Live at the Table 71: Locked Room Murder Mystery Pt. 1
Transcriber: Jay [jay8235]
Introduction        1
Game Overview        9
Set-Up        13
Meet the Suspects        20
Name the Suspects        55
Break; the Lead Up        72
Introduction
Jack: Welcome to Friends at the Table, an actual play podcast focused on smart characterization, critical world building, and fun interaction between your good friends, between your good friends. I am your host today, Jack de Quidt, and this is a Live at the Table, except it's not actually live, this is live to tape—
Sylvi [interrupting]: We’re doing audio logs. 
Jack: We're doing audio logs. It's going out, hopefully, on New Year's Day. Um, I spent my New Year's evening at the swankiest party, and at midnight I kissed a stranger. 
Sylvi [background]: Wow!
Jack: I'm joined by Keith J. Carberry. How did you spend your New Year's Eve?
Keith: Um, I got lost wandering the expansive streets of Providence, Rhode Island, uh, and found a locked door that opened only for me to find a party for one already set up.
Jack: Wow, what was in it? How is it a party for one? Is it just things you like?
Keith: It had all the accoutrement of a party, but no one else was there. 
Jack: Were you afraid of the poison possibility? 
Keith: [pause] Not until you said that.
Jack: Okay. Well, maybe it's a slow acting poison, or we're podcasting with a ghost. Also joining us, Sylvi Bullet!
Sylvi: Hey! For my New Year's, I was working, I was once again inside the New Year's ball at Times Square, running on the, the—
Keith: Are you why it goes so slow?
[group laughter]
Sylvi: Listen, dude, they got me on a hamster wheel in there, it’s manual, this is a very old contraption—
Jack: I see. Are you—
Sylvi: It’s very cramped, so like, be nice to me! This is all, I have to put up with this every year, every year.
Jack: Every year.
Keith [interrupting]: How many times has someone said that they heard about the ball dropping before they actually saw it, and when they saw it, it was the most disappointing thing they've ever seen in their life?
Sylvi: I don't know but they're hurting my feelings. I'm trying!
Keith [talking over Sylvi]: I’m sorry. Sorry—
Sylvi: I can only run so fast.
Jack: They should make the ball go down with alacrity.
Keith: It should be, it should be fully gravitational.
Sylvi: [crosstalk] I’ve been—
Jack: [crosstalk] It should just go whoomph.
Sylvi: I've been pushing for this for years. I’ve been like, “can I just get a lever to flip?” and they keep saying “run”. They keep telling me to run.
Keith: They should drop it from a plane, and it should take 10 seconds and it should land in the middle of Times Square.
Sylvi: I agree, let's bomb New York every New Year's. 
Jack: Well, now hang on. Um… [drawn out]
[Sylvi laughing]
Jack: This is a Live at the Table, which means that we are playing a game, um, mostly unedited. I'm going to clip out breaks that we take and stuff, this is the advantage of live to tape. Also, if you're listening to this on the podcast feed, you are hearing a very lightly edited version. Um, if you are unfamiliar with Live at the Tables, uh, they tend to be a little looser than general Friends at the Table stuff. Uh, this is where we got things like—God, was America's Playground a Live at the Table, that was not, right? That was—
Sylvi: No.
Jack: That was just Bluff City.
Sylvi: The Live at the Table that I think of a lot lately, is I think maybe one of the more recent ones we've done because it’s been a minute, is the uh, was it Unincorporated, Keith, was that the game we played?
Jack: Oh yeah!
Sylvi: [cross talk] With the supermarket?
Keith: [cross talk] Yeah, with the supermarket… and Bluff Zoo.
Jack: Oh, and Bluff Zoo.
Sylvi: Bluff Zoo was also live, yeah, that's a good show. I always think of that as a Bluff City canon, but it was a Live at the Table. There's a whole playlist of these on our YouTube channel, by the way.
Jack: Yeah, and we've sort of, um, we trailed off making them for a while. The last year, in terms of like the amount of Friends at the Table that we are making and the intricacy involved got fairly intense.
Sylvi: It kind of doubled.
Jack: Yeah. We sort of thought making Realis would be a bit like making Bluff City, but Realis is so peculiar and intricate that what it actually ended up feeling like was making two full seasons simultaneously. Um—
Sylvi: And then also we've got the two other shows too, on top of it.
Jack: Yeah, but we're gonna try and do some more of this. We're gonna try and get back to it. It's not a thing that we're gonna set like a schedule for, like a viewer facing schedule for.
Sylvi: My apologies, yeah. 
Jack: But over the course of 2026, we'd like to get back to more of these. 
Keith: Yeah, my big issue is that for the last year and a half or two years, I've been like, we should do more Live at the Table, but also I don't want to host it, so it's not, it doesn't help push the ball forward.
Jack: The ball.
Sylvi: [laughing] Someone should do something about this but not me. 
Keith: [repeating] Someone should do something about this, not me. Yes, exactly, it's not.
Jack: Today we are going to be playing the Locked Room Murder Mystery Game, a game by Adam Bell with cover art by Sasha Lee. This game is an ashcan, so it is sort of in playtesting, so you can get it for free at LockedRoomGame.com. We’re playing on a very fancy Miro board that was uh, set up by uh, Adam, and we are also going to be using playingcards.io to draw a tableau of playing cards.
Sylvi: Good word, tableau.
Keith: Thank God for tableaus.
Sylvi: French really cooked with that one.
Jack: I love a locked room murder mystery. 
Sylvi: Oh yeah.
Jack: I love it so much. And at the same time, whenever one happens, I feel the same kind of pang that I feel when I remember that because magic isn't real, magic tricks often have very prosaic uh, outcomes where like, you know, in a locked room, assuming that magic doesn't exist, there are only a few possible ways. You know, it's either the room wasn't locked, the person was in the room already, it was a slow acting poison, etc. But nevertheless, every single time I'm drawn back to them.
Sylvi: You should jump into the Ace Attorney series. They, they get some, they could put some stank on their locked room murder mysteries now and then.
Jack: Um, on the off chance that you, the viewer/listener, are not familiar with the particular conceit of a locked room murder mystery, Sylvi, could you explain what it is?
Sylvi: Yeah, I mean, it, it's kind of in the name, right? It's, uh it's basically, it's a trope within detective fiction. I think like, Sherlock Holmes even had one. Right? Was maybe the originator, even? Or, oh no, sorry, I'm looking it up now. The Murders in the Rue Morgue was the—
Jack: [interrupting] Was that our dear friend Edgar?
Sylvi: —was considered the first locked room mystery. That was our dear friend Edgar. Um, but basically a locked room murder mystery is a mystery wherein someone is killed and the room that they are killed in has been locked from, I believe, the inside, correct?
Jack: Yeah.
Sylvi: Um, and it's seemingly an impossible crime, like to. There's no clear way that the perpetrator entered and exited the, the room. I feel like I remember like [pause] there's like a lot of riddles related around this. There's one about like melting ice and stuff like that, but I mostly just think of it as, um, [pause] someone, someone did some shenanigans to get someone dead…
Jack: In a way that seems impossible. [crosstalk] 
Sylvi: It really is—
Keith: [crosstalk] I feel like—
Sylvi: [crosstalk] You described it as a magic trick and now I'm like trying to figure out a way to describe it other than a magic trick. And I can't [Jack laughing] because it really is the sort of like it's a sleight of hand murder mystery in a lot of ways.
Keith: I think the visual trope of it that's most common in like, American fiction these days is the dinner party murder mystery.
Jack: In what way?
Keith: Uh, I just think like, someone suddenly dies in the middle of a dinner party.
Jack: Does that count as a locked room? I'm not sure.
Keith: I think the house is the locked room. It's a bigger space.
Jack: Oh, I see, sure. Yeah. At that point you're like, well, it must have been one of us. That's I suppose, a kind of locked room mystery.
Keith: Yeah, yeah. And so I was like, oh, everyone here at the table, we are the suspects. You know, that's—
Jack: [crosstalk] It could be.
Keith: It could be any of us
Jack: It could be any of us. Um [drawn out] This is a game where we are going to be assembling a gang of—
Keith: [interrupting] Is The Thing a locked room murder mystery?
Jack: Is The Thing a locked room murder mystery?
Sylvi: No… I don’t—
Jack: And the lock is the ice.
Keith: Yeah, that no one could get in or out of the compound because of the ice.
Jack: [thoughtful] Yeah. I don't know. But I do want to watch The Thing again.
Sylvi: Yeah. Oh, it’s the perfect time of year for it.
Jack: It is the perfect time of year for it. They should—
Sylvi: I watched that last year during a blizzard with my little brother, who had never seen it. 
Jack: Oh, wow!
Sylvi: Incredible time. Incredible time.
Jack: If you want to see weird, gooey nightmares, boy, do I have a movie for you.
Sylvi: Does our friend, Mr. Carpenter, have a flick for you!
Jack: Does he? John Carpenter really loves to put gooey nightmares in many of his movies, but The Thing is the gooiest, I feel. [pause] Um, alright—
Keith: You can also watch that one episode of Ghost Rider where that weird gum man comes to life. 
Jack: Are there any gooey guys in the X-Files?
Keith: Oh yeah, oh yeah.
Jack: Oh yeah, the Fluke is pretty gooey, right?
Sylvi: [crosstalk] Jack doesn’t know about the Flukeman. Yeah, I was about to say!
Keith: Oh, have you seen the Fluke yet?
Jack: No, but I know about the Fluke from uh, cultural osmosis.
Keith: Okay.
Sylvi: Classic.
Keith: We’ve talked about the Fluke but not directly.
Sylvi: Have you… it’s pretty early in the show but the guy who can like, slip through—
Jack: That’s like episode three.
Keith: That’s episode one or two.
Sylvi: He’s also a slimy guy. He’s also a very slimy guy.
Keith: He’s also only one of like, three or four repeat—
Sylvi: Eugene Tooms, that’s his name.
Jack: Yeah…
Sylvi: Great, great villain.
Game Overview
[00:09:30]
Jack: He's gonna come back. Um, but for now, I am going to take us over. We should play the game. I'm gonna take us over to the game overview here in the rules. If we go to the game overview tab, let's go ahead and just talk these through. Um, I will read this game overview page, and then someone else should read the—We can skip key terms because I think it'll come up. Someone else should… Eh, we should read key terms.
Sylvi: This is on the, not on the Miro but on the—
Jack: This is in the rules themselves, yeah. [reading] Using these rules, the rules to this game are designed to be read aloud as you progress through the game. Each of the categories in the sidebar represents a new phase of the game. When you start a new phase of the game go over all of the rules pages contained within and then begin play. When that phase ends, move to the next one and go over its rules. Then: Flow of the game. The locked room murder mystery game follows a set structure inspired by the general formula of golden age detective novels. One: Meet the suspects. In this phase, we'll choose a case file. These are essentially like fiasco style, sort of like packets of information and mix and match the building blocks of suspects provided until we have a whole cast of characters, each as likely to be murdered as they are to be a murderer. Each suspect will go on its own card and arranged in a grid in the journal. This grid, which looks very fancy and kind of sci fi, honestly, this combination of like uh, rounded squares and things.
Sylvi: Oh yeah, a little bit.
Jack: [reading] Two: The lead up. We'll take turns drawing cards and writing chapters, that is to say, playing scenes that progress the story forward. Each chapter adds a clue to the journal that will be critically important later, if only our suspects knew how to interpret them. During this phase, a game piece called the Killer will move around between the different suspect cards in the journal. [stops reading] This is something I find fascinating and I'm so curious to see how this game handles, which is that we are finding clues before the murder has happened. So we are sort of painting the target around the arrow in a kind of way, which I think is probably how the game is going to try and generate a mystery in that like we're putting down clues before we start drawing the clues together. [reading] Three: The locked room murder. Once the cards drawn in the lead up form a full house, that is to say a pair and a three of a kind, the suspect whose card the killer rests on is found murdered in a locked room and our mystery begins. We'll determine where they're found and add clues from the scene using the cards we drew and the case file we're playing with. Four: The investigation. We’ll once again draw cards and write more chapters, as the game piece called the Sleuth begins its dance across the journal. This represents a great detective slowly unraveling the case, updating the clues as they investigate the way each one links to the suspects around it. The Killer will continue moving through the journal as well and will imperil our suspects and potentially enact plots against their lives. Five: The summation. Once the cards drawn in the investigation form a full house, the suspect the Killer rests on at that point is revealed to be the culprit. In the summation, we'll tie together the clues to the newly revealed identity of the culprit, emulating the parlor room scene where all secrets are revealed. At that point, the game is over. Okay, let's do the key terms quickly because as we get through the rules, they'll keep coming up and I think it's worth saying. Keith, do you want to read this one?
Keith: Sure. [reading] Chapter: The basic unit of play. A scene dictated by a player on their turn to drive the story forward. Journal: The grid of dry erase cards containing all of the suspects and clues important to the case. Suspect: A character with a card in the journal. Each suspect can turn out to be the culprit and/or the victim. Clue: A piece of evidence on a card in the journal, can be physical evidence, a conversation someone had, the weather or anything else that pertains to the case. Question: The space in the journal between a suspect and a clue. The Sleuth moves between questions. Killer: The game piece in the journal that represents the influence of the murderer. Sleuth: The game piece in the journal that represents the influence of the detective once the investigation begins. Culprit: The murderer as determined at the end of the investigation and proven during the summation. Victim: The murdered character discovered at the end of the lead up. Tableau: The reference board for the current phase that stores the playing cards already drawn this round. These should be arranged by rank for easy reference. Rot: The twisted secret at the heart of the case. Peril: A token placed on suspects by the killer during the investigation. Plot: An attempted murder that may happen when adding a second Peril to a suspect. Case File: A playset that includes a character table, causes of death and crime scene clues.
Jack: Okay. 
Sylvi: Hell yeah.
Jack: Alright. Sylvi, do you want to read the introduction?
Sylvi: Sure. [reading] The story we are about to tell is one of mystery, murder, rumors, and disgrace. It's a convoluted tale of a detective in search of the who, how, and why of the most impossible type of crime: the locked room murder. With the victim of the crime found dead behind. Or sorry, I added dead there. With the victim of the crime found behind closed and locked doors, the killer's escape from the room is as much of a mystery as their identity. While attempting to untangle the web of evidence and deception surrounding the case, our sleuth will uncover the twisted and troubling rot at the core of anything. Inspired by detective novels like the Mystery of the Yellow Room, Murder on the Orient Express and the Honjin Murders, our story and the mystery it revolves around will unravel as we play the game. We'll first learn all the relevant characters, each of whom may be a suspect. We'll play out and describe scenes, called Chapters, as we trace the events leading up to the murder, and then continue writing chapters of our detective, collecting clues from the crime scene and the secrets of all of the people involved, slowly putting the pieces of the puzzle together in their mind. As players and authors, we won't necessarily know how these pieces fit when we discover them, but we'll finally see the truth when the detective dramatically welcomes all involved to the summation exercise. This format allows us to be dramatic, with our chapters layering in clues and tidbits and theatrics without knowing exactly how it will connect in the end. We may know that Alfred briefed his wife and son about some clandestine plot in the limo ride to the gala, but not what sort of plot he had in mind. Perhaps you'll get a glimpse of Mr. Willard finding a threatening note that was slipped under the door of his study, but we don't yet know who authored it.
Jack: Okay, game setup. This obviously varies based on if you're playing online or in person. Because we are playing online, we are using a Miro board. Miro, since I last played, has bought into AI in a big way [Sylvi: Booooo!] and it can go fuck itself as far as I'm concerned. Nevertheless, here we are. That is what it is to exist on the Internet in 2026. I can say 2026, because although it's 2025 when we're recording, uh, yesterday. I kissed a stranger at midnight. 
Sylvi: [laughter] I was a big ball.
Jack: We're also using playingcards.io to draw cards for our tableau. Who is, who is, I can see another person's mouse in here, but I can't see two. I think Keith is not in playingcards.io yet.
Keith: Oh, let me see. Sorry, is that not, that is not a thing that's built into Miro?
Jack: [laughing] No.
Keith: I have to go to… Okay. I didn't understand that. I thought that was like a, like a VST.
Jack: [laughing] A Miro VST. Okay, stack the tableau boards next to the play area. That's these. Place the—
Keith: [interrupting] Alright, what’s the room code?
Jack: Oh, the room code is VTUT8S.
[pause]
Sylvi: Vee-tates.
Jack: Vita tates.
Keith: Vita tates. And a Vita tates to you.
Sylvi: And a Vita tates to you!
Set-Up
[00:17:53]
Jack: And a Vita Tates to you on this cold January day. [Sylvi laughing] [reading] Shuffle the playing cards and place them in the indicated spot on the tableau. Remember, the deck is 20 cards, ace to five in four suits. So we are playing with a dramatically reduced deck to make getting a full house much more likely, but kind of like paced, so we get some time before it. Set the peril tokens aside, as they won't be needed until the investigation begins. The peril tokens are here and look very scary.
Sylvi: [fake scared] Whoaaa!
Jack: [reading] Make sure everyone has access to a way to write on cards. You can just click on any of these things and they are text boxes that you can fill in like this.
Keith: Where are the tokens?
Jack: The peril tokens are to the left of the journal.
Keith: Oh, okay. Oh, right. Okay. Gotcha.
Jack: Okay. [reading] Create the journal by laying down the clue and suspect cards into a five by five grid in the journal. Alternate clues and suspects in a checkerboard pattern with clues in the center and corner spots. [stops reading] Adam has already done this nicely for us. [reading] Choose a case file. There are four case files included in the game. More will be available later, or you can write your own. You can find the four included case files in the sidebar after the rules. [stops reading] The four included on the website are: Murder on a Train. Everyone loves a good train murder. Our suspects are all passengers aboard some long distance train and unfortunately, one of them is going to end up dead. Huckleberry's Art Lodge. Pinky Huckleberry has a world renowned art collection that nobody in the world ever gets to see, until now. Our suspects are all invited to a lodge in the middle of the woods to view this prized gallery that some art critics have called a collection you could truly die for. Death at a Podcast Convention. The podcasters are meeting up in Latrobe, PA to discuss their craft but tensions quickly begin to rise. That Wears a Crown. It's a royal court scenario, and the king is going to be the suspect that gets murdered. But who will untangle the mystery and tame the chaos the king's murder will surely inflict upon the realm? We've talked this over before we started, and we think we're going to do an art mystery.
Sylvi: Mm-hm. Mm-hm.
Keith: In honor of Art Martinez-Tebbel.
Jack: Yeah.
Sylvi: Our good friend.
Jack: In honor of our good friend Arthur Martinez-Tebbel, who is not really a mystery to me [pause] in the sense that all people are mysteries, I suppose. But I don't think—
Sylvi: [interrupting] Jack's got him figured out. 
Jack: I don't think of him as a particularly mysterious person.
Keith: Jack also says that every time we play a game with Art, Jack says, “I've got you figured out.”
Jack: Yeah. We tend to cut it just because I've said it so many times now.
Sylvi: It's starting to feel intimidating, honestly.
Jack: The rest of the cast is like, yeah, yeah, yeah. Um. All of these look really cool. Even the podcast convention one, which we immediately ruled out because we were like, we're podcasters. We're not gonna do this, but it does look really neat. As such, let's scroll down to the pitch for Huckleberry's Art Lodge. Keith, could you read this pitch here?
Keith: Sure, Hubert “Pinky” Huckleberry is a reclusive, rich freak with one of the most sought after art collections in the world. It's rare that even Pinky's closest associates get the opportunity to see these coveted pieces. 36 days before our story starts, a seemingly random cast of characters receives an envelope containing a picture of a plane, a date, time, and GPS coordinates that seemed to be in the middle of Beaverhead Deer Lodge National Forest. A private jet awaits at those coordinates that will take them to Huckleberry's Lodge where a gallery has been arranged of the most valuable art of Pinky's collection. Add Pinky Huckleberry to the journal before beginning.
Jack: Incredible. Okay. I believe that he's going to get added into the center in a second. [Sylvi: Probably.] Although we will wait and see. Let me make sure. Which is the one that gets added into the center?
[long pause]
Sylvi: I love—I'm looking at the tables here. Do you want me to read out some of the tables while we, you look us up or…?
Jack: No, I'm ready. The cause of death is going to get added to the—
Sylvi: The “How does the detective get involved?” for this is really funny. Just looking at some of the—
Jack: [interrupting] Yeah, some of these are really good [Sylvi: [crosstalk] The options.] Also. Picture of a plane, a date, a time, and GPS coordinates. If I was a rich weirdo, I think I would. I would take a plane to the GPS coordinates and then I would be really. I'd be really awkward to find that there was a plane waiting for me. [Keith: [laughter]] You know?
Keith: I think, you know, plane to a plane. I think that's something that a rich weirdo would do.
Jack: Yeah. [stuttering] My embarrassment would quickly fade because I would be used to this kind of shit.
Keith: Maybe you'd grumble like “I just would have taken the plane all the way to the right place.”
Jack: So let's put Pinky Huckleberry in one of these suspect slots. We can put him in any suspect slot, I believe. So I am going to put him up here. [pause] Pinky Huckleberry, he rests there.
Keith: And there he will remain.
Jack: And there he will remain. Let's see. Let's go back to the game setup here.
Keith: Suspect table or… Where are we now? [crosstalk] Oh we’re going to read these to lead up.
Jack: [crosstalk] Oh, we're gonna read the file and read the pitch out loud. [reading] Make sure everyone has access to it. They should display well enough on your phones. Choose a detective. The full game will have illustrated detective cards for you to choose from. But until then, just have a conversation about who your detective is. Pull up some reference images until you get a feel for whoever is going to be solving the case.
Sylvi: Wow, Jack, I believe you have an answer to this question.
[Jack laughs]
Jack: Many years ago, during a New Year's Live at the Table, Ali and I created English French. An idiot detective who only works on the time between New Year's Eve and New Year's Day. He is part of a group of business, business people who are only active at that time for one reason or another. And I think, much like Hercule Poirot, we don't quite know yet why English French is involved with this case. But in the same way that, you know, Poirot shows up on the Orient Express, or Poirot shows up in the town when the strange murder of Roger Ackroyd is about to happen, I think English French is on his way. I think he was previously described as a short man, and I'm not sure that we went much further than that. I think he has mustachios. I think he has a beard.
Sylvi: Okay.
Jack: I don't know what he's been doing. But we have shared ownership over the detective. This is not a game where one player takes on the role of the detective. We are going to be playing the detective and the sort of spirit of the killer throughout.
Sylvi: We are all English French tonight.
Jack: We are all English French tonight.
Sylvi: We are all Montreal tonight.
[group laughter]
Jack: That was his call sign when he was in the army. A new fact about English French has been revealed. He was in the army at some point.
Sylvi: Which army? We'll never tell.
Jack: Oh, Keith. I think English French has a bit of a Monsieur Hulot vibe.
Keith: Okay.
Jack: From uh, the Jacques Tati. Excellent series of Jacques Tati. 
Keith: The Jacques Tati’verse.
Jack: The uncle in question. He is the uncle, right, Keith?
Keith: The… the uncle?
Jack: One of the Tati movies is called like, Stories with My Uncle, and I don't remember if—
Keith: [crosstalk] Yeah it’s called Mon Oncle.
Jack: [crosstalk] I haven’t seen that one.
Sylvi: Literally.
Jack: Okay, so we're gonna begin with Meet the Suspects. Sylvi, do you want to read this?
Sylvi: Sure. Let me just get back off this Jacques Tati tab.
Keith: He would be an uncle, though.
Jack: He seems like an uncle.
Keith: Yeah.
Sylvi: Okay. Oh. [reading] The player who last read a detective novel goes first. Players will take turns drawing cards and updating suspects until all 20 cards of the deck have been drawn. Place and then meet the suspect's tableau at the top of the journal. Make sure everyone has access to the suspect table of the chosen case file. [stops reading] Am I, Should I keep reading all the way through? [Jack: Yeah, yeah, go ahead.] [reading] Draw a card and update a suspect. Draw a card from the top of the Deck. Find that card's corresponding row in the case files’ Meet the Suspects’ tableau (the reference word labeled meet the suspects) and read the three options aloud. Choose either the trait, description or relationship and write it on an available space in the journal. Each suspect can have one trait and one description. Suspects share relationships with diagonally adjacent suspects, which means suspects can have up to four relationships depending on their position in the journal. You can collaborate with the other players, but you have final say on what gets chosen when it's your turn. Relationships are written on the diagonally adjacent corners of two cards. For example, if the relationship is parent and child, write “parent of” on the corner of one card and “child of” on the corner of the other. If there are still cards in the deck, the next player takes their turn. When the deck is empty, name the suspects. And: name the suspects. Continue in turn. Order each turn. Add a name to any unnamed suspect with at least one detail written on them. Give a brief description of them and introduce them to the story by showing how they are involved with the starting situation and any suspects that have already been named. Once all suspect cards with at least one detail have been named and introduced, move on to the lead up. Read the rules for the journal before beginning. [Jack: Okay.] Oh, designer notes: some of the suspect cards will likely be blank at the end of this phase. That's okay.
Jack: Yeah. Alright, so let's go over to who read a detective novel last?
Sylvi: Well, I need to ask whether visual novels count.
Jack: I think they absolutely do, unless you feel differently, Keith? 
Keith: No.
Sylvi: Then I think I am currently reading one.
Jack: Oh, well then. Okay. Sylvi is going to go first. I think—
Sylvi: [interrupting] Shoutout to Jake Hunter on the 3DS.
[laughter]
Jack: [crosstalk] Is that the—
Keith: [crosstalk] He hunts Jakes?
Sylvi: No. So his name is actually. What's the Japanese? I think it's. It's Saburo… Jinguju Saburo? It's a long running Japanese like, mystery adventure game series like dating back to the 80s. And the only couple that got translated were on the DS and 3DS and they're, they're fun. I'm figuring out what happened to a woman who was working at an embassy and then suddenly went missing.
Jack: Whoa, whoa. What do you think happened to her?
Sylvi: There is some… smuggling seems to be implied? So I think some organized crime in this city got to her.
Jack: Yeah. Yeah. As they often do.
Sylvi: Yeah. Frequent cases. Yeah.
Jack: Keith, did you read a detective novel recently?
Keith: Not even close.
Jack: Okay, then I'll go next because I, I also have not read one recently, but I read, I read And Then There Were None like last year.
Keith: What about a man who's trying to detect something about himself?
Jack: Whoa, Keith, are you just describing social realism?
Keith: [laughter] No, I'm actually. I'm describing sci fi.
Jack: Are you reading the Japer?
Keith: I read, I, so I was, I was just, like, looking at the list of books I read on my E-reader, and one of the more recent ones was The Man Who Japed, which does involve a guy trying to figure out why he committed a strange crime.
Sylvi: That guy who dressed like a bat knocked him in a vat of acid. [laughter]
Jack: Did he definitely commit a strange crime, Keith? Because that might—
Keith: [interrupting] He definitely committed a strange crime.
Jack: Oh, fuck. Okay, Keith is. Keith goes after Sylvi, and I go last, and then we rotate.
Sylvi: Okay, okay. 
Meet the Suspects
[00:29:55]
Jack: Alright. Sylvi, do you want to draw a card from the top of the deck and we will see? Just. Oh, yeah, you can hit Deal, but—
Sylvi: But should I hit—
Jack: You can also just get fun with it too. I didn't even realize you could pick those up.
Sylvi: Yeah, that seems like the most fun part of it.
Keith: By the way, Man Who Japed really short read if anybody—
Sylvi: Wait, can you guys see that, or do I have to put that out there?
Jack: No, we can see it.
Sylvi: Okay. Ace of diamonds.
Jack: Okay, let's see. Huckleberry's Art Lodge.
Sylvi: Yeah, let me get to this [crosstalk] suspect table.
Jack: [crosstalk] Ace of diamonds. Oh, wow.
Sylvi: Contest winner. Ooh, okay, wait, no, sorry. Let me read all three of these, because there's description, relationship, traits. Description, contest winner. Relationships, moneymaker and disgruntled house spouse. Or, traits, pompous.
Keith: Which. Which page, by the way, are the, is the table on?
Jack: Suspects table under Huckleberry's Art Lodge.
Keith: Great.
Sylvi: I am really leaning towards pompous here, if I'm being honest.
Jack: A nice, simple one. [chuckle]
Sylvi: If you two, well. Cause, like, I know who we are, and I feel like having a pompous rich guy does make sense here.
Jack: Yeah.
Keith: I have got a pompous rich guy voice I'm dying to do.
Sylvi: So do we. Let's mark, let's, let's take pompous. I'll take pompous for this one.
Jack: Where are you gonna put it?
Sylvi: Now this is my question, because I'm still kind of figuring out. I'm still kind of trying to get my head around the placement stuff.
Jack: You can put it anywhere.
Sylvi: Anywhere. Okay. It's not, doesn't have to be, like, closer to the diamond on the table up here?
Jack: What do you mean, closer to the diamond?
Sylvi: Well, when I look at—
Keith: [crosstalk] There's suits in the four corners.
Jack: Oh, no no no no, that's just about how the killer is gonna move.
Sylvi: Right. Okay. [thinking sounds] I think, I don't want this—I like the idea of this being someone who's a little separated from Pinky Huckleberry. [Non verbal agreement from Jack and Keith] So maybe you see if you go diagonal right twice.
Jack: Yeah. Down here, yeah.
Sylvi: Yeah. I'm gonna just fill in pompous in the trait.
Jack: Yeah. 
Sylvi: That is so tiny. That text is so tiny.
Jack: If you just click in the box you should get—You don't need to make a new text box. They're already pre.
Keith: It’s pre boxed.
Jack: It’s pre boxed.
Sylvi: Oh, beautiful. Oh, it's Mac and cheese. I get you.
Jack: It's pre boxed. I nearly had that for lunch today, and instead I had sardines on toast. The most toastable fish.
Sylvi: [approving] Ohhhh. I went for brunch with my wife. It was very nice.
Jack: Oh, nice. That's one of the reasons they invented brunch and wives.
Keith: I love tinned fish. [Sylvi: [crosstalk, responding to Jack] That’s true!] I think that sardines are overrepresented among the fish that people eat tinned.
Jack: They might be overrepresented in the ocean.
Sylvi: Okay. Do I have other stuff I need to do here?
Jack: No. Now it is Keith's turn.
Sylvi: Cool. I wasn't sure. Right, names come after all this.
Jack: Yeah, yeah, yeah. 
Keith: I will draw… How do I flip? Just click it?
Sylvi: Yeah. I just double clicked.
Keith and Jack: A two of hearts.
Keith: That is a classics professor, business rivals, or full of envy.
Sylvi: These are really good. [Jack: [crosstalk] These are really good.] I love a good table.
Keith: I love a good table.
Jack: Yeah.
Sylvi: I love looking stuff up on a table.
Jack: Yeah, me too.
Keith: I'm gonna, I'm gonna do… This is what I'm gonna do. Right between Pinky Huckleberry and the unnamed undescribed pompous person. I'm going to put business rivals.
Sylvi: Nice.
Jack: So. Oh, no, wait. So hang on. Those are relationships, so they go in the corners. You have to say who is rivals with whom. This is like fiasco style.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Keith: Wait. Okay. Describe to me what I'm doing wrong.
Sylvi: [crosstalk]So do you want to—
Jack: [crosstalk] Do you see these—Oh, you go Sylvi.
Sylvi: I was just gonna say, you see the corner slots here?
Keith: Oh, oh, I understand. I thought that this was a, the relation—Oh, the relationship is not the description because it's also in the middle. Yes, I understand.
Sylvi: Yes. The relationship goes in the corner with… a good way to think of it that I've started trying to internalize is the point. The way the corner of the box points is the direction of the relationship.
Jack: Oh, yeah.
Keith: I'm gonna put a line here…
Sylvi: Because, like, the lines on it just make it feel like little arrows. And—
Keith: There we go. How does that—? Yeah, I totally see it now. I didn't even notice that those boxes were.
Jack: This is a business rival with Pinky Huckleberry?
Keith: Yes.
Jack: Oh, hell yeah.
Keith: Who knows the pompous character.
Sylvi: Who knows?
Keith: Who may know. Who may know the pompous character.
Jack: Well that sucks, hang on. [laughing]
Keith: You can. You can do a lot. Yeah.
Jack: Excellent. Well we already have a, um…
Keith: Connection?
Jack: A connection. Yeah, because we don't know Pinky Huckleberry is going to be the person who's murdered. I just realized this. [Sylvi: [crosstalk] No, we don’t.] Pinky Huckleberry is. I thought he was like a Mr. Boddy Cluedo situation where he was the victim, but we don't know that that's true.
Keith: He may be.
Jack: He may be. Alright. [Sylvi: Maybe.] I'm going to draw a card. And I have drawn the five of hearts.
Keith: Here’s a question.
Sylvi: Oh my god.
Keith: And we can cut this. [Sylvi laughs] What did you draw?
Sylvi: Five of hearts is really good.
Jack: Five of hearts is really good.
Keith: Oh wow. Woooow.
Jack: What’s your question that we can cut, Keith?
Keith: Can the detective be the murderer?
Sylvi: I don't think so.
Jack. No. No, sadly not. Okay, well, so obviously my options here are pop star, fell for the same scam, and always wearing an unsettling rubber mask. And I think I have to choose the last one, right? Because you don't get an opportunity like this very often.
Sylvi: No. No.
Jack: You know, I can play a pop star or someone who's fallen for a scam. Oh, God. Fell for the same scam is really—
Keith: I was just about to advocate for fell for the same scam because it says something amazing about two people. And it is such [pause] Like, I've said this before. I would play Fiasco once a month for my whole life. It's such a Fiasco set up.
Jack: Yeah. It's also really good in that this is kind of immediate character work, kind of just on the page for us, right?
Keith: Yeah.
Jack: And while this is, this has some pretty clear character work straight away, this entangles two people immediately. Okay. Fell for the same scam. I've been talked out of the unsettling rubber mask. I'm just—
Sylvi: We can, like. We can, you know, if we want, just, like, [crosstalk] have that in there for funsies.
Jack: [crosstalk] Fell. For. The. Same. Scam. [pause] Wow.
Sylvi: [laughing] Fell same scam. Maybe it was a rubber mask scam.
[Keith laughing]
Jack: Fell. Same. Scam. Scam. [laughter] I’ve fucked up this box completely. Fell. [crosstalk] Same. Scam.
Sylvi: [crosstalk] You can make the text smaller too.
Keith: [crosstalk] Yeah, you can line break. Or you can, like that, yeah.
Jack: Fell same. Scam.
Sylvi: Fell same scam.
Jack: Okay. Sylvi?
Sylvi: Oh, wow. We're, like, very close to having a straight here. I got a three of hearts. 
Keith: Straight doesn't mean anything, though, right?
Sylvi: Wow. Wow. The three I got are inventor, scammer and scammed, and full of shit. And I need to take scammer and scammed now, right?
Keith: You need to now take scammer and scammed. Yeah. 
Sylvi: [thinking noises]
Jack: [crosstalk] How are you gonna arrange this?
Sylvi: [crosstalk] So I’m gonna put—
Jack: [crosstalk] Because depending on how, this could be a different scam. This could be-
Sylvi: [crosstalk] I know how I’m gonna arrange this.
Keith:  It could be a different scam, or it could be Pinky Huckleberry, and the one could be the scammer.
Sylvi: Oh, that could work. [crosstalk] I was gonna do up above here. Yeah, totally.
Keith: [crosstalk] Or the blank card, yeah.
Jack: Okay.
Sylvi: Totally.
Jack: Put that in, and then I think I will understand. 
Sylvi: I think I am gonna put that as the one above because I kinda like the idea of them being someone related to, like, has a relationship with Pinky being the scammer and running into [stutters] them at this event.
Jack: Yeah, yeah, yeah, I agree.
Sylvi: Also, to save space, I just put scammed on the one card and scammer on the other.
Jack: Nice.
Keith: Is this my draw?
Jack: It is your draw.
Sylvi: Yes, it is.
[pause]
Keith: Three of diamonds.
Jack: Only red cards.
Keith: Day trader, invitee and plus one, and presidential hopeful.
Jack: Wow. Look at that. 
Sylvi: Wow. Actually, do we only add these to blank cards or we add these to any cards?
Jack: I believe we can add them to any card, so.
Sylvi: Okay. So we can build upon ones that—Okay, cool. That's good to know.
Keith: I got it. I'm gonna do presidential hopeful.
Jack: Yeah. Amazing. Where are you gonna put it?
Keith: I'm gonna put it way down here in… 
[long pause]
Sylvi: Wow. 
Jack: Whoa, way down there.
Sylvi: I think—yeah, no, that does go in the trait box.
Jack: Okay, I am going to draw [pause] another red card. The five of diamonds.
Sylvi: Wow.
Keith: Oh my god.
Sylvi: And also, if we draw a five or a three, we're done.
Jack: No, no, we're not done. We keep going until there are no cards in this, Sylvi.
Sylvi: Oh, we go until there are no cards. Right. The full house is for later.
Jack: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Painter, translator and foreign language speaker, and a complete mark. I think I'm going to go for painter here because this is an art situation.
Sylvi: Yeah, that makes sense.
Jack: And I think I'm gonna make this painter a new character.
Sylvi: Okay.
Jack: They're gonna go here. Painter.
Sylvi: Painter.
Jack: Okay.
Keith: I’m dying to get two of clubs.
Sylvi: Okay well, if I pull two of clubs I will—
Jack: You’ll hand it over. [laughter]
Sylvi: I got the five of clubs.
Jack: Okay
Sylvi: Which is… Oh, my God. Priest, employer and employee, or shy. [crosstalk] I have an idea.
Keith: [crosstalk] Two of spades is what I meant, by the way. Not—
Sylvi: Okay, I have an idea.
Jack: Yeah. What are you thinking?
Sylvi: What if this scammer up here was an employee of our friend Pinky Huckleberry?
Jack: Oh, that's a really good idea. Mm-hm.
Sylvi: Okay. So I'm gonna do that.
Jack: It’s interesting—
Keith: [interrupting] We don’t know what Pinky does, right?
Jack: He has a big art collection. 
Sylvi: He’s rich. 
Jack: He is rich enough to have an art collection. 
Sylvi: Yeah. It seems like just sort of, you know, [crosstalk] billionaires very rarely describe their jobs.
Keith: [crosstalk] Rich freak is what we called him.
Jack: Yeah, that's true. Or they describe their jobs to us non stop in ways that only serve to underscore their importance.
Sylvi: [laughing] He’s a disruptor.
[pause]
Jack: Yeah, Keith.
[pause]
[everyone gasps]
Keith: No, wrong. It was two of clubs. I'm looking for two of spades. I just forgot which one.
Sylvi: [disappointed] Okay… but this one’s got some stuff.
Jack: Now I'm gonna make a pitch that we—You can go in any direction you want. But I do think bodybuilder/presidential hopeful or. [Keith laughter] [Sylvi: Oh my god.] Or bodybuilder/painter are both very exciting. Oh, no. Painter and bodybuilder are the same class.
Sylvi: They’re the same, yeah.
Keith: But speaking of class. Openly poor.
Jack: Yeah, the sort of Anya Taylor-Joy at The Menu type character. [Sylvi agreeing]
Keith: Sure. I haven’t seen it, but I get what you mean.
Jack: She is a regular person at a billionaire’s dinner.
Keith: Yeah, so then. Yes, exactly that.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Keith: And… let’s see—
Jack: [interrupting] Lovers just feels too easy. I mean, unless we find one that really just starts singing to us. But, you know.
Keith: Yeah. I'm gonna go up again. I'm gonna put this potentially with a relationship to Pinky.
Jack: Yeah.
Keith: Openly poor.
Jack: Mm. Interesting. Yeah.
Keith: I almost put in the bottom left most [Jack: Yeah] slot, but..
Jack: Yeah. [pause] An ace of clubs. They're really all sort of stacking up together. Metal drummer, talent and agent, or secretly poor. Now. [Keith: Ohhhh.] Now then.
Keith: Now secretly poor is a good one. You know…
Jack and Keith: You know who could be secretly poor? 
Jack: Could be Pinky Huckleberry.
Keith: That's exactly what I thought.
Sylvi: We all had the exact same thought.
Jack: It's almost as if secretly… my keyboard is behind my microphone, which is why I don't have it on.
Sylvi: Keyboard behind your microphone. One monitor. What's Jack doing?
Keith: Oh, my keyboard has never been in front of my microphone. Keyboard behind the microphone is the right position.
Sylvi: [crosstalk] No, I’m arms.
Jack: [crosstalk]: I feel like I’m constantly getting razzed about my desk.
Sylvi: It's crazy because you should see my desk. It's probably much worse. I just wanted to razz.
Jack: What do you have on your desk, Sylvi?
Sylvi: I have, okay. PlayStation Vita, mixer, sea spray for my hair, two empty cans of… [trails off into laughter] and an empty bottle, full bottle of water, fidget toys. One of those little, like, tomatoes that you stick pins into for when you're not using them while sewing. I don't know why it's there. Empty sunscreen bottle. Computer monitor.
Jack: Seems like a pretty normal desk, honestly.
Sylvi: Microphone arm. Yeah, it's fine.
Keith: Yeah. Although, you know, empty cans, pins…
Sylvi: Listen, man, I've been busy. I’m in here, I’ve been recording a lot. We've streamed yesterday. That's what the cans are from! [Keith agreement]
Jack: Crushing cans and playing Left 4 Dead.
Sylvi: Yeah, I needed those—that Monster Energy if I wanted to click on heads properly.
[Jack laughter]
Jack: Um, okay, so. Who’s up next? It’s Sylvi, right?
Sylvi: Right back up to the top of the order.
Keith: Oh, did you, did you, Jack, secretly poor was yours?
Sylvi: Right, yeah, ‘cause you got secretly poor.
Jack: Yeah.
Keith: So yeah, Sylvi.
Sylvi: Okay. [pause] I got five of spades.
Jack: Five of spades.
Keith: The tragedy is that we can only get cousins once. But it's okay.
Sylvi: We got head chef, parent and child and chauvinist.
Keith: It doesn’t—
Sylvi: Oh.
[pause]
Keith: These are great.
Sylvi: This is really good.
Keith: Can we do chauvinist?
Sylvi: Oh, yeah. Because I was thinking about it. I was kind of thinking about it for the scammed. [Keith: Oh, yeah!] But my other, my other knee jerk thought was parent and child for pompous being the child, presidential hopeful being the parent.
Jack: Oh, that's a—Parent and child showing up at this place is really good as well. I'm interested in ones that entangle the characters.
Sylvi: Yeah. I think a head chef would also be quite fun, but I'm trying to get more like, relationships on the board right now.
Jack: That’s a really good idea, yeah.
Sylvi: Because I feel like those are gonna be the most useful for defining what a character is like when we get into playing the scenes.
Jack: Yeah. Although it's worth saying that over the course of the game, we are going to be adding to and altering these cards pretty regularly.
Sylvi: Wait, I have another pitch for parent and child. Because we have scammer scammed and fell for the same scam, which does imply another—A third relationship between this person down here and the scammer. And what if I make them Pinky Huckleberry's kid?
Jack: Whoa. Pinky Huckleberry's kid is here.
Sylvi: Pinky Huckleberry's kid is here and got scammed by their employee, Pinky Huckyberry.
Jack: Yeah, I think that's a good idea. I think parent and child is a fun dynamic.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Keith: Pinkle Huckleberry does seem like, doesn't have kids.
Sylvi: That's the thing. And I've, I've suddenly really talked myself into chauvinist all of a sudden for this guy who got scammed.
Keith: I’m 100% on board with the scammed guy being a chauvinist.
Sylvi: I think I'm gonna do that. I think. I think I've. Oh, no.
Keith: Is chauvinist a description or a trait?
Sylvi: It's a trait. And I also accidentally moved the description box a little. Let me just. There we go.
Jack: Okay, excellent.
Sylvi: All right. 
Keith: Me?
Sylvi: It’s Live at the Table, baby. You get every bit of the thought process. [Jack laughter]
Keith: Oh, ace of hearts.
Sylvi: [crosstalk] Oh, this is a good one too.
Keith: Big game hunter, co-parents, and unbelievably handsome. Okay, well. Scammer, unbelievably handsome.
Sylvi: Yes.
Jack: Unbelievably handsome scammer.
Keith: Unbelievably handsome scammer [pause] or chauvinist big game hunter?
Jack: Oh my god, think of all the ways you could scam a big game hunter.
Keith: I know! Think of all the ways you could scam a big game hunter!
Sylvi: Oh, dude!
Jack: [laughter] It’s like an open box.
Keith: I love the unbelievably handsome scammer.
Sylvi: [putting on a voice] This broad told me I could get the yeti. [laughter] Said you give me a map where the yeti goes. And now I can't find it anywhere.
Jack: [putting on a voice] She told me there’s a line made of crystal.
Keith: [putting on a voice] Somebody tell me where the yeti goes.
Sylvi: [putting on a voice] Somebody tell me where the damn yeti is!
Jack: [putting on a voice] I want to make that snowman abominable. [laughter] [normal voice] Yeah. Chauvinist.
Keith: [putting on a voice] I'm the abominable one.
Sylvi: [hysterical laughter] Oh, god.
Jack: Big game hunter. Chauvinist big game hunter who fell for [crosstalk] a second scam.
Keith: [crosstalk] Chauvinist big game hunter who fell for a scam.
Sylvi: I hope he gets murdered.
Keith: Oh, no. That would be tragic because I wanted him to be around for the whole time.
Sylvi: You still get to play them, right? Until the murder.
Jack: Oh yeah, oh yeah.
Sylvi: Yeah. There's a phase of the game, but yeah. No, I agree. I'm in tears just thinking about this guy.
Jack: Okay. [laughter] Who's he played by? Oh, we'll get to it.
Sylvi: We'll figure it out. I mean, I'm assuming we all play everybody, right?
Jack: Yeah. No, I meant which accent?
Keith: Who’s the—
Sylvi: Oh, Sam Keith.
Jack: Sam Keith?
Sylvi: Is that his name? Sam… Wait. What’s his name? Sam—
Keith: Elliot?
Sylvi: Sam Elliot. Why am I thinking Keith? [Jack: I was thinking of Sam Elliot.] I was thinking of my friend Keith. I was thinking of Elliot.
Keith: Who’s the crazy guy from The Walking Dead?
Sylvi: Uh, you gotta be more specific.
Keith: Oh, he's the guy who's crazy in real life. Who's from the Walking Dead.
Sylvi: You gotta be more specific.
Keith: Ah, fuck. I don't know. [crosstalk] I haven’t watched that show.
Sylvi: [crosstalk] Jon Berenthal?
Keith: No, no, no.
Jack: The fellow who plays Negan?
Keith: I don't know anyone's name from it. Because—
Sylvi: [crosstalk] It’s not Michael Rooker, is it?
Keith: [crosstalk] Oh, it's Norman Reedus’ brother. Norman Reedus’ brother.
Sylvi: Oh, that is Michael Rooker!
Keith: Michael Rooker? Yeah, Michael Rooker.
Sylvi: Is Michael Rooker—Oh that makes sense. He seems like he'd be crazy. 
Keith: I've heard on podcasts—
Sylvi: Michael Rooker is also good casting.
Jack: Oh, what about Dean Norris?
Sylvi: [laughter] Dean Norris also really good.
Keith: Who’s the guy from The Wrestler?
Sylvi and Jack: Mickey Rourke.
Keith: Mickey Rourke?
Jack: Yeah. Mickey Rourke's also an option. Alright, that was—who got that? That was you, Keith, right?
Keith: That was me. That was me.
Jack: Okay, so I'm gonna draw here. Three of spades. Steroid era baseball player, nibling and pibling, and incel. What is a pibling? Presumably it's the opposite of an—It's the reciprocating relationship.
Keith: Yes, it's the-
Sylvi: Yeah, it's the, the—The sibling of the parent of the, of the nibling.
Jack: Okay, now let's see. None of these are immediately speaking to me because steroid era basketball player feels like the chauvinist big game hunter scam faller kind of, already I feel like we have that character archetype. [Sylvi: Yeah.] there already.
Sylvi: I feel like—And we've like—incel kind of falls under the—We've got the chauvinist trait a little bit.
Keith: But that is, that's almost [Sylvi: [crosstalk] They’re different.] the mirror image of a chauvinist. Like it's like the same, it's like reflected back.
Sylvi: Yeah, that’s true.
Keith: It’s like—
Sylvi: It’s the, it’s the Charizard to the Charmander in a way.
Keith: An incel wants to be a chauvinist. That was the golden age where incels were getting laid.
Sylvi: God.
Jack: [laughing] Christ.
Sylvi: That is—no, but he’s right.
Jack: Yeah, he is [Sylvi: Let Keith cook!] He is unfortunately right. Okay, so let's do a nibling and pibling. And…
Sylvi: Pibling sounds like a delicious offbrand soda.
Jack: Yes. It, it does. You’re right.
Keith: Mr Pibling.
Sylvi: Thank you. Mr Pibling!
Jack: I'm so wary of linking people up with Pinky Huckleberry, but it does kind of make sense.
Sylvi: Dude—The thing is, Pinky Huckleberry, I, I think I'm fine with the fact that we've established that Pinky Huckleberry does not seem like they would have kids, but they could have siblings and that would lead to niblings.
Keith: And siblings could have kids. Yeah. So I totally—Sylvi, your instinct to do parent and child with the fell for the same scam would—I think it cuts cleanly with nibling and pibling. Since we've established maybe Pinky Huckleberry doesn't have kids. [Sylvi: Yeah.] can be—
Jack: Yeah. So do we think it might be this connection here in the middle? Fell for the same scam?
Sylvi: Yeah, sure.
Jack: Yeah. Nibling. Pibling. Non binary people can fall for scams too. It's a sad fact of the world.
Keith: Yeah.
[Sylvi laughter]
Jack: People are out here telling me where the yeti is.
Sylvi: Yeah
Jack: I’m repeatedly disappointed.
Sylvi: God.
Jack: Okay. Who’s up next? It’s Sylvi.
Sylvi: It’s me!  Oh, it's only a single click, not a double click. [Jack and Keith gasp] There it is, Keith.
Keith: It’s gotta be cousins.
Sylvi: It’s gotta be cousins.
Jack: It’s gotta be cousins. [Sylvi: So…] Keith came into this recording and said, I have an insane idea.
Keith: Yes. I have three characters that I want to have in this.
Sylvi: Keith.
Keith: Yes.
Sylvi: I have two ideas for placement for cousins. [Keith: Okay.] They are—once again, it's pompous and presidential hopeful. And then the other one—I think pompous is kind of the hinge here for it. [crosstalk] Does that work for you? 
Keith: Yeah, yes. That does, yeah. I like—I like [Sylvi: Hm?] I like [pause] pompous and business rivals.
Sylvi: Sure.
Keith: That is. That, for me, works because it leaves open—because there's another set of cousins that we will not be able to draw [Jack: Yet, at this point.] but we will have to figure out who it is.
Jack: So this pompous person's cousin is a business rival with Pinky Huckleberry. [Keith: Yes.] That's how this chain of stuff works. [Keith: Right] Similarly, this person scammed this person who is combined in scamhood with this person.
Sylvi and Keith: Yeah.
Keith: So now any one of these three, the painter, the empty box here, and the presidential hopeful, they could all be also a cousin, and then that would determine which is the middle cousin in the three-two cousins group.
Jack: Now, this will be the first time you've heard this, dear listener, but please understand that we—We three are familiar with Keith's three two cousins plan.
[hysterical Keith laughter]
Sylvi: It's a very interesting plan that I'm a big fan of.
Keith: I hate to say I do have their names.
Sylvi: Good, good. [crosstalk] It’s your turn to draw.
Jack: [crosstalk] Keith came into this recording saying “I'm ready for the three two cousins”.
Keith: I'm doing—You two are doing locked room murder mystery. I'm doing three two cousins character development.
Jack: That's what he wrote on his calendar. Okay, Keith, you're drawing.
Keith: Okay. [pause] Four of clubs. Actual communist, parasocial relationship, and unfun.
Sylvi: These are all really good.
Jack: Get the commie in here. I want to get some [Sylvi: Yes!] I want to get some descriptions. And I think actual communist is a really good one.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Jack: Which kind of communist? We don't know.
Keith: Pinky Huckleberry, actual communist.
Sylvi: That would be gr—no.
Keith: That would be great. It would be crazy. I don't think that it will—I don't think that it will mesh [crosstalk] with what we’ve got. 
Sylvi: [crosstalk] We have…
Keith: It might be this empty one here.
Sylvi: I was gonna say we have a few empties that we could start tossing stuff in.
Keith: I wanted to, like, add actual communist to someone that already existed, but I don't think it works for communists. It could work for presidential hopeful, but it changes the whole vibe.
Sylvi: It does change the entire vibe.
Keith: Yeah. And it also feels like wish fulfillment in an empty sort of way.
Sylvi: Presidential hopeful doesn't mean they have a chance. It just means they're hoping they can be the president.
Keith: I think it means that they're at least on someone's radar. [Sylvi: Yeah, I guess.] Like Gavin Newsom is a presidential hopeful. You know what I mean? Like there's no—
Jack: Alas. 
Keith: Alas, alas.
Jack: And alack.
Keith: A severe lack.
Jack: Oh, yeah, a massive lack. Alright, now I am drawing and I have drawn a four of hearts. Four of hearts. Serial entrepreneur, currently scamming each other—
Keith: [interrupting] Oh, sorry, 
Jack: Yeah?
Keith: There's something that I didn't even consider.
Jack: There's something that I failed to tell you about the two cousins.
Keith: Is the scammer an actual communist?
Sylvi: Oh, for the cause.
Keith: It doesn’t have—we don’t have to move it, but—[crosstalk] we can keep it where it is.
Jack: [crosstalk] No, no. We should, we should, we should keep this one open because I feel like the kind of person who—Wait, was this person not unbelievably handsome at some point?
Keith: No, no, that ended up being big game hunter for the chauvinist.
Jack: Oh right, I see.
Sylvi: Yeah. Our most developed character.
Keith: That's why I—That's why I didn't even consider that one because to me it looked empty, but actually they've got two relationships.
Jack: Yeah. I think that I can't imagine an actual communist being the person scamming the big game hunter.
Sylvi and Keith: I can.
Keith: I don't—but it doesn't mean we have to. Just that I totally could see it.
Jack: Right. Yeah. No, I want a new one. I want a new block. Yeah. Okay. Sylvi.
Keith: What did you draw?
Jack: Sylvi hasn’t drawn yet, I don’t think.
Sylvi: Uh, what did you—
Keith: [crosstalk] Oh, yeah, no, Jack, you drew one and you were talking about it.
Sylvi: [crosstalk] You just drew actual communist, right?
Jack: Oh, yes, I drew serial entrepreneur, currently scamming each other.
Keith: Currently scamming each other! [laughter] Have we reached peak scam? [Sylvi: [laughing] I don’t know.] Can we get another scam relationship on the board?
Jack: I think we might be able to. I think we might be able to, but I think this one has to be separate. Do you know what I mean?
Sylvi: That’s pretty good!
Jack: I think this one has to be the communist scamming the presidential hopeful.
[Sylvi gasps]
Keith: But they're scamming each other. [Jack: Well the, hang on—] so the presidential hopeful would have to also be scamming.
Sylvi: That’s true. 
Jack: What are my other options here? Serial entrepreneur, currently scamming each other… Well, so the serial entrepreneur could be the victim of one of the scam.
Sylvi: That's true. Actually, that could be the, the nibling.
Jack: Yeah, yeah, let's do this. Serial entrepreneur.
Keith: I like that. [Jack:Yeah.] This makes sense.
Jack: I think this makes sense to me.
Keith: Yes. The serial entrepreneur nibbling to the secretly poor wealthy freak.
Sylvi: I think I figured out where the money went.
Jack: Yeah. [laughter. Okay.
Sylvi: My turn.
Jack: Yeah, your turn.
Sylvi: Oops. Four of spades. Which is conservative pundit, long lost cousins, or greedy. Keith?
Jack: Oh my god, Keith.
Sylvi: We did it.
Keith: Lo—we did it. We did it. Oh my God. There was two cousins on the board the whole time!
Sylvi: Oh my God. Wait. So is it, is it the painter? Is it the communist? Or is it the presidential hopeful? That's the third cousin in the three-two cousins?
Keith: Okay, so, I think it’s the painter.
Sylvi: Okay.
Jack: Okay, now also—
Keith: And I know his name.
Jack: Keith, very clearly, so that the court recorder can take it down, could you tell us what three-two cousins is?
Sylvi: [laughing] Yeah, please! We need it now that it's on the board.
Keith: [laughing] Now that it's on the board. Okay, so three-two cousins is when there's three guys and they're all cousins, except only one of them is cousins to both. Those two aren't cousins with each other, they're just [crosstalk] both cousins with—
Jack: [crosstalk] How is that possible?
Keith: What do you mean how is it possible? It happens every day.
Jack: Every day?
Sylvi: Yeah, it's the—like one of them’s related—
Keith: My cousin Ted and my cousin Kyle are both my cousins, but they're not cousins to each other.
Sylvi: Keith is a three-two cousin!
Keith: I’m a three-two cousin!
Jack: Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Hang on. This still gets me, and I can’t Google three-two cousins.
Keith: Okay, imagine I take my father's sister's son and my mother's sister's son and we all go to the store and we introduce ourselves as the three-two cousins.
Jack: [laughing] So what you're saying is that it is cousinhood where there is a sort of a nucleus cousin.
Keith: Yes. Yes!
Jack: With two cousins coming off them.
Keith: [laughing] Yes!
Jack: Okay.
Keith: Yes!
Jack: [still laughing] So who is the nucleus cousin? Wait—
Keith: [interrupting] Well, we can tell who the nucleus cousin is because it's the longest—[crosstalk] It's the one that is connected to the two.
Sylvi: [crosstalk] It’s the business rival.
Jack: [crosstalk] It’s this one. 
Keith: But then those two aren't connected to each other.
Jack: How long have you wanted to do three-two cousins? Or did you wait—
Keith: [interrupting] Thirty minutes.
Sylvi: I was gonna say this feels like it happened like, right before we started recording.
Keith: This happened at two—It's currently five o'clock, this happened at like two-thirty.
Jack: There are some character archetypes in my names folder in Friends at the Table that I have had in there for like eight years. And then there are some that I sit down before recording and I'm like, I'm possessed. I've been like, taken by a fey mood. And this was you with three-two cousins?
Keith: Yeah.
Jack: Is it not two-three cousins? No.
Sylvi: No, of course it's not, that would be absurd.
Keith: [laughter] Because they're the three—Because there's three of them. The three-two cousins.
Jack: Two cousins. Okay.
Keith: Because at any given time, only two of them are cousins.
Jack: Well, [pause] yes, [hysterical Keith laughter] but this person here has the most cousin wealth. Wouldn't you agree? 
Keith: [crosstalk] Yes. He’s definitely the richest cousin.
Sylvi: [crosstalk] There's a cousin imbalance, for sure, that is inherent to the—the setup.
Keith: Well it sort of, it makes, it makes him the sort of de facto leader of the cousins.
Sylvi: This is why Keith wanted to bring it up! Cause Keith is the fulcrum cousin.
Keith: Everybody, everybody who's got cousins on both sides of their family is a three-two cousin. You know, my three-two—My other two three-two cousins are also, in their own way, three-two cousins.
Jack: Sylvi, are you a three-two cousin? I am not.
Sylvi: I am, but, like, I don't talk to any of the cousins on my dad's side of the family. So it's like—
Jack: [crosstalk] You're a three-two cousin with a—
Keith: [crosstalk] Latent three-two cousinhood.
Jack: With a lack. There’s a sort of—
Sylvi: Yeah, I'm an absentee three-two cousin. [Jack: Yeah.] I’m a cousin three-two.
Jack: Like a, like a, like a maladaptive three-two cousin relationship happening there somewhere. [Sylvi laughing] Yes. Okay. So Sylvi just drew, right?
Sylvi: Right.
Jack: And got long lost cousins. So Keith has been lobbying for cousins all evening. And Sylvie drew both of them.
Sylvi: I did. Yeah. That's fine. It means, like, I'm gonna lobby for stuff when Keith pulls. 
Keith: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Absolutely fair.
Jack: Okay. Keith, you're up.
Keith: Okay. [pause] Four of spades.
Jack: Nope. That is a four of diamonds.
Keith: Oh, four of diamonds. Bitcoin guy, loveless political marriage, and sardonic.
Sylvi: Oh, these are all so good.
Keith: Yeah. We've got a guy who would be in a loveless political marriage.
Jack: We have. And that's such a good character archetype.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Keith: And [Jack: Oh my god.] bitcoin guy is a great kind of guy to get scammed.
Jack: What if the presidential hopeful and the [crosstalk] communist are married? 
Keith: [crosstalk] Serial entrepreneur and bitcoin guy. Would a presidential hopeful be in a [with Jack] loveless political marriage [Jack stops] with a communist? That seems counterproductive.
Jack: What if the actual Communist’s parents are phenomenally wealthy?
Keith: That would be…
Jack: That would be a reason. Although I don't know what are the options here?.
Keith: We'd have to fit that into it later.
Sylvi: Well, I mean, there's a assumption of—I mean, I don't know, maybe I'm bringing my own shit here. I had an assumption of wealth for most of the characters that are gonna be in here, which is why that there are traits of secretly and openly poor versus the rest, which are also kind of just default have money.
Jack: It could be a communist that has come into a huge amount of money.
Keith: It's true. You don't want to be, as a presidential hopeful, you don't want to know anybody who's a communist. You don't even want to know them.
Jack: That's true. That's true. That's true.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Jack: Okay, so we have bitcoin guy and sardonic. Sardonic is not bad. Sardonic is a nice, straightforward piece of characterization. We don't have, you know, we have Pompous, but.
Sylvi: Yeah, we don't have a ton on the, the fulcrum cousin, I will say, could fit there. [Keith: That’s true.] But we could also wait and get another card for that if you want. I think sardonic could work for a few of these characters. Honestly.
Keith: Yeah, I'm leaning Bitcoin guy, serial entrepreneur.
Jack: Oh, that's not a bad idea.
Sylvi: Does that work?
Keith: Yes.
Sylvi: Does serial entrepreneur not take that slot?
Keith: Oh, those are two descriptions. Yeah. Bitcoin guy is not a trait, it's a description. [Sylvi agrees]Yeah, so you're right. Yeah, totally. Okay, so Bitcoin guy could be the scammer. [Sylvi: True, that would be easy to do.] Either the painter or the unboxed cousin.
Sylvi: [putting on a voice] Told me to hunt a non fungible bigfoot!
[laughter]
Keith: Let’s see, we got business—Sardonic business rival. Sardonic. I like sardonic painter. Do we like sardonic painter?
Jack: Yeah.Sardonic painter is pretty good. Okay. I'm drawing.
Keith: Especially at a big art thing.
Sylvi: Yeah, exactly.
Jack: Two of diamonds, farmer, childhood friends, or gigantic? Now, now, hang on.
[wheezing]
Sylvi: What the fuck is—
Keith: [laughing] You can't get a fucking giant in here.
Sylvi: [still wheezing] It's the fucking yeti.
Keith: He dressed up as the yeti to scam the big game hunter.
[hysterical laughter]
Sylvi: That's so dangerous. Oh, no, wait, I don't know.
Jack: Oh, man.
Sylvi: I don't know. I think. Wow.
Jack: What do we think? Is it gigantic? Someone's like nine and a half feet tall.
Keith: I like gigantic.
Sylvi: Gigantic scammer is really funny.
Keith and Jack: [laughing] Gigantic scammer.
[Sylvi laughing hysterically]
Jack: Crouching down.
Keith: The cousin could also be gigantic. That's true. One big cousin. [unintelligible hysteria from Sylvi] No, that's a hat on a hat. You can't be a cousin and a gigantic. That's too many things.
Sylvi: What the fuck!
Jack: Okay. Excellent. Tremendous. Cool. Sylvi, you're up.
Sylvi: Gigantic. Wonderful. Oh, my God. Oh, wow. Second last card. Ace of spades. Oh, don't forget the joker. Okay, ace of spades. Butler, siblings, or boisterous.
Jack: Ah, now, butler might not be a bad idea because it gets.
Sylvi: Butler might not be bad here. Butler. Where does that fall under? Is that a…
Keith: Openly poor butler?
Sylvi: Ohhhhh
Jack: Butlers are often not super poor. A butler is a pretty well paid job, right? 
Sylvi: Right. There's, you know…
Keith: I think it's relative compared—
Jack: Relative compared to the person—
Sylvi: They're working for, yeah.
Keith: Yeah.
Jack: It's not a $200K a year—
Keith: [interrupting] because they see the butler and know that he's the butler, which would make him openly poor to them by default.
Sylvi: I do have a pitch for siblings though, which is actual communist and presidential hopeful.
Jack: Oh, now that's the—
Keith: Okay, that's great. There we go.
Jack: Right.
Sylvi: Like we've been trying to figure out how to link these two up and I feel like—
Keith: I think that's our—I don't know that there would be even a better pair in there than that. That's perfect.
Jack: I think you're absolutely right.
Sylvi: Alright. Keith, I think it's up to you. Last card.
Keith: Last card. Three of clubs. Media mogul, ex lovers, and funny.
Sylvi: Well, all these are going to be funny. It's us playing them.
Jack: Hey, it's true.
Keith: I would like pompous, media mogul cousin.
Sylvi: That's perfect.
Jack: That’s a really good idea.
Sylvi: Okay.
Name the Suspects
[01:09:01]
Jack: So, if we go up here to the—Meet the Suspects, we are now at the Name the Suspects stage. [reading] Continue in turn order, Each turn, add a name to any unnamed suspect with at least one detail written on them. Give a brief description of them and introduce them to the story by showing how they're involved with a starting situation and any suspects that have already been named. Once all suspect cards with at least one detail have been named and introduced, move on to the lead up.
Sylvi: Since, continuing—Jack, do you want to go first then since Keith just went? Since we're continuing in the order or.
Jack: Yeah, that sounds good. I'm not gonna name any cousins out of respect.
Sylvi: Out of respect for the [Keith: Please don't name any cousins.] for the three-two cousin himself.
Jack: Okay, let's see. [long pause] I'm looking at my names list. I'm thinking. [long pause] Okay, presidential hopeful is called Laura Washko. A nice normal name for a nice normal presidential hopeful. She is in her 40s, she is wearing like a two piece suit. She's dressed up nicely to come to this art event. She's, she's a little uh, on edge because as a presidential hopeful, she's not sure if she should be messing around with all these coordinates, private planes, strange messages. But she has a sort of like a background history in art. She's interested in seeing art. She has horn rimmed glasses, which is pretty cool for a president to have horn rimmed glasses. Who was the last president to have horn rimmed glasses?
Sylvi: I don’t know.
Keith: None. Never, never happened.
Jack: Damn. That can’t be right.
Sylvi: I Mean… Yeah, I don't know. I feel like a lot of American politics in the past were like, if you wear glasses, you're gay, so wear contact lenses is like what political, political strategists would have said to guys in the 60s and stuff.
Keith: Look.
Jack: Yeah.
Keith: Did—did LBJ, he wore glasses. Did he have horn rimmed glasses?
Sylvi: LeBron James?
Keith: Yeah, LeBron James.
Jack: Oh, it looks like he did. Or he's wearing like plastic glasses. I'm not sure. In any case, this is Laura Washko, the presidential hopeful. Her hair in a sort of perfectly manicured bob. [pause] And after me is Sylvi.
Sylvi: Yes. I wrote like a really stupid name in my back pocket.
Jack: Yeah.
Sylvi: And I'm kind of wondering if it's serial entrepreneur or gigantic scammer. I think…
Keith: What’s the name?
Sylvi: It’s Buford Knipps, spelt K-N-I-P-P-S.
Jack: That’s the big game hunter.
Keith: That’s the big game hunter.
Sylvi: Okay.
Jack: That's the big game hunter. Now that's the big game hunter. Buford Knipps.
Sylvi: Buford Knips. Now my question is, we threw around some guys we were gonna—We were thinking of like, who's playing this dude? And we never really settled. I'm kind of like, I've got an idea of Dean Norris, but styled like Sam Elliott?
Jack: Oh wow, yeah.
Sylvi: So with the mustache and the hair and a, and a big cowboy hat.
Jack: Yeah, absolutely.
Keith: Who is Dean Norris?
Jack: [crosstalk] He plays Hank in Breaking Bad.
Sylvi: [crosstalk] Dean Norris is—he was famously in Breaking Bad but he’s a character actor
Keith: [crosstalk] Oh, the cop.
Sylvi: Yeah. Character actor who's in a ton of stuff. He's been in a couple X Files episodes. He's been in… 
Keith: Yeah, yeah, I totally know this…
Sylvi: True Blood, I think.
Jack: I think he’s built to play like, a dumbass.
Sylvi: Literally a career like, I play cops on TV guy.
Keith: Yeah. Big tough guy. Big red faced tough guy.
Sylvi: Yeah, yeah. And now he's got a big, big bushy mustache. Like big bushy push broom mustache and like [Keith: bolo tie?] Of course, a bolo tie. He's basically dressed like Colonel Sanders or Doug Dimmadome from Fairly Oddparents.
Jack: Yeah.
Keith: Oh, owner of the Dimmsdale Dimmadome.
Sylvi: Yes! Of course. [crosstalk] Owner of the Dimmsdale Nippodome!
Jack: [crosstalk] How is he introduced to this situation?
Sylvi: I think that he is sort of in… Let me just, I'm looking back at the, the pitch really quick here just to make sure I have the details right. But like the GPS coordinates in the middle of Beaverhead Deer Lodge National Forest. I think that old Buford hunts around here. Like he's got a hunting lodge up here. He's not quite like this isn't like he lives there, but like he, he frequents the area enough that when he like, got the GPS coordinates, he was like, oh, that's, that's not too far from where my—That's not too far from where I go during buck season.
Jack: It’s possibly related to me.
Sylvi: Yeah. So I think, I think maybe we see him like, the first shot of him is like getting all—changing out of his hunting gear, putting on some like—getting on—Maybe he's wearing like the high vis vest over the sort of like, like white suit that I'm envisioning. And we see him like taking that off, taking off like a warm hat, putting on his 10 gallon hat and calling up a ride to get to the plane.
Jack: Oh is it snowy? Because it’s new year?
Sylvi: Oh yeah, sure, absolutely.
Jack: There's like a, like a, snow flurries coming down the plane, you know, big puffs of snow drifting across the runway as the plane comes into land.
Sylvi: Oh no. I hope it doesn't get worse once the planes all land.
Jack: [gleeful] Oh no, I hope it doesn't. Keith, do you want to name a cousin?
Keith: I would love to name a cousin.
Sylvi: Yeah, we know what Keith's first three names are gonna be, so it's up to us.
Keith: I'm going to name the media mogul. His name is Bill Tally Tab.
[sniggering]
Sylvi: Okay. Sorry, Tally Tab separate, or [crosstalk] hyphenated?
Keith: [crosstalk] Yeah that’s a first, middle, last name.
Sylvi: Okay. BTT.
Jack: Okay, I am going to name the… [long pause] I'm gonna name the gigantic scammer. And the gigantic scammer's name is Wayne John Hag.
[Keith laughter]
Sylvi: Great, great. 
Jack: God. Wayne John Hag is out here scamming Buford Knipps.
Sylvi: Mr Hag, why are you doing this?
Jack: Why are you doing this?
Keith: Of course he would fall for a scam from someone almost named John Wayne.
Sylvi: Probably—
[as Buford] I like the cut of your jib.
Keith: [putting on a Buford voice] You remind me of someone. Namewise.
Sylvi: Okay, wait, did we get this introduction for what Bill Tally Tab's up to?
Jack: Oh, no, we didn’t, that’s true.
Keith: Okay, yeah. So we need a description, an introduction to their story and what else?
Jack: Just kind of how they appear and how they arrive. What does the book say? The book says… I'm pulling it back up.
Sylvi: [reading] A brief description of them and introduce them to the story by showing how they are involved with the starting situation and any suspects that have already been named.
Jack: And any suspects that have already been named.
Sylvi: Oh, I missed that bit.
Jack: That’s good.
Keith: Oh, wait, what was it? And any suspects—
Jack and Keith: That have already been named.
Sylvi: We could start having them arrive at the lodge, now that I think about it. It’s also a way to do that instead. Instead of what I did with—I mean we could still have that scene of Buford earlier but like have him get into the lodge and like shaking snow off his big hat.
Jack: Yeah, you're absolutely right. The presidential hopeful is already sitting there. She's, you know, sitting neatly at a desk or something, checking her phone, putting her phone in her bag, taking her phone out of the bag again and checking it again.
Keith: [pause] Bill Tally Tab, pompous media mogul and cousin.
Sylvi: Listed in order of importance, most important, going last.
Keith: He's—yeah, it's ascending importance. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He is a suit wearing like a—like a lighter navy suit wearing kind of well kept looking guy who was a—An editor? Not an editor, sorry, an opinion columnist at a major newspaper who left to work in social media and has sort of bridged the gap that is bridged all the time between entertainment news and political news.
Jack: Oh shit.
Keith: He gets millions of views a day doing almost no journalistic work at all.
Jack: And he knows Laura. Like, they, they've hung in the same circles before.
Keith: Yes, I would say that he's interviewed Laura as a politician both as part of his newspaper job and then also as part of the, you know, video first post—
Jack: [interrupting] Do you think it's a nod and smile situation, a handshake situation or a hug situation?
Keith: Hug.
Jack: Mm. Mm-hm. It's like good to see you, you know.
Keith: Yeah.
Jack: In the sense of like a big tent and we ain't in it situation.
Keith: Yes.
Jack: Yeah. Okay. Wayne John Hag is playing darts. He’s found a dart board. He’s—Wayne John Hag is—How tall are the tallest basketball players?
Sylvi: Like seven feet up to. Let me—I'm gonna—
Jack: I'm trying to think of what is a reasonable—
Sylvi: How tall is Victor Wembanyama right now?
Jack: [crosstalk] Right now?
Sylvi: [crosstalk] I dont know! He’s young! He could—
Keith: [crosstalk] 7 foot is on the taller end of the basketball player, but still is like not as tall as you could possibly be and play basketball.
Sylvi: Victor Rambanyama is 7’4”. There are—there—There's currently a freshman on the Florida Gators apparently that is seven nine.
Keith: [crosstalk] Oh my god.
Jack: [crosstalk] Jesus Christ. Okay. Wayne John Hag is seven foot ten.
[hysterical Keith laughter]
Sylvi: Damn. Fuck that guy.
Keith: This is a real giant.
Jack: And he is—He is like—He is a big man. He's strong. He is someone who could be, who could easily dress up as a yeti to scam Buford Knipps. And holding a dart in one hand and holding a like, a can of Coke such that it looks like a tiny mini can of Coke in the other. He is playing darts in the corner of the room. And every time the door opens and someone comes in, he says, you know, like, “close the door, it's cold”. Who's next?
Sylvi: I think it’s my turn.
Jack: Yeah.
Sylvi: And I have a name for a nibling.
Jack: Nice.
Sylvi: If I can get an [Jack: [crosstalk] An entrepreneur nibling.] An entrepreneur nibbling. And I—
Jack: Who's also being scammed by Wayne John. 
Sylvi: Yes. This is Aiden Huckleberry-Hudson. Hyphenated name, also known as “AHH” on the Internet to people. [Keith laughter] Aiden is like, I think mid-30s, kinda, you know, like really. I don't know how to say this. He's wearing the Steve Jobs turtleneck. Like he's—[Jack: Okay.] clearly I think right now he’s having a—
Keith: Like inspired by Steve Jobs?
Sylvi: Oh, very much so. He's sort of in a—He's back to, you know, he, he tried to get off the Internet for a bit, but after, after some bad investment. But now he's back trying to get into the tech game again. His—You know, he did some work in the entertainment industry trying to like greenlight some projects, do some production. Didn't really work out great. I think we see him coming—He's got like a very, like a pea coat that is like very nice and expensive, but doesn't like—If you saw it, you wouldn't assume that it cost like three times what you think it would. And I think like, when he comes in, it's like, you know what? Actually I figured out who this would be. This is our—Where… I'm plucking you from Rian Johnson's mid factory and I'm putting you in our thing, Josh O'Connor.
Jack: Oh yeah, Josh O’Connor playing a rich twerp.
Sylvi: Yeah, he’d be great at it! Calling out for [putting on a voice] Uncle Pinky, I’m here!
Jack: Yeah.
Sylvi: And I think polite waves at the other people, but kind of walks in and starts looking for Pinky, I think.
Jack: Well, I don't think he's here yet. I don't think Pinky has made an appearance. I mean it's clearly his house.
Sylvi: But maybe that's what happens is he like, looks around for a bit, can't find him. And then Aiden's like whatever and talks to whatever staff are here. I'm assuming there is some form of staff here. Maybe I'm wrong. Am I wrong about that? Do you guys have—
Keith: I think there's evidence of staff, but no visible staff.
Sylvi: [crosstalk] Oh, I like that.
Jack: [crosstalk] Yeah, they might appear in scenes and we could—
Sylvi: Okay, so now Aiden's complaining about how no one's here to make him a latte.
Jack: A latte. [laughter]
Sylvi: Or like some sort of coffee thing. I don't know, I don't drink coffee, guys.
Keith: No, I was thinking Bill Tally Tab can be in that conversation with Hudson about like, where's our drinks?
Sylvi: I don't know. Uncle Pinky's usually a much better host about these things. [pause] Josh O’Connor I don't think you sound like that. Just to be clear. And also DM me.
Jack: Yeah. Shout out to Josh O’Connor. Keith, you want to name a cousin?
Keith: Yes, I'm going to name a cousin. I'm going to name the nucleus cousin. The business rival.
Jack: The rich cousin.
Keith: Yes. His name is Newton Henry Hertz.
[pause]
Jack: Ah, we have Bill Tally Tab and Newton Henry Hertz. We don't know much about this guy. We're gonna come to learn more about him. I think. He's a business rival with Pinky and he is the fulcrum cousin. We don't really know what his job is—
Keith: He was surprised to get a letter and knows exactly what it is. You know, you know Pinky Huckleberry for long enough, then you know how communications happen.
Jack: Are they sort of like these weird games and things?
Keith: Yeah. And you go, you're—I guess there's a surprise to it. 
[as Newton] Why would I be getting a Huckleberry thing? I'm, you know, we're business rivals.
Jack: But I feel seeing Bill Tally Tab bickering with Aiden about the drinks.
Keith: Oh, they're on the- They're already texting. They've been texting about it. All three cousins are.
Jack: Oh, I see.
Keith: Yeah, they know. I bet they even take—They meet up at the plane.
Sylvi: Well, wait. Are they—cause we have to address the long lost part of one of these cousin relationships.
Keith: I had assumed that this was a resolved long lost. [Sylvi: Ohhhh.] They had been long lost. Yeah, but we don't have to play it that way.
Jack: What if Newton Henry Hertz had spent most of his life feeling like he was the wealthy one of a two cousin, a two three cousin situation. But he couldn't understand why he felt that way because he only had one cousin, Bill Tally Tab. And then several years ago, it was revealed that sort of like the phantom limb, he had another cousin. [crosstalk] And this fills him with delight—
Keith: [crosstalk] You can always feel when you’re a three-two cousin.
Jack: A two-three cousin?
Keith: A three-two cousin.
Jack: A three-two cousin. Do the painter—
Keith: [interrupting] They are, sorry, this is—they are, they show up together, we are the three-two cousins. 
Sylvi: Okay!
Jack: Do they show up together? Okay. 
Keith: Yes. This is a three two cousin—It's not as much a way of describing a group—this relationship, although it now will be and forever will be called that, but it's because they call them. They have dubbed themselves the three two cousins.
Jack: Okay. I'm so excited to learn how Bill Tally Tab, and the painter feel about each other. All right, I am going to name somebody. I am going to name this mysteriously, openly poor person up here who we don't know really anything about. That's all we know about them. Um, and this person is called… [thinking noises, long pause] This person is called—They introduce themselves by a nickname and they are called Cueball.
Sylvi: Let’s fucking go.
Keith: Nice. Great. 
Jack: Cueball is a young woman. She has a shaved head. She has piercings in her ears. She does not know really why she was invited. She does not care to be here. But the booze seems to be free and, you know, the, the company of these people seems to be entertaining.
Sylvi [as Hubert]: You know, I never understood why a lady would do that to her hair, but I gotta admit, looks good on you, young lady.
Jack: Stares daggers at him. 
[Sylvi: Buford, please.] 
Jack: Wayne John Hag throws a perfect bullseye.
Sylvi: Okay, Sinead, sorry. All right, I'm gonna name our actual communist sister here. [Jack: Yeah.] I've given away that it is a sister. This is Sophia Washko, who is actually Laura's twin.
Jack: Oh, my God. Do they look similar? Are they identical twins?
Sylvi: Yeah, I think so. I think there's obviously some styling differences. I think that Sophia might have longer hair. You sort of described Laura as having like a very, like, manicured bob. Yeah? [Jack: Yeah.] I think that. I think Sophia I picture as being kind of an academic, kind of like in a stereotypical sense, a little like she's a little mousier than her.
Jack: Was she also wearing horn rimmed glasses?
Sylvi: I think she is wearing horn rimmed glasses as well, Jack. Yes. I also wanted to give her glasses and I was like, well, let's just make them twins. [Jack: Yeah.]  Eff it.
Keith: Same eyesight.
Sylvi: I think she shows up and she is surprised to see her sister there. And I think it's like, it's a little chilly between them. It's a little awkward.
Jack: Mm. Yeah. And Bill Tally Tab looks up. You know, he, I guess in his research, his political understanding, he knew that Laura had a twin sister and probably also knew that she was an actual communist. But I don't think has had the pleasure of meeting Sophia Washko.
Keith: Oh, it's definitely whispered about.
Jack: It's definitely whispered about. Is Laura Washko—Well, we'll find out. I was gonna say, is Laura Washko doing well? That's what the game is for, Jack.
Sylvi: Yeah. Play to find out what happens. Yeah, that's like our whole thing.
Jack: It is.
Sylvi: I have a question.
Jack and Keith: Yes.
Sylvi: Do we name these two in the bottom left corner, [crosstalk] or it is just named characters?
Jack: [crosstalk] No. We only name people who have a piece of information on them.
Sylvi: So that’s everybody, right? Oh no, we have [crosstalk] the final cousin, I apologise, I apologise.
Keith: [crosstalk] No, there’s one more name, the final cousin. The painter, Cedar Basil Banyan.
Sylvi: Good names, Keith.
Jack:  Cedar Basil Banyan, Newton Henry Hertz, and Bill Tally Tab. We're cousins.
Sylvi: We got—It's great because then we also have another one letter, two letter name with Aiden Huckleberry-Hudson. 
Jack: And Wayne John Hag.
Keith: There is. There is a. No, nevermind.
Sylvi: We love triplet names. 
Jack: We do love triplicate names. Tell us about Cedar Basil Bunyan, Keith.
Keith: Cedar is a hardworking painter. He has a studio. He's working all the time. You would maybe look at him knowing that he's a painter and see him as maybe performative for the overalls, the paint, the like—He's not dressed up, he's not dressed down. He's dressed as if he just came from painting because he always just came from painting.
Jack: Right.
Keith: And so he just looks like a guy who's just always covered in some amount of paint somewhere. I—
Jack: What does he paint?
Keith: He paints. [pause] Multiple different styles of landscape and cityscape, but in, in—across a handful of different styles.
Jack: And is he—is his work is generally pretty well regarded?
Keith: Yeah. I have an idea for how he knows Pinky, but we don't have to get into it or we can—It's only a sentence. I don't know how much we want to say now, but I had an idea about that specifically.
Jack: Let's, let’s, let’s play to find out what happens. Okay, So I think we have all of our people. Um—
Keith: [interrupting] These last two, will they get filled in ever? Or we've just—
Sylvi: No, I don’t think so
Jack: No, they will, they will. It's worth saying that like—Sorry, let me go back to my other page of notes here. [reading] Players can add new suspects or fill in or update the cards whenever they are writing a chapter. So for example, if we want to introduce staff, they can appear in a scene and they can start to appear on the board as well. This board is going to kind of shift as we, as we play. But let's quickly go over who we have. We have Wayne John Hag, a gigantic scammer and an employee of Pinky Huckleberry. We have Cueball, an openly poor stranger who has showed up here. She doesn't know why and no—neither does anybody else. Keith, you want to read this row?
Keith: Sure. We have Buford Knipps scammed by Wayne John Hag, a big game hunter and chauvinist who fell for the same scam along with another person who we'll talk about in a minute, we have Pinky Huckleberry, who is throwing this event, employer of Wayne John Hag, pibling of the serial entrepreneur, later secretly poor and business rivals with one of the cousins. And Cedar Basil Banyan, a painter, a sardonic painter, also a cousin.
Jack: One wing of the three-two cousins. 
Keith: One wing of the three-two cousins. 
Jack: Sylvi, you want to tell us about this?
Sylvi: Yeah, next up, we got Aiden Huckleberry-Hudson, who fell for the same scam as Buford Knipps. He is a serial entrepreneur and he is the nephew of Pinky Huckleberry. And then we also have Newton Henry Hertz, who is Pinky Huckleberry's business rival, a long lost cousin of Cesar Basil Banyan and cousins with, with a friend that will be introduced shortly.
Jack: And this is the focal cousin.
Sylvi: I don't know why I'm pretending we haven't mentioned it yet.
Jack: We also have Sophia Washko, an actual communist and the sibling of Laura Washko and Bill Tally Tab, the third of the two three cousins, who is a media—A pompous media mogul, like a, like a, bridging the gap between online media and like old print media editing.
Keith: And then we have Laura Washko, presidential hopeful and sibling of actual communist Sophia Washko.
Jack: These… 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7.
Keith: Twin. Twin with.
Sylvi: Yeah, I'm gonna add twins to this sheet, actually.
Jack: 8, 9, 10 people are our cast. I love these—This game mechanic of, like building webs of people. Fiasco also does something kind of similar. And every single time it's just such a fast way into, like, feeling these characters suddenly like, start appearing in front of you.
Sylvi: It was so fun, uh, highly recommend checking out the mini Patreon series we did of The Slow Knife.
Jack: Oh, does that also have similar one?
Keith: Oh, my God, Slow Knife characters are so fun.
Sylvi: We did the similar—It's a similar process happens in there, and it was so much fun having it all come together when we figured out who was doing what in what horrible fashion.
Jack: Okay. Can we take five minutes and then come back and we can start?
Sylvi: Yes, that would be wonderful.
Jack: Start the events themselves.
Sylvi: Alright. Be right back.
Jack: Cool. Bye. I hope you're having a nice time. I hope 2026 is proving fruitful. I hope this is the year that someone delivers me a box containing $4 billion and I—
Sylvi: That’d be so cool.
Jack: And it's not for scary reasons. [Keith laughter] It’s only for good reasons.
Sylvi: I gotta be honest, I can only think of scary reasons.
Jack: Yeah, that's so much money that someone—
Keith: That someone would give you $4 billion or that someone would have—Would—What they would do with it?
Jack: I think it would be. Yes, both. Yes, both. Yes. There's that thing about, like, if you found a bag of money, a massive bag of money floating in the ocean, what would you do with it? And the only good answer is leave it.
Keith: No, I would take it. I—I've seen Coen Brothers movies. I'd still take it.
Sylvi: Yeah. No, I. I would also get into sort of a Fiasco situation in real life, but, you know.
Jack: It never ends well for those people. They usually get killed by Anton Chigurh. Oh, Keith, real life is just like the movies.
Keith: I don't know.
Break; the Lead Up
[01:36:50]
Jack: We have assembled our cast. The snow is falling in drifts outside Pinky Huckleberry’s—I'm sort of picturing like a luxurious A frame, and on the inside, the Christmas decorations are still up. There's like fir boughs—like pine boughs on the walls. There's a big decorated Christmas tree. There's a mezzanine in the A frame. And then leading out of the back of the A frame is the door to kind of like the main body of the house, which contains reception rooms and art galleries and kitchens and Pinky's private quarters and stuff. But this sort of lobby and like—
Keith: [interrupting] Sorry, his private quarters, that's his secret quarter, collection and museum, not his bedroom.
Jack: Yes. And it's an art—It's an art project with the quarters. And there are also his public quarters, which are his bed—Those are the quarters he tells everybody about.
Keith: That’s his bedroom. [Jack and Keith laughter]
Jack: What else is here? In the lobby, there are three pristine pieces of art that are being shown. This is very exciting for the people here who know about Pinky Huckleberry's famed collection, because this is kind of like the teaser of the thing that everyone always wants to see but has never gotten the chance to.
Keith: Presumably, some of what's in here is public knowledge, if not publicly known, like, seen.
Jack: Yeah, that's true. I think that some of it is like—And I think that it's the public knowledge that makes the tease of the stuff that you don't even know about all the more exciting. Let's describe a piece of art on display in this A frame each. The first piece of art that greets people as they come in is—[pause] It is a series of water balloons frozen in the moment that they are being burst. So there is the sort of rubber shell of the balloon and then the perfect sort of glass shape of the water inside it, but it's also starting to drip and fall, and this is kind of like hanging suspended in the A frame above the door as people come in. Sylvi, what's your piece of art? Oh, what's Pinky's piece of art that you have chosen?
Sylvi: It's like a—I think like a triptych or something. It's like a series of portraits of a sort of like dust bowl era like, worker that just slowly get zoomed in more basically over the three images. And that's kind of all that's going on.
Jack: Wow. Sick. It's in black and white?
Sylvi: Oh, yeah, of course.
Jack: Laura sort of standing in front of it with her hands behind her back and Sofia standing next to her. They're looking essentially the same. Keith, what art have you got here in the lobby?
Keith: It's a classic renaissance nude, but a role reversal of a sort of slender, placid man being viewed from behind like, a series of bushes by three women.
Jack: Wow. It's a sexy renaissance nude.
Keith: The sexy renaissance nude.
Jack: Incredible. 
Sylvi: Someone says that. Someone calls it a sexy renaissance nude in the room.
Jack: [laughter] Is it, it is—it sounds like an Aiden thing or a Bill Tally Tab thing to me.
Sylvi: The conversation is between the two of them. Yeah.
Keith: [laughter]  And yeah, Cedar says, shut up.
Jack: Let's go over to the book and read about the lead up. I think it's worth going over this because while the section entitled The Lead Up here on the left at the bottom really talks through what we do, it builds on this stuff. [reading] Suspects and Clues. This game revolves around the Journal. All of the suspects and clues we live—[stops reading] Oh, sorry. Oh, my God. Talk about John Carpenter movies with weird guys. [reading] All of the suspects and clues we create live in its grid and should be updated as the game goes on. Some suspect cards will likely be blank after completing the Meet the Suspects phase. They can remain blank for the rest of the game, but players may add new suspects to empty cards anytime they are writing a chapter on one of their turns. Additionally, players can fill in and update the trace descriptions and relationships of suspects as they're revealed through the narrative. Clues are added after each chapter of the lead up. Five more clues get added at the end of the phase where the murder scene is found. To add a clue, simply fill in an empty clue card in the journal. In the rare case that there are no empty clue cards in the journal, simply erase an irrelevant clue to add a new one or combine the clue with an existing one. Designer note: Clues can be placed in any spot of the journal, but a clue's position will have implications once the investigation begins. The Killer. A specter is haunting our suspects. The spectre of murder. This specter is represented by a game piece known as the killer, which looks like this. [stops reading] That's the wrong sheet. [reading] Anytime a rule references the killer, it's specifically talking about this game piece. The killer represents the very idea of murder as it drapes over the characters in our story and infiltrates their every moment. The killer is placed on a suspect in the journal after the first phase of the game. Once it enters play, the killer will always rest on one of the suspects in the journal until the game is over. The killer will move from suspect to suspect based on the cards we draw on our turns. The killer's movement follows these rules. The killer starts its movement in the direction corresponding to the corner of the journal that matches the suit of the drawn card. So you can see we have hearts, clubs, spades, and diamonds. The killer moves a number of spaces equal to the rank of the drawn card. The killer turns 90 degrees to continue its movement if it hits the edge of the journal. If the killer lands on an empty suspect card, the active player chooses either to create a new suspect immediately or continue the killer's movement until it hits a named suspect. So you can see here the killer is moving three spaces. It goes 1, 2, 3. To put it simply, says the designer, the killer moves like a bishop from chess crossed with the screensaver from a DVD player. [stops reading] And it wasn't quite clear in the book, but I checked with Adam, who was very helpful and said that the killer begins the game on the last suspect that was created. Who was the last person we added? [pause] Was it Sofia—
Keith: Where anything was added?
Jack: The last named suspect.
Keith: The last cousin was named.
Sylvi: I believe that was the last cousin. Yeah, it was Cedar.
Jack: Okay. The killer begins on Cedar. [Sylvi: Whoa.] Writing chapters. You want to read this one, Sylvi?
Sylvi: Yes.
Jack: No, we can split this in two because it's a lot of text. Keith, read after Narrating or Roleplaying.
Sylvi: [reading] In the lead up in the investigation phases, you will take turns writing chapters. To write a chapter, you narrate the next part of the story in order to create or update the clues in the journal. In the lead up, you're primarily creating new clues. And in the investigation, you're updating the existing clues with new information. Each chapter has a focus character. In the lead up, the focus character is the suspect that the killer is currently visiting. In the investigation, the focus character is the suspect that the sleuth is adjacent to. The focus character must be involved in the scene in some way. You must also involve a number of suspects equal to the rank of the card drawn that round. This makes sure that all of the suspects get involved with one another and builds a messier situation moving forward. The suspects included don't need to be directly involved, eg. having a conversation with one another, but they do need to come up in some way. For example, if you drew a three, you could write a chapter about two suspects of your choice gossiping about your focus character. When writing your chapter, start by simply describing a situation the suspects are getting themselves into. You can write a chapter that's as specific as a single conversation between characters, or as far reaching as a character traveling to a new city and getting up to some sort of hijinks.
Jack: That will not be happening in the snowstorm.
Keith: No. [reading] Narrating or Roleplaying. Each chapter you can choose to simply narrate the action or get other players involved by casting them as the various characters you've chosen and acting it out to see what happens. Either way, keep your chapters brief. You don't have to come up with some complex situation or fill every chapter with loads of detail. It's good to start with either an idea of the characters you want to see interact: I want to show Chester and Ms. Claretta together or a specific clue you want to add to the journal: I want a documented instance of Jerry being lactose intolerant and see where it takes you. When narrating a chapter, you have final say over what happens, so choose that option if you have something specific in mind. If you want other people's ideas, set up a scene to get more players involved. The best games have a healthy mix of narrated and role played chapters. Designer note: Fans of GM-less role playing games might be familiar with this structure, but everyone has an innate storyteller. You're going to do great. [stops reading] Should I do this table of contents too?
Jack: Yeah, I don't think we're going to do this, but you can read it.
Keith: Sure. [reading] Included in the play kit is a sheet called the Table of Contents. It's wholly operational, but can be a lot of fun to add to as well as look back on well after the game completes. To use the table of contents, simply give each chapter a name after it concludes. It's a great way to emphasize the tone you've set for your story. A more silly murder mystery might have a very pun based chapter name, whereas a more serious one might have a grave and foreboding name.
Jack: I feel like we are documenting this pretty, pretty thoroughly as we go.
Keith: This is going to be well documented. Yeah, this is going to be fine.
Jack: Okay. [reading] The Lead Up. In this phase of the game, we'll take turns writing chapters to narrate the lead up to the murder. Place the lead up reference board at the top of the journal. Shuffle the deck and place it on the board. Gonna bring all these cards back. Cause of death and detective’s arrival. Draw a card to determine the cause of death [stops reading] again of someone who has not died yet [reading] by finding the corresponding entry on the case files. Cause of death table. Write it on the clue card in the center of the journal. [stops reading] Sylvi, do you want to draw a card and do the honors?
Sylvi: Sure. Okay. Okay. Oh, I think I accidentally closed our card thing, so maybe someone else do it while I get the link back open.
Jack: Keith?
Keith: Yep. One card?
Jack: Yep.
Keith: Two of hearts.
Jack: And now we are looking at the pitch in Huckleberry's Art Lodge. Cause of death, two of hearts. Hit with a sculpture.
Keith: Great.
Jack: Oh, my God. Okay, could you write that in the, in the middle here, Keith?
Keith: Yeah. The middle clue is hit with a sculpture.
[long pause]
Jack: Incredible. Just getting my notes back. [reading] Draw another card to determine how and when the detective arrives using the corresponding tables on the case file. The rank of the card indicates how the detective hears about the case. The suit indicates when they arrive. Then resume turn order as described below. [stops reading] Okay. Keith—Sylvi?
Sylvi: Okay. Pull another card?
Keith and Jack: Yeah. 
Sylvi: Two of diamonds. 
Jack: Two of diamonds. So this is somehow appears at the lodge when the murder happens and invited by one of the other guests.
[pause]
Keith: So wait, hold on.
Sylvi:  Where am I—
Jack: In the—under the pitch in Huckleberry's Art Lodge in the case files section.
Sylvi: Thank you.
[pause]
Jack: Oh, so maybe arrives late, has been invited by one of the other guests, but is not going to appear until the murder happens.
Sylvi: Do we want to mention who—I like keeping it a secret about who invited the—
Jack: We should absolutely keep that a secret. Although let's put a note here. Oh, my God, it's so tiny. Get bigger. Here we go. English, English, English, French. Appears once the murder has happened, comma, invited by—Jesus Christ. I promise I can type when there's not another microphone. Alright.
Keith: We should include the word somehow appears.
Jack: Yes. cause there's a real sort of like, pops out of a closet.
Keith: It's sort of Pink Panther-y.
Jack: It is very Pink Panther-y. Okay. Alright. Steps of a turn. I think Sylvi is going to go first because of you reading the visual novel.
Sylvi: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Jake Hunter. Yeah. Shout out.
Jack: But let's go here to the lead up and do this step by step [reading] One, draw a card from the deck. [aside] Oh, we should clear the tableau because. Okay. [reading] Draw a card from the deck and add it to the tableau. If the tableau now has a full house, that is at least three cards of one rank and two cards of another, immediately advance to the locker room murder phase. Otherwise, move the killer following the rules using the card that was just drawn.
Keith: Okay. I am drawing a five of hearts.
Jack: Okay. So the killer is going to move five spaces in the heart's direction. So he's gonna go, or they're gonna go 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. Resting on Aiden Huckleberry-Hudson.
Sylvi: Ooh. Okay.
Jack: Step two. Then write a chapter where the suspect the killer just moved to is the focus character. Remember to include at least as many suspects in your chapter as the rank of the drawn card.
Sylvi: So I just, I got five.
Jack: Five.
Keith: That's great. I mean, this is a big deal first scene.
Sylvi: I have an idea.
Jack: Yeah. While you are playing this, it's worth thinking—End the chapter when you know which clue you will add to the journal. Your clue can be just about anything. Physical evidence, a conversation someone had, the weather, or even an intent that was shown. Write what you described on the chosen clue card. And I think it's worth—Earlier they were talking about how you could play the chapters to do things like, I want to see these two characters interact, but also I want to introduce the clue that Mrs. Garrity has a lactose intolerance. So you can kind of like, come in character focused or come in clue focused.
Sylvi: Oh, interesting. Okay. I had an idea for what Aiden would be doing without, without his uncle showing up. Actually, I guess we don't know about Pinky's gender identity without Pinky showing up. Where—Because he is the blood relative of the person who owns the lodge that they're in, he has kind of taken it upon himself to become the, like, host in absentia.
Jack: Yes.
Sylvi: So, I like the idea of him going around asking people, like, trying to do the like, real, like, schmoozy vibe of like, 
[as Aiden]: hey, what do you want to drink? I can get you a drink. And you know, I can't mix everything, but I can. I can do a couple things. And it's. 
Sylvi: They're not very well mixed cocktails. They're not. It's not, you know, if anyone asks for a cocktail. Otherwise, it's just like, 
[as Aiden]: I know where the—I know where the good stuff in the liquor cabinet is. 
Sylvi: And so if we want to go through a couple character’s orders and like, the interaction that they have with Aiden, we could do that really quick. Buford, I feel like, is a straight whiskey man. Or actually, you know what? No, he'd probably ask for bourbon. And then when it's like—I don't—Maybe we have that? I don't know, man.
Jack: I don't know that I can do a good Beaufort Nips voice. Oh, who am I kidding? I can do a good Buford Knipps voice. [crosstalk] I just need to have faith in myself.
Sylvi: [crosstalk] There's no such thing as a bad Buford Knipps voice is the thing. You just need to go for it.
Jack: Hang on. Wait a second. 
[as Buford]: You're acting like you know the place. You don't know where the liquor cabinet is?
Sylvi [as Aiden]: Of course. Listen, I've been here. I used to, I used to summer here with my, my parents back in the day. So, you know, the memories are a little off, but I have a vague recollection of where the cabinet is. You know, don't need to be rude about it.
Jack [as Buford]: Well, then some bourbon. I'll be very happy with it once it arrives—Also, come here. 
Jack: Puts his head close to Aiden and is like:
[as Buford]: we need to talk later about the. You know.
Sylvi: They both shoot a look over at the—Wayne John Hag on the other side of the room.
Jack: Throws another perfect bullseye.
Sylvi: Yeah, that’s the—
Keith: It is unclear if they know they're being scammed yet.
Jack: It says fell. Fell.
Keith: Yeah, but you could fall for a scam and realize it and also not—
Jack: That's true. They could be talking about the golden opportunity. Yeah.
Sylvi: Talk about our mutual friend here. Could be the way we put it then, if we want to keep that a little ambiguous for now.
Jack: Yeah. There's business afoot.
Sylvi: Okay, so that's three—
Keith: Bigfoot!
Jack: I think. Cedar Basil Banyan kind of comes up and he says, 
[as Cedar] so you know the place, do you?
Sylvi [as Aiden]: I mean, probably better than the rest of you guys, huh?
Jack [as Cedar]: That's what you think. In the presence of such beautiful art as this, I feel like I've walked into a place that I know very well indeed. What is it that you do, young man?
Sylvi [as Aiden]: Well, right now, I've been really interested in trying to harness the power of generative AI but for dogs, I just—I think that it's kind of an underserved market. You know, pets are really big on the Internet right now. AI is really big on the internet right now. We got to figure out a way to synergize these two things.
Jack [as Cedar]: You spend a lot of time on the Internet, do you?
Sylvi [as Aiden]: Yeah, sometimes.
Jack [as Cedar]: Let me introduce you to the cousin of my cousin. Bill—Come—Bill. Come over here.
Keith [as Bill]: Yes?
Jack [as Cedar]: This is my cousin Bill. Sorry. This is the cousin of my cousin, Bill. Tally Tab. Bill spends a lot of time on the Internet himself. This young man's thinking about getting into AI for dogs.
Keith [as Bill]: For dogs. Cute. That's cute.
Sylvi [as Aiden]: Hey, thank you so much. You know, I was—I actually, I didn't want to give it away. I did know who you were when I came in. Your reputation does precede you, but I'd love to talk more about it, you know, See, maybe we can go in together on a. On a little thing. I'm—
Keith [as Bill]: Well, who’s interested?
Sylvi [as Aiden]: Well, I talked to Buford a little.
Keith [as Bill]: Buford?
Jack [as Buford]: Are you telling them about the dogs thing?
Keith [as Bill]: That's cute. No, Buford. Yeah, that's cute. Yeah.
Sylvi [as Aiden]: Yeah. Well, my—Pinky, obviously, you know. Pinky loves supporting my work, my projects, so.
Keith [as Bill]: Hmm. And what does it do for the dogs?
Sylvi [as Aiden]: So. Okay, so, you know, there's this—There's been this trend, right, of dogs. They have these buttons that people—that they push and it'll say like a word, right?
Keith [as Bill]: Oh that’s cute.
Sylvi [as Aiden]: It's cute, right? Yeah. But with what I'm working on now, [pause] they'd hit the button and then it would sort of generate the ideal treat and then the owner would be able to order that treat from one of the partner sites and then it would get there in two weeks or so.
Keith [as Bill]: So they don’t get the treat?
Sylvi [as Aiden]: They do, but, like, we can't instantaneously deliver it to them. We have to make it.
Keith [as Bill]: So it’s like, the—
Sylvi [as Aiden]: It's in sort of an alpha stage right now. I've mostly been trying to focus—I've kind of been focused on the branding while, you know, those eggheads I've got working for me handle the bits and boops about it. But I can—I got a whole prospectus that I could show you in my bag, but—
Keith [as Bill]: You can say it’s AI.
Sylvi [as Aiden]: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Keith [as Bill]: That’s huge. That’s huge.
Sylvi [as Aiden]: It's huge. I mean, listen, first two letters of my name, man.
Keith [as Bill]: H, U?
Sylvi [as Aiden]: A, I. Aiden.
Keith [as Bill]: Oh, okay. H, U for huge. A, I for Aiden.
Sylvi [as Aiden]: Yeah. I knew you'd get it. I knew—I knew if anyone here was gonna get it, I knew it would be you. 
Sylvi: I think that's it. The clue that I wanted to add.
Jack: Yes.
Sylvi: Uh, was going to be a—I don't know enough about like, fancy alcohol here to know what specifically it would be, but there is some sort of thing that Pinky had never opened before, like, had been saving for a special day. And it's, it's half empty now. It's half drunk.
Jack: Wow.
Sylvi: So I—I'm just gonna put like, half empty bottle of expensive liquor.
Jack: Let’s make up a fake liquor name.
Sylvi: Yeah, please. Help me.
Jack: Half empty bottle of—
Sylvi: Also, am I putting this in the right spot or should I put it—
Jack: You can put it wherever you want.
Sylvi: Okay, cool. I figured nearby the Huckleberry family.
Keith: 60 year Macauley.
Sylvi: Hell yeah, man.
Jack: [laughing] 60 year Macauley.
Sylvi: I don't know if that's how you're envisioning it being spelled. You can correct me on it, but—
Jack: That's great.
Keith: I was thinking like Macauley Culkin.
Sylvi: Oh, you know what? Hell yeah, man.
Jack: Okay—
Keith: Okay, thank you. I knew how to spell Macauley then. Now. [Sylvi: Yeah.] Many people do not know how to spell that.
Sylvi: That’s because I did not spell it right. It’s Macaulay.
Keith: Oh, okay yeah. it was the beginning part that I was looking at.
Jack: You know, I think Keith's up next. [Sylvi: He is.] So, Keith, you're gonna draw a card from the deck and add it to the tableau.
Sylvi: Pompous voice was great, by the way. It really lived up to the hype.
Jack: Do we have a full house?
Sylvi: Ace of spades… No.
Jack: So the killer is gonna move one step in the—in the spadeswards direction.
Sylvi: Oh. It's up to old Buf-y.
Jack: Buford Knipps has become our focus character. And this is a scene with one person.
Keith: This is a scene with one person.
Jack: One other person? [reading] Include as many suspects in your chapter as the rank of the drawn card. So just one. We can add more.
Keith: Is ace wild, maybe?
Jack: No.
Sylvi: Okay, we can make it wild.
Jack: We can decide.
Sylvi: I don't mind a scene that just has one person as the focal point, but it does tend to lead to quicker things, and there are only four of them we can pull, so.
Keith: So I'll say we could do a one person scene—
Sylvi: If you had an idea. I don't want to squash it. Sorry, I didn't mean to squash the house ruling. That wasn't my intent there.
Keith: No, I think that it’s worth it to have a house scene, because Buford is [pause] bored of the rich. You know, he's rich. Buford is rich. But when he's around other rich people, it makes him feel stupid, which makes him feel angry. So he goes out—He flew here, but he also, he had someone drive up his car of stuff. So he has a personal, like, trunk. And he's out in the woods nearby, target practice, shooting trees. Old—big old trees.
Jack: At night?
Keith: At night.
Jack: [laughing] That’s so dangerous.
Sylvi: Just peppering the giant oak tree in front of this cabin with buckshot.
Jack: Does he discover a clue here? What is the…
Keith: The clue is that Buford Knipps has a gun.
Jack: Oh, yeah. What gun is it?
Keith: It's like a, like a—It's like a hunting rifle. It is like a bolt action big caliber, large caliber hunting rifle.
Jack: Okay. Now I am going to draw a card. The ace of hearts. Gonna move once in the hearts direction, which is—
Keith: I put that clue on here and which one do I get? 
Jack: You can put it anywhere you want.
Sylvi: Anyone you want.
Keith: Okay.
Sylvi: That’s back down to Aiden, I think?
Jack: It is back down to Aiden. Okay, let's see. I think I would like to introduce the Washkos gossiping about Aiden.
Sylvi: Yes, I like this.
Jack: I think that they're just like, like, Sophia is just like laughing into her drink and says to Laura, 
[as Sophia]: Did you hear, he said AI for dogs?
Sylvi [as Laura]: I. You know, I think that we need to be investing in tech jobs everywhere.
Jack [as Sophia]: What's the problem? You really believe that?
Sylvi [as Laura]: No. Okay. How is a dog going to use ChatGPT, like let’s be real
Jack [as Sophia]: It's gonna push the button and then, you know, some sort of food is gonna arrive three and a half weeks later when the dog has completely forgotten about it, you know, even with those.
Sylvi [as Laura]: Did you hear about the last thing he worked on?
Jack [as Sophia]: What did he work on last?
Sylvi [as Laura]: Oh. Oh my God. Okay. 
Sylvi: She pulls open her phone and after a quick Google holds up an image of a baby dressed like Andrew Dice Clay on a poster that says Funny Babies.
[hysterical Keith laughter]
Jack: Okay, now hang on.
Sylvi [as Laura]: He tried doing stand up with babies like he would—They were dubbed by the comedians. But it went belly up when they found out that it wasn't really Andrew Dice Clay doing the Andrew Dice Clay voice.
Jack [as Sophia]: It was just someone, some fake person doing the Andrew Dice Clay voice.
Sylvi [as Laura]: Yeah, didn't even really sound like him in hindsight, but you know, it got one season on Netflix and canceled. And that seems to be the story of his life.
Jack [as Sophia]: And here he goes, he pivots. You see the way he's swanning around looking like he owns the place?
Sylvi [as Laura]: I guess he kinda—technically he might someday. Does Pinky have kids? 
Sylvi: That's in character.
Jack: Yeah. By the way, that question does Pinky have kids?
Sylvi: Also, Sorry if I overrode your clue with Funny Babies.
Jack: [laughter] No, no, I didn't have a clue in mind. Funny Babies showing up—
Sylvi: I’m just trying to think of the dumbest things this guy can could be trying to fake.
Jack [as Sophia]: Where is Pinky? Have you seen him yet?
Sylvi [as Laura]: No. I mean, the last time I talked to Pinky was at a fundraiser like months ago. At this point. [Jack: Pinky doesn't—] It was honestly a shock that Pinky showed up anyway.
Jack [as Sophia]: Yeah. What's he doing hanging around with you? Seems like it'd be a dull event for a art collector.
Sylvi [as Laura]: Some of us have ambition, my dear sister.
Jack [as Sophia]: I can tell that you do. How's that going?
Sylvi [as Laura]: You know, numbers are up.
Jack [as Sophia]: Mm-hm. The numbers are up.
Sylvi [as Laura]: The latest polls are good. They're better. They're better. They're better than they have been.
Jack [as Sophia]: Okay, well, you know, good luck. 
Jack: And she kind of, like, claps her sister on the shoulder, gets up and like, climbs the mezzanine and peers into the darker back rooms to see if she can see maybe where—See maybe where Pinky is. I'm gonna say clue… I'm gonna put the clue up here and I'm going to say [pause] What is the clue for Funny Babies?
Sylvi: This is the thing, man.
Keith: You should hit play on that video, by the way. 
Sylvi: Did you link something? 
Keith: No, I just know a lot of Andrew Dice Clay jokes.
Jack: Keith has an Andrew Dice Clay ready to go.
Keith: I mean, I've been quoting “Hour back, get it” for 20 years.
Jack: I don't think I know what Andrew Dice Clay looks like.
Sylvi: I barely know who—I just know that—his affect really.
Jack: Oh, that’s what he looks like.
Sylvi: Yeah, he's like the leather Jacket I always do—I'm thinking of him—
Keith: The weightlighting gloves.
Sylvi: The big thing was picturing a baby doing the weird smoking thing that he does, but with a lollipop.
Keith: Well, cause he has—The reason the babies make sense is he has a whole series of, of, of nursery rhyme bits.
Jack: But are they, like, rude and crude?
Sylvi: Oh yeah.
Keith: Little Miss Muffet sat on her tuffet eating her curds and whey. What came along? Miss Spider sat down beside her and said, hey, what's in the bowl, bitch? Ohhhh.
Sylvi: Oh. So unfortunately, the world is so stupid that when I did Google Andrew Dice Clay baby, a bunch of AI babies doing Andrew Dice Clay bits came up. [Jack: Oh my god.] So unfortunately, Aiden Hudson-Huckleberry is a real person.
Jack: Yeah. Yes, he's doing very well. Okay. Instead—As Sophia peers into the dark of the A frame, she sees a figure moving in the dark towards the back of the, like in the darkened hallways of the house as it moves in towards the rest of its, of its rooms. Dark figure inside. Pinky’s. Pink's. Pinky’s house. Okay, now we do have a pair.
Sylvi: Oh, we do.
Jack: I think you’re up.
Sylvi: My turn?
Jack: It’s Sylvi, yeah.
Sylvi: Okay.
[confused noises from Sylvi and Keith]
Keith: Maybe that’s true. Maybe that’s true.
Jack: Wait—what?
Sylvi: No, I think it’s Keith’s turn.
Keith: I thought it was—Okay.
Sylvi: No, I think you’re right, right?
Keith: What was the first one we did? Hit with a sculpture was first—
Sylvi: Yeah. 
Jack: No, no, we did, we did—We did Aiden. Then we did Buford. That was you, Buford, firing the gun in the dark. 
Sylvi: You’re right.
Jack: Then we did the sisters talking. So I think it is Sylvi.
Sylvi: Two of diamonds. So the murderer moves. Oh, we're up on Cueball.
Jack: One, two.
Keith: [whispering] Get them away from the cousins.
[Jack laughter]
Sylvi: Oh, man, I'm trying to—Cueball is the character I have like, the least grasp on right now.
Jack: Yeah, we know sort of nothing about her. We don't know why she's here.
Sylvi: She seems the most normal.
Keith: We've said that she doesn't know why she's here. That might not necessarily be true, but I guess it's definitely the vibe.
Jack: It could be a lie. Everyone is lying.
Sylvi: Yeah. I need two people in this. [pause] I think I have an idea for a clue given. So, okay, here's a question. Was that private quarters joke canon where he does have a core collection? Okay, cool. So I'm gonna come into this with the clue that I know I want to have, which is a rare, rare double sided coin being found on the floor.
Jack: Oh my god.
Sylvi: Actually, you know what? It might be even better because I, I was looking at some of these clues that they give us suggestions and instead of it being rare, I think it is just a double sided quarter with a drop of blood on it.
Jack: Oh, sick.
Sylvi: And I think that this scene is… Maybe this is Cueball and Wayne playing darts together. Like, she doesn't really know what else to do with all these weird, rich strangers around, but—
Keith: That’s a massive reach advantage.
Sylvi: I mean, listen, at least they're not playing for money. I think it's just sort of like one of those things where it's like, I don't know, can I—Do you want to play with somebody or are you just trying to do this by yourself? And then Wayne trying not to get the attention of the two guys he scammed is like. Yeah, come on.
Jack: What are they talking—
Sylvi: [interrupting] I think that—huh?
Jack: What do they talk about?
Sylvi: Oh, man. I think… See, it's interesting—I'm trying to figure out who would open with the like, “So how do you know Pinky?” Because, like, I feel like it's an interesting conversation for these two to have considering Wayne works for Pinky, but we haven't defined how and. [Jack: Oh, yeah.] Yeah. So maybe it's Cueball who asked the question where it's like, like, 
[as Cueball]: I gotta admit, everyone around here seems, no offense, way further out of my tax bracket than the two of us.
Jack [as Wayne]: You got that right.
Sylvi [as Cueball]: How do you know Pinky?
Jack [as Wayne]: Well, I work for him.
Sylvi [as Cueball]: You’re like his basketball coach?
Jack [as Wayne]: [laughter] Okay, yeah, pretty good. I get that a lot. No, I am—I get things done. You know, he has things that need sorting out. I sort them out. I'm sort of an assistant.
Sylvi [as Cueball]: [skeptical] Okay. Yeah, no, assistant. That's the word. I—
Jack [as Wayne]: Something you're trying to say?
Sylvi [as Cueball]: I'm—You're a guy who fixes things. Yeah.
Jack [as Wayne]: Are you implying that there's some, something criminal going on here between me and my employer?
Sylvi [as Cueball]: I'm sorry, man, I didn't mean to. I'm. I'm busting your balls. I'm just trying to like, lighten up the rough situation here. It's a little awkward if you can't tell.
Jack [as Wayne]: It is a little awkward.
Sylvi: Leans into Wayne. 
[as Cueball]: Mustache over there keeps staring at us. And I think it's just cause of my haircut, but I don't know.
Jack [as Wayne]: Oh, no. He's an interesting critter, that one. [Sylvi laughter] His name is Knipps. Buford Knipps. He has one of the rare—.
Sylvi [as Cueball]: That’s not real.
Keith: I look over, eyes shot over. 
[as Buford]: I heard my name.
Jack [as Wayne]: Don't worry about it, Bu. Just playing duds. Now you want to know something about Buford Knipps? He is the only man in America to have the rare distinction, if you can call it that, of hunting an orca with a rifle.
Sylvi [as Cueball]: Wait, I read that article. I read an article about him.
Jack [as Wayne]: The one that said ‘Evil Man on the Loose’.
Sylvi [as Cueball]: Evil? Yeah, evil—‘Killer Whale Killer’.
Jack [as Wayne]: ‘Killer Whale Killer Still At Large’. Yeah. You know, he likes two things. He likes hanging the heads on the wall and he likes drinking that horrible rye that he got named after him.
Sylvi [as Cueball]: Oh. Oh, he's that Knipps. Ew.
Jack [as Wayne]: Yep. Uh huh. Knipps whiskey puts [crosstalk] hairs on your chest.
Keith [as Buford]: [crosstalk] They only sell it in nips.
Jack [as Wayne]: They only sell it in nips, but [crosstalk] the nips are stored—
Keith [as Buford]: [crosstalk] You can only buy it in one ounce—
Sylvi [as Cueball]: The ad campaign where they had DJ Khaled saying have a nip of Knipps in the, in the ads just didn't really work out for them. But they tried.
Jack [as Wayne]: Yeah, those ads weren't, those ads weren't very good. I'm Wayne. I think Wayne. John Hag. Sorry. Wayne John. That's Wayne John.
Sylvi [as Cueball]: My friends call me Cueball.
Jack: You know, shakes your hand, gigantic hands.
Sylvi: Yeah. Completely dwarfs her hand. I think the way they find the clue is it's like, 
[as Cueball]: Okay, we gotta figure out who's going first here.
Jack: Oh, yeah.
Sylvi [as Cueball]: I don't have any change on me. 
Sylvi: She like, kind of like, looks around. And the thing that I think they notice is that it's a double sided quarter and they're like, oh, we can't use this. But there is—in the, in the film adaptation of this, the camera lingers and we see that just a little drop of blood.
Jack: Wow. We have a description for Wayne John Hag, he is a fixer.
Keith: Yep.
Jack: Wayne John Hag kind of has—Oh, Sylvi, what was the, what's the assistant in Alien Earth's name?
Sylvi: Oh, the one played by- Oh, wait, I might be thinking of someone else then.
Jack: I'm thinking of Boy Kavalier's assistant.
Sylvi: Yes, I was thinking of Timothy Olyphant's character, Kirsh. Atom. Atom Eanes? Is that's the name of the guy?
Jack: Adam Eanes?
Sylvi: Atom Eins? 
Jack: But much, much bigger. Yeah.
Jack: Yeah.
Sylvi: I'll link a picture for Keith so you can see this scary bald man.
Jack: Oh, Atom Eins.
Sylvi: Atom Eins, yeah. Good name.
Jack: Yeah, Noah Hawley has really good names in all his stuff.
Sylvi: I just put it in our—In the general.
Keith: Oh, I see.
Sylvi: Yeah.
Keith: [sarcastic] Ooh, so scary. Guy in a suit.
Sylvi: Yeah.
[Discord disconnection sound]
Keith: Oh, oh, did we lose Jack?
Sylvi: Jack got so scared.
Jack: I’m back.
Keith: Jack got so scared of Atom.
Jack: I got so scared of Atom.
Sylvi: I like that shot with the three faces.
Keith: Their faces. Look at that. Okay, now he's scared.
Jack: That's a man with spare faces.
Keith: That's a man with spare faces. You know—you never want to mess with a man with spare faces.
[Sylvi laughter]
Jack: Yeah. Where do you want to—Oh, you've put that here next to it.
Sylvi: I just put it down in the first slot I saw if I’m being real, but I don't know.
Jack: I think that works. Alright, Keith, you're up.
Keith: Alright, here we go. Three of hearts. So he goes 1, 2, 3.
Sylvi: The cousins remain safe.
Jack: Oh my god, a new person.
Keith: A blank space… Do we put a name? Do we have to? We don't have to put a name. This is just a free spot.
Sylvi: Is this what it is? The staff starts showing up?
Jack: Yeah, this should be the staff. We can introduce a new character.
Keith: Okay, can I just—
Sylvi: [crosstalk] Got something, man?
Keith: [crosstalk] I do have a name. Jack can say no because this is Jack's IP.
Jack: I don’t know if it’s my IP.
Keith: Our IP.
Sylvi: RIP. Rest in peace.
Jack: [laughing] Dutch Welsh! No, I'm very happy with Dutch Welsh. Who—Wait, also, how many, how—what, you do… Three. Okay, Three characters. Who the fuck is Dutch Welsh?
Keith: [pause] Dutch Welsh is the first person seen without an invite card and is doing staff-like tasks around the house, but not in any of the main areas. So I think he was first spotted by Buford moving trash barrels outside. And then he was spotted walking past the window while Wayne John and Cueball were playing darts. And then he was also upstairs moving laundry while Aiden, Cedar, Bill and someone else were talking about AI dogs.
Sylvi: I think Buford was the other person in that scene, because I got him a drink.
Keith: Yeah, sure, yeah.
Jack: What does he look like?
Keith: He's wearing a blue hat and a jumpsuit, and he's got a big, sort of like a big handlebar mustache.
Jack: Wow. A cool guy.
Keith: A cool guy. He's wearing, like a painter—He's like, wearing, like, a painter's jumpsuit. Navy, with a hat and a big mustache.
Jack: Oh yeah! I think Cedar catches sight of him and says, 
[as Cedar]: oh, are you a painter, too?
Keith [as Dutch]: Not in the same way.
Jack [as Cedar]: Oh, house painter then, maybe.
Keith [as Dutch]: Yeah, I've done some of that. I've done some of that.
Jack [as Cedar]: What do you primarily paint?
Keith [as Dutch]: I do city contracts.
Jack [as Cedar]: Oh, you’re not one of the guests?
Keith [as Dutch]: No, no, I'm, I'm here, I'm working.
Jack [as Cedar]: Oh, well—Well, it was nice to meet you.
Keith [as Dutch]: What do you, what do you paint?
Jack [as Cedar]: Mostly figurative landscapes.
Keith [as Dutch]: Mm.  As opposed to literal landscapes?
Jack [as Cedar]: [laughter] Cute. Cute, cute, cute. Well, I'm here with my cousins. Oh, my cousin, I suppose.
Sylvi [as someone]: My cousin and his cousin.
Keith [as Dutch]: Sort of like a three-two cousin situation.
Jack: Like, light dawns on his face. 
[as Cedar]: Are you a three-two cousin, my man?
Keith [as Dutch]: Who isn’t? 
Sylvi [as someone]: We all are.
Jack [as Cedar]: I'm afraid I'm sort of the—I don't know what you call them. My cousins and I, we call them the hanging cousins. The wing. I'm a wing cousin. Yes.
Keith [as Dutch]: I'm a wing cousin.
Jack [as Cedar]: Oh, would that I had the position of Newt. The fulcrum cousin. You're a wing, too?
Keith [as Dutch]: Oh, I'm a wing. But I'm also the body in another three-two cousins.
Jack [as Cedar]: You're a double three two cousin. This is fascinating! Are you part of the news group? [Sylvi laughter]
Keith [as Dutch]: I didn’t know that there was one.
Jack [as Cedar]: You didn't? You're a double three two-cousin and you didn't know there was a news group?
Sylvi [as someone]: You’re a six-four and you didn't know?
Jack [as Cedar]: And you—Bill. Come over here. Bill. I'd like to introduce you to—
Keith [as Bill]: What?
Jack [as Cedar]: What did you say your name was?
Keith [as Dutch]: Dutch, Dutch Welsh.
Jack [as Cedar]: Bill, this is Dutch Welsh. You're not going to believe this. He's a three-two and he's not part of the news group.
Keith [as Bill]: Not part of the news group? Cute, that’s cute!
Sylvi: I didn't want to steal it. It's so good.
Jack: What's the clue here, Keith? Is it Dutch Welsh? Is it double cousin? 
Keith: The clue is, um. How—[pause] I'm wondering how much editorializing that I can do. I think that it just says I have full control over what the clue is, right?
Jack: I think so, yes.
Keith: Okay. I'm going to say that Dutch Welsh is lying about why he is here.
Jack: Oh, that's a perfect clue. I feel like that's a great one. Okay. [pause] Oh, ho, ho. Two pair. Oh, the two of clubs. We're moving.
Sylvi: I’m sorry, we have oh, no, we do have two pairs. Yeah, we have two aces. I forgot.
Jack: We're moving. Clubswoods. One bong. Two bong. Sophia Washko. The knife falls over Sophia Washko.
Sylvi: You know, this puts—You know who this puts in real danger?
Jack: Who?
Sylvi: The cousins. 
Jack: What?
Sylvi: I draw one or two that a cousin's getting a cut—if I draw one or a two of diamonds. I guess if I got an ace of diamonds.
Keith: Two diamonds is already gone. Two of diamonds already gone.
Sylvi: So sorry. One cousin is in danger.
Jack: Right. Let's see, though.
Sylvi: If I got a two of clubs. RIP Bill. Two of clubs is also off the table. I'm fucking with you.
Jack: Okay, I think. I think I want a scene with Pinky. I think Sophia is exploring, and she finds Pinky in his study with his head in his hands…
Sylvi: In a, in a bathrobe.
Jack: In a bathrobe. Can you play Pinky?
Sylvi: Yeah, I can. I can play Pinky. And Pinky's just going. 
[as Pinky]: Oh, God. Oh, God.
Jack [as Sophia]: Pinky, is that you?
Sylvi [as Pinky]: Oh, Laura, is that you? Oh, Sophia, is that you?
Jack [as Sophia]: That's me. Yeah. You can tell. What's the matter, Pinkie?
Sylvi: Oh, oh—Jack, do you have something in mind for something being the matter with Pinky?
Keith: Okay, I would like to jump in with only one thing to remember about Pinky.
Jack: He’s secretly cool.
Keith: Is that. No, he's a freak. He's a rich freak. 
Sylvi: Perfect.
Jack: That’s true, yeah.
Sylvi: Let me change that. Pinky is not in a bathrobe. Pinky is in a extremely expensive kimono. 
Keith: Thank you. Perfect. It's a perfect edit.
Sylvi: Yeah, no problem.
Jack: Sophia grimaces. 
[as Sophia]: Pinky, we're all here. We're waiting for you, You—
Sylvi [as Pinky]: Oh, God, that's today. Oh, thats—
Jack [as Sophia]: Pinky.
Sylvi [as Pinky]: What?
Jack [as Sophia]: You sent out all the cards?
Sylvi [as Pinky]: Well, you know, I—With the—You never know when the, the postal system is gonna get off.
Jack [as Sophia]: You put the date on the cards. Pinky, we've been, we've been standing out there thinking that, you know, you, you might have been imperiled or you were in trouble or this is part of the games we play. I mean, I remember that last New Years Eve—
Sylvi [as Pinky]: Could you keep it down just a little bit?
Jack [as Sophia]: Okay. Are you hungover?
Sylvi [as Pinky]: It—I don't get hungover. I just sometimes get headaches the day after I drink. It's fine.
Jack [as Sophia]: Pinky, what happened yesterday?
Sylvi [as Pinky]: I got some news and we can talk about that at a later time. I'm so happy you made it.
Jack [as Sophia]: Okay. Are you gonna come out? What should I tell them?
Sylvi [as Pinky]: Whoa, what do you know about my personal life? [Jack chuckle] I'll be—
Jack [as Sophia]: [joking] Let me be clear: are you gonna come out of the closet?
Sylvi [as Pinky]: Not yet. Still waiting. 
Sylvi: I think Pinky, like, stands up sort of like gestures to himself a little bit. He's like, 
[as Pinky]: well, clearly I need a bit to get presentable, but rest assured, I will be making an appearance.
Jack [as Sophia]: Okay. Alright. 
Jack: Pinky—
Sylvi: I have, like, a very specific image of Pinky in my mind, but I need to look up the actor's name.
Jack: Yeah.
[pause]
Sylvi: It's—We can—Jonathan Pryce. The stage actor. Jonathan Pryce. I mean, not just a stage actor. He's just a very well known Welsh actor.
Jack: Jonathan Pryce. [Sylvi: Pryce with a Y.] Oh, yes, perfect.
Sylvi: He's one of those guys you'd recognize.
Keith: Yeah, I know this guy. Now, you know who I was thinking was Dudley Moore.
Sylvi: I'm looking up Dudley Moore. [pause] It's Jonathan Pryce with this haircut. Obvious toupee.
Jack: Clue. Pinky’s in trouble. This feels like a pretty straightforward—Oh, no, let's be more specific. Pinky has information for Sophia. [Sylvi: Ooh] because he said Sophia, but not for Laura. Yeah, he said, you know, I'll tell you about this later. Yeah, no. Okay, who's next? Now it's you, right?
Sylvi: Keith?
Keith: I think that I did Dutch and then we did Pinky.
Sylvi: Okay, it is me. Oh. That is a full house.
Jack: Whoa. 
Sylvi: Two of hearts.
Jack: Okay, so certain stuff happens when the full house is triggered. [reading] If the tableau now has a full house, i.e. at least three cards of one rank and two cards of another immediately advance to the locked room murder phase.
Sylvi: So, do we not move the killer card?
Jack: Do not move the killer. [Sylvi: Wow. Wow.] So [reading] when a full house is revealed during the lead up, the moment we've all been waiting for finally occurs. One of these suspects is found murdered in a locked room. We'll collaborate on a special chapter where we will add some clues based on the cards in the tableau and decide the time, place, and other key facts of the crime. Conducting the murder. Do not move the killer like you normally would. The suspect currently being visited by the killer is murdered. Place a dead token—
Sylvi: Of course, the communist
Sylvi and Keith: Of course it’s the communists.
Jack: Wow. Sophia Washko.
Keith: This means Dutch Welsh is safe.
Jack: Dead.
Sylvi: Yeah. I was gonna be like, wow, crazy that Dutch Welsh is gonna be our victim, but no, wrong. Sophia Washko.
Jack: Check—
Keith: I'm glad because it makes sense that the—It wouldn't narratively make sense for a character to be introduced and then immediately killed.
Sylvi: Yeah, no it would suck.
Keith: Yeah.
Jack: Check which suspect the killer would have moved to based on the draw.
Sylvi: Oh that is Dutch Welsh.
Jack: Which card did I draw? It was hearts…
Sylvi: Two of hearts.
Keith: It would have been Dutch Welsh.
Sylvi: So, yeah, I would have gone down and then up. Yeah.
Jack: [reading] This suspect will be the one to find the crime scene in the coming chapter. Each of the card ranks from one to five will add a clue based on the number of that card that was drawn and the crime scene clues table in the case file. [stops reading] If you go down here, you can see crime scene clues. I'll tab over to that in a second. [reading] Go through each card rank, starting with ace and proceeding to 2, 3, 4, 5 for each. Determine which clue gets added based on how many of that card rank are in the tableau. Add each clue to the journal once everyone has a shared understanding of it. [stops reading] So how many aces did we draw? Two. We drew two. So let's go. Crime scene clues. Two aces. The marquee piece of the gallery has been vandalized. What the fuck is the marquee piece?
[pause, thinking noises]
Sylvi: Now my question is, do we want this to be, like, an actual piece of art?
Keith: Wait, is that not—The entire gallery is revealed to be made of forgeries.
Jack: Oh, no, you're right. Oh, shit, Keith.
Sylvi: Oh, that's even better.
Jack: The entire gallery is revealed to be made of forgeries.
[gasps]
Jack: Sorry, what did you just think, Sylvie?
Sylvi: No, I just. I don't want to get into it because it might not pull out that way, but it's interesting to have that happen when we have a painter among our suspects.
Keith: And I have a really, really fun idea off of this that I hope we'll be able to parlay.
Jack: Incredible.
Sylvi: I'm looking for—at the crime scene clues table now.
Keith: Yes.
Jack: How many twos did we draw? We drew three twos. All eyes are drawn to the now obvious hidden door in the room where the victim was found. How was she killed? We drew this early on, right?
Keith and Sylvi: Hit by a sculpture.
Jack: Wow.
Sylvi: Hit by a forged sculpture.
Jack: Hit by a forged sculpture.
Sylvi: The stinker.
Jack: How many threes do we have?
Keith: Well, I'll say we don't necessarily know that this sculpture was part of the gallery and may in fact, not be a forgery.
Jack: That’s true.
Sylvi: Fair enough.
Keith: But. But it is likely.
Jack: It is. We drew one three. A freshly painted portrait of the victim. [laughter]That's very cool.
Sylvi: That’s wild.
Jack: That's very cool. Did we draw any fours? No. And we drew one five. The security system of the lodge went haywire around the time of the murder, locking all doors and sounding a deafening alarm. [pause] Okay. Man. Right, let's—
Keith: This is good stuff.
Jack: This is good stuff. Okay. [reading] Each of the card ranks. Okay. Then it's time to figure out where and when the victim is found. Consider how the victim might be found alone and why the chosen character will be the first to find them. Consider what leads the witness to find the victim, who else is there with them, and what they do immediately in the aftermath. Remember, this is the locked room murder mystery game. Your victim should be found in a locked room, which is detective novel shorthand for an impossible situation. It may be a true locked room, or it could be somewhere you can't immediately conceive how the killer would escape from unseen and unheard. [stops reading] Does anybody have a good immediate idea for how Sophia is—the locked room in which Sophia is found in?
Sylvi: I'm not gonna lie, my brain did go to the private quarters room.
Jack: Oh my god.
Sylvi: Where the coin collection is locked up. But I'm happy to have other suggestions. That was just knee jerk.
Jack: Yeah. There's a sculpture in there, I think.
Sylvi: Oh, yeah. Who invent—I'm Googling who invented coins?
[Keith laughter]
Jack: Oh, that sounds.
Keith: Maybe ancient China.
Sylvi: Yeah. I was just hoping that there would be like one guy that was like “I’ve made the first coinage!” and he sounded like that. It's fine, it's fine.
Keith: Coins were invented in modern day Turkey around the seventh century BCE.
Sylvi: Oh wow.
Keith: That was an AI answer. So I don't. I can't deny that, it just was…
Sylvi: It's of King Croesus of Lydia, is the—Who the—
Jack: Oh, the richest. The richest man. King Croesus.
Sylvi: Yeah. Because the Lydians were—Who were Herodotus ascribed the invention of the coin too, so that seems like [Jack: That makes sense, yeah.] a thing that makes sense. Yeah, that seems like a thing that Pinky Huckleberry, noted coin collector, would know about.
Jack: Yeah, it’s
Sylvi: So we've got a Croesus crisis.
Jack: We've got. Guys, we got a Croesus crisis.
Keith: Yeah. Maybe multiple—Maybe two crises.
Jack: And Dutch, how was the victim found alone and why the chosen character will be the first to find them. Keith, how is Dutch—How does Dutch find Sophie?
Keith: Dutch has been in every room in the house alone and has had to go into the rooms in the order in which they've been available to enter alone. The last of which would have been the private quarters, [pause] and that's when he gets there and finds Sophia already there, already dead.
Jack: Pool of blood, obvious hidden door in the room?
Keith: Yes. 
Jack: What is the hidden door? Is it just like a, like a…
Keith: The hidden door is underneath the spot where the statue was.
Jack: Oh, sick. And all the alarms are going off. Pinky’s, you know, clutching his head. Oh, my God. I bet, you know, Laura comes running to hear to—like, Dutch's cry of alarm. And, you know, is standing in the door with her hand over her mouth. Does Buford go and get his gun?
Sylvi: Buford faints.
[laughter]
Keith: Buford faints from drinking the 60 year Macaulay.
Sylvi: Yeah. Cause also, I've realized that I am actually picturing Colonel Mustard from the Clue movie as Buford.
Jack: Oh, yeah, there is a kind of Colonel Mustard thing going on.
Sylvi: Yeah, a little bit.
Jack: Wayne John Hag, you know, very gently picks Buford up, sits him in a chair, rolls his eyes towards Cueball being like this fucking guy.
Keith: Searches his pockets for money.
Jack: [laughing] Searches his pockets.
Sylvi: Damn, he ran his pockets. 
Jack: Okay.
Sylvi: Cueball's covering her ears.
Jack: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. The three cousins are like, you know, flapping about.
Sylvi: They're covering each other's ears.
Keith [as Bill]: Oh, what now? No, seriously, what now?
Jack: Yeah, I think. Yeah, I mean, I want to tell the cousins about the murder. I think Dutch Welsh comes in, says 
[as Dutch]: there's been a murder.
Keith: Who did you tell about the murder?
Sylvi and Jack: The cousins.
Keith: Oh, the cousins. 
[as Bill]: No, stop. No, seriously, stop.
Jack: Laura with her face, you know, with her face pale and horrible. 
[as Dutch]: Sophia, she's dead in the coin room. And what's more mysterious, the door was locked from the inside.
Sylvi [as Aiden]: Yeah, my uncle doesn't let anybody in the coin room. 
Sylvi: Aiden coming in now, fumbling with some sort of like, remote to try and turn off the alarm, but it's not working because, one, he does not know the right code anymore. But two, we've said it's malfunctioning.
Jack [as Dutch]: I don't know how she got in there, but she's not coming back out. She's dead.
Sylvi [as Cueball]: Okay, we. Someone should 
Sylvi: Cueball now. I'm Cueball now. 
[as Cueball]: I think someone should get her some water or sit her down or shut off the alarm so we can breathe, you know.
Jack: Laura sinking into a chair next to Buford Knipps.
Sylvi: The unconscious Buford Knipps.
Jack: Unconscious Buford Knipps, sort of like dimly recognizing that he might also have fainted. Does not understand what is going on here. I think Wayne John, you know, actually, you know, gives her a glass of water. Oh, no. Wayne John goes out and the alarm stops, you know? [Sylvi: Oh.] I think Cedar tries the front door and it's like the door's locked. 
[as Cedar]: We can't leave. Cousins. We can't leave.
Sylvi [as Newton]: What?
Keith [as Bill]: But I wish to.
Sylvi [as Newton]: But there's a—There could be a killer in here.
Jack [as Cedar]: There's almost certainly a killer in here. If the room was locked, it has to be one of us. And I think it was her. 
Jack: And he points at Cueball.
Sylvi [as Cueball]: What the hell?
Jack [as Cedar]: I don't know who the hell she is. And she's unsettling looking.
Sylvi [as Cueball]: How—What? I don't know who any of you weirdos are, and I'm not pointing fingers. Okay, well, I know who, I know who Laura is.
Keith [as Bill]: It could have been anyone except the three cousins.
Sylvi [as Cueball]: Uh huh.
Jack [as Cedar]: Our alibi is airtight.
Sylvi [as Cueball]: I'm just saying, first person to point fingers is usually has a guilty conscience about something.
Jack: Now hold on a second. I'm drawn to a little message down here which says English French somehow appears once the murder has happened, invited by another guest.
Sylvi: Bloop. Noclips in. 
[laughter]
Jack: Bonjour.
Sylvi: Bonjour.
Jack: How does he appear? Well, hang on. Let me see if there's any other business we need to do.
Sylvi: I have a great idea.
Jack: Yeah, wait, hang on. Well, first of all, [reading] once we have a shared understanding of the murder, we will tidy up the narrative of its discovery, ensure everyone is on the same page with these details, then move to the investigation phase. [stops reading] Who found her? Dutch Welsh. Where did he find her? Inside the locked coin room. How had she been killed? She'd been bludgeoned to death by a statue of King Croesus. And there was a passageway revealed underneath the statue of King Croesus. Is there anything else that we're missing or that we want to make clear in this moment?
[long pause]
Keith: Pinky is still in the public quarters.
Jack: He is still in the public quarters. That's true. Sylvi, did you have something?
Sylvi: No, I just like public quarters. I just think that's funny.
Jack: Okay, Sylvi, what's your English French appearance?
Sylvi: I really like the idea of English French having to climb in through the window. [laughter] We just see like his, his little head pop up. There's like, like a comical amount of snow on the rim of whatever hat he's wearing. And he's just like, 
[as English]: Bonjour. Would you mind? It appears the front door is no longer working. Could I—Could I trouble one of you fine people to simply open this window and step back?
Jack: Who is it most interesting that recognizes him. Yeah. Or is like, my God. English French, you've arrived.
Sylvi: I think I want to rule out Pinky. [Jack: Yes, I think so.] Pinky is maybe the least interesting. It could be. It could be Dutch. Okay, wait. I've got a pitch. I've got a pitch. Okay, Dutch Welsh and English French are not cousins, but they have a cousin in common.
[hysterical Keith laughter]
Keith: Well, I didn't want to say anything, but I definitely think that Dutch Welsh knows English French.
Jack: I think English French pops his head up and he says 
[as English]: Dutch?
Sylvi [as Dutch]: Cousin of my cousin!
Keith [as Dutch]: Cousin of my cousin.
Jack [as English]: What are you doing here, Dutch?
Keith [as Dutch]: I’m on a job.
Jack [as English]: Interesting.
Keith [as Dutch]: I mean, I’m doing my job.
Jack: Here's my pitch for who hired English French. It's Buford Knipps, who suspects that something is going on.
Keith: Has always suspected.
Jack: Yeah, not with the job necessarily, but with like, maybe Wayne, you know, the yeti thing, I'm not sure. But then why would he invite him here? I don't know. I doubt—Dutch doesn't seem happy to see English, so probably hasn't invited him.
Keith: Okay, here's, here's my—I'm just gonna go through and I'm going to name every character that I think could have called English French. Cueball. Pinky Huckleberry.
Jack: Yeah. Although we've ruled him out because Sylvie's not, I think, correctly.
Sylvi: I think. I think it's just a little too, like. I don't know.
Jack: Yeah, it's a bit pat.
Keith: I'm just saying. I'm just saying that could have.
Sylvi: Could have.
Keith: Yeah, sure. Newton Henry Hertz. Because he has not been in—vocal in a scene yet, so we don't know.
Sylvi: Actually quite true.
Keith: I’m going to rule out Dutch Welsh because [Sylvi: it's funnier that way] though he's not a guest.
Sylvi: Also true.
Jack: Oh, shit. Could have been Sophia.
Keith: I was just about to say it could have been Sophia.
Sylvi: Could have been Sophia. That's actually really fun.
Keith: And it also could have been Laura.
Sylvi: Or it could have been either, but they're twins, so that means they sound the same? I don't know where I was going with that.
Jack: There is something there. I think, English French, you know, climbs in through the window and brushes his—brushes the snow off his boots onto the floor. He's wearing, he's wearing like a puffy snow—he looks like Snoopy wearing the snow jacket. You know what I mean?
Sylvi: Yes! He's got that shit on.
Jack: If you're not familiar with this, what should I search? Snoopy coat.
Keith: Winter Snoopy.
Jack: Winter Snoopy, winter Snoopy.
Sylvi: He's wearing, like a- One of those, like, fuzzy hats, too.
Jack: Yeah, yeah, definitely. And we're talking Snoopy in the blue puffer Jacket. Not in the red puffer Jacket. The one where he's. The puffer Jacket. Huge. Gigantic. Yes, yeah, yeah, huge one. And he says, 
[as English]: Terrible alarm going on there, and I couldn't get in through the front door. Where's Sophia?
Keith [as unnamed guest]: She’s dead.
Sylvi [as Laura]: It's awful. 
Sylvi: That's Laura saying that.
Jack [as English]: Oh, my God, Laura, are you okay? What happened?
Sylvi [as Laura]: Of course I'm not okay. My sister is dead.
Jack [as English]: An accident?
Keith [as unnamed guest]: A communist.
Sylvi [as Laura]: The circumstances of our conception have nothing to do with this. [group laughter] She was killed, murdered, struck down.
Jack: And then the camera cuts back to English French and he's holding a notebook. The little man begins—
Keith: Dutch Welsh is not holding a notebook, but is typing into a little thing on his wrist. That's what he's got. He's got a little, like, wristwatch.
Jack: Okay, it's time to begin the investigation.