:37
Speaker
So Hobbs, do you want to take that first? Yeah, so um I'm Hobbs Q still found everywhere on the internet at Hobbs Q. And ah mom my pronouns are he him. And this one for me is actually pretty easy.
00:03:51
Speaker
It would be the Lego Ewok Village set. Oh, I knew it would be a Lego set. i Yeah. It's a retired Lego set. It's specifically the one that is the Ewok Village. I love both Ewoks and I love trees. I love building giant Lego trees. They're so much fun. You might be the first person I've ever had admit that they like Ewoks. You know, there's like a line. There's like a specific year where I think that there are people who love Ewoks and people who don't.
00:04:22
Speaker
So and I am I am a fan of those little furballs and so cannibal furballs cannibal furballs. I also just love them is that I think they make great minifigs. So we do have a couple of them for minifigs. And I basically turned the big tree house that Lego made into my own little like Endor. So it has a Darth Vader on the swing outside of it. It has Luke Skywalker hanging out with his dad. And I did get an Ewok and like hit it among the trees. But That would lure me into the house. That would that would pull me. All right, Seanan, if you want to introduce yourself more than Hobbes already did. Hi, I'm Seanan McGuire, also known as Mira Grant. As Seanan, I primarily write urban and modern fantasy and a lot of magic story. As Mira, I primarily write biomedical science fiction and the occasional terrifying tie in.
00:05:16
Speaker
And since Duskmorn was entirely our plane of horror, ah they decided it would be a good idea to invoke Meera. And you could lure me through a creepy doorway by having a creepy doorway. I will admit, I don't really have a lot of sense of self-preservation when it comes to things like storm drains, creepy doorways, um yeah bridges. I'd just be through that sucker before you had a chance to say, hey, Sean, and maybe no.
00:05:44
Speaker
I yeah yesterday went out with my camera to a building that I've been seeing in in Minneapolis, and I i was trying to find an easy way in without having to make too much effort.
00:05:57
Speaker
sarah I thought it was going to be a gen one My Little Pony you didn't have or a promo planeswalker card. you I would go through the door even faster for one of those but you don't need them. yeah You know it's kind of like when I was dating in high school I didn't understand what people were talking about when they said foreplay. You didn't need that you just needed boobs.
00:06:24
Speaker
I don't think I had a single high school relationship where the other person was dissatisfied because we didn't screw around before we got down to screwing around. I'm still in high school when it comes to creepy doors. is there new york Great. That's all you fucking needed. Let's go. but Have you have either of you been to the the Winchester mystery home?
00:06:45
Speaker
Yes, quite a few times. Okay, my my dad and I when when we went on a tour that my mom kept rolling our eyes because we kept trying every door we passed to try to find ones that were unlocked that was in like the areas they didn't take you in. So yeah, yeah. the I like your answer. It's fantastic. I would like to change mine. Yeah. creep to ourficionados let's go yeah Very tie bar of you. What was yours, Taz? So mine was, uh, the first thing was I'm too lazy and scared to go through the creepy door, so I'm going to hire someone to do it for me. Uh, but it would have to be some kind of like magic rarity or super rare artist proof or something like that to okay get my attention. Okay. How rare. How rare ever an artist proof are we talking?
00:07:39
Speaker
Like, Beta with the, uh, sketch or, uh, painting on the back. Yeah, it'd have to be. Okay. We're talking. That's pretty serious. Okay. You actually would take a lot to lure your hired help through the door. Yeah. I am definitely the Niv-Mizzet in this story. I am.
00:08:00
Speaker
Uh, as I said last week is I'm going to, um, send my students to do it for me. And then I'm just going to put my name on the paper the same way it works in academia.
00:08:13
Speaker
Sorry, my brain went down the Disney trail there with Raya, Raya, the last dragon who makes that a joke. So yeah. Well, let's talk all things. Well, dusk one. I'm so excited that we're finally here.
00:08:30
Speaker
Uh, yeah, and I guess we can start with the the the beginning, and I think you already mentioned it, but this story was a perfect fit for Mira. Did Wizards approach you specifically as Mira to write this story? Uh, no. Roy approached me as Seanan and then asked if I would be okay with it being a Mira thing.
00:08:48
Speaker
Because the fun thing about Mira Grant, like the really exciting thing is that she doesn't exist. You can't actually approach her to do things because she's not there. She has no forwarding address. What she has is me. And the the distinct possibility that I will say no, she doesn't get to have all the fun and demand to take over a project.
00:09:09
Speaker
um In this case, it was a good fit and also I had just done the murders at Karloff Manner's story. So it seemed like a way to not on paper look like I was writing more than I technically really should. ah I mean, except for the fact that as soon as the story came out,
00:09:28
Speaker
Oh yeah, no. there there is no here There is never any real pretense with Meera that she is anything other than me. Her website redirects to mine. Her Wikipedia page is me. like We all know. But remember that computers are phenomenally stupid.
00:09:48
Speaker
the entire I'm serious. The entire reason I became Meera Grant in the first place, it's really useful for marketing purposes. But also, my first book came out in September of 2009, and it was a fairly standard urban fantasy. um My third book, because of the way that publishing works, came out in May of 2010, and it was a hard science fiction zombie political thriller that we pitched as Night of the Living Dead Meets the West Wing. And both that one called, that one's feed, F-E-E-D.
00:10:24
Speaker
um And the thing about bookstores, about book ordering, is that bookstores base their orders off the lap the sales of the last book by that author. So your debut novel will almost always have better orders than anything else because they don't have any data to compare it to. And the people who published Feed did not want to risk Rosemary and Rue failing and tanking their debut science fiction author before they even had a chance.
00:10:54
Speaker
So Have a pseudonym was pretty much a condition of publishing feed because that way they would be able to get the debut author orders rather than being tied to the sales of an urban fantasy author. Now I got very lucky and my urban fantasy was solid enough to stand out from the pack, but by that point Mira had already been created.
00:11:15
Speaker
And she is a marketing tool, but she's also there because computers are stupid. So it doesn't matter how the next Seanan McGuire book performs if there's a Mira Grant book coming, because the computer only looks at Mira's track record.
00:11:31
Speaker
Well, if there was any chance that someone was gonna go, hey, we already had a main story set by this lady this year, when they put Duskborn into the system, the system is stupid. The computer just, oh, we regret, she's a completely new person. Yeah, sure, go ahead.
00:11:47
Speaker
if
00:11:53
Speaker
So would you- That's a fascinating look behind- Oh, sorry. The publishing industry. Yeah. it was Was that your plan from day one that you were going to publish different types of work under different names? This is getting a little bit away from magic story, but I will answer because you asked me um if you've ever read much Stephen King when you're reading his autobiographical stuff. He talks about the publishing industry as being a wife who only wants to put out once a year when he is an eternally horny teenage boy.
00:12:27
Speaker
And that is my publishing story as well. I write between six and nine books a year. ah Just about every year to every other, we are adding a book to my this hasn't been published yet stack as sort of a if I get hit by a truck, my my estate can pull a VC Andrews and just keep publishing friends. I do write faster than we can publish things.
00:12:52
Speaker
So I actually did kind of want a pseudonym because I knew from reading Stephen King's stuff that if I didn't have one, I was going to get speed limited. I was going to get the you didn't pay for a business DSL line at your home sucks to suck. And now I'm putting out two books a year and I want to die.
00:13:10
Speaker
That's awesome. so I mean, yeah, I know it's way a field of magic, but this this the use of pseudonyms in writing, and it's funny that you went to Stephen King because that was my first kind of my first experience with really learning about one, was with Richard Bachman. And so, yeah, so I was just kind of curious so this that just the use of it is always something I find very interesting. It is fascinating. And pseudonyms, you know you really do influence a lot about how people look at a work.
00:13:39
Speaker
As Seanan, as like I said, I'm primarily modern and urban fantasy, so people come into a Seanan book with different expectations. ah Really, the entire purpose of Mira is at this point the same as when Disney bought Touchstone pictures. and They didn't do that because they needed Touchstone. They did it so that no one would ever have to utter the sentence, Walt Disney presents reservoir dogs. It's all about creating those marketing categories and making sure that people have the right expectations going in.
00:14:13
Speaker
Even people who really like your work, if their expectations are set incorrectly, can come away dissatisfied. If I invite you to my house and say that I'm making lasagna, and then when you get here, what I've got is a risotto, even if it's the world's tastiest risotto, and you're just thrilled, you're going to be a little disappointed, because I promised you lasagna. Do you think that there, like how how quickly were you were you tagged by people after this story dropped?
00:14:42
Speaker
You mean the Duskmorn story? Yeah. Oh, very quickly. um There are readers of mine who have followed me over to Magic Story, which is fantastic, and I genuinely appreciate every single one of them. um But they already knew that I was Mira?
00:14:59
Speaker
And in fact, you can find some of them. I generally will swing by the Reddit, yeah the Vortos subreddit at least once when story starts dropping just to see if people are reacting. I don't even necessarily care if they're reacting positively because by that point I've already gotten paid. What I care about is...
00:15:18
Speaker
Are they invested enough to be reacting at all? And when I swung by, I saw a couple of people going, haha, I was so large brained. I said that we should have Mira Grant write the Duskmorn story. And look, here she is. As if it were difficult to get me to write anything. Yeah. So and this is what kind of goes into it is Duskmorn has a very different tone from your past stories. so Did you approach the writing this differently?
00:15:46
Speaker
I mean, yes and no. I approached it very differently because it's 80s style horror rather than being um fantasy. You know, Duskmorn is absolutely the horror plane. It's the 80s horror plane, which is a very specific vibe. Yeah. you Very different from Innistrad. Very different from Innistrad. And so you're going for that vibe and you're going for that feeling of 80s horror.
00:16:15
Speaker
A lot of people I think either forget or don't realize that I grew up in the fanfic minds. That is where I began my writing. That is where I learned how to write a cohorent coherent story. um All of that. And part of, for me, part of doing good fanfic was always matching the tone and the the feeling of the setting and trying to blend as much as possible. And I know that's not required and that for a lot of people that's not the fun thing, but for me the fun was always how much can I seem
00:16:55
Speaker
like I am part of the canon. How much can I blend? ah So for this it's very different not because I approached the writing differently but because the genre and the setting were so different that I had to approach them differently. While bringing in these known cast of characters. but Well bringing in this known cast of characters and also while working way harder than I think is evident in the final work and i'm I'm honestly proud of that because it means I did my job right but working very very hard to still feel like magic. Like I am intensely ridiculously proud of the opening of the first story where it's describing a suburb
00:17:37
Speaker
because why the hell am I describing a suburb? This is supposed to be Magic the Gathering, but that is what Duskmorn looked like before the house ate it. And so I had to try to describe what is gonna be very recognizable to a modern reader as a suburb without using any of the suburby words. Yeah. Yeah, I heard you talk about this on Tap Tap Concede. It was, ah and then, you know, once I heard you say it, I'm like, oh yeah, you did that. That's exactly what you did.
00:18:07
Speaker
See, my 80s horror brain, as soon as the opening line started, that's exactly where I went, right? Like, I i went straight to a suburb, even without the language or any of it. My my brain was thinking of cookie cutter houses that are in a row and, you know, that it was just this very interesting thing with the creepy house up on the hill. Yeah, you're picturing Nightmare on Elm Street and you're picturing Edward Scissorhands and Beetlejuice.
00:18:35
Speaker
You're like, what are the movies that I had down on my list of things to bring up? Yeah, uh-huh. you know And that was really, really challenging and something that part of why I don't actually hang out on like the Reddit sub forums, I just check to see that engagement is happening and then I get the heck out of there, um is is because people do forget that the authors are humans and we have feelings.
00:19:02
Speaker
um And we're also being told what to do most of the time by our bosses at Wizards, by the people that actually you know control the IP. And I knew no one was going to be happy about a suburb in Magic, and I was very right about that. For the most part, all of the responses I've seen have been people going, what the bleep? This is terrible. um They like the writing, but they don't like the existence of the suburb.
00:19:25
Speaker
And I feel for them, but please be proud of the artistry with which I crafted a suburb and didn't break your fictional universe. Like, come on, give me a second here. Yeah. Hang on a basic level, you know, there's there's very distinct monsters in Duskmorn, especially across the different regions. What is your favorite Duskmorn monster?
00:19:48
Speaker
Are we counting the Beasties as monsters? I wasn't really counting them as monsters, but Beasties are very cool. So... Beasties are absolutely constructs of Duskmorn. They don't exist outside the house. And within the house they are. They just generally don't kill you. Nope. They they generally don't kill you. ah You kind of have to provoke it in some way, though, because they are inhuman intelligences, provoking it may not always come in a form that you can recognize before it's too late.
00:20:18
Speaker
um But if we're gonna leave the beasties out because they're not monsters. They're they're just friends ah Probably my favorite of the actual dust corn monsters are the wicker folk They are absolutely terrible and and as I saw someone point out. There's no reason they should be hostile Because they don't have feelings anymore They're just constructs of wood and wicker. Why are they so hostile? And the answer is that, like the Beasties, in their own way, they are trying to protect you. Because if they make you into one of them, the house can't hurt you anymore. Now, the process of transformation is intensely painful, but whatever. When it's over, you'll be rid of all that pesky flesh. And I just kind of like things that manage to be horribly monstrous and destructive.
00:21:08
Speaker
with the very best of intentions. Yeah, that's really cool. And I do like the Beasties. they're They're adorable little characters. And the idea that there is stuff in the house that's not trying to kill you of was nice too. From of the house, but not. And I mean it really had that feel of like everything that had been created by the house. You had to have everything, right? So the house would end up being responsible for it.
00:21:35
Speaker
um I think of the side stories, that was actually my favorite, was the one about the Beasties ah for that reason. I am pretty sure that wound up being everybody's favorite. um I'm very partial to it, though I'm also extremely partial to Dead End and the Choose Your Own Adventure. Yeah. I didn't have the passkey for the two Choose Your Own Adventure until today, so I have not gotten to choose my own adventure yet.
00:22:04
Speaker
ah My brother did the chooser and adventure and thanked me for making sure that his most likely course of action would not result in horrifying death. ah That a very good sister. I didn't do it for you, but you're welcome. Oh yeah, i I died a lot reading that one. I think we all did.
00:22:27
Speaker
Yeah. I'm expecting to, but that's because I'm, I just read it today. I, I had, uh, seen it, didn't have the passcode and forgot to go back and do it once I got the passcode. Uh, and yeah, it was fun. I enjoyed it a lot. I'm good. It's really cool to see some interactive pieces story.
00:22:47
Speaker
Yeah, and i that's not my favorite because I think it's necessarily the best writing wise. I do think it's pretty solid, but because it took me three times as long as any of the other side stories, I had to triple check all of the routes to make sure that they got where I wanted them to and we didn't have any unintentional dead ends. Well, to me, it's just um I think what I really enjoyed about the side stories, since we're kind of on those for um for a moment and we're talking about them being used in the place of more general world building, which i is stuff that I'm glad that we get. And especially but this being the first time that we've gotten one author doing all of it. And I think that that is a big a big deal when it comes from a world building perspective was the different chapters had different flavors of horror ah in terms of what type of book they were. So when I got to the end and realized with the Pascy, once I got it in and saw that it was a choose your own adventure, like 10 year old me was just
00:23:45
Speaker
Gideon jumping up and down because that would have been, you know, one of the areas that I also explored my early getting to to enjoy horror. um Well, outside of my dad showing me horror films, probably way too young that I should not have been watching. Reading wise, the two joint ventures were a way for me to explore that. Yeah.
00:24:05
Speaker
And since Hobbs mentioned it, I'm going to jump to a later question I had on the list, which is, as far as I know, you're the first person to ever write all the main set and side set stories. Like, did you just start writing and not stop for Duskmorn? Pretty much, yeah. Like, you're still writing for it? Right on going. I'm still writing Duskmorn. It's going to be a trilogy in five years. um Not really. I cannot make any promises on the part of one of the ghosts. Please don't hit me, Roy.
00:24:35
Speaker
I know, I know, I have no chill. um But yeah, no, it it was the first time that we've let somebody write all of the main and all of the side. I don't know if it's going to be allowed to happen again. um You know, it was just it worked out in this case. ah But it doesn't mean that there was a huge amount of extra budget, which is also part of why the side stories are all about half the length of a normal story.
00:25:00
Speaker
um Again, back to Seanan wanders around the internet a lot and people forget that she's there. I did see someone complaining. We had more side stories for this set than I think we've had for any other since March of the Machine. I saw someone complaining about, oh, well, we got side stories, but they were still short. Side stories shouldn't be secondary. um Actually, yes, they should. That's what side means. ah But the thing we do have to remember as Vorthos is that magic story is a rounding error.
00:25:30
Speaker
You know, we are we are not a huge part of the budget. We are coming out of this tiny little pool. And in order to say to Wizards that we want more, we want more side stories, we want more main story, all of that, we need to keep engaging and clicking on the links.
00:25:46
Speaker
Yeah, I reminded everybody about that in last week's episode as well. It's like, you know, good. go Go listen to the story on YouTube. Listen to it on the audio thing. Click the links. Just you know let them know that we want more story. I mean, it's it's a little bit like Netflix, although I am less terrified of being canceled tomorrow in that they are looking to see what gets engagement. And if what's getting engagement is having more side stories, they're going to keep expanding the side story budget.
00:26:16
Speaker
ah Now, if that doesn't get any engagement at all, it's a waste of resources. Yeah, I mean, it's something we we've talked about before, right? Like we've gotten in, we're getting more story actually than than we had previously. I mean, if we will go back far enough to novels and stuff, but I'm saying within the last couple of years, story has been getting ah a much bigger place. Vortho stuff in general has been getting world building has been getting a bigger place. That only happens if people keep engaging.
00:26:45
Speaker
Exactly. And I know it looks like you here's this multi-billion dollar in international company. They don't need my click to so to do the thing, but they kind of do because if you don't give them feedback, they stop. And I can't blame them for that, even though them stopping would mean I'd have to stop. And again, I have no chill. You don't want me to have that much nervous energy or free time.
00:27:10
Speaker
Did you get to choose any of the strike team or the supporting characters like I'm a not to? No, ah you pretty much never do because card design happens and is finalized long before they bring the authors in. ah So as a general rule, the the authors who are brought in to do story will be told, okay, you are writing the strike team to Phyrexia and here's who's going with you. And you don't really have an opportunity to say, hey,
00:27:42
Speaker
Could we maybe not take likes to bond to giant monsters to the plane of giant infectious monsters? That is already finalized before the story team comes in. yeah um so And I kind of wish it weren't because we could point out a lot of the the fallacies with things like taking dude who bonds to giant monsters to the plane of giant monsters. But it is as it is, and it can make for some really fun challenges. Every team I've written, um every time I've written Magic Story, whether it was a team or not, there's been at least one character in the mix that I would not necessarily have chosen chosen to write for. Choosen, that's a word now. um I would not necessarily have chosen to write for that I have wound up just absolutely loving, and they're one of my favorites now.
00:28:31
Speaker
nice Yeah, I appreciated getting some story for Amanatu for the first time, you know, since she was introduced five years ago. Yeah, I don't think she's ever actually shown up in Magic Story before. She was in comics, but they're non-canonical. Yeah. And I think she had a blurb when her card actually came out. Yeah, that's all we got. We got a blurb about her. Yeah.
00:28:55
Speaker
With that, I'm gonna jump ahead to one of our listener questions because it kind of fits in here, which was ah so from cilantro lad, one of our friends in the the discord wanted to know. so So if you were choosing your own strike team for yourself that you were going to be part of, who would you want to have a on that to venture in? And then more importantly, who would you want to be trapped alongside when the house split the party?
00:29:21
Speaker
I mean, if I'm going to wind up in Duskmorn, I am dead in about five minutes, so it really doesn't matter who I want to have with me. I am not a planeswalker, and I have a back injury. So all the plane really needs to do is shift slightly, dump me on my ass, and I am a sitting duck.
00:29:38
Speaker
ah You know, so who am I going to choose to be on that strike team with me? Well, first off, whoever volunteered me for the strike team, because I know it wasn't me. yeah So their ass is coming to. Yeah, pretty much. yeah If I'm going to die, you're going to die with me. Yeah. Ajani, because he is a fantastic healer and maybe he could fix my back injury before the house ate me and I'd have half a chance. ah Probably not. But at least it would be something worth trying. And and we're not forgiving up yet.
00:30:10
Speaker
um I think Ajani would hate the house. He would hate everything about it. It is antithetical yeah to his existence. But we're not asking who would I take with me into Duskmorn for a nice time. We're asking who would I take with me into Duskmorn if I have been apparently volunteered to go into Hell House. Thank you so much. um Yeah, I got voluntold here.
00:30:33
Speaker
I mean, you did say earlier, it would be pretty easy to lure you into spooky doors. Oh, it would be super easy to lure in, but if there's a strike team involved, then there's no luring. There's, I have been volunteered. I go in Valskmorn, and fuck you. I guess Valskmorn, and we're sending a strike team to retrieve me.
00:30:57
Speaker
I would like Tyvar because he is the only person whose day is not ruined by going into Duskmoor. He is just having a lovely, lovely time. yeah Good for him. He can bring Garak with him because I think Garak needs some enrichment for his enclosure and he would also enjoy all the punchy punchy. Also, we would then get to find out where Garak is. He's in Duskmoor, obviously. yeah I kept looking for him.
00:31:26
Speaker
Not Yuri, because she is terrifying, and also she would hate everything about being there. She would hate it so much that she would find a way to speedrun the house. okay if yeah yeah And half the house is made out of things she can actively control. So basically, Duskmourne's like, I am your god. And here he's just going, nope, thud. I mean, there's a reason the Zendikar door was blocked off.
00:31:49
Speaker
ah nothing yeah like The house does not want anything to do with Zendikar or Nahiri. It is not happy about anything that is going on here. This is all terrible. Screw you. And then Niv Mizzet. Let's make the big lizard deal with some shit for once.
00:32:12
Speaker
He's so lazy. I mean, he would kill you. yeah He's busy being the Living Guild Pact, but also he is a millennia old giant elder dragon. He doesn't see the need to make an effort for anything. And why should he really?
00:32:38
Speaker
So I guess the other half is if you did end up somehow with the group and they got split. I would stick with um either a Johnny, because he could keep putting me back together after I got taken apart by Duskmorn, which would not be fun, and I would not be having my best day, but at least I'd have legs again. ah Or again, Tyvar, because he's having his best day, and that way I can watch someone who is having their best day and know that my utter screaming demise was not for nothing.
00:33:09
Speaker
<unk>
00:33:12
Speaker
Speaking of Tyvar, did they make you put a vest on him? Yes, they did. Well, OK, but what about the fanny pack? I have no idea about the fanny pack. I don't know where he got it. I don't know why he put it on. OK, because I thought it was a good idea.
00:33:32
Speaker
I really wanted it to be the like that you you insisted that Tyvar, at some point over the last couple of years, have insisted if we ever see Tyvar again, I think he would have a fanny pack. Except I really don't.
00:33:50
Speaker
I do wish I had been able to see his hard art before I finalized the story, just because he would have loved to hit somebody with a baseball bat. Oh, yeah, for sure. Yes. And he doesn't get to do that in story because I didn't know that having a baseball bat was an option. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. oh But yeah, no. So I didn't think you'd put a best on Tyvar voluntarily.
00:34:16
Speaker
No. He did take it off as soon as possible though. He did. That is true. Yeah. I also just love that that was the the reason he was it was it'll make him blend in. his right I appreciate that we found a reason for it rather than it just being oops, we got to match the card art. Yeah. I love it. I like it just such as like, oh, yeah, this will work. Yeah. I am invisible now. Yeah. yeah It's some frickin shoes, my dude.
00:34:50
Speaker
ah Were the fate shifters there as an excuse to brutally murder everyone in gory detail without canonically killing them? Yes, absolutely. oh And what was your favorite fate shifted death? mike and i have I have like two parts to this one. yet My favorite fate shifted death was probably either the wanderer because she got the shock value. She got the oh you're going first and was very graphic or honestly Nico because Nico's death was so mundane.
00:35:21
Speaker
Yeah, Nico was my favorite. um Also because you had the, you know, last thoughts about going back to Theros or whatever. Yeah. Like that is something that's come up a couple times in in my part of Magic Story is where do planeswalker souls go when they die? And I don't think we have a canonical answer for that. But in my head, everything kind of plays by Wreck-It Ralph rules.
00:35:49
Speaker
You know, if you die off plane, you just kind of stick around and haunt wherever it is you died. We know that Elspeth saw Gideon in the underworld, but we don't know that she actually saw Gideon in the underworld. Yeah. I mean, her her mental reliability wasn't the greatest at that time because Ashyak was totally screwing with her. Exactly. So did she see Gideon or did she need hope? And yes, ma'am.
00:36:16
Speaker
Yes. Hello. Go away. and And that's where she ended up. I mean, when she died. So, I mean, we know that at least for her belief system, she didn't get moved anywhere. Yeah, she was still on theros. But but Nico was fun just for the mundanity of it all. um And then my favorite from a function. OK, could you stop?
00:36:41
Speaker
but but you love pets so this is Oh, my kitten is currently weaving around my feet and under my desk, chirping and sticking claws in my thigh. I was about to say, have you been stabbed? Yes. Now I am holding her and she is taking up all of my hands. I have no hands left, only Kelpie.
00:37:04
Speaker
Yes, baby girl. Now you can rub your head on all the things on Mother's desk. Can Mother go back to talking about Magic the Gathering, please? You'll consider it, okay. um So I really liked the functionality of Tyvar's death because everybody else died and went, whoa, shit, better not do what I just did. And Tyvar died and went, oh, I was half a beat behind on that rhythm game. I better just adjust slightly and go again.
00:37:29
Speaker
yeah That's, that's Tyvar though. That is. Hi baby. Can I put you down? No. Okay. I'm waiting on you. I'm covered in cat. Okay. I just wanted to make sure you weren't still dealing with cat. Um, so one thing I liked or at least, um, appreciated was we're still seeing a lot of reactions to the followed invasion. Like Tyvar is running with the body horror paintings and Simone meeting her completed Dean and Kaido punching Jace. ah You know, beside just the ability to open doors, Dustborn is feeding quite well right now, isn't it? Duskmorn has a lot to eat. as So Duskmorn is, in a weird way, just another way of saying Valdovoth. Because Valdovoth, the demon at the center of the plane, created the plane. The whole thing is his cocoon. And what he feeds on is fear.
00:38:30
Speaker
he That's the reason that when he transformed everything else, including some of the survivors, he kept a bunch of survivors as people, as you know kind of humans. It's so he could eat. They are his grocery store. And once we dump this once we dump our group in, Kaito and the Wanderer and everybody, Valdovov has all these fresh, delicious new fears. He is eating well.
00:38:57
Speaker
Yeah. And do ah and just the the awareness that he does not need his own pets anymore. Yeah. He doesn't have the farmer any longer. Yeah. no um yeah you You know, you mentioned the the the the feeding off of fears. It did. So as I was kind of going through this, and I know that this one is theoretically in the past, but it's much more of a story ah about stealing of joy and those type of emotions, which I guess feeding on fear is a similar idea.
00:39:25
Speaker
But I didn't know it did any Clive Barker come into this any thief of always or oh, that's more is 100% the thief of always. Okay, I like that one. I it's one of my favorite books. Um, and I actually like as reading I was literally like I had windows up on the thief of always looking at it. So Yeah, welcome to the house of hall to the holiday house. yeah And I did actually call that out in my DVD extras as one of the influences on the way that the house was approached and written. um Because it is always aware of you, it always knows what you are doing, but because it's a house, it's a little slow and creaky sometimes. It can't always stop you at the speed that it wants to. yeah It has to send its emissaries to try and stop you when you're doing something it doesn't like.
00:40:14
Speaker
okay So that, okay, so that, um I mean, the the house, the idea of, like you said, it being a cocoon for valga, valga, bra? Valga Voth. Valga Voth is a great big moth. Valga Moth. Oh, wow. Okay. I love this. um Yeah, the math the moth imagery in general, both in card art and in the story was fantastic. um Yeah. But um just that idea that the house being that lame thing that extended out. um I did want to know. It's like it's I mean, I'm automatically as soon as we get to the finish or say, well, where does it go from here? ah This this is the first time in a while that we've had sets both from a mechanical standpoint and from stories and points that I've really wanted block structure kind of back in some ways. um Because there's from from a gameplay perspective, a lot of cool new mechanics
00:41:13
Speaker
I think we're explored here and and kind of got introduced here and knowing, especially like the concept of rooms and opening and closing doors to- Yeah. Manifold has the red is distressingly fun to play against.
00:41:28
Speaker
ah My favorite is still the fact that that there is- Which just does manifest red, yes. right um Yeah, so it it's that interesting thing that it's a, as you were saying, kind of the joke about writing the sequels and stuff and haven't stopped writing. did This was the first set, this Bloomborough, and and it could just be that the the influences behind them gel with me a lot more, really had me wishing almost for like a block structure or return to some sort of structure.
00:41:56
Speaker
Well, I think, and this is entirely me, I have no forward knowledge and I'm not saying anything that's going to make Wizards shut down your podcast or eat me for breakfast. ah But I think that leaving Valdovov for right now is a good thing because he is a fantastic future enemy.
00:42:14
Speaker
You know, for right now, he's just getting hold of the Omen Baths. He's just figuring out what he can do. But how much is he gonna go hunting? You know, how much is he gonna start to pull from other planes? Even if he's not interested in becoming other planes? yeah Which he might be. um And we know at the end of the story, he also has possession of loot. So that that's gonna go well, I'm sure.
00:42:41
Speaker
ah You know, I know you can't really talk about future story, but ah I'm definitely excited to see where that leads because I'm assuming that something with loot is going to have to be resolved in the short term due to though it's ah ah his importance to the overall arc. But ah yeah, I'm interesting that that that's where the story ended ah with that bit. He doesn't seem to understand why loot is important, though. Yeah.
00:43:10
Speaker
which is honestly a best case scenario.
00:43:18
Speaker
Thank you for punching Jace in the face. I do appreciate that. I really don't think that Valdovov went fishing for loot on purpose. I feel like Jace and Raska were just taking loot to the zoo or something. And they stepped into an omen path that Valdovov had just seized and got stuck.
00:43:39
Speaker
So this is not, Jace is a bad parent and this is not, Valgavath has some great grand plan involving eating Lut's brains. It's just well shit. The interpass was closed. So I'm actually going to bet that maybe what could have happened just because it's like a strike team type situation but that actually this is probably Malcolm and Breach's fault, is is the bad uncles. That's fair. I could support it being Malcolm and Breach's fault. Yeah.
00:44:04
Speaker
Like they're, they're the ones that are going to take loot to some sketchy carnival and follow the door way, way quicker. That is true. But yes. Um, it it was interesting. I did have some people going, well, why would Kaito punch Jason in the nose? And it's the last time things were really bad. Yeah. It's kind of a thanks with his fists dude.
00:44:31
Speaker
Like he's not as bad as Tyvar. Jace is lucky he didn't initially run into Tyvar, except that Tyvar doesn't really know how to hold a grudge. He'd just be like, ah, friend Jace, you have returned. And then it would be Jace complaining about his bruised ribs rather than his positive nose. But, yeah. And Tyvar deserved, not Tyvar. Kaito deserves a little nose breaking. As a treat. Yeah, definitely. He's been working real hard.
00:45:01
Speaker
And he has a rough life. ah You know, speaking of, you know, Tyvar though real quickly, like Zomone and Tyvar made a great odd couple and did lead to the best line in the story that behold the power of math lying. And I'm just like, can we get more of Tyvar hanging out with nerds on Strixhaven? I'd be in.
00:45:27
Speaker
I just think the main reason not to let me have that is that my greatest weakness as a writer um is that I really just want to let the characters hang out and talk to each other. That's the thing that's fun to write. That's where they are happy. That's where no one's dead. And if you let me put Tyvar and Rutha in the same room, ah there is no word count in this world that can stop me.
00:45:52
Speaker
yeah but Like I'm going to blow past my word count by a factor of so much that Ray ray is just going to, Roy is just going to shake his head and frown at me.
00:46:06
Speaker
Oh, I would love to see them interact too. that would be Here's your, here's your novel. Yeah, exactly. Like I got bored and this happened. Yeah. Cool. Cool. Oh.
00:46:24
Speaker
ah um ah Killing Tomio for a second time hurts. Like, is Nashi allowed to have anything nice? So if it had been up to me, Tomio would not have existed to be killed a second time. Because, and and I say this as someone who is in literal trauma therapy for grieving over someone that has left me, hanging on to an echo of the person that is not and can never be the person,
00:46:54
Speaker
is not healthy. You're never going to get better. tre is I'm sorry. Nothing. go ahead I was going to tell you that one of the things that I really appreciated was your handling of of this in some ways, letting go fully for Nashi. That that he was having to make that decision to leave his his mother in the blind eternities where he would want her.
00:47:22
Speaker
But from a, you know, it's I know you just mentioned being in the trauma therapy and and stuff like that and and and dealing with grief and loss. To me, this one felt like a ah great way for us to get to see that from Nashi. Yeah. Actually having to make an intentional decision that he's going to leave his mother behind is the goal, right? I mean, that is not, I mean, you leave behind is a not the word I mean, in the sense of like, not forget or not still think about or not still care about, but Yeah, he needs to be able to to live and be able to move on beyond. Yeah. So it's not that Nashi can't have anything nice. It's that Nashi really needed to be able to let go in order to start healing. That makes a lot of sense. Otherwise, he was just going to wind up turning into a weird shut-in who did whatever it is he does during the day and then went home to his dead mom at night. And he'd never get to grow up or move on.
00:48:19
Speaker
yeah that's a All really good points. um But also kicking the little rat boy is fun. Yeah. and that That took a different tone right there. Yeah, that was good. I mean, some characters, you do I do want to help them heal. I want i want trauma therapy for for former planeswalkers. Oh, all planeswalkers need trauma therapy. That is true. The omen pass allow it. We know Pha Bean is just sitting there on Nuka Pena waiting
00:48:50
Speaker
Yeah, just saying for being will take everybody. That's true. I'm trying to convince them that I should be able to to set up a therapy lounge on Kaldheim.
00:49:01
Speaker
thank yeah and We're just going to send our traumatized planeswalkers to spend a couple of days with Tybar punching stuff yeah and hanging out in the sauna and they will feel much better.
00:49:14
Speaker
um Now, Tyvar also has some issues he needs to work through, but hasn't been because that's less fun than punching dudes. um It is always fascinating to me when people say that there are no after effects from the Phyrexian invasion. and I'm over here being like, I have written 150,000 words of after effects this year. Yeah. here um I think that to I think we finally have seen people come around to this idea that the after effects don't have to be death.
00:49:44
Speaker
right, that there are lots of things besides death that signal changes and significant changes in the story. And I think we're i think we're seeing that as the stories have gone on. I think i've I've heard less of that. And that is good. Yeah. So um you confirmed in the DVD extras that Winter's Door went to Innistrad. Was this just a ah sick trick of Belgovoth to send them there of all places?
00:50:13
Speaker
Yes. Also, right now, Vagavath still has a limited Rolodex for planes.
00:50:21
Speaker
So he knows about, ah we know he knows about Innistrad, he knows about Ravnica and Kamigawa. Apart from that, he apparently now knows about Kaldheim and Strixhaven based on the doors that Zimon and Tybar saw. But we don't know how many worlds he learned about from Tamio while he had her.
00:50:40
Speaker
And apart from that, he really doesn't, he doesn't just have open access to the whole multiverse. This is not Realm Breaker 2.0. So yes, he was sending Winter to Innistrad as the most unpleasant place he had access to. ah If he had had access to more, I honestly think he'd have been sending him to Ulgrotha. Oh, yeah. Yeah, that would be worse.
00:51:05
Speaker
That would be worse, yeah. Or possibly because winter is winter to Bloomboro. You know, ready to get the afternoon hugs time and winter would just be going, I want to go home. We go back to Duskmoor, my God. Community, friendship, no. I want to know, you know, if we had the crossover between Innistrad and Duskmoor, who would be more horrified?
00:51:34
Speaker
What direction would that horror really go? You know, the people on Innistrad, would they just be like, okay, this is nothing new? or Or would the introduction of things like wicker people and horrors and razor can actually shake them out of some sort of just... I think that for the most part, the Innistradians would be more horrified because they are used to polite horror.
00:51:57
Speaker
yeah Which I know is a weird statement, but they are coming from that gothic ideology where horror does have rules and the vampires leave you alone during the day. So putting them in a place where the rules have been suspended, the only rule is welcome to the purge, they would be very unhappy. Now that that's said, magic has however unintentionally developed a secondary set of rules ah that I call the squirrel girl effect.
00:52:24
Speaker
which is basically that Jiralf and Jesus Asani can defeat anything through the power of arguing.
00:52:33
Speaker
They are Innistrad's greatest heroes. They are the squirrel girl of the Marvel universe. You know, they're unbeatable as long as they're fighting with each other. Yeah, which doesn't mean much. I was going to bring them up, but yeah, you already got it. If we drop them on Duskborn,
00:52:51
Speaker
They will find a way out of the house and they will free the rest of the Innistradis because they are Innistrad's greatest heroes. yeah No one has told them that yet. And as soon as they find out, they're going to be just absolutely fucking horrified.
00:53:10
Speaker
But I do believe that Jeesa and Jiralf would be able, through the fact that they have completely rewritten the rules around themselves, be able to just walk in, look around, go, yeah, no, this sucks, and walk out again.
00:53:28
Speaker
a ah That would be be lovely to see them show up in the next Sussman Worn set whenever that happens. ah We'll do some listener questions. ah Before we wrap up, and the ah so we had a couple from Halvar's bridge. Alon was just a quick video. Please tell me Dawn's proto pack was intentional. Yeah. I loved it.
00:53:56
Speaker
ah I guess this was how but how much of giving Tyvar depth beyond being a himbo ah with his kind of momentary lapses of more seriousness that we get to see from him a little bit here.
00:54:09
Speaker
was view versus kind of specific direction, if you're if you can. That was all me. um They do not give us that kind of micro level direction. They give us who the characters are. And if in the process of writing, we deviate too much, we write the character out of character, then they'll pull us back into line. But that that was entirely on me. Sorry.
00:54:35
Speaker
I mean, you don't I don't think you need to apologize. i i His insights were, I like to see the inside alongside the yeah smiley brash boy, so. e um I think you talked a little bit about this just with the ah lead time between like development story and then not getting to see the art and stuff like that. But it seemed like there was a disconnect between story with like the limited tech and um the things being driven with like like spirit type things and the cards which are full blown 80s or felt kind of significant and
00:55:13
Speaker
um Yeah, I did not see very much of the art. I had an early world guide and I had my editors working with me. um But magic is happening through so many hundreds of hands for every set that keeping everything completely harmonized is is pretty much impossible. We just do what we can. um I admit I actually like the the limited tech and kind of everything is falling apartness of the story.
00:55:43
Speaker
ah better than I like the full-blown oh no we have those shooters and salad spinners um of the cards but both are wonderful and I think they harmonize well enough together that you have to kind of be looking for them to mismatch to really find a lot of the spaces.
00:56:01
Speaker
I think this was an interesting set for me because there's been, you know and and Mark Rosewater spoke about this in his like state of the the union or is his is looking at things of people feeling that there was a little bit of leaning into tropes this year um and you know maybe even some comedy stuff that they felt could have been pulled back from, especially with cards. And it's funny because I knew we were going from there to the 80s horror plane, which hilariously would be the one that I would most want To have tropes, I mean, this is the screen there mentality of, you know, even if you're going to break the rules, you still have to follow the rules of of horror. And so it was just that that interesting piece to me that I was like, well, i hopefully we didn't do this before. Like we didn't start making huge changes in that area before leaving the 80s plane where we need one.
00:56:48
Speaker
I wanted tropes, more so than I have. Okay, so everything is tropes. You cannot tell a single story without tropes. The problem with the last couple sets has been references and vibes. Okay. Like everything is tropes. I actually got into an argument with Mark Rosewater on his blog about this. I'm like, you know, Mark, Mark, you're you're using the word wrong. References versus tropes, I guess. References versus tropes. Okay.
00:57:18
Speaker
Creepy children is a trope. It was originally really popularized by John Wyndham's 1957 novel, The Midwich Cuckoos. But creepy children in a wheat or cornfield is a reference to children of the corn. Yeah. And we got a card related to it. So the issue really has been more really on the nose references than tropes.
00:57:43
Speaker
ah But I am not Mark Rosewater and thus cannot wade that close to sounding really critical of the people I want to keep hiring me. Yeah it one Yeah, I'm actually the thing is that I guess even then the concept of a card called jump scare is Something that I am more okay within this world than I am with others, but that's just a personal a personal preference for what I'm looking for um from like card. art This is more to do with card names in particular and mechanics. Right. And that's the creative text team. Yeah. um I don't have anything at all to do with writing what cards are called or what text goes on cards or any of that. And we do talk to each other sometimes when we are able, but we are not always able to.
00:58:26
Speaker
um Well, I think we can wrap up with one last question from Coda as what is your color identity? Ooh. My color identity would I would like it to be red, blue, but I'm pretty sure it's green, blue. I'm way too chill to be full on. I'm glad this is the last question and we saved it for the end. Why are you going to argue with me?
00:58:51
Speaker
No, I, uh, green, blue is just my like, but but it is the color color. It's funny because that's the color combination I'm least aligned with. Uh, but I would have put, I put myself at more red, blue. So green, blue is just a hard one for me to sometimes wrap my mind around. yeah It's hard for me to wrap my head around mechanically, but in terms of what the color pie is supposed to represent, yeah I think that's where I would be. I would be much happier in red, blue. I like it when things explode, but that is sadly not my fate.
00:59:19
Speaker
Well, Seanan, it's been fantastic having you again. I know that you mentioned with the DVD extras, is that the main place that you did put kind of some of the like primary influences in terms of just maybe what either text slash movies you did kind of have? All of the primary influences for the stuff that I brought to desk more and rather than the stuff that was brought and delivered to me have been explicated on my blog as the DVD extras series that I did.
00:59:47
Speaker
Uh, and that is at least all in one place. So, you know, convenient. Um, and if you can spell my name, either of my names really, but mostly the Shawnan one, if you can spell my name, you can find me on the internet. I never really shut up. Um, I am most accessible for questions and weirdnesses via either Tumblr or by sending an email through my website.
01:00:13
Speaker
And I was going to say, we will look link to that. The DVD extras has been such a um an amazing addition to ah the story piece, getting those additional insights that you are able to provide. So I admit I started doing them solely because I wanted to drive more people to clicking on the story and was trying to get my readers engaged. So cool it worked. Life is good. um Thank you so much for having me. Is there anything you want to plug for your upcoming book releases or anything?
01:00:42
Speaker
I just had a book come out. And for once, for once in my life, I have no more books this year. Oh, oh on the one hand terrible. On the other hand, I'm going to get my taxes done before the extension on the extension. and Oh, what book was that that just came out? The book that just came out was What If Wanda Maximoff and Peter Parker Were Siblings, yes Marvel Publishing, and it is a what if novel. I mean, yeah, fairly blatantly from that title. um It's been in my Amazon like wish list. ah I also would like a full spider Gwen slash go spider novel but someday. Yes, that would be lovely. Also, maybe if there was a book people would stop calling her spider Gwen because that has never been her code name. Yeah, it's we have a kid.
01:01:39
Speaker
named Gwen. You lean into what she has been known woman before she started being more actively in 616 and got renamed to Ghost Spider to avoid confusion with Jessica Drew. Yes, it was the it was when they first had the the it was because of the covers, right? Like the initial run of it was all Spider Gwen and then the hilarious list of Oh, right. She would never go by Spider Gwen, given that that name would make zero sense. And you would be able to figure out who she is.
01:02:09
Speaker
Yeah, now that doesn't really help with code names very much. Now, on a cute related tangent, though, my younger daughter named Freya gets really jealous that there is a Gwen character, her sister's name, and she now points at the screen and says Spider Freya. So my household. Yeah, it is Spider Gwen and Spider Freya. Okay.
01:02:33
Speaker
And that's our show for today. You can find all of the hosts on Twitter for now. Hobbs can be found at HobbsQ, Tay can be found at Tayatransends, and Alex can be found at Mel underscore Chronicler. Feel free to send us any questions, comments, thoughts, hopes, and dreams to the Goblin Lore Pod on Twitter, or email us at goblinlorepodcast at gmail dot.com.
01:02:55
Speaker
If you would like to support your friendly neighborhood Gobslugs, our link tree can be found on our Twitter account and in the description of today's show. This has everything from various discount codes to the link from our Patreon. The music for today's show was by Wintergotten, who can be found at vintergotten at bandcamp.com. The art was done by Steven Raphael, who can be found at stevereffel on Twitter. Gob and Lore is proud to be presented by Hipsters on the Coast as part of their growing forthos content.
01:03:23
Speaker
Check them out on Twitter at hipsters MTG or online at hipstersofthecoast.com. Thank you for listening and remember goblins like snowflakes are only dangerous in numbers.