Cedric:Are you?
Krod:yes good i wouldn't i wouldn't be too concerned about it
Cedric:Oh, no.
Cedric:Oh, no.
Cedric:He's here.
Gamemaster:Sorry, should I leave?
Cedric:We can't talk about our plan.
Gamemaster:Do you want me to leave so you can talk about your plan and come back in five minutes?
Cedric:No, we just have a plan for today's session, but I think we're all ready.
Gamemaster:How do you have a plan for today's session when you don't know what it is?
Gamemaster:Okay.
Cedric:Yeah, don't worry about it, actually.
Cedric:Noah knows about it too, so.
Gamemaster:That makes me more worried about it.
Andros:Yeah.
Gamemaster:And I know you know that that makes me more worried about it.
Cedric:No, no, no.
Cedric:I was just telling Josh that we've been planning for today's session and he's worried because we shouldn't know about it.
Krod:I wouldn't worry about it.
Krod:And not to worry.
Krod:We're telling him not to worry.
Cedric:I don't know why he doesn't listen to us.
Gamemaster:I don't... I just... I don't know what you could be planning.
Gamemaster:You know nothing about today's session.
Andros:We're... We're planning, don't worry.
Krod:I wouldn't even think about it.
Andros:Don't worry about it, Josh.
Cedric:Yeah, yeah.
Gamemaster:That's... Okay.
Gamemaster:I guess I won't... I won't think about it.
Gamemaster:That's fine.
Andros:Yeah.
Andros:I wouldn't either.
Cedric:Good, good.
Gamemaster:How are all of you doing besides plotting, I think, my demise?
Cedric:I don't know if you guys have been following gaming news, but Battlefield's apparently doing really well, which is cool.
Cedric:And it is causing COD to make a bunch of adjustments.
Cedric:Because apparently when Battlefield launched, they rejected like 300,000 plus cheaters.
Cedric:immediately, and COD's like, all right, we're going to start taking our anti-cheat better.
Cedric:And also, COD does this really cool thing of not compressing their game files.
Cedric:So if you download it, it's like a 200 gigabyte game.
Cedric:We played once, and Josh, I remember you being like, why is this so fucking massive?
Cedric:And apparently, they've been doing that so that if you have a console, it's hard for you to have multiple games loaded in, which is just really scummy.
Cedric:But then Battlefield launched relatively high compressed.
Cedric:So then COD basically hot patched it.
Cedric:And they're like, oh, we actually shrunk our game from 150 gigabytes to 30.
Gamemaster:See, it's funny because Helldivers does the opposite for, as best I can tell, no reason.
Gamemaster:It's 30 gigabytes to download, but it's like 120 on disk because whenever they need to reuse an asset, they literally copy and paste the whole asset into a new location under a different file name instead of referring to the same file.
Cedric:So speaking about that, Helldivers also finally admitted they have performance issues and crashing.
Cedric:And they've been kind of silent about that.
Cedric:And they're like, hey, we're going to try to fix this.
Cedric:We didn't expect this many players to come out for the ODST and then this new bug thing.
Cedric:And then also, we're hiring a new CTO.
Cedric:We're looking to start making a bunch of changes in our code stack.
Gamemaster:Good for them, I guess.
Cedric:No, Helldivers 3 isn't coming.
Cedric:We're trying to fix this one.
Cedric:I haven't, but I had last night, I think I played last night, I had some stuttering, but that was the only ones I ever had.
Andros:Thank you.
Gamemaster:I haven't had any performance issues, which is, I guess, good.
Cedric:I know Mike crashed a couple of times when we played.
Gamemaster:Yeah, but he deserved it, so... The ghost didn't follow you?
Krod:Yeah, with my old PC.
Cedric:Mike has ghost PCs, though.
Krod:No, no, no.
Krod:The old PC, I believe, is the ghost PC.
Krod:I don't think... Maybe some things happened in the beginning of this PC, and maybe there was some ghosts, but as of right now, knock on wood, there is no ghosts in this PC.
Gamemaster:That's good.
Cedric:And also know, if you ever get Helldivers, let us know, because you can do four-person parties.
Gamemaster:You could shoot a bug.
Andros:Maybe.
Andros:Oh, I do hate bugs.
Cedric:Yeah.
Cedric:Or a robot, or a zombie.
Andros:Hades 2 just came out today, so I'm going to be on that for a little bit.
Cedric:Yeah.
Cedric:I did... I don't know if I want to play Hades 2 for a little bit, because I played the early access a lot, which is exactly why you shouldn't do that, but I did it anyway.
Cedric:And I have nothing but great things to say about the game.
Cedric:Like, it was so fun to play.
Cedric:And now I just got to redo it.
Cedric:And then they purposely held out.
Cedric:Like, you might beat a person.
Cedric:And then they'll be like, and then something happens.
Cedric:But you can't see it unless you get the full game.
Cedric:Which was like, so there's a bunch of like, I don't know what happened.
Gamemaster:I've been
Cedric:But yeah, yeah.
Cedric:So it'll be fun.
Krod:That's why I like the Battlefield beta because it's like, this is an online multiplayer game.
Andros:i'm very good
Krod:Go play online multiplayer.
Krod:There is no story that you're missing out on.
Krod:Just go shoot at people and we'll collect data.
Cedric:The reason... I played a lot of it.
Cedric:But it was also because I played the first Hades game and was like, this thing is fucking awesome.
Cedric:And then immediately I was like, I want to play the next thing.
Cedric:And they're like, it's in beta.
Cedric:And I'm like, alright, it's basically the end of beta.
Cedric:Let me play it.
Andros:Good enough.
Cedric:It was pretty fun.
Cedric:It was pretty fun.
Gamemaster:I had been holding off, waiting for the actual game to come out, so I've looked at nothing about it, purposefully.
Gamemaster:And then, of course, they had to release very recently after Silksong came out, and so I need to beat Silksong first.
Gamemaster:So I have to wait.
Gamemaster:I have to imagine it's great, because they only have a good track record with this kind of stuff.
Andros:I'll let you know how it is.
Andros:It's gotten really good.
Krod:you
Cedric:Oh, it's great.
Cedric:It can only be better than the early access, so it's great.
Gamemaster:The only thing I've seen so far is I saw a post on Reddit that said, here's like the mega thread for Hades 2 reviews, and it just said 10 out of 10, like aggregate, which is ridiculous.
Cedric:Yeah.
Andros:I think this morning it was sitting at the highest Metacritic score for a game this year.
Cedric:It is, I think, more balanced than the first one.
Cedric:I think it's more balanced than the first one, and there's more...
Cedric:There's more things to do.
Andros:Oh, I like that.
Cedric:Really fun.
Andros:That was my issue with the first Hades, is that after so many times, I was like, all right, I know there's still more storyline, but it's just kind of...
Gamemaster:Then it's different.
Cedric:Yeah, I also like the keepsake system in the new one better.
Gamemaster:I take it then you go up to a nice cabinet of stuff and swap it out every... Oh, okay.
Cedric:It's like, no, no, that's still there.
Cedric:It's like 95% the same.
Cedric:There's just one different thing.
Cedric:I don't need to say if you want to see it.
Cedric:Yeah.
Gamemaster:We'll find out.
Cedric:Yeah.
Gamemaster:Mike will find out, too.
Andros:What's your favorite game?
Gamemaster:He told me that he was going to play, so.
Krod:Mm-hmm.
Krod:Actually, if the Metacritic score is 10, unfortunately, I'm not going to play because I only play bad games.
Cedric:Oh, that makes sense because...
Gamemaster:Oh.
Andros:That's a bad game, Mike.
Krod:The game that I have the most playtime in over, like, probably the past month is Rainbow Six Siege.
Gamemaster:I'm shocked that people still play that.
Gamemaster:I know it has like an active community still, but it's like over a decade old, right?
Cedric:That's what I think about every time I see people playing Destiny.
Krod:Mm-hmm.
Cedric:I'm like, that piece of garbage?
Gamemaster:Destiny's Dead, if that helps.
Andros:Weren't you super big in Destiny for a while?
Cedric:Wait, did Destiny die more?
Gamemaster:Yesterday, it's like max player count was something like 9K on PC.
Cedric:That's crazy.
Gamemaster:Which is ridiculous given that a raid is coming out in like two days.
Cedric:Yeah, so no.
Krod:People are just sleeping for the raid.
Cedric:I did play Destiny.
Cedric:with these folks as well.
Cedric:They just did this really cool thing of every year wanting you to spend $100 just to have access to it, but make a very buggy game experience, and then the story is just bad.
Andros:Oh.
Andros:What?
Cedric:It's just flat out... The writing is horrible.
Gamemaster:For what it's worth, out of the three of them, I got by far the most into it.
Gamemaster:And, like, I was fine spending the $100 a year.
Gamemaster:That's less than a WoW subscription, and I used to spend a ton of money on a WoW subscription, so that didn't do much.
Cedric:Like, I can just sum this up.
Gamemaster:But they made a bunch of changes recently that, like, to the point that however much fun it is no longer outweighs all of the many, many, many, many shitty decisions they've made over the past few years.
Andros:What?
Gamemaster:So, like, there's no point.
Gamemaster:They...
Cedric:Noah, you need to cap your FPS if you're playing on a computer, because if you have too high FPS,
Cedric:enemies do more damage to you.
Gamemaster:Correct.
Gamemaster:Because the thing that they use to calculate damage is keyed off of game ticks, which is based off of your frame rate, because it was originally developed on the Xbox and PS4, which were only 30 FPS.
Gamemaster:So if you get hit, they don't despawn the projectile fast enough.
Gamemaster:So if you're at 60 FPS or 120 FPS, you get hit two or four times more than somebody at 30 FPS.
Gamemaster:It's a good time.
Andros:What?
Gamemaster:Yeah.
Gamemaster:So, you know, it's great.
Cedric:Which one do they remove?
Gamemaster:The bugs aren't even really the problem, I think, because I loved Skyrim, and Skyrim has a ton of bugs.
Krod:Yeah.
Gamemaster:The most recent issue is that they removed all of the content.
Andros:What?
Krod:Removing content writing sucks ass.
Gamemaster:All of it, effectively.
Gamemaster:They made a change when they released the most recent yearly expansion that changes how loot works, how guns and stuff drop into a new rarity system.
Gamemaster:And they didn't go back and update all of the old sources of guns to work with the new rarity system.
Gamemaster:and all of the new stuff is objectively better.
Gamemaster:And in some cases, you're not allowed to play the new content without using the new guns.
Gamemaster:So you can only play the new content, the things that they updated with the rarities, in order to continue to play new stuff.
Gamemaster:But there's literally four activities total that drop the new gear.
Gamemaster:So I don't understand why they did that.
Gamemaster:On top of they changed it.
Gamemaster:It used to be like you have this power level that dictates how hard you hit in some activities.
Gamemaster:And it was really easy to level it up to almost the cap just by like regularly playing the game.
Cedric:soft cap.
Gamemaster:And they...
Gamemaster:Yeah, the hard cap, actually.
Gamemaster:Talking hard cap to pinnacle cap.
Cedric:Oh.
Gamemaster:It was really easy to raise it up to that point just by playing the game.
Gamemaster:They changed the limits there, where it used to be the, like, you could get it up to 10 under the power level.
Gamemaster:Now you can only get it up to 200 out of 500.
Gamemaster:And then the next 300 levels, you can earn one eighth of a level at a time by playing an activity that is at a minimum five minutes long.
Gamemaster:So the power grind went from something you could do by playing every once in a while over the weekend for like four weeks to taking literally thousands of hours.
Gamemaster:And then they reset it every six months.
Cedric:And then also, so the way it works is, Josh, can you give a better, I'm just gonna, okay, I'll say one thing, then I'll ask you to take over.
Cedric:So the way your power level is defined is it's how, what's the power, your average power level of the things you're using.
Cedric:So you have three weapons at a time.
Cedric:You're like your main, secondary, and like a heavy.
Cedric:Then you have a helmet, arms, arms, chest piece, legs, class item.
Cedric:So that's eight things you're holding.
Cedric:Every time you want to go up in level, you need to average all of those go up.
Cedric:But activities, you can't guarantee they're going to actually hit a thing you need to hit.
Cedric:So you can have a bunch of high-powered helmets, but because you have no high-powered chests, your average is just lowered.
Cedric:Now, Josh, can you explain the soft cap, hard cap, and pinnacle?
Cedric:Because I honestly keep forgetting how that works.
Gamemaster:They kind of got rid of that.
Gamemaster:From levels 10, which you start at, to 200, any activity you do will drop at least one item that is three levels higher than the current average power level of your gear.
Gamemaster:Once you hit 200, you have to specifically do activities that are at a higher level than you for a chance to get an item that drops one item of one to two levels higher than your current average power level.
Gamemaster:And that's it.
Andros:What?
Gamemaster:That's like the whole system.
Cedric:And before there used to be, there was a soft cap you can get by playing regular games.
Cedric:Then you had to get the hard cap by certain activities.
Gamemaster:They made it simpler, but also...
Cedric:And then there's a pedicle you can get three a week.
Gamemaster:The problem is that people have tried optimizing... You don't only get good weapons until you get up to level 450.
Gamemaster:So people have tried optimizing to get to level 450 as quickly as possible.
Gamemaster:And so that means running a particular solo one-person activity that takes three to four minutes to complete.
Gamemaster:to get a plus one item in one slot, and then you have to do that literally a few thousand times, and then you're at level 450.
Andros:Thank you.
Gamemaster:And I don't understand why they made that change, because it defeats the point of playing the video game.
Cedric:And one of my biggest complaints with it, aside from... I felt like, first of all, if there was a glitch that was in the benefit of the players, immediate hot patch.
Cedric:Any other glitches, eh.
Cedric:But then, okay, honestly, that was...
Gamemaster:People talk about that a lot online, and I don't know if there's a lot of evidence to support that.
Gamemaster:For instance, these past two weeks, there's been a bug where if you get a secondary, like a light sword, and you don't have any ammo, and then you hit something with it, it does max damage.
Andros:everybody.
Gamemaster:And they just kind of left that in for a few weeks.
Cedric:Well, I don't know about anything recently.
Gamemaster:So...
Cedric:I feel like the game might just be dead.
Cedric:But then... But again, my biggest complaint with it was... I know it's an MMO, but I felt like...
Gamemaster:It used to be like when people found things that broke the economy, they would fix it quickly, but I honestly don't have a problem with that.
Cedric:I was physically getting punished if I took any time off.
Cedric:They're like, oh, you dumb, dumb, dumb, dumb, dumb.
Cedric:You're behind.
Cedric:Now you can't play with your friends on this other activity because you're 20 levels behind them.
Cedric:And then they slowly start making that better.
Cedric:But it was so punishing to take time off.
Cedric:And I'd be OK if it was cool.
Gamemaster:I have to step away a second.
Cedric:Yeah.
Gamemaster:I'm sorry.
Gamemaster:Continue complaining about Destiny.
Cedric:I would have been okay if I was just missing cool shit.
Cedric:Like, I come back and people have, like, rainbow capes and they're, like, flying upside down or something.
Cedric:I don't know.
Krod:Jorge, Jorge.
Krod:I think he's gone.
Krod:So we're killing this kid?
Cedric:Yeah, yeah.
Krod:No, I'm joking.
Andros:day.
Cedric:We need to go kill this kid.
Krod:We're like, God, we just had to talk about Destiny to get him to leave.
Krod:No, but I'll also add, they make a product, and then they don't follow standard rules of making people use the product.
Krod:Like me, Noah, I'm an item hoarder.
Krod:So I have a bunch of items in that game, but they cap your vault.
Krod:And then they don't increase it consummate with new loot.
Krod:So every time I log in, I'm at the cap.
Krod:I can't pick stuff up.
Krod:It'll just start disappearing from the game.
Krod:And I'm like, but I want my loot to disappear.
Krod:And also, this isn't that fun anyways.
Krod:I'll just turn it off.
Cedric:So Noah, I feel like, at least in the old Destiny, if we played like an hour,
Krod:Just give me 300, 400 more vault space, which is almost doubling it.
Krod:And then I'm fine.
Andros:That's it.
Krod:And also, look at the player accounts in the activities that people are playing, and then just make those more enjoyable, interesting, whatever.
Krod:Don't introduce 700 more new currencies, which is what they do every season.
Cedric:we would get, like, 60 to 80 items, I'd say.
Cedric:But you can only hold, like, 700 items.
Krod:yeah it's
Cedric:So it's just, like, a constant, do I need this?
Cedric:No.
Cedric:Do I need this?
Cedric:But there's, like, randomized drops.
Cedric:So then you've got to, like, sift through different perks.
Cedric:And then, like, it'd be so nice to just not have to, every time you log on, be like, oh, do I need to do vault cleaning?
Andros:That just seems so... It seems like they hate their players.
Cedric:Or all the time you're playing, do I need to sift through this?
Andros:What is the point of that?
Cedric:Yeah, no, I... Yeah.
Krod:It's just, like, you have to memorize, like, entire perk grids.
Krod:Because then, like, you get a weapon, and it rolls with, like, three or four perks, and then, like, two of them have variable slots.
Krod:So you're looking at six different perks, and you're like, is this better or worse than the eight others that I have of this?
Krod:Do I even want this kind of a gun?
Krod:And then you're like, I don't know, what's the fucking god roll?
Krod:And then you have to search it.
Krod:You need a third-party website to tell you the best rolls on this weapon.
Krod:And then you're like...
Krod:I don't even fucking care.
Krod:Delete the weapon.
Krod:Let's just move on.
Krod:But then it becomes like, oh, I can't pick this up.
Krod:Everything's full.
Krod:I'm dying.
Krod:Everything's full.
Krod:I want to kill myself.
Krod:And then they don't let you automate vault cleaning.
Krod:So they let the API lock items in your vault, but they don't provide an API to third-party people to just clean it for you.
Krod:So you hit a button, and it gets rid of stuff.
Krod:Now you have to be like...
Krod:go through your vault and delete it one by one.
Krod:So if I have 700 items and I need to make some room because we're going to play a mission and I want to get rid of 30 things, I literally have to sit there and hold delete because it's not just like click, delete, click, delete.
Krod:I can't highlight, select.
Krod:It's literally delete, delete, delete.
Andros:Like, that just seems annoying.
Krod:Don't worry, guys.
Krod:And then they write like shit, which it's not hard to write well, if I'm honest.
Krod:There's lots of great writing on TV shows.
Cedric:I don't think I've seen worse writing.
Krod:There's lots of okay writing on TV shows.
Krod:Just get one of the okay writers.
Krod:It just doesn't make sense.
Cedric:I really don't.
Cedric:No, it's just...
Krod:I really feel like they have a bunch of fucking higher-ups that are like...
Andros:Oh, they're making all this.
Krod:on drugs and just like guys we should just fucking chat and the people that like the devs and people that play the game are like this don't please like you're not paid to think and you're like you're right here's your buggy game sir
Cedric:Yeah, and it's also like... They also were taking a bunch of our yearly money and just putting it into other games, which I suspected they were doing.
Cedric:And I was told I was crazy, and then it comes out they had a bunch of failed problems.
Cedric:They were trying to release an extraction shooter too late.
Andros:What does that mean?
Andros:What does it mean?
Krod:It's like Escape from Tarkov or one of the CODs.
Cedric:Like...
Krod:Essentially, you go into an area, you move around, maybe there's some challenges that you can do, you pick up guns, and then you leave.
Krod:But if you die, all of the loot you have on there stays there.
Cedric:So it's like, imagine Fortnite, but you can extract early if you want to just get out and keep stuff.
Krod:you have an inventory of guns it's like very high risk high reward like there's i've seen uh versions of extraction shooters like i've played them that like maximize regret it's just like you died you had this purple gun on you you can pay eight dollars and keep it and it's like i i'm deleting the game yeah it's probably eight dollars or something yeah
Andros:Oh, like eight for real life dollars?
Gamemaster:Are we talking about marathon?
Gamemaster:Is that what's happening now?
Krod:We're close.
Cedric:No, we were just... I was playing the COD.
Krod:The one that I played was some horrible Tarkov knockoff on the Xbox before good people made attraction shooters.
Cedric:I think we played it, the COD Extraction Shooter.
Krod:Yeah, Warzone.
Cedric:My gripe with the COD Extraction... No, not Warzone.
Cedric:That's their Battle Royale.
Cedric:It was DMZ.
Cedric:My problem with the COD Extraction Shooter was the game crashed a lot.
Krod:Yes, DMZ, DMZ, yeah.
Gamemaster:Yeah, my problem was I kept getting kicked out.
Cedric:So it kind of ruins...
Cedric:So it kind of ruins the whole vibe of, oh, maybe I should bring in a good gun and try to do this mission to get this other thing when, oh, you just died and reset everything.
Cedric:So it's like, oh, cool.
Cedric:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Andros:Oh, that sounds terrible and like a bad time.
Gamemaster:Because when you get kicked out, you lose all of the stuff you had on you permanently.
Andros:That's wildly bad.
Cedric:Yeah, yeah.
Krod:Well...
Gamemaster:I understand why they implemented it that way, so that you couldn't just exit out of the game if it looked like you were about to die.
Gamemaster:But also, if your game crashes, I'd say one in every three matches you enter, then what's the point?
Cedric:Yeah.
Cedric:Honestly, maybe higher.
Cedric:Maybe one in every two.
Gamemaster:Yeah.
Cedric:Yeah.
Cedric:Yeah.
Cedric:So like, it is, I don't know.
Cedric:And then my other gripe with Destiny is I like PvP games.
Cedric:And a large portion of Destiny's player base was PvE people, PvP.
Cedric:They didn't make a new map for like 10 years.
Andros:Oh.
Cedric:They were just like, go fuck yourself.
Andros:Really?
Krod:Which is okay.
Krod:I could get, if you're like, oh, this is the stupid, this is the new map.
Krod:Like, if I was Destiny, I would be like, here's five new maps.
Krod:Here's the new map playlist.
Krod:Here's the old map playlist.
Krod:And then at some point merge them or something.
Krod:Because I imagine you have the old heads that are like, I played this game for 10 years and now there's a new map.
Cedric:No, but most of the people want it.
Krod:I gotta fucking learn a new map.
Cedric:But at least when League of Legends, they'll take a map.
Cedric:They'll put Snowdown and Christmas presents.
Cedric:Or they'll put...
Cedric:Do something.
Cedric:Show at least some care.
Cedric:There's another game mode, Gambit, they didn't care about at all either.
Cedric:And it's just like, yeah.
Gamemaster:It's dead now.
Krod:That was said.
Krod:Literally look where people are playing.
Krod:Actually, I don't think that many people were playing Gambit, to be fair.
Krod:I liked Gambit.
Cedric:Yeah, but also part of the reason people weren't playing is because they didn't touch it in 15 years.
Krod:That's true.
Krod:But I don't know.
Cedric:Wait, this was built on the Tiger engine, right?
Krod:I agree.
Gamemaster:Yeah.
Gamemaster:Which is their in-house engine.
Cedric:Yeah.
Cedric:Yeah, it was like in the 2000s, early 2000s.
Cedric:I know also what's annoying about it too was certain maps, you couldn't have a, I think they implemented a flashlight on your character, but it wouldn't work for most of the maps before this amount of time.
Cedric:Because if you had a flashlight, it would just crash the game, because it wasn't made to render light from a different source that could move.
Krod:I buy that.
Krod:Lights hard.
Gamemaster:Sorry, what are we talking about?
Cedric:Yeah.
Gamemaster:We're talking about the time that they got rid of a bunch of stuff because they changed the lighting engine?
Cedric:Yeah.
Gamemaster:Because they would have had to remake the levels and instead they chose no, just delete them instead.
Gamemaster:And now they're getting sued.
Gamemaster:And they're getting sued about somebody who's saying that they stole a story from his book.
Gamemaster:And the guy's wrong.
Gamemaster:They didn't.
Gamemaster:But besides that, he's making references to missions that are no longer in the game because they deleted them.
Cedric:Yeah.
Gamemaster:And to the judges compelling them to make them visible because they're not accepting YouTube videos of playthroughs of the missions.
Gamemaster:So now they have to figure out a way to make those missions available to play again, specifically for this lawsuit.
Cedric:So they do this funny thing about, hey, every year you need to spend $100 to play this and get this content, but we're going to
Gamemaster:I don't think it's ever going to be available for players, but it's a funny hole that they've dug themselves into.
Cedric:sunset the content, which is a really nice way of saying you're not going to be able to play it anymore.
Andros:You paid for the content.
Cedric:But they've been doing this for years.
Andros:You paid for the content.
Gamemaster:No, actually, technically, you're paying for a license that allows you to use the content that they have available.
Gamemaster:You're not purchasing the content outright, which is how they get the whole, you know, effectively.
Krod:Or you got a license for that content?
Cedric:So they get sued all the time.
Andros:That's...
Cedric:And to be fair, they do steal a lot of content.
Cedric:Like, people will be like, yeah, this is my, like... Yeah.
Gamemaster:They've gotten in trouble on four separate occasions for stealing art.
Krod:But not the story.
Krod:They could have stole the writing, lots of plausible liability, but they steal the pixels of the Heart.
Krod:Just do Game of Thrones.
Gamemaster:Mm-hmm.
Krod:Just don't tell anyone and just do Game of Thrones for like one of the seasons.
Andros:Just do Game of Thrones and be like, it's the War of the Roses.
Andros:It's not Game of Thrones.
Cedric:I don't know about this one, but they'll do stuff like this.
Andros:That's wild.
Cedric:I don't know about this one in particular, but I've seen other things that are basically the exact same thing, but they'll just steal it.
Gamemaster:So, for Marathon, the entire aesthetic of the game appears to be copied from an artist on Twitter named Sidereel, who they said, listen, this art was limited specifically to one of the contractors that we hired, who no longer works for the company.
Cedric:Yeah.
Gamemaster:But, like, the creative director and the Heart director and a few employees known to work as artists at Bungie all follow Sidereel on Twitter.
Gamemaster:So, like...
Cedric:Yeah, yeah.
Krod:That's so clever.
Gamemaster:Thank you.
Cedric:So... So, like, this is one of the things they stole from this artist for Marathon.
Krod:You're like, hey, hey, we're going to contract you, but look at this guy's Twitter if you want ideas on what to do with the game.
Andros:What?
Cedric:Yeah, no, no, like, just straight stolen.
Cedric:But anyway, so yeah, one dude's suing, and he's like, you stole my idea for the Red Ward, my book from the early 2000s.
Cedric:I talked about a celestial body coming to Earth, and then there's fights and flamethrowers, so you stole it.
Cedric:And they're like, that's not enough.
Cedric:But the judge is like, great, can you show your content?
Cedric:And they're like, uh, we have this Twitch VOD, and they're like, unacceptable.
Andros:That's such a silly thing to dig themselves into.
Krod:I also hate very easily converged ideas for shit.
Cedric:Yeah.
Krod:I saw something today.
Krod:Who was it?
Krod:It was one of these terminal... It's some AI fucking VS Code thing.
Krod:They released a font.
Krod:and they're like check out our fucking new kick-ass font and it's like dude it's a fucking font like i don't know what to tell you like it's it's so much like every other font because if it wasn't it would be useless so i'm like looking at it and they were getting made fun of because they're a terminal editor company and they released a non-monospace font and i'm like that's fucking stupid why would you guys do that but then i saw someone be like actually uh
Andros:Thank you.
Krod:They stole this font from Michael Bieblin's font collection.
Krod:And then they posted two fonts.
Krod:I'm looking at them like, I can't fucking tell them apart.
Krod:But also, if you showed me anything and you're like, this is a copyrighted font, I'd be like, fuck, I don't know.
Krod:Who owns this?
Krod:This is like the alphabet.
Krod:You're telling me that a judge is going to be like, yeah, no, you copied.
Krod:most common way of drawing the alphabet.
Krod:I award you $100 million.
Krod:Font copyright is so fucking stupid.
Krod:I don't even care if it's dumb because I don't want to incentivize people to make new fonts.
Krod:You're literally reinventing the wheel.
Krod:You should...
Andros:Mike Hayden, new fonts is not what was on bingo list for.
Krod:When I saw it, I was going to be like, guys, and they fucking stole it, too.
Krod:That's the worst part.
Krod:And I'm like, this isn't like papyrus or whatever or some very stylized font.
Krod:It's literally the letters.
Krod:So I'm like, I have no sympathy for anyone.
Krod:This guy put his fucking name on it.
Krod:Dude, the paperwork to file a font has to be more expensive than any residuals you get from people buying it.
Krod:I'm going to pirate your font, dude.
Krod:Like, it's so stupid.
Krod:Fonts are dumb.
Krod:We peaked font.
Krod:We had probably peak font in the 80s.
Krod:I'm going to be completely honest.
Cedric:I think there was some discussion when we digitalized them, but after that, it's been solved.
Krod:Yeah.
Krod:Steve Jobs solved fonts.
Cedric:If I ever become rich and start my own startup, I'm going to force everyone at the company to write in cursive fonts for their code.
Krod:Okay.
Andros:Hey.
Cedric:No, people...
Cedric:I've been also seeing people, have you seen the videos of Macron having to walk around the streets of New York?
Cedric:Have you seen this?
Krod:I did see that video.
Gamemaster:because of Trump's motorcade.
Cedric:Yeah.
Cedric:And I see people criticizing, they're like, this is all because of Trump.
Cedric:I'm like, I kind of feel like it's an NYPD problem.
Cedric:Some cop told the French Prime Minister with Trump on the phone, sorry, you can't cross.
Cedric:What the fuck, man?
Krod:No, this is a planning problem.
Krod:This is not Trump or the NYPD.
Cedric:Yeah.
Cedric:Yeah.
Krod:This is whoever was like,
Krod:And then we'll have Macron cross Trump's motorcade running through a fucking police barricade and almost getting hit by the beast.
Krod:Like, that's not going to happen.
Krod:Why would you tell him to cross the road?
Cedric:Yeah.
Krod:Why doesn't Macron have a helicopter?
Cedric:Also, why aren't they in cars?
Krod:That's also true.
Cedric:Like, there was another one of the South Korean president.
Cedric:They're like, oh, he has to wait on the sidewalk.
Cedric:Why isn't he waiting in a car?
Krod:Yeah.
Krod:I tried to check about your walkable city and it is not as walkable because of all the presidents driving around.
Cedric:There's...
Cedric:Trump was here I forget what a couple of weeks ago and like we didn't get confirmation Bailey and I were walking out by our apartment and you could see like the highway and like it had to be Trump because there was a barricade that was like so fucking long or all these cop cars and like perfect unison everything and we're like well Trump did do a speech here and he's now going to Virginia
Cedric:So this has to be the guy.
Cedric:There are just so many police escort.
Cedric:Such a large police escort.
Krod:Yeah, if you ever want to know if Trump's in town, just fucking ask me, because they shut down the entire street outside of my building every time.
Andros:Which would happen in a Batman movie.
Krod:They don't even shut it down.
Krod:What they do is they put barricades to halve the bandwidth of foot traffic, and then they literally stack buses and dump trucks on the side of the road and halve the shit on the road.
Krod:So you're just walking through a barricaded... I...
Cedric:they don't want what happened in a Batman movie to happen here.
Krod:I feel like they don't want a lot of stuff to happen.
Cedric:You know, I think it's, I think Joker just drives like a dump truck or something through just like, there was like one area where there were two cop cars and he's like, I can just drive a truck through this.
Cedric:So now I've noticed in barricades, people start putting like actual dump trucks and I'm like, I wonder if Christopher Nolan caused this.
Krod:Well, there's that cat is just appearing out of thin air.
Cedric:Yeah.
Cedric:He looks like an owl.
Gamemaster:It's magic.
Krod:He does.
Krod:He does look like an owl.
Krod:I mean, they have large cement barricades around the entirety of Trump Tower.
Andros:kit.
Krod:It's been the whole time.
Krod:And then they also have barricades around Trump Tower.
Krod:They just triple down like a two or three block radius around it anytime he's there.
Krod:And you're like, fucking... I can't wait to compete with all of these half pint...
Krod:fashion influencers, because the road is fucked.
Cedric:Thank you.
Krod:You have the Apple store, and then you have every fashion store, and then you have Trump Tower.
Krod:If I were to walk directly where I get lunch, I would have to walk through all of it, but it's on my route back, so I'm dodging fucking people standing in front of the Giant suitcase building, and then there's a guy that has a rubber Trump mask that directs traffic sometimes, and then it's the crowd of the people outside the Apple store.
Krod:The guy in the Trump mask is very funny, though.
Cedric:I went to go get my tux fitting when I picked it up, and there was a massive delay because a bunch of people just decided they were going to do a protest.
Krod:He literally stands at the corner and he's just like... And he's doing nothing.
Krod:He's not directing any... But he's standing in the middle of the intersection for like two hours on days when he feels like it.
Andros:Everyone's got to have a hobby.
Cedric:They were just going to put on some vests and just block traffic.
Cedric:And there were, like, very little signs.
Cedric:I was very confused what they were protesting.
Cedric:There were a couple of signs that were, like, anti-fascism.
Cedric:And then I was just... I forget what else it was, but I was like... I don't even know what, like, I'm supposed to be... Is this general dislike of him?
Cedric:Was this something... Was this a particular bill?
Krod:Why blend him?
Cedric:Like, at the time when it was happening, and I was like... Also, it doesn't help that all of you guys look...
Cedric:really annoying.
Cedric:Like, all of them look so annoying.
Andros:How annoying is that?
Cedric:And I was just like, ugh.
Cedric:But yeah, they were just causing traffic, and I was like, alright, cool.
Cedric:It's really cool of you, though, to block bus lanes, because people that have to work on Saturdays are probably very happy that their buses are blocked, because I saw a bunch of people trying to go to work on a Saturday, and they couldn't because the buses were blocked because of these people.
Krod:You should ask them if they're pro-public transport.
Krod:Aren't you guys supposed to be... I'm going to have to take an Uber now.
Cedric:Imagine if they let buses through.
Cedric:They're like, we're not animals.
Cedric:Come on.
Krod:I feel like that would be the most aligned protest.
Krod:If you're like, we hate the government!
Cedric:Yeah.
Krod:Let the bus through.
Krod:Nah.
Krod:This is an Uber.
Cedric:We're trying to help the working man.
Cedric:Yeah.
Krod:I see you.
Krod:This is an Uber.
Krod:Both of you should be on the bus.
Gamemaster:I apologize that I had to step away a bit.
Gamemaster:It's football time.
Gamemaster:There's a football game happening.
Cedric:Yeah, yeah.
Gamemaster:Stuff broke, but I think it's fixed now.
Andros:Josh is playing in the football game right now.
Gamemaster:I am a running back?
Krod:Sure.
Andros:Jorge, you play football, isn't it?
Gamemaster:That sounds like a football thing.
Andros:That's a position, right?
Cedric:I don't know why he'd pick that one, but... No, it's pretty cool.
Andros:Is that not a good one?
Gamemaster:Are they not cool?
Krod:They're cowards.
Krod:It's in the name.
Cedric:It's just... It sucks.
Cedric:They have very short lifespans.
Gamemaster:No, listen.
Andros:Oh.
Krod:They have very short careers.
Cedric:No, I chose my words correctly.
Gamemaster:I'm white and I can't throw, so I know I would be a kicker if I were in the NFL.
Andros:Oh, unrelated.
Andros:Sorry.
Andros:Josh, Happy New Year.
Andros:Shana Tova.
Gamemaster:Yeah.
Gamemaster:Yeah.
Gamemaster:It's good.
Gamemaster:I had an apple with honey.
Gamemaster:I got in an argument with my family because they're all QAnon people.
Gamemaster:It was a good time.
Cedric:What?
Krod:Oh, they received messages?
Gamemaster:QAnon people.
Cedric:I don't know what that is.
Gamemaster:I don't know if any of them are actually in any Telegram chats.
Gamemaster:But I do know they are simultaneously concerned about aliens and also very, very, very concerned specifically about Bill Clinton.
Krod:Wait, did they mention the video?
Gamemaster:So much.
Cedric:Alright, alright, alright.
Cedric:That's not that crazy.
Krod:Hold on, hold on.
Krod:Did they mention the video of the UFO getting shot by a missile and it bounced off?
Gamemaster:They did not.
Gamemaster:That's fun.
Krod:Okay, so they're not up to date.
Gamemaster:I guess not.
Gamemaster:I don't know what to tell you.
Gamemaster:U-A-N-O-N?
Krod:Alright, whatever.
Cedric:Wait, so how do you spell this?
Andros:Josh, I feel you.
Andros:I got a very long lecture.
Cedric:Q-A-N-O-N?
Cedric:Q-A-N-O-N.
Krod:Hold on, hold on.
Gamemaster:QAnon.
Krod:Why do we have to do this to Jorge right now?
Andros:Jorge just didn't learn what QAnon is.
Gamemaster:Jorge is going to fall down a rabbit hole.
Krod:Why do we have to expose Jorge to Q?
Gamemaster:Do you know about Pizzagate?
Andros:He has no QAnon right now.
Cedric:Does this have to do with living under New York City, or is it a different thing?
Andros:I'm
Krod:Jorge, when I say... Jorge, when I say ping pong comet, does this mean anything?
Cedric:No, it doesn't mean anything.
Cedric:But do you remember when there was that headline of Jewish people under the city?
Krod:message received that's actually a confirmation yeah
Gamemaster:The Jews were tunneling under the city, though.
Cedric:In the tunnels.
Andros:The Jews did come under New York.
Gamemaster:That's a real thing that happened.
Cedric:So that's a real thing.
Cedric:This is a separate thing.
Cedric:Okay.
Gamemaster:The Jews tunneled under New York, but that's an isolated incident.
Gamemaster:And it was a Jew-on-Jew crime.
Gamemaster:So, you know, I don't know if that's included in all the other stuff.
Andros:Josh, I do feel you, though, because I got a very long lecture from my sister about how food dyes are causing autism.
Gamemaster:That's true, though.
Gamemaster:We did the Tylenol causes fetus death thing, so I get it.
Krod:My favorite.
Andros:I don't have that part of Instagram yet.
Andros:That'll be next week.
Krod:Oh, that's Twitter.
Cedric:So my thing with the Tylenol thing and a lot of similar stuff is just like, I don't know.
Krod:You got to be on Twitter for that.
Krod:We get it first.
Andros:Oh, she's on Instagram.
Gamemaster:Hmm.
Cedric:In tech, it's like, I know a lot of autistic people.
Cedric:What is this War on autistic people?
Cedric:And I saw another tweet that was, Trump is... Yeah.
Krod:I think it's.
Andros:Because if you run out of someone to blame, the people start blaming you.
Andros:You just got to start picking new groups every time.
Cedric:Like, everyone's so personally offended by the Tylenol.
Cedric:I'm like, you guys aren't pregnant?
Cedric:You're not doctors?
Cedric:Do you have Tylenol stock?
Cedric:Like, why do you care so much?
Cedric:I saw this and went, cool, doesn't bother me.
Cedric:And if Bailey was something, I don't know if she'd have Tylenol or not, but I don't know why people care so much.
Gamemaster:See, like, part of my problem specifically is that if they say bad things about Tylenol, people who don't do enough research will be like, okay, I won't take Tylenol when I'm pregnant.
Gamemaster:I'll take, like, an NSAID instead, which will actually, like, fuck up your kid.
Cedric:Yeah, but I feel like if you are pregnant, you should be talking to a doctor.
Gamemaster:So... The kind of person who takes RFK Jr.
Cedric:And that doctor is going to be like, do this or do that.
Gamemaster:'s advice on what to do when they're pregnant is not going to believe a doctor.
Krod:I'm also not sure how much we can stop them from doing already harmful things.
Krod:If it's just like Tylenol is just like one more drop in the bucket.
Cedric:Yeah.
Krod:But I think the best thing to come out of the Tylenol thing was how quickly the vernacular picked up.
Krod:It's a very memetically strong word.
Krod:It's a very memetically strong concept.
Krod:People are calling each other Tylenol Americans when they want to call them autistic.
Andros:Thanks.
Krod:That's hilarious.
Krod:So very easily, it's in the zeitgeist already.
Krod:what, did your mom have Tylenol?
Krod:Maybe that's why Trump said it.
Krod:He's just like, this is too brandable.
Krod:It has to be true.
Krod:So then he's like, it's Tylenol.
Cedric:I also saw Trump first adds $100,000 to feed H-1B visas and is now banning Tylenol.
Krod:The whole thing's Tylenol.
Cedric:He's really coming for Silicon Valley.
Krod:Yeah, sorry.
Gamemaster:They walked back almost immediately parts of the H-1B visa change.
Krod:He's waging a War.
Gamemaster:So, you know.
Cedric:Yeah.
Andros:Yeah.
Andros:Now he's coming for the UN because they sabotaged his escalator.
Gamemaster:But... Yeah, there was that guy on Fox News that said that the UN should be bombed.
Gamemaster:But because specifically somebody in Trump's entourage accidentally turned off the escalator.
Andros:What?
Krod:That's too close.
Gamemaster:Absolutely wild stuff.
Gamemaster:But also, there might be a UFC fight on the White House lawn.
Krod:The White House lawn?
Gamemaster:Yeah.
Andros:Wait, what?
Gamemaster:Conor McGregor's asking for $100 million and 100 gold cards to hand out as he pleases as his fee to participate.
Andros:No.
Krod:Actually...
Krod:That's a $500 million... That's how much those gold cards are worth.
Krod:But... Okay, well, him asking to fight on the card in general is crazy.
Gamemaster:I don't know what to tell you.
Gamemaster:I just know what he's asking for.
Krod:If he fights on that card, it's a travesty.
Krod:But when is the card supposed to be?
Krod:It's going to be June of next year?
Cedric:I thought I heard Dana White saying that he wanted to put McGregor in there because he's like, McGregor, he sells fights.
Krod:I might go.
Gamemaster:You're going to go?
Krod:I was thinking about trying to do a DC trip for the 250th US Independence anniversary.
Krod:But if there's also going to be a UFC fight...
Cedric:Let me know if you get tickets.
Cedric:I'd go.
Cedric:Could you imagine telling your kids you were there?
Cedric:They'd be like, wait, wait.
Andros:Can you imagine, though?
Cedric:Dad, did that happen during... Obviously it was during Trump.
Cedric:And they'd be like, oh, okay.
Andros:It's like that picture of the Little Rock Five, and there's that one woman in the background screaming at them, but instead it's a fight on the White House lawn, and it's just Mike's background being like... No.
Cedric:Yeah.
Cedric:Okay.
Gamemaster:The weigh-ins are going to take place at the Lincoln Memorial.
Cedric:I don't...
Cedric:That's crazy.
Cedric:What I will also say, though, is growing up in Massachusetts, it was funny learning about civil rights and things like, oh, the Little Rock Five.
Cedric:And you're like, Arkansas is horrible.
Cedric:And then they cover Boston busing.
Cedric:And then it just doesn't click into our heads.
Cedric:We're like, oh, yeah, that's our state.
Cedric:But then when I got older, I was like, wow, Massachusetts is really racist.
Cedric:And I was like, oh yeah, last baseball team to desegregate, super white state, they used to just bust black kids around.
Cedric:Yeah, yeah, that's right.
Krod:It's like one of the enduring stereotypes of Boston is homophobic and racist.
Krod:Not a lot of cities still have those as stereotypes for the whole city.
Gamemaster:Thank you.
Cedric:And angry.
Cedric:And angry.
Krod:Yeah.
Cedric:Like when a...
Cedric:The Boston Marathon bombing happened.
Cedric:I remember seeing people on Twitter being like, well, at least it happened in Boston.
Cedric:They're very tough over there.
Cedric:I'm like, we're not tough.
Cedric:We're just kind of angry.
Cedric:We don't really like gay people, and I'm black, and they don't really like that.
Cedric:But other than that, we're pretty... Yeah.
Krod:They're like, if it was any city that should have racially profiled the people that did the Boston bombing, we would have thought Boston would have taken care of it.
Krod:Josh is so disappointed in that sentence.
Gamemaster:And what's worse is I can't even really argue with it.
Cedric:No, you can't.
Gamemaster:It's true.
Gamemaster:It's just sad.
Krod:How did you guys let him through?
Krod:Are you profiling?
Krod:No, but I expected you to.
Gamemaster:You don't have to take off your shoes.
Cedric:So I signed up for PreCheck or something like that, that quick thing, whatever it is.
Cedric:And they 100% racially profiled me.
Cedric:Because both times, Bailey gets to just scan it.
Cedric:Fine.
Cedric:Me, they go, oh, you're flagged.
Cedric:You have to go talk to a person.
Cedric:So then I was like, why am I flagged?
Cedric:They're like, oh, your name must be different from your... I was like, it's not.
Cedric:I'm looking at it.
Cedric:It's not.
Cedric:They're like, oh, did you spell it wrong?
Cedric:I'm like, no.
Cedric:I spelled my name right.
Cedric:I can do that.
Cedric:So then it was on... I was coming back from Colorado.
Cedric:And I was flying there.
Cedric:Because it happened again there.
Cedric:No, it's happened not just in Colorado.
Cedric:It happened in other places.
Cedric:So then I was just like, what is wrong?
Cedric:And then they're like, oh, no, no, your name is... I was like, no, no, I'm not leaving.
Cedric:Tell me what's wrong.
Cedric:And they're like, oh, oh, oh, it's the...
Cedric:I in your name is actually a 1.
Cedric:And I was like, that's never happened before.
Cedric:I've never gone to type in an I in Nario and put a 1?
Cedric:And it's like, I know why they're doing that, because they're probably thinking I might be illegal, and they're trying to also see my ID.
Gamemaster:Let's get some fuzz together.
Cedric:But it's like...
Cedric:Just fucking tell me that, you know?
Cedric:You don't need to pretend that for the first time in my life, I'm like, oh, what is... Hit the number key!
Cedric:Hit the numbers!
Cedric:Like, that's just so stupid.
Krod:just tell me that?
Krod:If I was a TSA, I would be pulling the monitor.
Krod:No, no, no.
Krod:You had water the last time you came through and so you got flagged.
Cedric:Yeah, no, no, no.
Cedric:No one wanted to answer me, but the guy in Colorado, I'm just not used to that.
Cedric:So he's like, oh, yeah, I can tell you.
Cedric:Yeah, sure.
Cedric:But they...
Krod:Did you set an appointment to go through security in Denver?
Cedric:No, I just...
Andros:I do that every time.
Andros:It's nice.
Gamemaster:Set an appointment?
Krod:yeah i i like checked in and then they're like hey you can set an appointment go to security and i'm just like what the fuck is this scam dude you're just gonna make shit easier for me what the fuck so then i like i checked on red i swear i did this i checked on reddit and they're like oh yeah no it's great and i'm like all right what are you gonna do with my email or something and then i like signed up and then they're like yeah just go through the line that everyone else is everyone's skipping the line to you have an appointment yeah uh yeah just fucking i don't know
Krod:Just go through.
Andros:It's a scam.
Krod:Just walk through.
Krod:No one will stop you.
Krod:And I'm like, okay.
Andros:TSA PreCheck in Colorado is a scam, but they bury it very deep, and they're like, do you want to reserve a spot?
Andros:And then you just skip the line.
Cedric:Yeah.
Gamemaster:I had no issues with CSA PreCheck.
Gamemaster:I understand I'm not in a group that's at risk for having issues with CSA PreCheck, but like... So Delta hates you.
Cedric:Yeah.
Cedric:Apparently, Delta changed my name spelling on my ticket, so that was the issue.
Krod:I like staying grounded.
Krod:I like staying grounded, so I don't have TSA PreCheck.
Krod:I go in with the masses.
Cedric:My credit card covers it, so I don't have to deal with the poor people.
Gamemaster:I'm sorry.
Krod:I also think, because sometimes I'll go, and the lines will be about the same.
Krod:And there's no priority for TSA PreCheck.
Krod:It's just a different line.
Krod:And I'm just like, I don't know.
Krod:It doesn't seem worth it.
Krod:At least not worth my mental... If I got there and it's like, I would have saved 15 minutes.
Krod:I would have written it down and then forgotten to do it, which is what's happened.
Krod:Oh, okay, quicker.
Krod:But now I look and I'm just like, at Newark, it's like fucking 50-50.
Krod:I'll go through the line where they slap you or whatever.
Krod:The other one.
Andros:Yeah, the one where they smack you.
Gamemaster:I think TSA PreCheck is really nice if you leave the country.
Gamemaster:Global entry through customs is so easy compared to having to do customs with the plebs.
Cedric:Very nice.
Gamemaster:I don't know if it's necessarily as much an improvement if you're just flying domestically.
Gamemaster:With Global Entry, my times going through customs have literally been stand in front of this computer, it takes a picture of your face, it prints out a coupon, you walk up to the person at the end of the, like, behind the glass, you hand them the coupon, I say, okay.
Gamemaster:And that's it.
Gamemaster:That's the whole deal.
Gamemaster:Takes like five minutes total.
Krod:that doesn't make sense we've been planning plan make the plan
Cedric:Are we going to play?
Cedric:Because we have a plan to enact.
Gamemaster:Oh.
Gamemaster:No.
Cedric:If you can't, that's okay.
Gamemaster:I still don't understand.
Gamemaster:Can you tell me the plan?
Andros:It makes sense.
Cedric:No, don't worry about it.
Gamemaster:So I can adjust in case the plan doesn't make sense?
Gamemaster:Maybe I want to help you make the plan make sense.
Andros:Don't worry.
Andros:It's bulletproof.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Cedric:What if you drop us in and then we just ignore the quest and we just all try to romance?
Cedric:Johnny's mom or whatever and it's like a Netflix movie where she has to choose between three guys
Gamemaster:Okay, so...
Gamemaster:So that's actually part of my concern about this plan.
Gamemaster:Does your plan have anything to do with killing Benny?
Gamemaster:Because I feel like that's the only thing you could be planning around.
Andros:Wait, killing Betty or killing Tommy?
Krod:Yeah, Benny was not... Wait, three?
Gamemaster:Sorry.
Gamemaster:Sorry.
Gamemaster:Tommy.
Andros:I was driving the other day, and I realized there's a lot of kids in this campaign.
Andros:We've had three kids, which is more children than we've ever seen in a campaign.
Andros:And then the head of the Voidsong we saw in a one-shot, so I'm counting that as a kid.
Cedric:That's true.
Gamemaster:There are kids in this one, and they're evil sometimes.
Krod:There's Benny.
Krod:There's Tommy.
Gamemaster:I'm talking about Benny.
Cedric:Iconoclasm.
Cedric:Oh, and then we got attacked in Iconoclasm from an undead burning kid thing.
Krod:Oh, yeah.
Gamemaster:They grew up, though.
Gamemaster:They got better.
Andros:Oh yeah.
Gamemaster:No.
Gamemaster:I don't know.
Gamemaster:That wasn't old enough to be considered a kid.
Andros:A newborn.
Gamemaster:It's too young.
Cedric:The toddler?
Gamemaster:Yeah.
Gamemaster:No, I think a toddler's still a kid.
Gamemaster:It was technically an unborn fetus.
Gamemaster:I don't know if that's better or worse for whatever bookkeeping you're doing.
Cedric:That's worse.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Cedric:That counts as three.
Gamemaster:Sure.
Gamemaster:Everybody knows if it isn't born yet, it's three kids.
Gamemaster:Once it's born, it's down to one kid.
Cedric:Conservatives love this one simple trick.
Krod:It's like... Well, hold on.
Gamemaster:I hate that so much.
Gamemaster:Does anyone want to do a recap of the last two?
Krod:I had a horrific joke.
Gamemaster:Sorry, yeah, tell your joke about fetuses.
Krod:It's like some fucked up version instead of the three-fifths compromise.
Krod:It's the three-ones compromise or the four-ones.
Krod:Pregnant women have the voting power of four people.
Krod:This is how we get back in these specific seats.
Gamemaster:Craig, you got that?
Cedric:Remember when Mike was trying to get extra character actions by being a pregnant character?
Krod:We'll move all the electoral votes over by counting pregnant women as four.
Krod:No, that was you, was it not?
Cedric:That was me.
Gamemaster:Yeah.
Krod:Okay.
Andros:Why did you put that on the mic?
Andros:Did you think no one would remember that?
Gamemaster:Immediately tried to deflect it.
Gamemaster:Nobody was thinking about it.
Gamemaster:You brought it up and then pinned it on someone else.
Andros:No one mentioned that.
Cedric:I still stand by it.
Cedric:They should have six actions.
Andros:Wait, why did you stand by it now after you put it on the mic?
Andros:Did you want... What was the...
Cedric:I'm going to be honest.
Cedric:I couldn't remember if Mike came up with it or I did.
Andros:Let's do it.
Cedric:And I was like, I feel like I did.
Gamemaster:What?
Cedric:But if I say I did, Mike's going to be like, you stole that from me.
Cedric:So I was like, let me just give him credit.
Krod:Thanks for the credit.
Gamemaster:Ugh.
Gamemaster:Bad.
Gamemaster:Do we want to play some Pathfinder?
Gamemaster:Does anyone want to give me a recap of the previous two sessions?
Cedric:Yes.
Krod:Sure, I'll try.
Gamemaster:Because this is a sequel.
Cedric:The previous two?
Gamemaster:Yeah.
Krod:Let me read off.
Gamemaster:We can do one and one if you prefer.
Cedric:Yeah, cool.
Gamemaster:Great, popcorn mic.
Krod:Yeah, I'll start off, and then if I feel like it, I'll hand it off in the middle.
Cedric:Cool.
Krod:We'll do popcorn reading.
Krod:So the initial session, essentially we are a group of hardcore detectives.
Krod:Several of us are Hollywood for some reason.
Krod:We work in the magic crimes unit of a church.
Krod:Don't look into it too much.
Krod:And pretty much these people were getting the shit sucked out of them.
Krod:And our job was to find the shit sucker.
Krod:There's a lot of shit sucking going on.
Krod:And there was really no pattern to the victims.
Krod:Just sort of random shit sucking.
Krod:But we were able to follow one lead of a tunicked man.
Krod:heading on a midnight train going anywhere and by anywhere we mean actually only one reasonable stop we went to the place with the one reasonable stop there is a stark lack of tunics we discover that the tunic people where the alleged shit sucker lies I'm just going to throw as many tongue twisters as I can in this where the alleged shit sucker lies it's a cult they're super nice
Cedric:Thank you.
Krod:I imagine they're analogous to Amish.
Krod:This guy had some weird, powerful gem under his bed.
Krod:His pillow didn't smell like anything in particular, even though we had a very good bloodhound on the pillow.
Cedric:... ... ...
Krod:And being essentially at our wit's end, we decided that the best way to find this guy was to just walk directly into the forest like psychopaths.
Krod:using this necklace, which doesn't even make sense, because if this guy was using the necklace to guide him, he would have the necklace, unless he has two.
Krod:We didn't really think that through.
Krod:But we head just directly into the most terrifying forest that we've heard of, because honestly, it seems like death is a better fate than going back to the church and saying that we can't find the shitsucker.
Krod:We go deep into this forest.
Krod:We slaughter Giant praying mantises?
Krod:Praying manti?
Gamemaster:You.
Krod:and then we slaughter a tree branch that was holding onto a kid.
Krod:We interrogate the kid.
Krod:It's pretty much a kid.
Krod:We actually really don't care, but we also don't care if it's a kid or not so much that we're not leaving.
Krod:We know we're going to a more dangerous part of the forest just with a child, because ultimately, yeah, I mean, we just don't give a fuck.
Andros:He's a level one.
Krod:So...
Krod:We march into the middle, we flash a couple badges, we pull out our notepads, and we begin to interview people that may be part of the scene of the crime.
Krod:They laugh at us, tell us to go fuck ourselves, and we decide that they were reaching and promptly dispel the threat.
Gamemaster:Bye.
Andros:A level.
Krod:Yeah, so then we dispel the threat.
Krod:Very importantly, very strong willpower, we don't walk into the place that would have killed us and converse with some sort of god being.
Krod:Instead, we just kill the people in front of us because we feared for our lives.
Krod:And then we leave the forest with the kid, drop the kid off at his hot mom, who probably does witchcraft.
Krod:And then I guess, oh, actually, sorry, that's all two sessions.
Krod:That's all two sessions.
Cedric:I... I get...
Krod:I didn't popcorn Noah.
Gamemaster:That's all the sessions.
Andros:also we were in the magic the magnificent mansion and something was like we really geared up to fight it and we were really ready to fight it and then it looney tunes cartooned out of there not for dropping a piano on our head though in the form of a half
Krod:Oh, yeah.
Cedric:I get so much enjoyment out of being able to get Josh laugh with like dialogue.
Cedric:Like we met the mushroom people and we're like, everyone get in a lot.
Gamemaster:It's just, the idea that, like, I get it, you guys are magic cops in a magic setting, so maybe you wouldn't be all that freaked out by magic, but just, like, cops having just trekked for two weeks straight through a forest in the pitch dark find, at the end of their result, these otherworldly weird insect elves, and their first thought is, okay, we need a lineup, is crazy to me.
Andros:you
Cedric:Thank you.
Krod:I like to think we all have the same internal dialogue and we're like, oh god, what the fuck is that?
Krod:That's fucking terrifying.
Krod:And we're just like, chin up.
Krod:Chin up.
Krod:Back straight.
Krod:You're going to go in there and you're going to figure out who killed where the hell this murderer is.
Krod:In a line.
Gamemaster:It's just, it's like a comedy, except all three of you are the straight man, somehow.
Gamemaster:Like, against all of the weird stuff, and it works.
Andros:Okay.
Gamemaster:It works.
Gamemaster:It's just a little very ridiculous.
Cedric:Yeah, that was great.
Gamemaster:Anyway, Mike's recap was irreverent, but I think pretty competent.
Gamemaster:So, you get a hero point.
Krod:Oh, I get both.
Gamemaster:Sorry, a mythic point, because you guys are mythic.
Gamemaster:sure you can have one of each that's fine mythic characters don't have any actions that use hero points so you're just gonna get to hang on to that hero point but you can have it don't eat it it's toxic um okay so uh
Andros:Hello.
Cedric:you
Gamemaster:Yeah, your characters, members of a convox set to investigate magic crimes.
Gamemaster:Unfortunately, at the end of your weeks-long investigation into the Verdant Expanse, had a little more information, but were not able to, decisively, were not able to stop the cause.
Gamemaster:Of the curse.
Gamemaster:Nor were you even able to actually track down either the person who you now know is causing this particular curse, one Lyric Burke, an Amish slash Mennonite equivalent, or the motive as to why any of this is happening, other than those fey creatures in the woods either made or convinced Lyric to do it.
Gamemaster:To what end?
Gamemaster:Who knows?
Gamemaster:So, not completely empty-handed, but certainly more empty-handed than your immediate superiors would like, you returned back to headquarters.
Gamemaster:A... Oh, shoot.
Gamemaster:It's a...
Gamemaster:Where is the... I have... I have... You are in the... You're in Glasswater, the district that your particular... your Convox's HQ is in Hallia.
Gamemaster:An affluent or, like, upper-middle-class area called such because it's where one of the rivers that runs through Hallia runs and is decorated along the sides with all kinds of, like...
Gamemaster:glassware that reflects the light into the river such that it shines with rainbow colors as a kind of reflection of the aurora above.
Gamemaster:It's pretty, it's home, and in the evening that you return home, it is not an unwelcome sight.
Gamemaster:That said...
Gamemaster:You have to, the next day, report back to your superiors or meet back up with your posse if you left them behind.
Gamemaster:You know, fill out some paperwork, debrief your superiors on what happened, and ultimately the answer is the case is still open.
Gamemaster:And while there are still leads to track down the four of you, but right now just the three of you,
Gamemaster:still have one or two things to chase down.
Gamemaster:You regroup, you put in a little bit more legwork, trying to track down now that you have a name.
Gamemaster:and perhaps a little more information, something to go off of.
Gamemaster:And the next thing that kind of pings your detective senses is you still have the necklace that you took from Lyric's home, that Fae stone necklace.
Gamemaster:And, you know, there are definitely experts in stonework and the like within the church.
Gamemaster:But unfortunately, most of them are out on various duties, and you don't want to wait.
Gamemaster:You don't have time, because every day that you waste trying to wait for some expert in stones to make it back over to your convox is another day that somebody could be afflicted by the curse.
Gamemaster:So instead, you...
Gamemaster:try the next best thing, which is taking a trip over to Crystal's Rock, which is a professional jeweler's conference that's happening in town right now.
Gamemaster:You figure if there's somebody who might know anything about this stone and maybe a lead into what it could be used, it'd be jewelers.
Gamemaster:They work with this kind of stuff.
Gamemaster:So you...
Gamemaster:You grab whatever is necessary for your detective work and or other work.
Gamemaster:Take a tram on down over to the conference hall, which is, you know, it's a ballroom that's been rented out from a hotel.
Gamemaster:And you make your way in, trying to find, you know, any information you can.
Gamemaster:So you make your way into the conference.
Gamemaster:First hurdle immediately.
Gamemaster:You are not jewelers.
Gamemaster:You are not part of the Jewelers Union, nor are you sponsored by a company that is part of the Jewelers Union.
Gamemaster:You do not have tickets into Crystal Rocks.
Gamemaster:So the three of you are on the outside of the hotel.
Gamemaster:You know, on the inside is the conference.
Gamemaster:What is the plan of attack here?
Cedric:badges?
Cedric:Can our badges get us some?
Gamemaster:You can try.
Krod:Let's see if we can get a shot.
Andros:I'll just hold my badge up, follow behind.
Cedric:Okay.
Andros:I'm just, like, moving among the entourage, being like, excuse me, excuse me, sorry.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Cedric:I will start walking towards it.
Cedric:Cedric will start walking towards it, and he'll have his entourage move people away from him as he starts heading in.
Gamemaster:Absolutely.
Cedric:Hey, excuse me.
Andros:Do these people work for us?
Andros:Are these... I've never seen any of these people before.
Cedric:Yeah, the deputies.
Cedric:They'll be moving people for us.
Andros:Excuse me.
Gamemaster:they technically I believe they technically do not work for the police force or for like for this convox they are just people who are big fans specifically of Cedric but you know they're present they can help out absolutely
Andros:This one's just a cardboard cutout.
Cedric:Yeah, yeah.
Cedric:Excuse me.
Cedric:Move aside.
Cedric:And I flash my badge when I get to the doorman.
Cedric:Official police matters.
Gamemaster:there's a minotaur looking fellow standing as a kind of not a bouncer because these are jewelers this is not a nightclub but as like the kind of guy who's checking tickets and stuff out the front door you walk up you flash a badge I'd love a diplomacy check please you know just to introduce yourself
Cedric:Great.
Cedric:Is the stars out?
Gamemaster:No, you're inside a hotel.
Gamemaster:And also it's the day.
Cedric:Okay.
Cedric:40.
Krod:But it's like celebrities at the hotel.
Gamemaster:Not in the lobby that you can see.
Gamemaster:A 40 is enough.
Gamemaster:This is, like, not a high security place.
Gamemaster:You're just kind of bypassing the entry fee, effectively.
Gamemaster:You guys can walk right on in.
Gamemaster:You know, you're cops.
Gamemaster:This is fine.
Gamemaster:Looking around, this is... Have you guys ever been to, or did you ever participate in, like, third grade, the science fair, where a bunch of people have those, like, three-fold poster boards?
Gamemaster:It's a cross between that and, like, a really, really lame Comic-Con, where it's different booths.
Cedric:Hmm.
Gamemaster:where, like, vendors and the like, suppliers of stones and jewels are there to, like, talk about how great they are at procuring particular compositions of emerald and the like, or it's people showing off various cuts of gems, advertising themselves as people who can, like, as stonecutters and the like.
Gamemaster:It is very clearly targeted specifically at people who work in the jeweling or jeweling-adjacent industries,
Gamemaster:It's not like for the average person to walk in and be like, ooh, look at all of these cool gems and stuff of that nature.
Gamemaster:To which, I don't know of the three of you, sorry, the seven of you, because you have your posse with you, collectively look the part of either person who's looking to purchase jewels or person who's looking to sell jewels.
Gamemaster:So...
Andros:Or.
Cedric:I will have my entourage kind of block me for a second.
Gamemaster:You're definitely raising some attention there.
Gamemaster:Yes.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Cedric:And then I will use quick disguise.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Cedric:And since I'm a master, I can do it in three actions.
Gamemaster:Right.
Cedric:So I will try to look as a rich person that might be buying jewels.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Gamemaster:I believe that would be a deception check, correct?
Cedric:39.
Gamemaster:Quick disguise.
Gamemaster:Set up a disguise enlistment.
Gamemaster:Yes.
Gamemaster:39.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Gamemaster:Absolutely.
Gamemaster:You do a little bit of cover for Surrounded by Your Entourage.
Gamemaster:And just do, like, change a few things such that you no longer look immediately like a guy who's tracking down a murderer and more like a guy who just really wants to buy some rubies.
Cedric:And now my entourage is going to, they're going to vaguely try to pretend to just be like rich person staff.
Gamemaster:Which I think, knowing your character, that's probably easier than most to get into that particular spirit.
Gamemaster:So that's fine.
Gamemaster:Yeah.
Cedric:And I'm going to try to separate a little bit from my top looking compatriots and just try to, so we're trying to track down what, what this like necklace is or wires.
Gamemaster:Sure.
Gamemaster:So you have fey stone.
Gamemaster:You have the fey stone necklace, which you know is a particularly rare stone that is related somehow to what's going on there.
Cedric:Mm-hmm.
Gamemaster:It led you to those fey in the woods and of that nature.
Gamemaster:But besides that, you don't know much.
Gamemaster:You're just kind of here as a way to gather more information about it, hoping to track down a lead that might point you in the direction of
Gamemaster:you know honestly you guys tracked down the most promising lead in this particular case and there wasn't anything that you could really work with at the end of it so you kind of just have to deal with whatever's left and this was just the second most promising thing that you've had
Cedric:Speaking of which, are they going to look into that otherworldly being, the Iridescent Church, or are they just going to be like, eh, well, that sucks?
Gamemaster:The otherworldly being being... Yeah, like, who are you talking about when you say that?
Krod:Edit to the list.
Cedric:Like, the ones that were like, hey, if you enter this door and die, you might be able to talk to someone and close this kersh.
Andros:Uh.
Gamemaster:You guys are currently looking into it.
Gamemaster:Like, that was an unknown group.
Gamemaster:You have the best lead, and the only lead you currently have is they have black raiments, and this stone is associated with them.
Cedric:Okay.
Gamemaster:So...
Cedric:I feel like the judge would be like, we're gonna send in troops and we're gonna go dig those fuckers up, which is fine.
Cedric:Different factions.
Gamemaster:You don't work for the Scale, so... Yes.
Andros:With my negative one charisma, I think I'm just going to be walking up people going, where are you from?
Andros:And then leading in very closely and like noting down where everyone's from and seeing if anyone is from the same area as the Mennonites and the Verdant.
Cedric:I would like to make a gather information action.
Gamemaster:Absolutely.
Gamemaster:Sure.
Gamemaster:Roll either a society or a perception check then as you walk around and start asking people where they're from.
Cedric:Share to gather information.
Gamemaster:With your entourage, that takes like five seconds, right?
Gamemaster:Or something like that.
Gamemaster:You do it in a quarter of the time.
Cedric:I have two things that make it quicker, and then the entourage also gives me a bonus.
Gamemaster:Sure.
Andros:I got a. Yes.
Gamemaster:Okay, so what are you looking for?
Gamemaster:Sorry I interrupted you.
Cedric:I'm looking for information on this necklace, people who might have made it, materials, anything like that.
Cedric:And then general, I'm going to throw in a little bit of, oh, anyone knows what's happening in that town over there?
Gamemaster:Okay, yeah.
Gamemaster:Roll Diplomacy, I believe, is the check for you.
Cedric:Yes.
Cedric:And then I will...
Gamemaster:And a 33 on your Perception roll right now.
Gamemaster:Okay, so you're just going around from person to person, getting up in their face, asking them where they're from.
Gamemaster:And the cool thing is, I mean, you're a trained cop.
Andros:Thank you.
Gamemaster:You kind of have this air about you of general authority that's just been ingrained from years and years of being on the force.
Gamemaster:So you lean in.
Gamemaster:You're kind of an imposing figure.
Gamemaster:So the immediate response for a lot of people is to answer it and then be like, wait, why am I answering you?
Gamemaster:Um, as a kind of like, okay, sure.
Gamemaster:Yeah.
Gamemaster:I just, I almost reflex.
Gamemaster:Most of the people that you interact with here are either from somewhere in Calaria, most of the people from Hallia, or are from Tormeré, which is the country to the south that is famous for a number of rare jewels that only come out of that region, which makes sense.
Gamemaster:Every once in a while you get one or two people that are from somewhere slightly further out.
Gamemaster:There's a few from Velthara, which is big.
Gamemaster:mining town or mining country in general uh no one from Wrenford or from around the uh the the verdant expanse as best you can tell um just you know
Andros:Whenever I come back to my comrades, one, I think one of these vendors just got me into a conversation and I do not have enough charisma to say no.
Andros:So I come back with just a Giant like solid gold rhinestone covered like shotgun.
Gamemaster:God snob them.
Andros:non-functional, and it has the flag of Calaria and the host's raiment on it in diamonds, and I'm like, I couldn't say no.
Andros:It's not functional.
Krod:And I would like Krod.
Cedric:Make an impression.
Krod:Didn't have to check his name.
Krod:Totally knew his name.
Krod:Easy to remember.
Krod:Not easy to mix up.
Krod:Can Krod go to the sketchiest looking jewelry dealer and just talk to him?
Gamemaster:Sure.
Krod:Like, I mean, not make an impression.
Krod:I mean, I want to ask him about Fae Stone specifically.
Andros:you you
Gamemaster:Yeah, I mean, that'd be a diplomacy check to try and get this info out of him.
Gamemaster:I will allow if you have something else you'd prefer to roll, if you could explain why it would be better, I'll let you do that, but diplomacy's the base.
Krod:So I would like, I want to go to the sketchy person and I would like to sort of hint that I'm not a hundred percent legit.
Krod:This is why I picked the sketchy person because I'd like to use legal lore to sort of be like, Hey, yeah, I heard these face stones, but you know, there's some things that are like going on against the church with these face stones.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Krod:It's all very interesting, isn't it?
Krod:And sort of hint-like.
Krod:Do you know anything about the legality or the favor of these face tones?
Gamemaster:Okay, I'll let you roll a legal War there.
Gamemaster:And then I saw that crit from you, Jorge, earlier with your... I mean, you have a team of people working for you, like, moving through the crowd trying to pull this information out.
Gamemaster:And they're, you know, they're sycophants.
Cedric:No one recede.
Gamemaster:They're used to, like, just... That's crazy.
Gamemaster:Two crits in a row?
Gamemaster:Okay.
Krod:I'd kill him.
Gamemaster:So...
Gamemaster:So Cedric and Posse are moving throughout, trying to find information on the Facestones in general.
Gamemaster:And then Krod finds... He does a lap around the conference hall.
Gamemaster:and finds the person who clearly has the least, like, polished setup.
Andros:Thank you.
Gamemaster:But not polished for lack of money, polished for lack of care.
Gamemaster:It's more like they're here to set up because it's just part of keeping appearances.
Gamemaster:But this isn't actually really their crowd.
Gamemaster:They don't seem to know many people here.
Gamemaster:So we'll do that one first.
Gamemaster:You sidle up to one of the people, kind of tucked into the corner, clearly didn't get the best table available, and you convincingly put up this whole, you know, I want information on face stones, I know they're hard to get, especially through the correct channels, stuff like that, to see if they have any information there.
Gamemaster:And I think the response you get...
Gamemaster:is like you me and everyone else would love to get phase stones more easily part of the problem is that they're in such such short supply that generally speaking there's only ever one or two people that sell them in any capacity and that's because they're particularly rich and can afford to just spread people out across the infinite horizon searching for instances of the stone
Gamemaster:And so they just happen to get it first.
Gamemaster:And it's almost always worth it because of how much a small chunk of face stone goes for.
Gamemaster:But because you crit, I will...
Gamemaster:I will say that this guy heard rumors and immediately dismissed them, because if it were true, there would be more of the face stone on the market.
Gamemaster:That someone in town supposedly figured out some, like, blood ritual to make more face stone willingly.
Gamemaster:And it's one of those things that, like, he dismissed offhand immediately.
Gamemaster:It sounds like fantasy.
Gamemaster:It sounds like crap.
Gamemaster:But I think...
Gamemaster:You would understand that rumors like that probably start for a reason.
Gamemaster:How true it necessarily is, you wouldn't be able to tell from this, but there might be a grain in there that matches up.
Gamemaster:And then with the other crit, looking around for information on that, yeah, ridiculous check.
Cedric:46 crit.
Cedric:My entourage is helping me.
Cedric:I'm guided by the stars.
Cedric:That's a feat.
Cedric:I decide to use it.
Cedric:And then, yeah, generally gathering.
Gamemaster:Don't you need to be under stars to use that?
Cedric:No, it just gives me a plus one for it.
Gamemaster:Oh, okay.
Gamemaster:Sure, sure, sure, sure.
Cedric:So, yeah, and then general gathering knowledge, I think, is two hours with the hobnobber.
Cedric:And then this feat is 30 minutes.
Gamemaster:Not the hobnobbler.
Krod:There's a hot bubbler in here.
Krod:Everyone get down.
Krod:No, I just think your dress looks really nice.
Gamemaster:Absolutely.
Krod:No, there isn't.
Gamemaster:30 minutes.
Gamemaster:Very fast compared to how long it would take most other people to gather information.
Gamemaster:I think you immediately, like...
Gamemaster:find people and and cross them off your list of people to ask that like they either don't seem like they would know anything about this topic or they don't seem like they would have the connections or they don't seem like they would have the money because it becomes very obvious uh pretty quickly on that this stone is both extremely rare and in high demand uh so the only people who would be able to have interacted with it in any capacity are people with capital um so
Gamemaster:You can, like, narrow your search over to the people that work for the really large companies or the people who just look filthy rich.
Gamemaster:And then go from there.
Gamemaster:And for the most part, a lot of the information you get is either along the lines of, no, I wish I had Facestone.
Gamemaster:If you find out where to get any information about it, I will pay you for it.
Cedric:Hmm.
Gamemaster:Or, yeah, I have a small chunk that I inherited from my grandfather where he purchased it off some orphan who found it 300 years ago, and it's been in my family ever since, and stuff like that.
Gamemaster:But with a crit, I think you will also find one of the...
Gamemaster:One of the larger booths, they're not selling fake stone or anything like that.
Gamemaster:It looks like it's primarily a high-end jeweler.
Gamemaster:It's mostly diamonds and gold and platinum jewelry and the like.
Gamemaster:But you schmooze a bit and you kind of move the conversation in the direction of like rare stuff that you're trying to get your hands on.
Gamemaster:Posing it more is like a curiosity.
Gamemaster:I'm assuming you're not immediately opening with, hello, I'm a cop.
Gamemaster:So...
Cedric:Yeah, no, that's why I disguised myself first to pretend to be a rich person.
Gamemaster:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Cedric:Yeah.
Gamemaster:Right.
Gamemaster:So, like, work your way in there.
Gamemaster:And I think eventually it comes up that this guy... This guy has some face-dump if you're in the market to purchase.
Cedric:Yeah.
Gamemaster:Which, like, he...
Gamemaster:He brought up with him.
Gamemaster:He knew that there would perhaps be some people in town with the kind of pockets required.
Gamemaster:For the record, the chunk of feystone that you're carrying around, this guy estimates it.
Gamemaster:He doesn't see it, but like describing estimates of pricing and stuff, that chunk is worth like 50,000 gold pieces.
Cedric:I assume purchasing will be in a different location.
Gamemaster:It's like this big.
Gamemaster:It is worth a ridiculous amount of money.
Gamemaster:And, you know, the only reason you're still walking around with it to use for your investigation is because your higher-ups did not realize that that's like funding for a few months for the department.
Gamemaster:But you... He like... He says, listen...
Gamemaster:Yeah, he says that he's not going to... He's like, you can't make any... With something like this, you're not going to make a deal, especially out in the open, because you get mobbed.
Cedric:Cool I report back.
Gamemaster:But he'll give you his business card and say to come back in the evening.
Gamemaster:He'll be at his office once the conference shuts down for the night.
Gamemaster:And you get the card of Amos Guren, of Guren and Guren, which you would recognize as a relatively popular consumer jewelry store.
Gamemaster:but you figured you have a lead there.
Gamemaster:Yeah.
Cedric:We might have to confiscate the stones.
Krod:Krod will report back as well.
Krod:Yeah, if this guy or anyone else here feels like they have a surplus supply, I think that's a big red flag that they might be close to the blood sacrifices.
Andros:I have a list of where everyone's from in this hall.
Cedric:Entity.
Cedric:Yeah.
Krod:Yeah.
Cedric:So actually, we probably should confiscate this, but we can deal with that later.
Cedric:Oh.
Cedric:Good, I guess.
Gamemaster:Amos is from Hallia.
Cedric:Yeah.
Krod:He answered.
Andros:Everyone answered.
Gamemaster:Yeah.
Andros:It's a long list and this bedazzled non-playful.
Cedric:Should I...
Cedric:We got some time to kill.
Cedric:Should I try to disguise myself as someone else and then do field propaganda to make the cops seem super scary, our branch, so if we go there, they're going to be like, oh my god, there's the Navy SEALs at our doorstep.
Gamemaster:So, like, normally the way that feat works is if they look up information about whatever topic you're propagandizing, they learn what you learn.
Gamemaster:If you want, I will let you, like, attempt to roll.
Andros:you
Gamemaster:The DC will be hired to, like, proactively add that information into, like, their knowledge.
Cedric:Oh, I didn't take.
Gamemaster:Less of, I looked up information about this con box, and they're freaking scary, and more, did you hear those people talking about the people from the con box?
Gamemaster:They're freaking scary.
Gamemaster:It's possible.
Gamemaster:I'll let you try it.
Cedric:OK, that's OK.
Gamemaster:But...
Cedric:I thought I had so rumor, but I didn't take that feat, so.
Cedric:Never mind.
Cedric:Actually, you guys want to try it or?
Andros:Why not?
Andros:Not doing anything else.
Krod:I don't... Are we showing up as cops to the deal?
Cedric:You're right.
Cedric:We should, we should, I can disguise you guys and then we can take off our costumes and show where cops after.
Krod:Yeah, or you can just talk and we can just stand as part of your entourage that they've already seen you with.
Krod:Or...
Cedric:Yeah, but we're still gonna need to just, I still need to, you guys look, you guys reek of cops that we can't show up to a meeting with you guys.
Andros:I don't know.
Andros:I've been going to improv classes on the weekend, so I feel like I'm getting really good at this.
Krod:For flavor and for lore, Krod Snodman looks like a PI.
Krod:So he's familiar with the underground.
Cedric:Yeah.
Gamemaster:Hmm.
Krod:He looks like someone that would be hired guard for a jewelry deal.
Cedric:OK.
Krod:So I think Krod is okay, but the 10-foot tall guy, I don't know, maybe we're a package deal.
Cedric:With aviators.
Andros:Andrews looks like the pictures you see online of obvious narcs.
Cedric:Yeah.
Cedric:OK, so I'll discuss them.
Cedric:Wait, one side note.
Cedric:Have you guys seen the movie where people go under, they're improv actors that go undercover for a cop?
Andros:No, but I know what movie you're talking about.
Cedric:It's really funny.
Cedric:You should watch it.
Cedric:But anyway, okay, so I will make a disguise check for my big guy.
Cedric:I rolled a 19.
Gamemaster:Okay, so we'll move forward a little bit.
Gamemaster:The conference has ended.
Gamemaster:You're going to disguise the big guy.
Gamemaster:45 is ridiculous.
Krod:Don't receive.
Andros:What's that over there?
Cedric:I rolled a 19.
Gamemaster:Still.
Gamemaster:Yeah, absolutely.
Gamemaster:You...
Gamemaster:you teach this narc how to not look like one, uh, doing things such as, uh, not wearing, um, like uniform shoes, uh, and, um, you, and wearing his watch so that the face, uh, faces out instead of in, uh, so, you know, stuff that like normally you'd think of, but I'll go on undercover.
Andros:I like these shoes.
Andros:They're broken in.
Gamemaster:Who knows?
Gamemaster:Um, and you, uh, you, you, you make your way over to, like, it's not a particularly long, uh, uh, trek.
Gamemaster:He's, was by, he's in this area as well, the office of Guren and Guren.
Gamemaster:Um...
Gamemaster:You come in, you have his business card, and it seems he let his administrative assistant know that you're coming because you're directed up to the, like, second highest floor in this office building.
Cedric:Okay.
Gamemaster:You're on, like, floor 9 of 10.
Gamemaster:Which you see opens up into, it looks like, a kind of private showroom.
Gamemaster:Because when you first walked in, there is the full public showroom of this store, where normal people could walk in, peruse, all that kind of stuff.
Gamemaster:But the good stuff, the stuff that they have for...
Gamemaster:wealthier clientele, things that they would put out on the normal public floors up here.
Gamemaster:And you see, none of you are actually of the echelon where you would necessarily be visiting places like this all that often, but even to the untrained eye, the stuff here is of definitely a higher cost level.
Gamemaster:If not necessarily immediately, obviously better quality.
Gamemaster:it's things like that look like they've been fully bedazzled by diamonds um or or um like weird looking misshapen gems and rocks like purposefully left uncut things of that nature um and this uh the amos the the dwarf the the guy that you um you had spoken to originally
Cedric:I snap.
Cedric:I'm like, hey, how are you?
Cedric:And that snaps also activating honeyed words on my ring of lies.
Gamemaster:Absolutely.
Gamemaster:He turns to you, and you get a better look at him while he's in his element now.
Gamemaster:This guy is a three-piece suit.
Gamemaster:He's got a long black beard that has gems wrapped in the hair, like decoration.
Gamemaster:And similarly, he's got a very long braid down the back, also with gemstones in the braid.
Gamemaster:He looks at you and says...
Gamemaster:I'm glad you could make it!
Gamemaster:I've been very excited.
Gamemaster:Not many people get to see what I'm going to show you today, but you seem like the kind of person who might be interested in something like this.
Cedric:Excited to see the inventory.
Gamemaster:Just, you know, one last check before we bring it out.
Gamemaster:If you wouldn't mind
Gamemaster:Could we run a quick credit check on you just to confirm that this is something that you might be interested in?
Gamemaster:Roll a deception check.
Cedric:I would like to insinuate that I don't want my name being run.
Cedric:I have business dealings, things like that.
Cedric:Okay.
Gamemaster:Because, like, now, like, you clearly carried yourself well to get to this point, but he's at the point where it's like, okay, I am now realizing there are seven people up in my private showroom that I'm about to bring out a very expensive piece of jewelry to show.
Cedric:That makes sense.
Gamemaster:I swear to God, I'm going to reseat it.
Krod:Thank you.
Gamemaster:That's what's going to happen.
Andros:Go do it.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Gamemaster:47.
Cedric:Yeah.
Cedric:I'm powerful.
Cedric:I'm secretive.
Cedric:I'm an oligarch somewhere.
Cedric:I don't want this information running.
Gamemaster:You know what?
Gamemaster:For you, fine.
Gamemaster:If we don't want stuff like this, I don't necessarily want the attention either.
Cedric:Appreciate that.
Gamemaster:And he will walk over to the back area behind a counter and take out a wooden box and open it up to show you.
Gamemaster:And on the inside, there is...
Gamemaster:A necklace that actually looks very similar to the one that you had already picked up.
Gamemaster:The only difference being the one that you have is the fey rock with a twine necklace.
Cedric:Hey.
Gamemaster:This one, the rock is inset into a golden chain.
Gamemaster:But the rock itself looks very similar.
Gamemaster:It is this greenish, almost jade-like composition.
Gamemaster:It hasn't been polished, but it still kind of gives off a shine as if it had been.
Gamemaster:It's just an intrinsic quality of the rock.
Gamemaster:And he shows it off to you and he says, I got my hands on this just barely a week ago.
Gamemaster:And for you, special price, only 45,000 gold pieces.
Cedric:at a pretty good price.
Cedric:So really appreciate you showing me this, but I already have a similar piece in my collection.
Andros:you
Cedric:I was wondering if you had anything else a little bit more interesting.
Gamemaster:Anything other than Facetone?
Cedric:Oh, do you have any other face stones besides?
Cedric:I have a very similar looking piece.
Cedric:Granted, I could use some work actually done on it as well, but is this the only one you have?
Gamemaster:Facetone is exceptionally rare.
Gamemaster:No, it's not like I have a whole supply behind me.
Gamemaster:I was lucky to happen across this one.
Cedric:Do I believe him?
Cedric:Have a lie to me.
Gamemaster:Roll a deception check.
Cedric:Okay.
Cedric:Like the beefy.
Krod:Jesus Christ.
Cedric:I have a plus 30 with the ring.
Gamemaster:Um, so I think what you get from that is he is telling the truth.
Gamemaster:He doesn't have any more face stone.
Gamemaster:Um, I, I think that you would hone in on, he has not told you where he got this face stone from.
Cedric:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Gamemaster:And he's, he's a little cagey about, he doesn't want to go into specifics about where he might've gotten it, but he's being truthful in that he doesn't have any more.
Gamemaster:Uh, this is, this is what he's got.
Cedric:OK.
Cedric:So yeah, I think I'll probably take this.
Cedric:Out of curiosity, where did you find this piece?
Gamemaster:All right, that's good.
Gamemaster:I was worried for a second there.
Gamemaster:Oh, I can't go around giving my suppliers.
Gamemaster:Then you just go past me to them directly.
Cedric:Come on, we're friends here.
Gamemaster:My job is to find the good stuff.
Cedric:I don't want to deal with those suppliers, you know?
Cedric:Just give me a little help.
Gamemaster:Then you don't have to.
Cedric:I'll throw in an extra... That is true.
Gamemaster:Then you don't care if you're dealing with the suppliers, if you're just going through me.
Gamemaster:Also, we're not friends yet.
Gamemaster:You haven't sealed the deal.
Cedric:I look over at my friends, and I give them the same cop look that I did right before we started blasting before.
Cedric:Do I?
Cedric:No, just flash a cop badge.
Andros:you you
Krod:Start blasting?
Krod:Maybe we wait a bit.
Krod:Why don't you... What would Krod do?
Cedric:Okay.
Krod:I think... I think... I think what the boss here is saying is maybe we want a bit higher volume.
Gamemaster:WWCD.
Krod:We'll put on a good word for you with the supplier if you are able to relay the contact information.
Gamemaster:I'm sorry, just for me to understand.
Gamemaster:You want my supplier's information so that you can tell them I did a good job selling their stuff to you?
Krod:I mean, frankly, you don't really have a high volume here.
Gamemaster:No, but... Sorry, you know of people who have access to Facestone?
Krod:You're not really favored by them currently, so.
Cedric:Look, we know some people are, they have nice access to Feyrock.
Cedric:So try to find out a little more about that.
Cedric:Get some more on forts too.
Gamemaster:Because I'm pretty confident I'm the only person selling this.
Andros:Yes.
Andros:And?
Gamemaster:collectively, you guys can roll a diplomacy check.
Krod:That's very interesting.
Cedric:Heard some people are doing some,
Krod:That's very interesting.
Krod:You're the only one selling it.
Krod:And I'll flash the cop badge look back to back to fuck Cedric.
Cedric:Okay.
Cedric:I'm going to... I'm going to just pull out my patch and be like... Alright.
Gamemaster:Oh, okay.
Krod:When he pulls out his badge, Krod will pull out his notepad and immediately just start jotting down the stuff that he's been saying.
Cedric:And then I'm going to grab this Feyrock and say, we're confiscating this in the order of the Iridescent Church.
Cedric:Look, we know there's blood magic going afoot.
Cedric:We're trying to figure out what's causing it.
Cedric:Help us and we will be lenient.
Gamemaster:Roll an intimidation check, I think.
Cedric:38.
Krod:Keep in mind.
Gamemaster:We've switched from being friendly to the guy to, no, I'm taking your shit, unless you help.
Krod:He didn't help.
Krod:Oh, no, no.
Krod:We are taking his shit.
Krod:Him helping.
Gamemaster:I'm taking your shit, also you need to help.
Krod:Yeah.
Gamemaster:Sorry.
Andros:Yes.
Cedric:I will be right back.
Cedric:Sorry.
Krod:After these messages.
Gamemaster:Okay, so what was your plan?
Gamemaster:Because I'm fairly confident at this point it was we need to kill the eight-year-old.
Krod:Oh no, we were just joking.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Krod:I think me and Jorge talked about it at some point over Helldivers, but yeah, is the kid in the room?
Krod:Can we kill him?
Gamemaster:The kid is not in the room.
Andros:I attack the kid.
Krod:I'm here!
Krod:This is my first black market jewel deal.
Gamemaster:He's just been following you around ever since.
Gamemaster:And he's scary, though.
Andros:Yep.
Krod:That's totally what Benny would do.
Krod:Listen, Bucko, this is my first... He is scary.
Krod:You're right.
Gamemaster:Like, I... There's no way to have a nine-year-old armed with picks not be scary.
Andros:Benny is a scared child.
Krod:He's also... He's got a very adult confidence that is uncomfortable.
Andros:I thought it was...
Krod:If you saw a kid just walking with the same cadence and... He's not skipping along.
Krod:He's just walking as if he's a small man.
Krod:It's just like, what the fuck's up with that kid?
Gamemaster:And he's got the solidness of a full-grown man.
Cedric:What is this?
Andros:dense when he walks, the ground cracks under him.
Krod:Josh was wondering what our plan was.
Krod:He's like, I'm pretty sure you guys just wanted to kill the kid.
Krod:What was your plan?
Krod:And I was like, no, we were mainly joking around, but is the kid in the room with us?
Krod:Can we kill him?
Krod:And then we were joking about how Benny would be at his first black market jewel deal.
Cedric:Yeah.
Cedric:Yeah, so grabbed it, threatened him with, uh...
Gamemaster:So, he actually rolled pretty well.
Gamemaster:He's like, hey, this is not my first time interacting with law enforcement.
Gamemaster:Let's keep it calm.
Gamemaster:You can, if you wish, I know the rights, you can confiscate the jewelry if you like, but I am...
Gamemaster:going to submit paperwork that says that you did so without the approval of your superiors, because I know you didn't ask.
Cedric:Yeah.
Gamemaster:And then you'll have to deal with the consequences there, because I will be charging interest for the time that it's not in my possession.
Gamemaster:So I think if you don't want to cause issues with your superiors, maybe we could talk this out a little more cordially, given that you did come in here lying to me.
Gamemaster:We got off on the wrong foot, clearly.
Cedric:Just want to put the record out.
Cedric:We are allowed to lie for investigations.
Cedric:This was undercover work.
Gamemaster:I understand, but... Listen, I sell rocks.
Cedric:But I do understand and I appreciate your response to this.
Cedric:Recently, we had a discussion with someone on the same topic and they tried to throw us into another dimension and kill us all.
Cedric:So sorry.
Cedric:Sorry, I was a little aggressive there.
Cedric:I'll just put this back on the table for a moment.
Andros:Andros is in the back putting his own shoes back on and turning his watch face back inside.
Gamemaster:None of that's happening.
Gamemaster:Yeah.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Cedric:Is it true that everything he's saying?
Gamemaster:Absolutely.
Gamemaster:Yeah.
Cedric:Or is he bullshitting us?
Gamemaster:No, he's being serious.
Gamemaster:This guy has had to deal with cops before, getting all up in his shit.
Gamemaster:And he, as best you can tell, doesn't appear to be nefarious.
Gamemaster:He is definitely disappointed.
Gamemaster:He thought that he was going to make a sick payday, and instead it's just a bunch of cops asking questions.
Cedric:So he actually doesn't
Cedric:Doesn't seem nefarious?
Gamemaster:What?
Cedric:So you say he didn't seem nefarious?
Gamemaster:No, he didn't seem nefarious, and he doesn't seem concerned.
Cedric:Oh.
Gamemaster:Like, he is not giving off the vibes to you, like, looking at him, that he's hiding secret blood rituals or something like that.
Gamemaster:He doesn't... Either that or he's got a very cool demeanor.
Cedric:Great.
Cedric:I will show him the other necklace that looks very similar and just mention we found this on the body.
Cedric:We know this was in the possession of a murderer who's doing blood magic.
Cedric:That's why we're looking into this and try to basically convey the importance that this rock might be linked to murders, and if he's causing more murders, it will be bad for him.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Gamemaster:Gosh, I wish you had opened with that.
Gamemaster:I got a nice bottle of champagne and everything.
Gamemaster:I thought this was going to be a quick turnover.
Andros:We'll still drink that.
Gamemaster:No, you won't, unless you're still planning on purchasing the necklace.
Andros:You shouldn't say no.
Andros:It really shuts down the conversation.
Gamemaster:You've ruined my night.
Gamemaster:I think I'm allowed to be a little curt with you.
Cedric:Well, you know, I'm going to be honest with you.
Cedric:I don't really care for the money.
Cedric:I'm here for solving the murders.
Cedric:And my superiors don't seem to know how much this rocks cost, so... No, no, no, no.
Gamemaster:And they will.
Gamemaster:If you take it.
Cedric:I mean this one.
Cedric:And I hold this one up.
Krod:I don't think it would be in their interest if it would be in your interest for them to know if you would all want to increase your inventory on this.
Krod:But also, I think very candidly, the church is not an organization without power.
Krod:I think if you do right by us, the thing about these murders is they're completely random.
Krod:They don't affect, I'll say, the disaffected of society.
Krod:So there are people in high places that have their eyes on this case that would be happy to see someone cooperate and help to solve it.
Gamemaster:No.
Krod:Can I roll it with a plus 20?
Krod:Yeah, I better get a crit on this.
Gamemaster:Yeah, I mean, you guys are talking together.
Cedric:Can I help him out, or can I also roll one?
Cedric:28.
Gamemaster:I will let you aid him.
Cedric:Oh, it's a good thing I didn't do that.
Krod:that you rolled first what is uh 28 on aid does it even hit the dc okay 18 i have a plus one
Gamemaster:You get nothing.
Gamemaster:Yeah, you get nothing.
Gamemaster:18.
Cedric:You have plus one.
Gamemaster:He says, you're just not proficient.
Gamemaster:It happens.
Gamemaster:He says, listen, you're detectives.
Gamemaster:My net worth is greater than the salary you will make over your entire lifetimes.
Gamemaster:If we're talking about who has power, I agree your organization has power.
Gamemaster:I can go over your end.
Gamemaster:So let's not get too... Let's not get in a dick-measuring competition.
Cedric:To be fair.
Krod:The dick measuring was a dick to help you.
Andros:I'll just step through my friend so I'm directly over him, and then I'll pull up my notepad, and leaning over him, and I'm like five feet taller than him, I'll just say, please write down the name of your supplier on this notepad in clear handwriting.
Gamemaster:I'll help.
Gamemaster:I don't mind help.
Cedric:To be fair.
Krod:I'm saying this is above both of our heads if you cooperate.
Gamemaster:I...
Gamemaster:You can't do anything to help me either.
Gamemaster:I already agreed to help you.
Gamemaster:I just think we don't need to be so aggressive.
Cedric:Yeah.
Krod:Okay.
Andros:Thank you.
Gamemaster:Listen, I don't know.
Gamemaster:Okay?
Andros:How do you not know?
Gamemaster:That's the host's truth.
Andros:Where are you getting it from?
Gamemaster:You don't have a supplier for something like this.
Gamemaster:It's not like I call up a guy who owns a warehouse and he says, yeah, I'll send you three pallets of this stuff.
Gamemaster:You find somebody who claims that they found a rock or two and then you go and you vet them and then you check the rock and you make sure it's real and if it is, you hand them a chunk of money
Gamemaster:And then you never talk to them again, really, because the chance of the same person finding multiple stones is very slim.
Gamemaster:This stuff, as best I can tell, comes out of thin air.
Cedric:Who is it?
Cedric:Okay.
Gamemaster:They found me.
Cedric:Go, go, go.
Gamemaster:I was walking home, and they approached me.
Gamemaster:You know, standard.
Gamemaster:I, like, didn't see their face.
Gamemaster:They were wearing this hood.
Gamemaster:They were covered in, honestly, what looked like gauze.
Cedric:Okay.
Gamemaster:Like, suspicious types.
Krod:A tuning.
Gamemaster:Frankly, normally, I... No, not a tunic.
Gamemaster:Like, normal clothes.
Gamemaster:I just couldn't see their skin or anything.
Gamemaster:It was, like, medical bandages around it.
Gamemaster:I assumed that, like, they had escaped somebody who set them on fire trying to get the rock or something like that.
Gamemaster:I just, you know, this kind of stuff.
Cedric:Where was this?
Cedric:And you said you... I don't... So you just thought some guy... That doesn't really make sense to me.
Gamemaster:Normally I don't interact with him, but he had the rock with him.
Gamemaster:Like he, he found me as I was walking home and he took out the rock and he said, do you want this?
Gamemaster:And then he offered to sell it to me for 20 grand.
Gamemaster:That's like substantially under market price.
Gamemaster:I'm not going to say no to that.
Gamemaster:And I just assumed that he didn't know how much it could go for on the free market.
Cedric:You think... Sorry, that was out of game.
Cedric:So you just found a random guy, come up to you, offer you a fantastic deal, seek you out, hit him, and then you didn't investigate him?
Gamemaster:Frankly, I thought he stole it.
Cedric:You just handed him the money?
Cedric:How'd you check?
Gamemaster:I thought he stole it, but I'm not going to ask any questions.
Krod:Yeah, I think he's telling the truth.
Krod:Do you know any other popular jewelers around here that have similar pieces?
Cedric:All right.
Gamemaster:As best I can tell, no.
Gamemaster:I really think I'm the only one here.
Gamemaster:The only other person who would have the money to be able to drop on a purchase like that, just kind of impulsively, is if you go down the street, there's another jeweler who would also be able to.
Gamemaster:Crystal Raymond.
Krod:Where did this incident happen?
Gamemaster:As I was walking home a few blocks down, and he'll give you the address.
Gamemaster:It's in this district.
Gamemaster:I was headed home.
Gamemaster:I had just... I live close enough that I just walk.
Gamemaster:He found me, I assume, my guess, and I didn't ask questions because gift horse and all.
Gamemaster:I assume he stole this thing.
Gamemaster:He looked up a directory of famous jewelers or whatever, and he just picked one off the street.
Cedric:How'd you verify it was real Feyrock?
Cedric:You just know?
Gamemaster:I did.
Gamemaster:There are particular signs that you can't quite fake a rock.
Gamemaster:You just need a magnifying glass and the ability to recognize some magic.
Gamemaster:I can show you if that would be useful.
Andros:Yeah.
Cedric:That'd be great.
Gamemaster:Verify if your rock is real.
Gamemaster:And he'll take out of his pocket one of those monocles with a bunch of lenses that you can flick down to zoom in.
Gamemaster:He makes a few checks.
Gamemaster:He taps it, and it comes back.
Gamemaster:Yep, this is real.
Gamemaster:This one is also a real rock.
Cedric:And then other question, would, Shire Superiors clearly did not realize how expensive Feyrock was when they last take this.
Gamemaster:Yes.
Cedric:Do they normally care if evidence goes missing?
Gamemaster:Yeah.
Gamemaster:No, if the evidence just...
Cedric:I wasn't sure how early crime was.
Gamemaster:If the evidence just disappears, they will know.
Gamemaster:I don't know if they're quite at the level of we need chain of custody to prove that so-and-so owned this or anything like that, but this is part of an ongoing investigation that has attracted the attention of higher-ups in your particular convox.
Cedric:Yeah.
Cedric:Okay.
Gamemaster:They will know if something like this goes missing.
Andros:um oh
Krod:So we could just try to bait this guy out.
Gamemaster:Listen, I... Um... He had, like, a black raiment, which was weird.
Krod:I mean, it seems like it was a one and done.
Krod:You said that there's nothing besides the gauze that was off about his appearance.
Cedric:Oh, no.
Gamemaster:But other than that, I... Yeah.
Cedric:Did he leave any contact information?
Cedric:I don't know.
Cedric:No, of course not.
Andros:Hmm.
Gamemaster:No, I got no information from him that I didn't ask.
Cedric:Well, I give him my card, and I say, if you run into this man again, let us know.
Cedric:Have you run into anyone else with a Black Raymond before?
Gamemaster:Sure.
Gamemaster:No, but this dude was already very suspicious.
Gamemaster:I wasn't going to ask questions.
Cedric:That's fair.
Cedric:All right.
Cedric:Well, thank you for your time.
Cedric:Sorry for running a sting.
Gamemaster:Sorry I can't be of more help, but I'm still annoyed that you're not actually purchasing this.
Andros:Thank you.
Gamemaster:That's fine.
Krod:Yeah, if that guy runs into you again, let us know.
Krod:Because we were under the impression from sources that the supply of, was it Feyrock, Feistone?
Krod:Of Feistone has increased a good bit.
Gamemaster:Other jewelers haven't been bragging about it, if that's what you're asking.
Krod:I mean, I guess you have one in your inventory.
Krod:Is that an impression you've gotten from other jewelers?
Krod:I know it's still exceedingly rare.
Gamemaster:But also, you don't go around...
Cedric:if they thought it was stolen as well.
Gamemaster:Yeah, you wouldn't go around telling people you have dubious sources.
Gamemaster:You don't advertise it in general unless you think that somebody's going to buy it, because if nothing else, it just is an easy target for theft.
Andros:Hmm.
Cedric:Makes sense.
Cedric:When this rock is done being a piece of evidence, would you like us to put you on the list in case this goes to police auction?
Gamemaster:Sure.
Gamemaster:If you end up selling this, I would absolutely love to crack at it.
Cedric:All right, I'll make sure to keep you in mind.
Cedric:We'll see if the other folks have rocks linked to this.
Gamemaster:Sure.
Cedric:Sounds good.
Gamemaster:You know where to find me.
Cedric:Did you add this chain, or was it also a twine similar to this one?
Gamemaster:No, we added the chain.
Gamemaster:The rock was actually on its own.
Gamemaster:It wasn't attached to anything.
Gamemaster:Just like the raw stone.
Krod:Crystal Rainman?
Cedric:Let's go ahead over to other jewelers.
Gamemaster:Absolutely.
Gamemaster:Crystal random.
Gamemaster:Can we get, like, another, I guess, diplomacy check or deception check to try and get in and learn if they also have face down?
Cedric:Yeah, I'll do a deception.
Cedric:Oof, I'll hero point this.
Cedric:Mythic, sorry.
Gamemaster:How dare you call it a hero point.
Gamemaster:Jail.
Cedric:Oh, 33.
Gamemaster:Jail for a thousand years.
Gamemaster:Absolutely.
Gamemaster:Okay, with a 33.
Gamemaster:I think with a 33... A 33 is enough.
Gamemaster:It's not enough to get you into the room with somebody higher up here.
Gamemaster:You can only really talk to the receptionist and all of that stuff.
Gamemaster:But with a 33, I think a little bit of fishing tells you that...
Gamemaster:The receptionist saw that something had been something pretty expensive that they expect to sell to a VIP had been brought in like a day or two ago.
Gamemaster:That might be face down, but they didn't actually see the thing.
Cedric:Does our face stone like come up at all anywhere and point us in any directions?
Gamemaster:And you don't you unfortunately aren't like one of their members that they would know would be willing to purchase something like this.
Gamemaster:So they're not going to bring it up for you.
Krod:Okay.
Gamemaster:Nope.
Cedric:Was and then.
Gamemaster:Whatever magnetism it had stopped as soon as you killed Uriel and Janelle.
Gamemaster:I think that was his name.
Andros:Hmm.
Cedric:And then the guy that the murderer that we knew that had this at one point, we ended up getting his name from the commune.
Gamemaster:Jyn.
Gamemaster:Uriel and Jyn.
Cedric:Does he live around here?
Gamemaster:Lyric Burke?
Gamemaster:You can ask around to see if he lives in this area.
Cedric:Yeah.
Gamemaster:Because all you know right now is that he's not dead and that he's happy.
Cedric:Yeah.
Gamemaster:So.
Cedric:Oh, my God.
Andros:Oh, no.
Cedric:Really, really swung away.
Gamemaster:Oh, ha ha ha ha ha ha.
Krod:Payback.
Cedric:Yeah.
Gamemaster:Nothing's changed.
Gamemaster:It's just that's how random this works.
Andros:You can look around.
Gamemaster:So with a 29, sure.
Cedric:Anyone else want to look?
Gamemaster:Diplomacy or perception?
Andros:I'll do perception.
Andros:38.
Cedric:I'll think.
Gamemaster:38.
Gamemaster:That's not bad.
Gamemaster:Asking around to see if this guy lives around here.
Gamemaster:I think with a 38, nobody would really recognize either the name or the description you have.
Gamemaster:Unfortunately, nobody suspicious rings a bell.
Gamemaster:38 is high enough, though.
Gamemaster:If you're just asking around for strange figures, there would be people who said that they spotted somebody with a black raiment over the past few days.
Andros:I'll try and gather information on your web.
Cedric:Uh, yeah.
Krod:Where?
Gamemaster:So they would point you in the direction of...
Gamemaster:A district that's kind of adjacent to this one called the Gullet, which is an area slightly further down the river that you're following, where all of the crap that gets chucked into the river collects before it ends up moving further out of the city.
Gamemaster:It's definitely a less well-off part of Hallia.
Gamemaster:But people said that they had seen somebody with a black raiment walking into the Gullet from this district.
Gamemaster:So that kind of gives you a place to investigate.
Andros:To the gullet.
Cedric:I will use Summon Mythic Power.
Krod:Yeah, I say we go.
Gamemaster:But once you get there, I will... Okay.
Gamemaster:And then I will need another search, which... Yep.
Cedric:Should we rest before we go in there?
Cedric:I don't know how long we've been going.
Cedric:I feel like this has been like... This guy might be active at night, though, right?
Gamemaster:It's the evening at this point, because it's after the conference had ended, and you were asking around.
Gamemaster:The suns have set at this point.
Gamemaster:If you'd like to take a rest, that would be reasonable to do.
Andros:Yeah.
Gamemaster:Also possible.
Cedric:All right, let's go.
Krod:It's a murder investigation.
Krod:It's the first 48 days.
Gamemaster:Yeah.
Krod:So search.
Krod:So perception check.
Gamemaster:diplomacy if you're asking around perception if you're trying to do it yourself or if you have something else that you can justify justify it
Cedric:Let's go.
Cedric:I can gather information.
Cedric:Oh, my goodness.
Krod:And I'll search around.
Krod:All right.
Cedric:All right, we need to receive this.
Krod:That is actually... Wait, hold on.
Krod:This doesn't make any sense.
Cedric:Oh, wait, I do have a moving power, though, so I can... It's a weird speed.
Krod:I guess there's some randomness, but of the last 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 8 rolls, they've either been a 3 or a 17.
Krod:And now we have a 9.
Gamemaster:Good job.
Cedric:All right, 39.
Gamemaster:Okay, 39.
Gamemaster:Oh, did you reroll with Mythic?
Gamemaster:Is that what happened there?
Cedric:Yeah.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Gamemaster:Was it 39 looking around?
Gamemaster:trying to figure out more information about this person.
Gamemaster:Most of the people you talk to have no idea who you're talking about.
Andros:you
Gamemaster:A black raiment is strange enough that it would probably stand out to people, because that isn't one of the outer gods, and it isn't even really reminiscent of one of the other smaller alternative religions that would exist in Hallia.
Gamemaster:So that would stand out to people.
Gamemaster:With that rule, I think after literal hours of searching throughout this district, which isn't particularly large, it's mostly people who couldn't afford to live in the areas around here, but work in the stores and stuff around here.
Gamemaster:I think you would catch somebody
Gamemaster:who says that uh they think they saw somebody in their building um like living in their same apartment complex uh that might match that they're not too sure uh it's just like you know it could have been dark when they last saw them um so it wouldn't stand out much but they would they would point you in the direction of the apartment that they think would be this person
Cedric:Mmm.
Krod:Away.
Gamemaster:So you get into... This apartment doesn't have a doormat or anything.
Gamemaster:It's easy enough to get into.
Gamemaster:You just kind of hit a bunch of random doorbells and eventually somebody hits a button and the door unlocks.
Gamemaster:And you head over to... What?
Cedric:Take care.
Cedric:Take care.
Gamemaster:The apartment's on the second floor.
Gamemaster:This place has... It's clearly a bit run down.
Gamemaster:It's got cracked tile floors.
Gamemaster:It's got fluorescent lights where one out of every three light bulb is either off or flickering.
Gamemaster:There are random people just kind of sitting in the hallway that see you enter and don't do anything about it.
Gamemaster:They just kind of look at you and then they go back to kind of staring off into the distance.
Gamemaster:Can I get a medicine check from anybody who would like to?
Andros:Oh, yeah.
Andros:Medicine.
Cedric:Would a society check help?
Gamemaster:Yes, but the DC's higher.
Andros:Yeah.
Andros:34.
Cedric:I just want to roll.
Gamemaster:Just for funsies.
Cedric:No!
Gamemaster:Society check doesn't help here.
Gamemaster:A 34 would.
Gamemaster:There are... As you walk by, like one of the people that are just sat on the floor kind of staring off into space, you can tell that there are...
Gamemaster:Their skin has this weird, slightly bluish pallor to it that you would recognize as a symptom of long-time abuse of a narcotic.
Gamemaster:It's like...
Gamemaster:not uncommon in poorer parts of the city here uh but to be like open about it means that this is clearly like one of the poorer buildings in a porter district normally people at the very least don't do it out in the open
Gamemaster:But you also know that this particular person is so far gone on whatever particular compound they're on that they're not going to be a problem for you, but they're also not going to be of particular help answering anything.
Gamemaster:So just something to keep in mind as you continue up to the second floor, up to apartment 2B, which you know is the apartment that may or may not have the person with the black ring that did it.
Andros:I, uh,
Cedric:All right, who wants to knock?
Gamemaster:It looks like Krod just did.
Krod:Yes.
Gamemaster:Krod knocks.
Krod:Is there a midget at my door?
Gamemaster:No response.
Gamemaster:No response at all.
Cedric:Knock again.
Gamemaster:Second knock.
Gamemaster:Still no response.
Krod:Tall guy.
Krod:Confuse him.
Cedric:What's the protocol here?
Cedric:Do we need to announce ourselves or can we just break indoors?
Krod:We have probable cause.
Gamemaster:No.
Gamemaster:Wards aren't really a thing.
Cedric:Great.
Andros:I knock a third time, but it's a very hard knock that busts the door open.
Gamemaster:Absolutely.
Gamemaster:Roll an athletics check.
Andros:These are low rolls.
Andros:31 still.
Gamemaster:31 is enough.
Gamemaster:This is not a particularly sturdy door.
Gamemaster:This is like the equivalent of like, shoot, like oriented strand board, you know, where it looks like they just chopped up a bunch of other wood and then glued it together into the shape of a door.
Gamemaster:uh it's one of those things where if you lean on it a little too hard it'll put a hole in it uh so you you knock on it just like quick two hits and you've left it dead straight through and then you can reach your hand and you just kind of turn the knob and push the thing off its hinges roll a perception check as you uh you excuse me break into this apartment
Andros:As this is happening, I will loudly say, we attempted a knock, but we thought that he might be injured, so we had to get in to help him.
Andros:35.
Gamemaster:Uh, okay.
Krod:We heard him reaching through the door.
Andros:We heard the sound.
Gamemaster:So, a 35.
Cedric:Can we have two rolls, or do you want to roll, dog?
Gamemaster:Yeah, no, up to two people.
Krod:Sure.
Krod:Yeah, I was going to, and then I figured it was just the person that busted the door.
Gamemaster:No, you're... You're all in front of the door, all about it.
Krod:40.
Gamemaster:Uh, 40.
Gamemaster:Okay, so the two of you who are in the front who, like,
Gamemaster:hit open the door and take a look inside.
Gamemaster:This is a studio.
Gamemaster:Relatively run down.
Gamemaster:It's all one room.
Gamemaster:It's pretty cluttered, actually.
Gamemaster:It's got furniture that's in-universe equivalent of Ikea.
Gamemaster:Cheap, put-it-together-yourself furniture.
Gamemaster:It's got a bed over in the corner.
Gamemaster:It's got a ratty, bug-infested kitchen off on the side with, it looks like, a few dishes piled up that haven't been cleaned.
Gamemaster:There is actually a small dining room table kind of in the kitchen area with a plate of food on it.
Gamemaster:It looks like some kind of bread that looks very moldy.
Gamemaster:There's a random...
Gamemaster:You would identify as like magical accoutrements scattered around the room, like weird books opened at different places.
Gamemaster:You'd have to like go in and actually look to see the contents of them.
Gamemaster:Random like clothing and fabrics.
Gamemaster:just kind of scattered around the room.
Gamemaster:But the centerpiece of the room is in the very center there is a magic circle of some kind drawn in some red liquid about five feet in diameter in the center of the room.
Gamemaster:what look to be red wax candles placed at specific intervals amidst runes.
Cedric:Great.
Gamemaster:And in the very center of this circle is another book closed and floating above it, chest pulled up by string, limbs pulled backwards towards the ground, is a humanoid figure, maybe about 5'6".
Gamemaster:wrapped in some kind of medical gauze, notably missing a leg.
Gamemaster:They do not seem to react to the door being hit open.
Andros:Are they, like, alive in any way, shape, or form?
Andros:Or are they just, like... I'll raise my shield and enter, making a medicine check, as I do.
Gamemaster:You'd have to walk in and make a medicine check to tell.
Andros:Uh, 27.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Cedric:I'll be waiting right at the entrance, also keeping Anaïs out for someone trying to come in that might get spooked.
Gamemaster:27.
Gamemaster:So you kind of have to like, are you touching the figure?
Gamemaster:I guess is the first question.
Gamemaster:Or are you just trying to do like a visual examination?
Andros:I'll start with the visual examination, and then if I can't see anything, I'll touch it.
Gamemaster:Okay, so from visual examination, most of the skin is covered with this gauze, which means that you can't get a good look at the person.
Gamemaster:But they are held in such a strange position, like spine bent backwards, hands and legs being pulled down towards the ground, but chest being pulled up about two feet off of the ground.
Gamemaster:it doesn't look like it would be comfortable if this person were conscious or alive.
Gamemaster:But I think the thing that stands out most to you is the one bit that isn't wrapped in the gauze that you do have a reasonable look at is the spot where the one leg he's missing is.
Gamemaster:You can see that where you would expect to see, if nothing else, like a stump of flesh, there is a green jade-like rocky outgrowth from that bit of his lip.
Cedric:Oh no.
Cedric:Like they were moved into growing
Andros:Oh my god.
Andros:Is it... Is it Facestone?
Gamemaster:It looks like it.
Gamemaster:It doesn't look like it's something you can snap off.
Andros:Ugh.
Andros:I'm gonna... I'm gonna put on my healer's gloves.
Andros:And then I'll reach over... First, I'll snap off the Facestone.
Gamemaster:That's his leg.
Andros:Oh, like, they removed the meat and it was inside of him?
Gamemaster:More like the leg turned into a face stone and then bits of it was removed.
Krod:Take care.
Andros:Oh, I'm going to start unwrapping bandages.
Gamemaster:Absolutely.
Gamemaster:So it doesn't, like, fall down from the levitating position that it's in.
Gamemaster:That body is, like, stuck there.
Gamemaster:But as you pull away the bandages, it looks like that piece of his leg is feystone, and it grows up to just, like, under his thigh area.
Gamemaster:The rest becomes regular flesh.
Gamemaster:Although it doesn't, like, take a check or anything.
Gamemaster:You can see that the green of the feystone is slowly growing up the leg.
Andros:Ugh.
Andros:I'm going to unwrap some more benches, but this time from around his face, if he's alive in there.
Gamemaster:No, very dead.
Gamemaster:The face is stuck in what looks to be a screen that got cut off.
Gamemaster:It's got this kind of immediate onset river mortis look.
Gamemaster:You're a magic detective.
Gamemaster:You've seen a lot of dead bodies.
Gamemaster:So you would recognize that this is somebody who's been dead for a little bit.
Gamemaster:Not a long time.
Gamemaster:The body isn't bloated like gases have built up yet, but certainly more than a day.
Gamemaster:But they look... They haven't been completely turned into this face stone.
Gamemaster:It seems like whatever it was was growing up the leg and is continuing to grow up the leg, but something fetched a piece of what grew.
Krod:you
Andros:Am I able to tell if the feystone started growing before or after he died?
Gamemaster:What did you get for your medicine check?
Andros:Not super high.
Gamemaster:Yeah, I...
Gamemaster:I think if you did an autopsy, you might be able to tell that, but just from this general investigation, it's unclear.
Andros:Okay.
Andros:I relay all this information to my compatriots.
Cedric:Anyone else in the room?
Cedric:I'm keeping Anaïs out for anyone trying to come back in.
Gamemaster:Nope.
Gamemaster:No one else in this room.
Andros:Are we able to get this guy down from here?
Andros:Like if I pull or anything, is he just stuck?
Gamemaster:He seems firmly set in place, but I think you could gather that whatever this ritual is, is holding him there.
Gamemaster:If you broke the ritual, then he might fall down.
Andros:Yeah, I'll just start kind of snapping some planks and stuff, breaking the ritual.
Cedric:Should we try to grab some Faerach first?
Gamemaster:Absolutely.
Cedric:Just in case it goes away.
Cedric:Not to sell, but just to have as proof for the higher ups.
Krod:I think we should.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Gamemaster:crafting check to chisel part of this guy's transmutated leg away?
Krod:Crafting?
Cedric:Anyone here a Crafter?
Gamemaster:Uh-huh.
Andros:I actually am a crafter.
Gamemaster:Or you can try an athletics check instead, but that's less for taking a chunk off and just kind of powdering a bit of it.
Andros:What are these roles?
Krod:I was thinking more along the lines of cutting the lower part of his leg off.
Gamemaster:You're trying to remove the leg with the stone in it instead of just taking the stone?
Krod:Well, isn't the whole lower part of his leg the stone?
Gamemaster:Uh, yeah.
Gamemaster:So, like, he's missing his leg from just above the knee down.
Gamemaster:That's completely missing.
Gamemaster:And in the bit where it had been severed, you can see that there's a bit of that fey rock growing there, up about an inch or two of his leg.
Krod:Hmm.
Gamemaster:And it's continuing to grow at a slow rate.
Gamemaster:So if you want, you could just chop off the remainder of his leg, and then you'd get, like, the two inches of fey stone.
Gamemaster:Or you could try and chisel away the stone itself off of the leg.
Cedric:Oh, just got the leg.
Gamemaster:Okay, so then that's an athletics check to just hack it off.
Gamemaster:35.
Krod:Athletics.
Krod:35.
Gamemaster:Okay, yeah.
Gamemaster:I mean, you just try to hack a piece of the leg off, it comes off.
Cedric:So is this about like twice the size of the necklace?
Gamemaster:You now have a separate leg from, like, the hip.
Gamemaster:Um...
Gamemaster:No, it's way larger than that.
Cedric:Oh, okay.
Gamemaster:You have, like, it's a cylinder the circumference of this guy's leg, about two inches tall.
Gamemaster:Yeah, the face stone is a small piece of this.
Gamemaster:You're holding, like, half a million gold pieces worth of stone right now in your hand.
Cedric:That's crazy.
Cedric:Cedric will keep Anaïs on it.
Gamemaster:Cetrical pocket.
Krod:Sure.
Cedric:I will use Prestidigitation to try to suck up the blood.
Cedric:I don't want to blood anything.
Gamemaster:Notably, not really much blood to suck up.
Cedric:Does that work?
Gamemaster:You chop the leg off.
Cedric:Oh, so it is converting blood.
Cedric:Yeah.
Gamemaster:Yeah, you chop the leg off and there's like no blood starts coming out of the new cut that you've made.
Cedric:All right.
Andros:Should we just wait for this guy to come back, you think?
Krod:yeah sure we should wait here yeah
Cedric:I guess so.
Cedric:Should we wait in the lobby, or should we?
Cedric:Well, the door's broken.
Andros:Should we stay up here and hide?
Andros:I'll try and fix the door.
Gamemaster:That's a crafting check to try and repair the door.
Gamemaster:You did put a hole in it.
Andros:But I do have on me...
Andros:Knight's maintenance kit.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Gamemaster:Doesn't that just give you a bonus to the check?
Andros:Yeah, probably.
Gamemaster:This one.
Krod:If it's done at night, which it is.
Gamemaster:No, I mean, you pretty seriously wrecked this door.
Andros:I got a 25.
Gamemaster:You are not affixing it back onto its hinges.
Cedric:I will attempt to disguise myself as a denizen of this apartment complex.
Gamemaster:Okay, roll a deception check.
Cedric:All right, 40.
Cedric:So I can be lookout, and then he can pass me on the way in, and then you guys are inside, and then I give a signal.
Andros:Let's do it.
Krod:Sure.
Cedric:Cool, so I'll do that.
Gamemaster:Okay, so you two are, the two down here are staking out from inside the apartment, and then Cedric's gonna pretend to be a ne'er-do-well.
Cedric:Yeah, ideally, is there how many stairs?
Gamemaster:Where's your entourage?
Cedric:I actually assume they wouldn't be here because it might be dangerous.
Gamemaster:Okay, so you can leave them behind, that's fine.
Cedric:Yeah.
Gamemaster:It wasn't explicitly dangerous, so you could have had them come with you if you wanted them.
Cedric:I would have thought it would be dangerous.
Gamemaster:Okay, that's fine, yeah.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Cedric:Especially once I saw the druggie person in the beginning.
Cedric:I'd be like, all right, you guys leave.
Gamemaster:Sure.
Gamemaster:Okay, roll a perception check.
Cedric:Who?
Gamemaster:Look out.
Cedric:OK.
Gamemaster:The other two guys are in the apartment.
Cedric:Yeah.
Gamemaster:No check necessary, by the way.
Gamemaster:Who has the leg?
Cedric:35.
Cedric:I do.
Andros:Oh.
Krod:He has the leg, yeah.
Gamemaster:Okay, absolutely.
Gamemaster:Okay, 35.
Gamemaster:Posted out front.
Gamemaster:There's not a lot of movement in this apartment.
Gamemaster:Around when the suns are rising, you get a few people who come back in from outside.
Andros:OK.
Gamemaster:They don't spare you a second look.
Gamemaster:They also do not head towards this apartment.
Gamemaster:They keep moving forward.
Gamemaster:How long are you willing to wait?
Cedric:Yeah.
Krod:I think mid-afternoon the next day.
Krod:Like, if he's having a late night out, he would definitely come back.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Gamemaster:You wait the full duration.
Gamemaster:Nobody ever tries to get back into the apartment.
Andros:Yeah.
Krod:Okay.
Cedric:Should we just do shifts sleeping?
Cedric:Should we disable this ritual?
Krod:I don't know if... Yeah.
Krod:Actually, yeah.
Krod:Let's attempt to disable the ritual now.
Cedric:I checked the leg.
Cedric:Is anything up with the leg?
Gamemaster:Yeah, it's grown, or the the face stone has grown through the flesh despite being separated from the person It's continued increasing.
Gamemaster:It's taken another two inches off this stump Now you have like a million gold pieces worth of face stone though Yeah, the
Andros:Ew.
Krod:All right.
Krod:I guess another two inches.
Krod:Yeah, I guess another two inches for us.
Krod:I'll make an athletics check then.
Gamemaster:It hasn't grown any further on the body.
Cedric:No, it's on the leg I have.
Gamemaster:It's grown on the thing that he's holding.
Krod:Oh, it's growing two more inches.
Krod:That's way grosser.
Krod:All right.
Krod:This is plenty of money.
Krod:How do we turn this off?
Andros:Have a trot song.
Gamemaster:Joel, are you trying to stop the crystal from the leg from growing?
Gamemaster:Or the ritual that has the floating dude on it?
Krod:No, Kron actually doesn't think that it's too much money.
Krod:He just wants to stop whatever's happening in the apartment from going on.
Cedric:Wait a second.
Cedric:What if the guy who set this up was going to come back once it's fully done?
Cedric:So he'd have an estimate of when it'd be fully done.
Krod:I mean, we can wait, yeah.
Krod:Sure.
Krod:Or estimate and then wait.
Krod:So it's another two inches.
Krod:It's two inches a day.
Krod:How much leg does this guy have left?
Gamemaster:you would guess that like for the whole body or just for the leg the leg would be done in like another two or three days probably at the rate that it's currently growing because you were already like pretty close up to the hip but for it to spread through the rest of the body like a month or two
Cedric:Yeah.
Cedric:I'd say a couple of days, because he already cut half the leg, so he's probably ready to cut another half once it's done.
Krod:Yeah, I mean, I guess we could wait another day.
Krod:I don't really have too much issue with that.
Cedric:All right.
Gamemaster:You rolled high enough.
Cedric:I will disguise the rest of my friends as denizens, and then we can start taking a shit, sleeping in the apartments and stuff.
Gamemaster:I don't think I'm worried about you getting the other people disguised.
Gamemaster:You can take shifts if you like.
Gamemaster:So one of you hangs out outside, and then two of you hang out in the apartment with the dead guy hanging in space above a ritual circle.
Gamemaster:Absolutely.
Cedric:Yep.
Gamemaster:I don't need perception checks for the next day.
Gamemaster:Whoever did this doesn't return.
Krod:So maybe he's got something in here that lets him know that it's compromised.
Krod:Do we want to try to disable the ritual then?
Krod:Do you want to try just prestidigitationing the blood on the ground that's probably dried at this point?
Andros:Yeah.
Cedric:Guess we do.
Cedric:Sure.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Krod:Does our marionette...
Gamemaster:The ritual circle doesn't appear to be made purely out of blood.
Gamemaster:Whatever red ink they used probably has blood in it, but isn't fully.
Gamemaster:It is resistant to magic effects.
Gamemaster:If you want to smudge it, you have to do it yourself.
Cedric:Okay.
Gamemaster:You can't use a little bit of magic to whisk it away.
Krod:gross.
Krod:So we'll reenact a scene from Annie, and Krod will grab a sponge.
Krod:I imagine there's one in this apartment, and... Sure.
Gamemaster:A very moldy one, but yes.
Gamemaster:If you want to scrub away some of the stuff on the floor, you may.
Krod:And can Krod also remove, I don't know, can Krod remove some of the candles?
Krod:Just, like, move all the candles off of the circle first?
Krod:Does that...
Gamemaster:Removing the candles, which, by the way, didn't descend at all over the two days you've been watching, and also didn't go out over the two days you've been watching.
Gamemaster:If you, like, physically remove a candle, just removing one is all it takes to disable this ritual.
Gamemaster:You watch as you take one off, and all five candles around the area go out.
Gamemaster:And the body clatters to the ground.
Krod:Nice.
Andros:Great.
Krod:Shall we talk to the other people in this building to see if they know where this guy went, if they've seen any patterns?
Krod:Maybe we should have done that before.
Cedric:I assume what happened was this dude got murdered in his own apartment.
Krod:Yeah, but we...
Cedric:Yeah, I guess we can chat around.
Andros:Somebody did one of those.
Krod:Yeah.
Krod:Can we just go to his... Does he have a neighbor across the hall?
Gamemaster:You can go to 2A.
Krod:Crotch, he'll knock.
Gamemaster:You knock on the door.
Gamemaster:You hear a little bit of scrambling behind the door, and after a second, the door opens like a quarter of an inch, and you can see there's the chain of a deadbolt pulled across.
Gamemaster:And on the other side, you can see a very emaciated-looking human man peeking out, saying, What?
Krod:We just want to ask you a couple of questions about your neighbor.
Gamemaster:I don't know nothing.
Cedric:It's all right.
Cedric:We're with the authorities.
Krod:Can I?
Gamemaster:I still don't know nothing.
Gamemaster:We'll close the door.
Andros:I'll stop that door from closing.
Krod:Hey.
Andros:I will not do that.
Krod:Oh, Jesus Christ.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Cedric:Look, there's two ways this goes.
Cedric:You can talk to me, and I like to think I'm a very nice person, or you can deal with the big guy.
Cedric:But we need to solve a murder, so we don't think you're in trouble here.
Krod:Thank you.
Cedric:We're just trying to get some information on your neighbor.
Cedric:Please just make this easy.
Gamemaster:Well, one of you roll an intimidation check.
Cedric:All right, I can roll it.
Gamemaster:Big guy's just like, hired muscle in the back looming.
Andros:Yeah pretty much.
Cedric:Jesus.
Cedric:21.
Gamemaster:He says, I can't help.
Gamemaster:You try and take me down to whatever cop station you've got, I can't help there either.
Gamemaster:Just go away, ask someone who knows something.
Gamemaster:And then he will try and close the door again.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Cedric:All right, well, since it's a new day, I will summon Mythic again.
Cedric:Do we just?
Cedric:Have we seen him leave in the last two days we've been here?
Gamemaster:This guy?
Gamemaster:No.
Cedric:Yeah.
Andros:Might have drugs in there.
Gamemaster:He's been holed up in his apartment.
Cedric:All right, well.
Krod:I hear him reaching.
Cedric:Amazing, does he seem like a husk?
Krod:I hear him.
Cedric:Or does he seem more just like drugged?
Gamemaster:Like, no check necessary.
Gamemaster:This guy is clearly either on or recently on a narcotic of some kind.
Cedric:Well, he's probably not too helpful, huh?
Cedric:Alright, we'll just let it go.
Krod:Downstairs, neighbors.
Cedric:Yeah.
Krod:I'm not sure where else.
Cedric:Or any other... Yeah, knock on the door.
Krod:There's a guy that was in here and he was alerted and now he's not in here and he won't be in here.
Krod:We have to go around the town looking for a Black Raymond is pretty much it.
Andros:We go to the apartment that would be directly under the one we were in.
Andros:Mm-hmm.
Gamemaster:You can do that to 1B.
Gamemaster:Absolutely.
Andros:On that one.
Gamemaster:you knock the first time and there's no response.
Gamemaster:You knock a second time and then you hear a shout from inside the apartment that says, I'm coming!
Gamemaster:I'm coming!
Gamemaster:And after a second, this door also opens.
Gamemaster:Not deadlocked this time.
Gamemaster:He doesn't open it all the way.
Gamemaster:It looks like a half-work.
Gamemaster:But he is standing in the frame of the door, such that you can't really see further into his apartment.
Gamemaster:What?
Cedric:We'd like to ask you some questions about a neighbor of yours.
Gamemaster:Why do I want to answer them?
Cedric:We're cops.
Cedric:A show badge.
Gamemaster:He will immediately go to close the door.
Andros:Sir, your upstairs neighbor has been murdered and we're just trying to track down the culprit.
Gamemaster:I didn't do it.
Cedric:We don't care what you're doing in this apartment.
Cedric:Drugs, whatever.
Cedric:Not important to us.
Cedric:We just want to know if you've heard some things and if you've seen anyone with the black ring mint.
Gamemaster:Yeah, you're talking about my neighbor.
Gamemaster:The dead one?
Cedric:Oh.
Andros:Oh, he had a blackberry?
Cedric:He had a black ring mint?
Gamemaster:Yeah, weird dude.
Andros:How long has he been living there?
Gamemaster:I don't know.
Gamemaster:I don't keep track of this stuff more than a year.
Andros:How long?
Cedric:I gave him... What's the equivalent of a gold piece?
Cedric:Is that $10?
Cedric:So I will give him a pullout.
Cedric:I don't know, like, yeah, I guess two gold pieces, or 20 bucks.
Gamemaster:$20.
Cedric:Give him one 10 down.
Cedric:I go, all right, other 10, give us more information about this guy.
Gamemaster:Roll a diplomacy check.
Gamemaster:I'll give you a plus two circumstance bonus.
Cedric:Dope.
Gamemaster:God, I just, you know, going around to these people and introducing yourself as a cop is just not a good idea to get on their good side.
Gamemaster:$45.
Cedric:Oh, well.
Cedric:45.
Gamemaster:He, like, takes it, crumples it up, sticks it in the pocket somewhere.
Gamemaster:What'd you ask?
Cedric:I just want more information about this guy.
Cedric:Let's see with this mouse.
Gamemaster:I don't know much.
Cedric:Are there multiple black arrangements?
Gamemaster:No, it's just him.
Gamemaster:His name was Anthony.
Gamemaster:He lived upstairs.
Gamemaster:He's been here for more than a year.
Gamemaster:Never really talked to no one.
Andros:Did he ever have visitors?
Gamemaster:Weird dude.
Gamemaster:Not to my knowledge.
Gamemaster:I mean, I don't keep track of his comings and goings.
Cedric:What does he look like?
Gamemaster:But I like... Yeah, he's...
Cedric:Can you describe?
Gamemaster:I know he's human.
Gamemaster:He's on the shoulder side.
Gamemaster:He's like 5'5", 5'6", something like that.
Gamemaster:I never really saw him.
Gamemaster:He used to wear plokes and stuff.
Gamemaster:It's not like he came around for beers or anything.
Krod:Do you ever get a look at his face or his skin?
Gamemaster:I mean, I've definitely seen his skin at some point.
Gamemaster:Like, years ago.
Gamemaster:At this point, when he first moved in around.
Gamemaster:Recently, no, but also I'm not looking.
Krod:Hmm.
Gamemaster:I don't make a habit of looking at people.
Andros:When was the last time you saw him?
Gamemaster:Like a week ago, maybe?
Gamemaster:Nothing weirder than normal, I don't think.
Andros:Did you hear any strange noises upstairs?
Cedric:I will keep it.
Andros:Can I try and get a peek past this guy and what's going on in his apartment?
Gamemaster:Roll a perception check.
Andros:Jesus, 26.
Andros:What is happening?
Gamemaster:You're ten feet tall, so you have to kind of duck down a little bit in this hallway.
Gamemaster:And unfortunately, your positioning means you don't get to see much behind him.
Gamemaster:He's blocking your vision.
Cedric:Do I think?
Cedric:He's telling the truth.
Cedric:He doesn't know anything else.
Gamemaster:Roll a perception check.
Gamemaster:Lie to me.
Cedric:Great.
Cedric:On this one.
Gamemaster:Yeah, so, no, he's telling the truth.
Cedric:But yeah.
Gamemaster:Like, this dude, the dude with the black raiment, lived in the apartment above him.
Gamemaster:He's been here for more than a year.
Gamemaster:He saw skin at one point a while ago.
Gamemaster:He hasn't seen it recently.
Gamemaster:But, like, the people here don't keep tabs on the other people around, so... Yeah.
Cedric:The rich jeweler said he saw a guy that was brown 5'6", robes, kind of sounds like the dude upstairs as well, and the body we found, right?
Cedric:All three.
Gamemaster:Yes.
Gamemaster:Yeah, it sounds like the body you found upstairs is the guy who lives upstairs is the guy with the black rainbow.
Cedric:Yeah.
Cedric:And then... Okay.
Cedric:Did he have any friends around here or something?
Gamemaster:No.
Gamemaster:Frankly, I don't know if I ever saw him speak to another person.
Gamemaster:He'd come in, every once in a while he'd go out, he'd come back with weird magic shit, and then that was it.
Gamemaster:He never had friends over that I remember.
Cedric:What type of shit?
Gamemaster:He never did any of that crap.
Cedric:What type of magic shit?
Gamemaster:I don't know, like books and stuff.
Andros:We didn't find any of that upstairs, right?
Andros:Do a better.
Krod:We did.
Gamemaster:Yeah, he found plenty of stuff.
Cedric:We did.
Cedric:Alright, let's go back up and look at those folks.
Gamemaster:None of you looked at it, but you definitely did find stuff up there.
Cedric:I'll give them the other 20.
Cedric:Yeah, I'll give them the other... I'll give them the other... I'll go give them the other 10.
Gamemaster:Absolutely.
Krod:We also didn't try to inspect what the other red liquid was.
Krod:We should probably go to that too.
Gamemaster:Sure.
Gamemaster:He will unceremoniously close the door on you once you get up to him.
Cedric:Yeah.
Cedric:Go back up.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Gamemaster:You guys go back up to the crime scene.
Gamemaster:Door kind of, like, propped in the doorway so that it kind of locks view in, but clearly isn't on its inches.
Gamemaster:Okay, so what are you doing?
Gamemaster:What are you looking for?
Gamemaster:You've now got the limp body laying on the...
Cedric:Special.
Gamemaster:now de-energized ritual circle.
Gamemaster:You've got the candles, you've got the weird red ink that they're made out of, there was a book that was the centerpiece of that ritual that this guy's fallen on, and then around the room there's, like, wax and various books of some kind of make, and, like, cloths and stuff of that nature, as well as, at this point, a week-old set of rotting food.
Andros:Yeah, while they're doing this... I'll start performing a full autopsy on this guy.
Cedric:Does it?
Cedric:Did we see something that looked like it was what killed him?
Cedric:Does he have a wound or anything?
Gamemaster:No.
Gamemaster:No, like, nothing obvious there.
Gamemaster:You guys haven't done a full autopsy of him, now that you've removed him from the ritual site?
Gamemaster:You could, if you wanted.
Cedric:All right, I'll leave the autopsy and look around the rooms to my compatriots.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Gamemaster:Medicine check for the autopsy, perception check to, like, look around another step around the room.
Krod:A container that has that looks like the other red liquid that has the red liquid in it.
Cedric:Alright, I'll roll the person.
Gamemaster:And it would be useful if you could tell me what specifically you're looking for.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Andros:I'm going to use a hero point.
Andros:This is getting crazy.
Krod:And yeah, I mean the books, but I think the books might be obvious.
Gamemaster:Okay, so 31 for the autopsy, which is a critical failure, because I assume that's a natural one.
Krod:from what I did.
Gamemaster:Yeah, unfortunately, so I think the only thing you would gather from this autopsy is this dude's innards have been rearranged in a really weird fashion.
Gamemaster:in such a way that everything is now, like, right angles and the like, and solid.
Gamemaster:It's not like squishy organs like you would expect.
Gamemaster:Unfortunately, cause of death and whether or not the rock was growing first or anything like that, you just can't get from the body anymore.
Gamemaster:And you made a little bit too much of a mess, so if you were to turn in this body to, like, the morgue back at HQ, they also would not be able to identify that stuff.
Gamemaster:Excuse me.
Andros:Cool.
Gamemaster:What did we get for the perception checks?
Krod:40.
Gamemaster:40.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Cedric:We don't need to talk about mine.
Gamemaster:So with the 40 looking around, yes, you do find what look to be an alembic and other alchemical supplies just kind of stuffed into a corner in the kitchen that you can see that there is in one of the distilling classes.
Gamemaster:It looks like a vial of the same red liquid that matches with the rivet circle on the ground.
Gamemaster:Otherwise, just going around picking up titles of books and stuff, the majority of the books here are...
Gamemaster:As best you could tell, like, bullshit.
Gamemaster:Like, you go into a bookstore and you buy, here's 18 dark rituals to make someone fall in love with you and stuff like that.
Gamemaster:Like, random kitschy things.
Gamemaster:But the book that you find in the ritual circle, like, not opening it or anything, just the title of it is called Gloaming Codex.
Gamemaster:And it feels hefty in a way that you would identify as magical items usually do.
Gamemaster:Like there's a bit of weird inertia to it as you move it around that doesn't match with the material.
Gamemaster:The cover is also strange.
Gamemaster:It's like a kind of tan leather, but it's got this rigidity to it that if you tap it, it almost feels more like rock.
Krod:We take both, the vial of red and the book.
Gamemaster:Yep, you've got both.
Krod:No one's given the book a read through?
Krod:I don't want to identify, because I'm not going to be able to identify the file.
Gamemaster:As far as I'm aware, while you guys have been staking this stuff out, nobody has actually interacted with the magical stuff around the room.
Gamemaster:So no.
Krod:Can I just read through the book?
Krod:What's it say?
Gamemaster:Absolutely.
Gamemaster:You...
Gamemaster:Pull open the book.
Gamemaster:There is a bit that's like dog-eared near the back that you would gather is relevant to what this guy was looking at.
Gamemaster:But just opening it from the front, there's this weird creaking sound as you open the cover.
Gamemaster:Almost this like crackling bit as you seem to be breaking the spine.
Andros:Hmm.
Gamemaster:But the interior of the page is filled with...
Gamemaster:scribbles in this deep red font of a similar color, actually, to the liquid that you had picked up.
Gamemaster:The first few pages flipping through them are alchemical recipes, it looks like, for making different magical reagents and the like.
Gamemaster:And some weird diagrams.
Gamemaster:Can I get an occultism or religion check, actually, as you look through to understand maybe some of the, like...
Gamemaster:more esoteric bits of this book.
Krod:from me specifically as the reader i'll show it them and i'll make a religion check i get a seven on the religion check
Gamemaster:You're the one reading it.
Gamemaster:If you want to show it to other people, they can make a roll as well.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Cedric:My occultism is 15, so.
Andros:Mine's not even that high.
Cedric:I'll roll.
Gamemaster:Seven on the religion check.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Cedric:Oh, right.
Gamemaster:16 on the occultism check?
Cedric:Should we take this back to the HQ, bosses?
Krod:Yeah.
Andros:Yeah, maybe.
Krod:I mean, we were anyways, but
Gamemaster:Absolutely.
Gamemaster:Unfortunately, I... Yeah, I don't think you would recognize anything here as, like, to your knowledge of anything.
Gamemaster:It's just weird writing.
Gamemaster:Like, weird recipes and stuff.
Gamemaster:There's a particular... The dog-eared page is in illustration.
Gamemaster:a stairway leading up to this... Yes, but not.
Cedric:Got home.
Gamemaster:Because it's a stairway leading up to a black hole, almost, written into it instead of shining.
Cedric:Oh.
Krod:the void home.
Gamemaster:Sure.
Gamemaster:With this weird, angelic figure with its arms wrapped around the spot that the staircase is leading to.
Andros:you
Cedric:What's the laughs for?
Krod:We just found the new thing that we're going to force Josh to rename.
Krod:Because it's now the void home.
Gamemaster:Why?
Gamemaster:I already... Okay, it's fine.
Krod:Permanently.
Krod:You should have made it clearly labeled.
Gamemaster:Anyway, you... The Gloaming.
Krod:Circled a hundred times.
Krod:Dark area.
Krod:Or whatever the actual name is.
Krod:That way we cannot.
Krod:Already force the vernacular to be.
Gamemaster:It's on the title of the book.
Gamemaster:I said it already.
Gamemaster:You just chose to ignore it.
Cedric:What is it called?
Gamemaster:But that's fine.
Krod:Titles aren't important.
Gamemaster:The Gloaming?
Cedric:A Way to Home.
Cedric:Okay.
Gamemaster:Void Home.
Cedric:Should... Okay, so I guess we should bring this back to HQ.
Krod:Yeah.
Cedric:Gentlemen.
Cedric:We got a lot of money worth on this leg.
Krod:I don't know what you're talking about.
Cedric:Should we chip some of it for ourselves?
Andros:What leg?
Cedric:Even better.
Cedric:I'm in.
Cedric:I go to shake his head.
Krod:Frankly.
Krod:Frankly, I'm completely of the opinion that anything that aids us in our investigation is ours until it can better the church
Krod:in another way.
Krod:And as far as I know, this investigation is still going on.
Cedric:What?
Cedric:Great.
Cedric:Great.
Cedric:So we're not going to mention that this leg was growing more rock.
Cedric:That might be helpful for them to figure it out, but I'm OK.
Cedric:Not much.
Krod:I mean, well...
Andros:I don't think they'll figure it out.
Andros:I did a really poor job on this autopsy.
Andros:They can get anything from this body.
Cedric:Oh, that's why you messed it up.
Cedric:That makes sense.
Andros:Listen, improv classes are not cheap, and like that very mean jeweler said, I don't get paid a lot.
Krod:Why don't we just use this to bribe people to get information and then return it to the church?
Gamemaster:Oh.
Cedric:I guess we probably have a guy to fence it for us.
Cedric:We might need to sell it at half cost, but we still pocket a half a million each in total.
Andros:Thank you.
Cedric:How are we going to use this?
Cedric:We're not the cutoff pieces, then?
Krod:yeah we're in a slum it's very straightforward there's a guy upstairs growing it out of his leg yeah
Cedric:Who are we going to even bribe?
Cedric:We're going to give the slum people Feyrock?
Cedric:That's like going to a crack house and then handing out the Hope Diamond to ask for information.
Gamemaster:It would work.
Cedric:I don't even know if it would.
Cedric:They might not even know what this is.
Cedric:I didn't know what it was until very recently.
Gamemaster:Correct.
Krod:Well, that also means that the number of people that can purchase this is very small.
Krod:Anyways, we'll figure that out when we get there.
Krod:I mean, we're not returning it to HQ immediately.
Krod:Either way.
Cedric:I'm returning one to HQ.
Cedric:Hey.
Cedric:All of your characters have sold out multiple one-shots.
Cedric:This is my sellout one.
Krod:No, but this is in character.
Gamemaster:Thank you.
Cedric:This is my... Well, we were secret agents and gangsters in a mob, and both had no allegiances.
Krod:This is the characters that are absolute devotees to the church.
Krod:They work for the church.
Cedric:So I think cops can be dirty.
Cedric:Anyway.
Krod:We were hired guns and actively disrespected prior to the job.
Krod:It is completely within reason for them to turn.
Krod:We got a hot car to do a job in.
Cedric:I don't know.
Krod:I would not give those people...
Krod:my life a second time.
Krod:This is the churches.
Krod:We've had no interaction with the church during this investigation where they're hampering us from continuing it or disrespecting us at random.
Krod:This organization has not been bad to us.
Cedric:They could have given us more respect.
Cedric:Just saying.
Cedric:Put in a lot of good years and I'm watching all these people make more money than us.
Cedric:This isn't it.
Cedric:But anyway.
Cedric:All right.
Gamemaster:So what are you guys doing?
Krod:um yeah uh let's see
Cedric:Can you fence this leg?
Andros:I guess we book back to HQ and see if they can figure out anything more than we can.
Andros:We're kind of hitting a dead end here.
Cedric:I have a portable.
Cedric:I have a bag of storage, by the way, or whatever it's called.
Cedric:That's where the leg is.
Gamemaster:Okay, that's fine.
Cedric:Yeah.
Gamemaster:thank you
Krod:There have been so many instances... There have been so many instances in, like, a couple of these one-shots and a bit in the campaign where I'm like, damn, I wish I had fuckin' Divex's kit.
Cedric:Spacious pouch, too.
Cedric:That's what I have.
Krod:Like, a level 13 Divex would do very well during this entire thing, and I'm like, fuck, I have no utility.
Cedric:Yeah.
Krod:It's like, I talk to someone, roll with a plus one, you asshole, and I'm like... Let's go find something to kill.
Andros:No.
Cedric:Yeah.
Krod:That's what Krod's good at.
Krod:Maybe if we kill enough people, we'll get the answer.
Andros:It'll just take all this stuff.
Gamemaster:cop finds a million dollars worth of rock at crime scene immediately goes on killing spree.
Cedric:Mm-hmm.
Andros:We'll just start back to HQ, I guess.
Krod:This guy's outfit was like a cloak.
Gamemaster:Yeah, he was wearing like a hood and his skin was all bandaged up.
Gamemaster:Oh, that's something you would have found during the autopsy.
Gamemaster:I'm assuming you took the bandages off.
Gamemaster:He would have had like rings drawn all over his skin.
Andros:Yeah.
Krod:Does one of us want to dress up in a cloak and start interrogating wealthy people in the wealthy district next to here and just see if they're like, I already told you no or I've already bought from you or something?
Krod:I feel like that just leads us back here.
Krod:Even if they were like, but where did he go?
Krod:He went back there.
Krod:We found him.
Krod:He's dead.
Cedric:Yeah, so I don't guess.
Andros:What's confusing is it seems like he was the one selling the face stone, so then who jumped him and turned him into face stone?
Cedric:It seems like he was... I think he might have been selling... Like, he was all scarred up.
Cedric:So he might have been just selling parts of his own body.
Krod:That's what I feel like.
Cedric:I, uh... But, like, maybe... Maybe he comes back to life after a bit?
Krod:And it might have gone wrong.
Andros:Yeah, Josh, is there signs of a struggle or anything in here?
Gamemaster:No.
Gamemaster:You guys who looked through here, there's no signs of a struggle.
Gamemaster:And you had asked the guy downstairs if he heard anything strange, and he hadn't.
Gamemaster:And he probably, given how thin the walls are here, he would have heard, like, a kerfuffle.
Cedric:We're the worst cops ever.
Andros:Yeah, maybe he just... Maybe ritual just went wrong and he accidentally killed himself.
Andros:It was a suicide.
Cedric:But we have no leads.
Cedric:We have just straight up no leads.
Andros:This should have been an investigator.
Krod:Let's go back.
Krod:We've got this vial that we can identify, so we can go back to HQ and ask them to identify it.
Krod:I don't know.
Cedric:got books.
Krod:It's really difficult to investigate a guy who essentially killed himself.
Krod:Here's what we're looking for.
Krod:The big picture facts.
Krod:There is some sort of a cult that is... The thing that they worship leads people to have black raiments,
Krod:They figured out some blood ritual to churn out this fey stone, which leads people more or less towards it.
Krod:And... Yeah, and...
Cedric:We gotta turn this face stone into the HQ now that I think about that.
Cedric:Cool, this murder plague thing.
Andros:I mean, I think we're seeing a sort of dark fey cult, right?
Andros:Because fey stone, those evil bug fey that we fought in the forest, it's all tied together somehow with this evil fey cult creating the plague, turning people into creating fey stone.
Krod:Creating the plague?
Krod:Oh.
Krod:Yeah.
Krod:Why are they making the face stone?
Krod:They're making the face stone to fund something?
Cedric:I think it's to lure... Or it's to lure... Well, that guy had a necklace, and that necklace pointed him to where the fey people were.
Krod:The people that they're killing?
Krod:How about this?
Cedric:When did we kill those fey people?
Gamemaster:In the forest?
Gamemaster:What do you mean?
Cedric:Yeah.
Krod:When?
Cedric:Like, was that a week ago?
Gamemaster:Like how far away?
Gamemaster:Like how long ago?
Gamemaster:Yeah, about a week ago.
Krod:Yeah.
Gamemaster:The time it would take you to leave the forest again and then take the train back.
Cedric:So it's right on...
Cedric:So it's around the time this guy killed himself.
Gamemaster:Around, yeah.
Krod:Yeah.
Andros:Oh, do you think he was trying to perform the ritual and when we killed them, the ritual went wrong and ended up killing him too?
Cedric:I don't know.
Cedric:Maybe they had some connection over him.
Cedric:I don't know.
Andros:Josh, are there any signs of extensive drug use on this guy like there are with everybody else around here?
Gamemaster:I mean, like, your autopsy didn't do very well, so it's not like you've got a quick tox report of his knot blood to check.
Krod:OK.
Gamemaster:But his skin doesn't have the same pallor that you would accept.
Gamemaster:He doesn't look like he's... He's got other things going on, but it doesn't look like he was particularly high while it was happening.
Andros:Okay.
Cedric:And then the other jewelry house, they said they seemed to have got an expensive thing like a day or two ago, right?
Cedric:Or a few days ago.
Gamemaster:Oh.
Cedric:So there might be someone else slaying rock.
Gamemaster:Yep.
Krod:So we have to go re-interrogate them for their supplier?
Krod:Yeah, I do think that's like essentially the only lead that we have, at least the only thing like remaining.
Cedric:I could look like this guy and approach that rich guy.
Cedric:Assuming the fake cult lookalike.
Cedric:Should we call in HQ to come investigate this crime scene?
Andros:Yeah I think so.
Krod:Yeah, I think we also need somebody to get a look at this,
Krod:red liquid here.
Krod:But yeah, someone else is slinging it and we need to know where that guy got it.
Cedric:Yeah, so we can.
Cedric:Can we call HQ to come?
Cedric:One of us can go send an order out to get some people to come process this crime scene.
Gamemaster:You can do that.
Cedric:Yeah, we'll do that.
Gamemaster:Sure.
Gamemaster:Done.
Cedric:Okay, and then I guess I'll... Who owns the other jewelry store?
Gamemaster:I don't like moles or anything.
Gamemaster:You know that the name of the store is Crystal Random.
Krod:Crystal.
Krod:OK.
Gamemaster:You don't, like, know the owner.
Gamemaster:And they wouldn't see you the last time you visited.
Cedric:Yeah, yeah, but we could...
Andros:Can we talk to HQ and get a warrant or something to make the guy talk to us?
Gamemaster:You can compel that the guy come down to HQ and talk to you.
Gamemaster:It will take some time.
Gamemaster:Yeah, not HQ.
Cedric:We can give a little bit of this Feyrock over to our other jeweler friend and see if he'll go on a limb for us.
Krod:set up a meeting.
Krod:Is that something that we think that HQ would approve?
Cedric:Yeah.
Krod:Fair.
Cedric:No, but we're going to be bribing him with rock, so they don't know about the rock anyway.
Gamemaster:If you haven't told HQ about it, you're free to do whatever you want with the rock.
Gamemaster:They would not let you use it as a bribe.
Cedric:Alright, can we chisel just a little bit off of it?
Cedric:Will that require a check, or...?
Gamemaster:No, you've already removed the leg from the body, so it's relatively easy to do at this point.
Cedric:Okay.
Gamemaster:Okay, so...
Cedric:Alright.
Cedric:I, uh... Yeah.
Gamemaster:You ask HQ to send over somebody to look at the crime scene, investigate the vial of the book, and then you're going to take the leg back to... What was his name?
Gamemaster:Amos.
Gamemaster:Like, use a little bit of the rock to try and bribe him to set up a meeting between you two?
Cedric:That's fair.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Gamemaster:I'm not going to require a rule here.
Gamemaster:He'll say, like, he'll purchase the rock off of you.
Gamemaster:He's not able to set up a meeting with the other company.
Gamemaster:They are rivals.
Gamemaster:They don't have a particularly friendly relationship.
Gamemaster:So he's not, like, he can just call them up and show up.
Cedric:That's fair.
Krod:Okay.
Krod:We take the piece of the rock that we were going to sell him and we go in and we say, hey, we'd like to talk to the big man and then flash.
Andros:Yeah, maybe.
Cedric:Cool.
Krod:Does it sound reasonable?
Krod:Flash it a bit and say, we're selling this at a good price, but only if we talk to the guy.
Gamemaster:I'll take a diplomacy check to try and do that.
Cedric:Should I hero point that?
Cedric:Mythic point it?
Cedric:It's a seven.
Krod:Yeah, why not?
Cedric:All right.
Cedric:Well, hopefully it's better.
Krod:We can only hope.
Cedric:We got the same result.
Gamemaster:32.
Gamemaster:So the receptionist calls up to the office and then after a second comes back and says, I'm sorry, I'm being told we're not in the market for any face stone right now.
Gamemaster:But we can hold on to your number if you'd like us to call us when we are.
Gamemaster:If we'd like us to call you when we are.
Cedric:That'd be great.
Gamemaster:They'll take your number.
Cedric:Let's go try to talk to the guy that told us about the blood rituals to begin with.
Krod:yeah did i grab i probably would have grabbed this card does he have an address on his card i think this is a better question okay
Gamemaster:He would have just given you his phone number.
Cedric:Yeah, we'll call him up.
Gamemaster:Absolutely.
Gamemaster:You get a line disconnected number.
Gamemaster:He did not give you a real number.
Gamemaster:This dude is very explicitly you look for somebody who's in the criminal side.
Gamemaster:He's not giving you his actual phone number.
Cedric:So we found him at just like an expose.
Cedric:Does that happen every day?
Cedric:What happens there?
Gamemaster:No, it's done.
Gamemaster:It was a conference.
Gamemaster:Conference is over.
Gamemaster:People left.
Krod:Can we go... Oh, Tomare.
Gamemaster:He's from former A. He's become an informant that he's not happy about.
Krod:Can we go back to Amos and ask if he knows anyone in Tomare that deals in... Hey, listen.
Cedric:We should just give him a piece of the rock.
Krod:At least you know that we're... Can you help us out?
Gamemaster:He knows dealers in Tormeré.
Gamemaster:None that claim to be selling Facestone right now, but I think around this time, you would get a call from the crime scene asking you to come back, because they have some questions about the stuff that you left for them to investigate.
Gamemaster:And they'd like some context.
Krod:Sure.
Gamemaster:So you guys can head back over.
Gamemaster:This is me as a GM realizing I didn't give you guys enough openings to investigate, and so you're just grasping at threads.
Gamemaster:You get a call calling you back to the crime scene, where one of the investigators has the page opened up to the dog-eared thing, and he says, I...
Gamemaster:Was there anything else at the crime scene?
Gamemaster:It seems like this needs an activator of some kind, like a catalyst.
Gamemaster:Was there anything there, or is that something we're looking for?
Krod:Something that would have been in the middle of this circle?
Gamemaster:I'm still deciphering its contents.
Krod:Or...
Cedric:I show him the small piece that we have of the rock.
Cedric:Not the big piece.
Cedric:I do not show the full leg.
Gamemaster:Yeah, absolutely.
Cedric:I go, we found this part.
Cedric:It seemed to be like wedge, right?
Cedric:The lower part of him.
Gamemaster:You should have brought that up earlier.
Gamemaster:If you found something at the crime scene, you can't just be carrying that around.
Gamemaster:That might be it.
Cedric:What we have, and then I show the other thing that I'm carrying around that we've been cleared to carry and go, sorry, I just thought we were allowed to do that here.
Gamemaster:No.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Gamemaster:It's fine.
Gamemaster:Show me the rock thing.
Cedric:Alright, I'll hand both of them over to him.
Cedric:If you need to book those, that's okay with me.
Gamemaster:You watch as he brings, like, the sliver, like, any of the face stone over towards the thing.
Gamemaster:It does start to, you watch as his hand kind of, like, gets pulled down.
Gamemaster:It seems within a particular area around the book, it is actually being pulled towards the book.
Gamemaster:Yeah, no, I think this is it.
Andros:you
Gamemaster:Why didn't you bring this up earlier?
Cedric:I don't know.
Gamemaster:It's fine.
Krod:I mean, we
Gamemaster:It's fine.
Gamemaster:It's fine.
Gamemaster:It's whatever.
Cedric:You know, this isn't our specialty.
Gamemaster:It's not worth getting into now.
Cedric:I'm known for talking to people.
Gamemaster:Okay, I'm just going to push this down and see what happens.
Cedric:At this point, my entourage behind me is like, yeah, he's pretty good at talking.
Gamemaster:We're not on the ritual stone, but there's still some kind of energy with it.
Gamemaster:And I don't know what else to do, frankly.
Cedric:Sure.
Gamemaster:Pushes it onto, there's like a particular glowing spot on a page that it looks like it's being pulled towards.
Gamemaster:There's a flash of energy.
Gamemaster:And you all feel this sudden, intense pull from the spot that the rock made contact with as you are pulled into the book.
Andros:oh just to see
Gamemaster:Can I, just to visualize it, could you all go to https://btl.iridi.cc.radita.cc?
Gamemaster:Just so you can see what the book looks like.
Krod:Yeah.
Cedric:STC.
Krod:My favorite way to view books is going to https://btl.iridi.cc.irini.cc.
Gamemaster:That's just where I have the image of the book, okay?
Gamemaster:That's where the book is.
Krod:This is where I read for pleasure.
Krod:Oh, yes.
Gamemaster:It's just, this is where the book is.
Gamemaster:Can you see the book?
Gamemaster:Can you guys see the book?
Cedric:Yes.
Gamemaster:Okay, good.
Andros:Oh, wow.
Cedric:Oh no!
Cedric:Where's the other guy?
Cedric:The investigator.
Krod:The Void Home.
Gamemaster:Oh, he should... One second.
Gamemaster:Bad.
Gamemaster:One second.
Andros:Oh, it's a storybook.
Andros:Oh, gosh.
Andros:Wow, this is a cool map.
Gamemaster:This is the investigator.
Andros:This is a cool map.
Gamemaster:I know that isn't the investigator, but I'm just... Yeah, I'm just using him as a stand-up for the investigator.
Cedric:Mickey Iron Roots.
Cedric:Isn't that Tanner's character?
Cedric:All right.
Cedric:Well, he could have been the voice of reason.
Andros:Mickey Aaron's been here the whole time.
Cedric:He had the planer lore, remember?
Gamemaster:He's been here the whole time.
Gamemaster:Yeah, he knows all this stuff.
Krod:Didn't Iron Roots have some int or something?
Krod:Oh no, he is a Kineticist.
Krod:Well, I guess he could have hit it.
Gamemaster:One second.
Gamemaster:Yeah, no, he has a plus zero to it.
Cedric:Well.
Andros:We, uh, no one built a smart... No one built a smart cop.
Gamemaster:But he's really good at nature.
Krod:I'm disgusted that Anthropos doesn't have more limbs.
Andros:Uh... Andros Andros?
Gamemaster:What?
Cedric:Anything immediately attack us?
Krod:I'm disgusted that Andros Anthropos doesn't have more limbs.
Gamemaster:Bye.
Andros:I have the of half human, half human limbs.
Cedric:I guess we gotta go into this door.
Cedric:I guess we gotta head into this door, huh?
Gamemaster:Yeah, so you guys feel yourselves compressed down into two-dimensional space.
Gamemaster:It's weird because you can look around as if you're standing on top of the book almost, but you can only move across the surface of the book instead of walking off.
Gamemaster:But nothing immediately jumps out at you.
Gamemaster:It's not like you're suddenly attacked or anything like that.
Krod:God, I...
Gamemaster:But I would love it if somebody could make a medicine check for me.
Cedric:Gentlemen, I feel like this is the same door that we said no to before.
Andros:Oh yeah.
Cedric:I guess we got to finally say yes.
Andros:We're back.
Andros:Oh my god, what is happening tonight?
Andros:28.
Gamemaster:This is a completely different despot.
Gamemaster:The DC for this one, luckily, was low.
Gamemaster:The tips of her fingers are a little numb and ever so slightly green.
Andros:Oh no.
Andros:Oh no.
Andros:Is this door over here?
Andros:Does it look like a door we can go through?
Gamemaster:Maybe.
Gamemaster:You can try.
Gamemaster:It just kind of looks like black, inky void.
Krod:Try it.
Andros:I'm going to walk towards it.
Gamemaster:Absolutely.
Andros:For Calaria.
Gamemaster:It's interesting.
Gamemaster:As you get closer, it's all two-dimensional.
Gamemaster:But it's got this kind of slightly undulating quality within the darkness.
Gamemaster:Like it's a kind of veil, almost.
Gamemaster:There are strange ripples in it.
Gamemaster:And as you walk closer, you can see that it almost bows slightly out towards to meet you.
Andros:I'll walk up to meet it.
Gamemaster:Just like a few inches in your direction.
Andros:I fear no doors.
Gamemaster:Absolutely.
Gamemaster:You make contact with the fabric as you walk up to meet it, and you feel as tendrils of it immediately reach out and try and attempt to subsume you as you make contact.
Gamemaster:As this carnivorous ink comes out of the void and tries to eat you.
Andros:Oh god!
Gamemaster:There he is.
Andros:Oh!
Krod:Ah!
Andros:Oh my gosh!
Gamemaster:Ignore the image.
Gamemaster:It's not eating a town right now.
Gamemaster:And also, it's supposed to be ink.
Gamemaster:But it is going to try and attack you as you make contact with it.
Gamemaster:One second.
Gamemaster:But luckily, it rolled bad.
Gamemaster:So it doesn't do that.
Gamemaster:With that, I am going to have to ask you guys to roll initiative as this ink arrives out.
Gamemaster:Why did we default to acrobatics initiative?
Krod:okay oh you rolled a perception check
Gamemaster:That's not useful.
Cedric:Wow, we get a lot of 29s.
Gamemaster:What am I missing?
Andros:I did roll.
Gamemaster:I don't have Andrus.
Andros:I don't know where I went.
Andros:Maybe I rolled.
Gamemaster:Oh, you just rolled the percentage check.
Andros:Oh.
Gamemaster:You're at 31.
Gamemaster:I can add you.
Andros:Oh.
Gamemaster:That's fine.
Andros:I hit the wrong button.
Krod:It was showing me an 18, and then it tilted to a 5.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Cedric:That's messed up, man.
Gamemaster:Nice.
Krod:I know.
Krod:Pissing me off.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Cedric:I don't like how it's numbered.
Gamemaster:That's just what carnivorous ink just by default is numbered.
Andros:I do.
Gamemaster:It is Andros.
Gamemaster:Do you have a response that you wanted to make to this ink as it tries to grab you?
Andros:First, I will enter my hampering stance.
Andros:I'm trying to give myself an answer.
Andros:There we go.
Andros:All spaces within a five-foot emanation from me are difficult terrain for my enemies.
Gamemaster:okay move him up a little bit just so he's not directly on top of you
Andros:Uh... Then... I will... I'll activate my Clockwork Shield.
Andros:Give myself an extra reaction.
Andros:And lastly, I will... Let me try all my stuff.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Andros:Sorry.
Andros:I will raise my shield and taunt this man.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Krod:Man.
Andros:His ink.
Andros:His ink is taunted.
Gamemaster:The ink is taunted.
Gamemaster:Okay, that's the integer.
Andros:Yes.
Andros:The taunt and the raise is one action.
Gamemaster:Great.
Gamemaster:It's the ink's turn.
Gamemaster:The ink is going to... I would love it if you could make a reflex save.
Gamemaster:This reflex save, please.
Andros:36.
Gamemaster:That is a success.
Gamemaster:So it tries to engulf you, and it doesn't manage to do it.
Gamemaster:You, like, just kind of chop away the pieces of it that are grabbing at you.
Gamemaster:So instead, I think it's just going to follow it up with a regular attack.
Gamemaster:36.
Gamemaster:Because if your shield misses, because you have a ridiculous AC.
Andros:Come on, Ink.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Gamemaster:That's all three of its actions, because engulf is apparently two actions.
Gamemaster:Do you take damage even if it succeeds?
Gamemaster:No.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Gamemaster:That's the end of its turn.
Gamemaster:Next up is Krod.
Krod:Grodd will get to here.
Krod:And Grodd will strike viciously.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Gamemaster:Krod viciously strikes the ink.
Gamemaster:Yeah, that's a crit.
Andros:Yes.
Krod:Grodd quickly strikes me.
Krod:Critical.
Krod:Yes, Vicious Swing is on.
Krod:64 slashing, and if it is able to be frightened to an off guard, it is.
Gamemaster:points of damage.
Cedric:I wonder if it needs to be the.
Gamemaster:Absolutely.
Gamemaster:It can be frightened, and it can be off-guard, but you feel your axe hit the ink, and just sail right through it.
Gamemaster:Doesn't appear to have done any damage.
Krod:Unfortunate.
Andros:Oh, no.
Andros:It's been hit with face stone or magic.
Krod:That is my turn.
Gamemaster:okay um is that the end of return when cedric's turn
Cedric:green stuff.
Krod:It is, yes.
Cedric:All right.
Cedric:Cedric is going to hit him with a tried and true special.
Cedric:He wants.
Cedric:Yeah, I guess I'll just do quick.
Andros:Yeah.
Cedric:Sure strike.
Cedric:And I will roll the deck.
Gamemaster:Absolutely.
Cedric:This should be with advantage.
Cedric:I guess didn't matter.
Cedric:So now you need to make it.
Gamemaster:OK.
Gamemaster:Yeah, that critically hits.
Gamemaster:So it has to make a save, and it goes up by, or it goes down by one.
Cedric:Yes.
Gamemaster:I rolled to critical success, so that gets dropped to a regular success.
Cedric:So just as half damage.
Gamemaster:64 points of damage.
Gamemaster:Absolutely.
Gamemaster:It takes the full damage.
Gamemaster:you watch as you send a disintegration ray at it, and it tries to move out of the way, flow out of the way, and it does successfully flatten itself in the middle to try and get out of it, but your disintegration beam goes right through it, carving it in half.
Cedric:Oh.
Gamemaster:And you watch as now two pools of this ink next to each other are righting around one second.
Gamemaster:Let's see if this works.
Andros:You.
Gamemaster:Oh, it should have updated it.
Gamemaster:That's fine.
Gamemaster:I was hoping it would update the number.
Gamemaster:OK.
Gamemaster:Already.
Cedric:Return.
Gamemaster:That's the end of your turn?
Cedric:Uh, how much action sister?
Cedric:I haven't.
Cedric:I haven't moved.
Cedric:I'm going to move over.
Cedric:Here.
Andros:you
Gamemaster:Okay, absolutely.
Gamemaster:Next up, it will be this guy's turn.
Gamemaster:Come on.
Gamemaster:Out of the forest comes...
Gamemaster:A bat-like creature.
Cedric:out.
Gamemaster:Just the upper torso, though.
Gamemaster:Lower torso is completely missing.
Gamemaster:It's floating above the ground.
Gamemaster:And it will... I don't know what's its movement.
Gamemaster:Fly 40.
Gamemaster:That's 40 feet.
Gamemaster:That's 80 feet.
Andros:Yeah, come get me.
Gamemaster:Andros, you're flat-footed.
Andros:No, I am not.
Andros:Because of my dragon turtle armor, I am not off guard from creatures that flank me.
Gamemaster:Why not?
Gamemaster:Nice.
Gamemaster:Okay, you're not flat-footed.
Gamemaster:It's still going to attempt to attack you.
Gamemaster:It will make a strike of burning cold.
Gamemaster:But I rolled so poorly.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Andros:Get some.
Gamemaster:The next step is going to be this guy's turn.
Gamemaster:I think this one will go for proud.
Krod:Yay.
Gamemaster:That's 40 feet.
Krod:He's within it.
Krod:That's what Krod sounds like.
Krod:Krod is... Krod was bred to have improper breathing passageways.
Cedric:Thank you.
Gamemaster:I hate that.
Krod:23.
Andros:uh you
Gamemaster:You hit.
Gamemaster:Roll damage.
Gamemaster:23 points, slashing.
Gamemaster:This guy does take the damage that you deal.
Gamemaster:He used one action to move, and then I think he'll inflict a Curse of Darkness on you.
Gamemaster:Can you make that Fortitude save, please?
Krod:Yeah.
Krod:What are the traits for this?
Gamemaster:None.
Gamemaster:It doesn't have any traits.
Krod:Oh.
Andros:Oh no.
Gamemaster:It's just a creature ability.
Krod:But is it an action or what kind of?
Gamemaster:It's an action.
Gamemaster:You critically succeed, so you don't get cursed by darkness.
Krod:Okay.
Gamemaster:So I think it'll use its last attack to a burning coal view as well.
Cedric:Crazy, that's a critical... Oh, he has something that pushes it up.
Cedric:Okay.
Gamemaster:Yeah, I critically hit this time.
Krod:unfortunate.
Gamemaster:So you are going to take the crit damage here.
Gamemaster:46 points of cold damage, as well as a bunch of persistent cold damage.
Gamemaster:And also, you are immobilized.
Andros:All right.
Gamemaster:as ice grows around your limbs or make contact.
Krod:Okay.
Gamemaster:Andros, it's your turn.
Gamemaster:You're surrounded by some carnivorous inks.
Andros:I don't know if these inks can take physical damage, so I'm just going to...
Andros:This guy has no bottom part.
Andros:He's just a... Okay, there.
Gamemaster:Nope, he's just a torso with wings and some arms and some cold fire in his hands.
Andros:I will try and punch him with my shield.
Gamemaster:All right.
Gamemaster:Give me a good old shield punch.
Gamemaster:That hits.
Andros:I hit.
Cedric:Good day.
Gamemaster:That hits.
Andros:21 points of shield.
Gamemaster:absolutely he takes the full shield damage absolutely i wouldn't expect it to give you a buff but i guess it
Andros:And then... I will... Second action, I'll drink this Potion of Electricity Retaliation.
Andros:I feel like it should give me the... I don't know.
Andros:I don't know where I put it, I guess.
Andros:But...
Andros:Okay.
Gamemaster:Let me see if there's an effect.
Gamemaster:There isn't.
Gamemaster:So you'll just have to remember it, unfortunately, and tell me.
Gamemaster:Anything else you'd like to do?
Andros:I will taunt and shield.
Andros:I will taunt this carnivorous ink that could also get crawled.
Gamemaster:OK.
Andros:I'll taunt it.
Gamemaster:OK.
Andros:It is taunted.
Gamemaster:Sorry, one or two.
Gamemaster:OK, one is counted.
Andros:One.
Cedric:Oh, that's a good range.
Andros:Raise my shields.
Gamemaster:What?
Gamemaster:It's right next to him.
Cedric:I don't know.
Cedric:I thought, oh, Carnivorous Ink.
Cedric:Sorry, I was thinking of the Cursed Thoughts.
Andros:I think I could get the other Cursed Thought too, but I will just do the Cranegra Sink.
Andros:I don't think I can intercept that far away, but...
Gamemaster:The carnivorous eggs are supposed to be below you in the initiative order, but they seem to have just disappeared entirely.
Gamemaster:So I'm just going to put that back.
Gamemaster:OK.
Gamemaster:I know it doesn't have an admission score.
Andros:Yes.
Gamemaster:I'm going to ignore this.
Gamemaster:I'm going to place it where it's supposed to be.
Gamemaster:OK, is that the end of your turn?
Gamemaster:It's the Carnivorous Ink's turn.
Gamemaster:I think this one's going to go for Crod.
Gamemaster:Oh, actually, Constrict works on any number of creatures.
Gamemaster:Oh, no.
Gamemaster:Grabbed a Restrict by it.
Gamemaster:Okay, it does have to attack.
Gamemaster:So it's going to use its pseudopod to attack Krog.
Andros:It gets a minus one because it's taunted and not attacking me.
Gamemaster:Correct.
Gamemaster:But I also rolled so bad.
Gamemaster:Then it's going to spend its remaining actions attacking Andrus.
Andros:Also off guard until the start of my next turn.
Krod:It's absolutely.
Gamemaster:It can't do anything unless it actually successfully lands a single hit.
Gamemaster:So I'm just going to roll twos repeatedly and miss.
Andros:There's no like manipulate on that?
Gamemaster:It's the second next turn.
Gamemaster:This guy's going to try and engulf you, Andros.
Gamemaster:I need you to make this reflex save, or attempt to make that reflex save.
Andros:Is that?
Gamemaster:Um...
Gamemaster:This character block doesn't have any traits for its actions, so no.
Gamemaster:But it would be considered an attack, which I don't think you can do a reactive strike on anyway.
Cedric:Oh.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Andros:Oh no, I've been struck.
Gamemaster:Back to our regularly scheduled attacking with pseudopod.
Gamemaster:Finally!
Andros:I'll shield block.
Gamemaster:Ah, Shield of Black.
Krod:Clemson.
Andros:And I'll also make a block.
Gamemaster:Okay, so you could push him.
Andros:Because I'm off guard.
Andros:to the end of my next turn.
Gamemaster:Absolutely.
Gamemaster:You may block the 36 points of damage split between Bludgeoning and Acid.
Gamemaster:It's going to choose not to be off guard.
Gamemaster:It's just going to choose to be pushed back five feet.
Gamemaster:Because it gets to choose which of those happens.
Andros:Does it choose or do I choose?
Gamemaster:It chooses.
Andros:Yeah, no I was
Gamemaster:The triggering creature chooses.
Gamemaster:It's triggering the shield blocker.
Gamemaster:Because it says you use your shield to push the triggering creature, either automatically shoving it five feet or causing it to become off-guard.
Gamemaster:The triggering creature chooses whether to be moved or become off-guard.
Andros:I wasn't sure about the difficult terrain because of the hampering stance, but I guess it's leaving difficult terrain.
Gamemaster:It's forced movement as well.
Gamemaster:It is Krod Snodman's turn.
Gamemaster:You're immobilized and you're taking some cold damage because you've been frozen.
Krod:Yay.
Krod:Fair enough.
Gamemaster:Oh, I should have mentioned, I apologize, I should have mentioned this at the top of the initiative order.
Gamemaster:You guys feel the joints in your hands freezing up as the green glimmer on the tips of your fingers continues to press downward.
Andros:Oh, no.
Cedric:Great.
Krod:I didn't even realize there was a country.
Gamemaster:Also, Trump just announced new tariffs on kitchen cabinets.
Gamemaster:Just FYI.
Andros:What?
Krod:Sorry, I'm just double-checking a couple of things.
Andros:I think penguins.
Krod:We're going to viciously swing at this... What is it?
Gamemaster:Cristal or carnivorous ink?
Krod:Cursed thought.
Cedric:Thank you.
Krod:Cursed thought, because my character token was in front of the first word, and I was like, is it gourd?
Krod:Is it gourd thought?
Krod:It's not.
Gamemaster:Ignore that.
Gamemaster:I didn't mean to do that.
Gamemaster:I'm not sure I had to pick that guy.
Krod:Hits good.
Andros:Okay.
Krod:But this thing did damage, and I don't want it to do damage again.
Krod:So I'm going to reroll at Mythic.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Krod:Which I am now realizing is just a plus two.
Gamemaster:Yep.
Krod:And that's still not enough to crit.
Krod:That's fine.
Gamemaster:Nope.
Krod:I did still hit.
Gamemaster:But you still hit.
Krod:39 damage.
Gamemaster:Absolutely.
Krod:And I would like to give it another shot with full map, because why not?
Andros:Okay.
Gamemaster:Sorry.
Krod:Not even a crit miss.
Krod:OK.
Gamemaster:Is that the end of your turn?
Krod:Yep.
Gamemaster:Centric!
Gamemaster:Oh wait, sorry.
Cedric:Thank you.
Gamemaster:First take 22 points of cold damage, and you can attempt a recovery check.
Krod:It says I succeeded already.
Gamemaster:Success!
Krod:Spoiler alerted me so bad.
Gamemaster:You managed to break out of the ice.
Gamemaster:I... did it.
Krod:Yeah, it removed the effect mid-roll.
Krod:The game was just like, we're rolling the dice.
Krod:Just like, don't tell him, but he's totally going to make this.
Gamemaster:It happens.
Gamemaster:Now it's over.
Krod:Yeah, that's the turn.
Cedric:OK.
Andros:more.
Cedric:So I will do.
Gamemaster:What you got, magic boy?
Cedric:Yeah, so I will do this one.
Cedric:And then I would have cached.
Cedric:Yeah.
Gamemaster:Planar Palace.
Cedric:Chan lightning.
Gamemaster:Chain Lightning.
Gamemaster:Absolutely.
Gamemaster:Uncursed Thought 2, I imagine.
Cedric:Yes.
Gamemaster:So bad.
Gamemaster:It's too many dice.
Cedric:Yes.
Andros:Yes.
Cedric:And this is with overwhelming energy, so it'll ignore target's resistance.
Gamemaster:He takes the full 60 points of damage.
Cedric:I think.
Cedric:Okay.
Gamemaster:Carnivorous Ink won, then.
Gamemaster:Also bad.
Cedric:Yes.
Cedric:Double it.
Gamemaster:Critically failed.
Cedric:Double it and give it to the next guy.
Gamemaster:I take double the damage.
Cedric:Okay.
Gamemaster:It's a basic reflex save.
Gamemaster:Having a doubling is appropriate.
Cedric:Double it and give it to the next guy.
Gamemaster:Okay, absolutely.
Gamemaster:120.
Gamemaster:That's enough to just straight up vaporize this guy.
Cedric:All right.
Gamemaster:Which means he doesn't get to split because you take all of his health.
Gamemaster:That's too much.
Cedric:Next guy.
Cedric:Next guy.
Cedric:Next guy.
Gamemaster:Reflex.
Gamemaster:This guy fails.
Gamemaster:It's not quite a critical failure, but it did suck.
Gamemaster:60 points of damage, and he does split.
Andros:Oh, no.
Cedric:All right, I'm going to attack the splits.
Gamemaster:You don't.
Gamemaster:The split happens after the thing resolves.
Gamemaster:You don't get to attack the split.
Cedric:Damn it.
Gamemaster:You've already done damage to the entity.
Cedric:All right, all right, and then I'll curse that one.
Gamemaster:Give me a second to shrink these guys.
Gamemaster:And then this guy.
Gamemaster:God, I rolled so poorly on all of these.
Cedric:Cool.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Gamemaster:Full damage to this guy as well.
Gamemaster:He takes the full 60.
Gamemaster:So that Cursed Thought, because he's been walloped a few times, is actually bloodied now.
Gamemaster:Which is good for me, because he makes a Burning Cold Fusillade attack.
Andros:Oh, my gosh.
Gamemaster:Which is... Unfortunately, the only person in range is Krod.
Gamemaster:So Krod, you're going to take three attacks from this guy.
Cedric:Oof.
Krod:Wait, from Cursed Thought 1?
Gamemaster:The cursed thought next to you, yeah.
Krod:Is he doing any sort of manipulates?
Gamemaster:No, it's an attack.
Gamemaster:Attacks don't have the manipulate trait.
Krod:I know.
Krod:I'm just checking.
Krod:I wasn't sure if I missed a manipulate earlier.
Krod:Oh my god.
Gamemaster:Two hits of crimp.
Krod:R.I.P.
Krod:Krod.
Cedric:Andrus might have to go revive this guy.
Gamemaster:Sorry, crowd.
Andros:A little too far away.
Gamemaster:35 points, 58 points, and then 35 points again.
Krod:Yeah, RIP crowd.
Gamemaster:Poor crowd.
Cedric:Do you have that mythic thing that allows you to ignore damage that bring you unconscious?
Krod:I do, but I can't remember how much I started with.
Krod:I thought I started with like, what does this add to?
Krod:This adds to 93?
Krod:I think I started with 94, the first two.
Gamemaster:What?
Cedric:Yeah.
Krod:Like, if I click this damage thing... Yeah, okay, so it didn't apply.
Gamemaster:You're dead.
Andros:thank you
Krod:Krod actually doesn't.
Krod:Because Krod is mythic.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Krod:Krod has... Where the fuck is it?
Gamemaster:Where's what?
Krod:Divert Destiny.
Krod:Trigger.
Krod:An attacker effect would reduce it to zero hit points or kill you outright.
Krod:You defy the fate before you, calling the walls of blah blah blah.
Krod:You expend one mythic point and survive the triggering attack.
Krod:I do have one mythic point.
Gamemaster:Nice.
Krod:I gave him 23 hit points.
Gamemaster:You are standing with a number of hit points equal to 10 plus your level, regardless of how many hit points you had before.
Gamemaster:So you have 23 hit points, Grodd.
Gamemaster:But you are not dead.
Krod:Yes.
Krod:The important part.
Gamemaster:Cedric, anything else you'd like to do?
Cedric:I moved.
Cedric:I got to just move five feet because of my sorcery thing.
Cedric:I'm just going to move to here.
Gamemaster:Cool.
Gamemaster:As you run, you notice the guy that got you into this mess with the crystal is just cowering in a corner.
Cedric:Yeah.
Gamemaster:He's not a fighter.
Andros:Oh my God.
Cedric:Yeah.
Gamemaster:He doesn't know what he's doing.
Andros:This guy.
Gamemaster:He's just kind of freaking out.
Cedric:Yeah.
Gamemaster:You actually watch... He'd be a lower level than you, so you would watch at this point, already, both of his arms have turned fully green.
Andros:Oh no.
Cedric:Damn.
Cedric:All right, well... Actually, I'll be there.
Gamemaster:Um... Sure.
Cedric:Okay.
Gamemaster:It's Cursed Thought 2's turn.
Gamemaster:Cursed Thought 2 is probably going to Shadow Blast you.
Cedric:Me?
Gamemaster:No, sorry, Andrus.
Gamemaster:He's right next to Andrus, but he's going to Shadow Blast Andrus.
Cedric:Okay.
Andros:Well.
Gamemaster:Choose Acid, Bludgeoning, Cold, Electricity, Fire, Force, Piercing, Slashing, or Sonic damage.
Gamemaster:The blast deals 5d8 damage.
Gamemaster:Of the type you chose.
Gamemaster:Is there a save?
Gamemaster:Does this have a save?
Gamemaster:It must have a save.
Gamemaster:One second.
Gamemaster:Let me look up the shadow blast.
Gamemaster:Oh, okay.
Gamemaster:Basic reflex or will save.
Gamemaster:That makes sense.
Gamemaster:Andrus, choose if you would like to make a reflex or a will save as this guy shadow blasts you.
Andros:There's no traits on this guy, or on this thing.
Gamemaster:Sorry.
Gamemaster:Concentrate, manipulate, occult, and shadow.
Andros:Manipulate Reactive Strike.
Gamemaster:Okay, absolutely.
Andros:And then I will decide what I make.
Gamemaster:Yeah, make the attack.
Krod:Oh, I could have attacked that first.
Andros:Oh.
Gamemaster:I'm sorry.
Andros:Huge wolf.
Andros:Okay, I'll make her a reflex save.
Gamemaster:Sure.
Gamemaster:Excuse me.
Andros:Sorry, I have to check this trait on my .
Krod:That's unfortunate.
Krod:The first crit that I got hit with, I could have reactive striked.
Gamemaster:I'm sorry.
Andros:No.
Andros:It showed me it was almost an 18 when it rolled away.
Gamemaster:27, unfortunately, is a failure.
Andros:No.
Gamemaster:So you're going to take 34 points of... We're going to make this Sonic damage.
Gamemaster:And then he's going to attempt two claw attacks on you.
Gamemaster:Because that was only one action.
Gamemaster:Bad.
Gamemaster:Good.
Gamemaster:42 hits.
Andros:whack i'll shield block that one
Gamemaster:Okay.
Gamemaster:You're going to take 28 points of damage minus whatever is your bucks.
Gamemaster:It's Cursed Thought 1's turn.
Gamemaster:This guy is going to... I think he's going to try cursing you with darkness again.
Gamemaster:Make that fort safe, please, Grodd.
Krod:i'll try not to it does
Gamemaster:Get darkness cursed.
Gamemaster:Don't get darkness cursed.
Gamemaster:He's still going to try and attack you.
Gamemaster:He sees that you're almost dead.
Gamemaster:I rolled pretty good.
Andros:Grodd.
Gamemaster:That hits.
Gamemaster:Anything you do about it, or I make the attack?
Krod:um i don't think i have anything to do about that curses crud is now unconscious
Gamemaster:Unfortunately, big number, then.
Gamemaster:26.
Gamemaster:Crowd is unconscious.
Cedric:Kraat is... Kraat is not... Kraat is not unconscious.
Andros:I'm coming for you, Grodd.
Gamemaster:God, it's not your turn.
Gamemaster:Take it back.
Gamemaster:It's Andrews' turn.
Andros:Uh.
Krod:God is not unconscious.
Gamemaster:God is unconscious.
Gamemaster:Why is God not?
Gamemaster:Oh, you word of revision.
Krod:Word of revision.
Gamemaster:What does that do?
Cedric:I believe he's at one hit point.
Krod:Yes.
Gamemaster:What does it do?
Gamemaster:It's your hit points.
Gamemaster:It remains at one hit point.
Gamemaster:Great.
Cedric:And since I moved last turn, he is now 50 feet and within range.
Cedric:Ah, if you had that coming, I would have saved my spell slot.
Gamemaster:Nice.
Andros:First action, I will taunt and shield against this cursed thought in front of Krod Snodman.
Andros:And my shield is raised.
Andros:Next, I will Doctor's Visitation.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Cedric:No, I'm happy he's up.
Cedric:I'm happy he's up.
Gamemaster:Wow.
Andros:stride over here uh and battle medicine crawd if if it will let me roll uh
Gamemaster:Don't worry.
Gamemaster:So you click Battle Medicine.
Gamemaster:And then for Battle Medicine, you click Treat Wounds.
Gamemaster:And then in Treat Wounds, you scroll down until you see Treat Wounds with the HTML tag symbol.
Gamemaster:And you click that.
Gamemaster:And that should let you roll it, which is ridiculous.
Andros:Okay.
Andros:I'll just do a... I've been rolling pretty badly, so I'll just... Do I made a risky surgery and kill Krod?
Gamemaster:Yes.
Gamemaster:Success.
Gamemaster:You get 20 points again.
Krod:All right, nice.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Gamemaster:That's two actions.
Gamemaster:What's your third action?
Andros:Third action.
Andros:Punch this cursed thought.
Gamemaster:That hits.
Andros:I have done 20 points of damage to the cursed thought.
Gamemaster:He takes 20 points of damage.
Gamemaster:He's not looking great.
Gamemaster:He is still standing, but he's not looking great.
Gamemaster:And your turn.
Andros:That is all I got.
Gamemaster:It's Carnivorous Inc.
Gamemaster:2's turn.
Gamemaster:He's simple.
Gamemaster:He's going to attempt to pseudopod you until that works.
Andros:But.
Gamemaster:It did work the first time.
Gamemaster:But...
Gamemaster:It also didn't work the second time.
Gamemaster:Nor did it work the third time.
Gamemaster:These guys don't have a lot to do until they grab you, and unfortunately your AC is just ridiculous, so I don't know if that's ever going to happen.
Gamemaster:It's Cedric's turn.
Gamemaster:Part of the problem is they have to get you on the first or second action, because it's a third action to grab you.
Gamemaster:So even if I hit you on a Hail Mary on the third one, it doesn't do anything.
Cedric:I don't like my positioning, but sometimes he's gotta do what you gotta do.
Gamemaster:Cedric, it's your turn.
Cedric:So I will.
Cedric:Uh.
Gamemaster:Die.
Cedric:No.
Andros:Oh, no.
Cedric:Then I will do this.
Krod:That wouldn't be smart.
Krod:Why would he do that?
Gamemaster:I choose to pass.
Andros:Be a bad move.
Gamemaster:The man is striking Shirley.
Cedric:Charlie.
Cedric:Shirley is even doing something.
Cedric:seventh level on the two cursed thoughts.
Cedric:And this should have advantage because of my spell.
Gamemaster:Yep.
Cedric:Yes.
Gamemaster:Turned into a crit.
Andros:Nice.
Cedric:Dope, dope, dope.
Cedric:So now you need to make a fort save.
Gamemaster:That is a success, dropped down to a failure, and a failure dropped down to a critical failure.
Cedric:Cool.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Gamemaster:He failed, so he takes the full 78 points of damage.
Gamemaster:He is mortal.
Gamemaster:He's hanging on by a thread.
Gamemaster:And then Cursed Thought 2's turn, they take double damage, which disintegrates them wholly, which means they go from injured to dead, skipping the bloody attack where they get to make three attacks on you.
Cedric:Cool.
Cedric:Yes.
Cedric:Yes.
Cedric:Gosh.
Gamemaster:And they just vaporize into dust.
Cedric:And with my propellers, I get to move because I used my sorcery stuff.
Andros:That.
Cedric:So I move five feet.
Gamemaster:I like the difference between the two damage messages.
Cedric:That is my turn.
Gamemaster:I just revealed them to you so you can see what they look like.
Andros:Over there.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Gamemaster:Krod, it's your turn.
Gamemaster:You have been almost killed twice in the past six seconds.
Krod:yay yes um i am going to use a healing potion um i'll do it after i i'll do it after i make this swing though first on the off chance
Gamemaster:If you insist.
Gamemaster:68.
Gamemaster:Oh.
Andros:That's a good healing potion.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Gamemaster:You have to make an attack.
Gamemaster:He makes an attack.
Gamemaster:That hits.
Gamemaster:Roll damage.
Gamemaster:24 is better than 5.
Krod:24.
Krod:Oh, nice.
Gamemaster:He's dead.
Krod:And then I will use my help.
Gamemaster:You chop him again.
Gamemaster:44 points of healing.
Krod:Crod's back, baby.
Gamemaster:Excellent.
Krod:And that's the turn.
Gamemaster:Andrus, you're still engaging some carnivorous apes.
Andros:Yeah, I'll just... I'm just going to start swinging.
Andros:I'll swing on this guy.
Gamemaster:Yeah.
Andros:Oh.
Gamemaster:That hits.
Cedric:At two hits, it's crazy.
Andros:That's a very low AC.
Gamemaster:Absolutely.
Krod:There it is.
Andros:20 points of piercing damage.
Gamemaster:Unfortunately, it doesn't seem too effective, I think.
Andros:They're immune to piercing.
Andros:Oh, gosh.
Gamemaster:Yeah.
Andros:Uh... In that case, I will use my faith tattoo.
Gamemaster:They're losers.
Andros:Uh... I guess cast a third-rank harm?
Andros:Okay.
Gamemaster:That would work.
Gamemaster:Do you have the ability to cast Arm?
Cedric:if they have regular healing.
Andros:I think you have to give it to me.
Gamemaster:Do I have to give her to you?
Gamemaster:Arm?
Andros:It's through this faith tattoo.
Gamemaster:You know, a third rank Arm.
Andros:Nice.
Andros:I cast harm.
Andros:I try to talk to this guy.
Gamemaster:He's not undead, but I also... How many actions are you harming him?
Andros:Just the one-act.
Gamemaster:Two actions?
Andros:Nah, just the one-act.
Gamemaster:One action.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Gamemaster:Do the one action harm.
Andros:He must make this basic save.
Gamemaster:He does succeed, so he's going to take half of whatever harm damage you do.
Andros:That's a pretty good roll.
Andros:Takes nine points of harm.
Gamemaster:Nine points of harm.
Gamemaster:And... I'm just not going to bother updating the numbers.
Andros:Oh, gosh.
Cedric:Yeah.
Andros:And then I'll just do the good old taunt and shield.
Andros:And I'll taunt the one closest to me.
Andros:And also shield.
Andros:That is my turn.
Gamemaster:Okay, great.
Gamemaster:This guy's turned.
Gamemaster:It's all three of their turns.
Gamemaster:These guys can no longer engulf you, so they're just going to continue on pseudopod attacks.
Gamemaster:But your AC is ridiculously high.
Gamemaster:I don't know if they'll ever hit you.
Andros:No, one of those hit.
Gamemaster:One of those hit?
Andros:Yeah.
Gamemaster:Oh, the first one hit, so it wouldn't have done the third one, because it would have grabbed you instead.
Gamemaster:I just hit all of the buttons, just in case.
Gamemaster:Okay, pseudopod attack.
Gamemaster:37 points of damage.
Andros:Okay, I'm going to block, but I'm going to make it an aggressive block.
Gamemaster:Okay, he'll be flat-footed.
Andros:Bummer.
Andros:I was hoping he would do the other one.
Gamemaster:No, he wants to grab you.
Gamemaster:I've been trying to grab you for four rounds now.
Andros:Well, still pretty rude.
Andros:Wow, that was a lot of damage.
Andros:Jeez.
Gamemaster:And it grabbed.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Gamemaster:Next up is the other small one's turn.
Gamemaster:Maybe we'll take this more slowly.
Gamemaster:We'll do one at a time.
Andros:Oh, my flat footer from being grabbed.
Gamemaster:That hits.
Andros:Oh, gosh.
Gamemaster:Sick.
Gamemaster:You're going to take 27 points of damage.
Andros:I will not shield block that because my shields can break.
Gamemaster:It is already grabbing you, or you're already being grabbed, so it grabs you again.
Gamemaster:So now you have two things grabbing you.
Gamemaster:And then for its third action, it's going to attempt to constrict you.
Gamemaster:So make that fort safe, please.
Andros:Oh no!
Andros:I failed!
Gamemaster:That's a failure, so you're going to take this bludgeoning and acid damage.
Gamemaster:15.
Gamemaster:And then it's this guy's turn.
Andros:I just have 15 different inks on me over here.
Gamemaster:What's their move speed?
Gamemaster:Their move speed is bad.
Gamemaster:That's two actions.
Krod:they call him the ink guy attack of opportunity get inked up this does no damage but it'll apply the effects
Gamemaster:Yeah, that works.
Andros:Oh, wow, that was...
Gamemaster:Critically hits.
Gamemaster:Yeah.
Gamemaster:He is frightened and off guard.
Andros:Wow.
Gamemaster:OK.
Gamemaster:He's going to attack you for that.
Gamemaster:That was rude of you.
Andros:That is a great.
Gamemaster:I'm just really trying to kill Krog specifically because I think shootings are dumb.
Gamemaster:And that is the end of its turn.
Gamemaster:Cedric.
Cedric:uh cricket casting you gotta make a uh dfdc
Andros:Wolf.
Gamemaster:Okay, excellent.
Gamemaster:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Gamemaster:These guys don't have particularly good reflexes.
Gamemaster:They're oozes.
Gamemaster:He has 30 hit points left.
Cedric:Number two, the lower one.
Gamemaster:Vaporized.
Gamemaster:Okay, I think this is just going to wipe all of them out.
Gamemaster:Magic is OP.
Cedric:They could basically succeed.
Gamemaster:I think I need to nerf casters.
Gamemaster:okay so that one also kills this guy um this guy has 25 hit points left if i critically succeed i'm fine if i get any other number i'm not fine is that a critical success okay
Krod:Oh.
Andros:Peace.
Cedric:They could critically succeed.
Cedric:They could critically succeed.
Cedric:Yeah.
Cedric:No.
Krod:Not that I can tell.
Cedric:I also did it quick in casting, so I was going to do action 7th level fireball anyone who survived.
Gamemaster:So, once again, we end an encounter with Cedric casting an AoE effectively spell that just wipes out the remaining players off the board.
Cedric:Yes.
Gamemaster:Okay.
Gamemaster:With all of the immediate dangers revealed, you still see that the green stone-like material is growing up your hand.
Gamemaster:But you see that the stairway almost grows out of the void a little bit, and it appears to leave the book.
Gamemaster:You can either follow it into the void, or use it to leave the void.
Andros:i think we're going in we came this far i'm going in
Gamemaster:Or use it to leave the book.
Cedric:We going in, boys?
Cedric:All right, let's go in.
Cedric:I'll go in, too.
Gamemaster:Okay, you guys enter the void.
Krod:Ugh.
Cedric:Is our friend dead?
Gamemaster:And we'll... He's probably like... Yeah, he'd be dead at this point.
Gamemaster:The stone would have reached his torso.
Gamemaster:And you can't really breathe if your lungs are made out of rock.
Gamemaster:You guys enter the void, and that's where we cut.
Andros:Oh.
Cedric:All right, I just want to put it out there.
Cedric:I specifically left three spell slots for banish.
Cedric:So we could banish ourselves out of here, theoretically.
Gamemaster:That's fun.
Cedric:That was my backup plan.
Cedric:Just, yeah.
Gamemaster:That's a good thought.
Cedric:And I have quicken casting, and I totally would try to evac my friends.
Gamemaster:Yeah, you guys might not be on your home plane.
Andros:Oh, gosh.
Gamemaster:Excuse me.
Gamemaster:That makes sense.
Gamemaster:That's fun.
Gamemaster:Oh, no, sorry.
Gamemaster:You can't cast banishment on yourself.
Cedric:I know.
Gamemaster:You can't cast it on other people either.
Cedric:Oh, why not?
Cedric:Oh, it's smart.
Gamemaster:Banishment only works if you are currently on your home plane of existence.
Andros:Oh.
Cedric:OK, sad.
Gamemaster:You can banish people away from your home plane.
Gamemaster:You cannot banish yourself to your home plane.
Cedric:Sad.
Gamemaster:They thought of it.
Gamemaster:The creators were thinking of it.
Andros:I feel like he may be back.
Gamemaster:Yeah, but that's definitely an interesting thought.
Gamemaster:We may or may not pick this up at some point.
Gamemaster:I don't know what we're doing next week.
Gamemaster:Is Tanner back?
Gamemaster:Do we get one week where all of us are around?
Gamemaster:And then... Okay.
Cedric:I'm not sure I'm going to be able to play next week, but... Okay.
Gamemaster:That's fine.
Gamemaster:I'm not going to be around the week of the 13th either.
Gamemaster:So...
Andros:So the week of the 20th, we restart the campaign.
Gamemaster:This just happens to be a... Yeah.
Cedric:So we might end up taking F3 week.
Cedric:Alright.
Gamemaster:I should have added more clues pointing you towards doing stuff with the book.
Gamemaster:It occurred to me, once you guys were scrambling around, being like, okay, now we need to go back to that guy that we spoke to the first time for the third time, and he needs to arrange a meeting, and then we'll go to an alley and pretend to be this guy again, all that.
Gamemaster:I'm like, oh no.
Gamemaster:I've set them on a wild case chase.
Krod:I think we made the right call.
Krod:This fucking guy brought us into the death book.
Gamemaster:Yeah.
Krod:If you told us this brings you into the book and you don't have to fight stuff or this brings you into the book, which I'd be like, I don't want to go to a fight.
Krod:That sounds fucking scary.
Krod:Why would we go to a book?
Cedric:Is that a... Wait, before you hop up.
Andros:Yeah, that's what you get.
Gamemaster:Yeah, no, totally fair.
Gamemaster:But, I mean, story-wise, now it wasn't you guys that brought you into the book.
Gamemaster:It was the competence of your dead, uh, co-worker.
Krod:Yeah.
Gamemaster:Great.
Andros:Well, fellas, I got to be up early tomorrow, so I will hop off.
Gamemaster:Um, yeah.
Cedric:Is that a blue-footed booby?
Andros:Yeah.
Cedric:Amazing.
Gamemaster:It's two.
Cedric:Alright.
Gamemaster:It's blue-footed boobies.
Cedric:Yeah.
Andros:Don't be looking at my boobies.
Cedric:Amazing.
Cedric:All right.
Andros:But.
Cedric:Goodnight.
Gamemaster:Adios.
Krod:See ya.