All According to Plan
Membership Drive
by Mark
Time has been flying since the turn of the new year and the beginning of Season 2 of The Misplay. We've alluded to an episode about the internal jargon and shared vocabulary we use with our team as we design and develop Animal Kingdom (don't worry—we're still workshopping everything, including the name).
While Jason and I were at Game Market West this past weekend, I turned to him and said something along the lines of, "In the board game community, I feel like a tourist at best and an imposter at worst." Jason's reply was both affirming and insightful. It also accurately described why I feel that way. Interestingly, his response sounded very similar to how I recently described differences in training Capoeira to a friend.
On the show, we make a conscious effort to avoid idle chit-chat or tangents unrelated to the Misplay project in some way. Despite those efforts, pedagogy and stories from our non-podcast lives have a way of seeping into the show. So, allow me a slight tangent we don't often permit ourselves.
Capoeira is deeply central to my recreational and social life. I train three or more days per week, travel for it, and co-lead classes locally with a couple of my closest friends. A few weeks ago, I traveled to visit some dear friends in Wisconsin at the Capoeira school where I first started training. I returned home energized and with a fresh perspective on training and learning. While reflecting with a friend, I described a key difference in how people approach learning Capoeira.
For me, there is a significant difference between Capoeira participants and Capoeira students. Participants show up, take class, support local events, and go home. Capoeira students train themselves during class, study the art, and over time, Capoeira gets under their skin—even after the workout is washed away. Both approaches are valid. One of life's joys is getting to choose how to engage with our interests.
When I described feeling like a tourist in the board game community, I was reflecting on how I've chosen to engage with board games and the surrounding community up to this point. Jason challenged me to reconsider that perspective after we've sat down at an event and playtested a game for someone else and then have one of our own games tested within the community.
Board Game Casual also put it eloquently: to be a member of a community is to participate, support, and uplift the people within it. Membership requires contribution. We need to show up, put in the time, and contribute to the board game community. Game Market West was an inspiring starting point.
I'm going to start small. I'm going to start local. But I'm going to start becoming a member of the community.
Dear Mark
by Jason
We all wrestle with imposter syndrome. None of us have the time to be experts at everything.
Mark is a phenomenal teacher who can dance-fight with the best of them. He also loves music, climbing, board games, video games, wearing mismatched socks—and probably has a few secret hobbies he hasn't told me about yet. Juggling? Singing? Who knows. Same goes for me. My hobbies run deep, but I'm really only good at a few. The rest? I learn as I go.
If I showed up to a pickleball tournament, I'd feel out of place. I play pickleball. I'm probably "better than average." But I don't live pickleball. And I think that's the tension we feel—we're making a podcast about board games. If I were podcasting about pickleball too, I'd feel like an outsider there, based on my experience level.
As podcast hosts, that creates a certain pressure. Each week, there's this lingering question: is what I'm saying credible? Do I sound like I know what I'm talking about? Does my opinion actually carry any weight?
And here's the truth: there's a lot we don't know about board games. Like… almost all of it. And yet here we are, building a board game and talking about it like we know what we're doing.
But that's where I want to remind Mark—and myself—we were incredibly deliberate when we named this podcast and this company. We are The Misplay. We make misplays. We're learning as we go. We designed it that way.
This isn't a podcast about mastery. It's a podcast about the messy, uncertain, wildly fun process of creating something you care about—even when you're not sure you're "qualified" to do it.
Sponsors
Board Game Casual
Board game content for those looking to learn more about the hobby.
Koenig Kreations
They create games that you can print at home. “Easy to print, easy to play!”