2026-8-17 — Akasha

Argyle:you Howdy

Argyle:I can hear you.

Benny:I don't know what this is doing.

Benny:Can you hear me?

Argyle:Yeah, I can hear you.

Argyle:Can you hear me?

Benny:Yeah, is this the correct mic?

Argyle:Yeah, that sounds good.

Benny:Nice.

Benny:Why isn't everything

Benny:So I have several transcripts.

Argyle:Okay.

Benny:Language models playing secret Hitler.

Benny:I know my brother suggested audio

Argyle:With audio or no?

Benny:but Jesus Christ

Benny:I have to add so many rules to these motherfuckers

Benny:they just talk and talk and say the same shit

Benny:and they're all stupid

Benny:I'm also using

Benny:I just kept letting Claude make decisions

Benny:on how this runs

Benny:because I didn't want to think too much on one part

Benny:I just wanted to get transcripts

Benny:So it picked like a selection, like seven different models to play a seven person game. And then we hit the $5 game cap, like almost immediately. And I was like, $5 just went on $5.

Argyle:All right.

Benny:player what the fuck happened claude tell me what happened with this why is this broken and then it's

Benny:like ah it's some of these models are expensive gpt filled up its scratch pad and spent three

Benny:thousand or five thousand tokens per session reasoning i'm like what the fuck is what's the

Benny:cheapest model we have and it's like mistral large i'm like make everyone mistral large all right i'm

Benny:not paying fucking ten dollars to to read a transcript of the most lobotomized things on

Benny:the planet play a bluffing game they have a lot of trouble lying they have so much trouble just

Benny:saying what's not true it's even with like sharpened prompts like and reading these transcripts

Benny:is so funny because it's like lena fascist nominates greta fascist uh fascist policy

Benny:passed auto asks lena why did you why did you pass a fascist policy which cards did you get

Benny:Lena, let's not jump to conclusions.

Benny:Just lie about the cards you got.

Argyle:Which model are you switching to?

Benny:Let's not jump to any rash conclusions.

Benny:The next round, they keep pressing her.

Benny:Two of the liberals keep pressing her.

Benny:And she's like, guys, your questions are distracting.

Benny:The real problem here.

Benny:And she just never lies about the cards, ever.

Benny:I have to be like, you can lie.

Benny:Other people will lie to you.

Benny:But I'm also switching to a more powerful model,

Benny:and I'm hoping it's more capable of lying.

Benny:GPT Luna.

Benny:Because again, I don't...

Argyle:Were you using Soul?

Anzu:Are you making a game Mike You getting fake people to play Secret Hitler

Johnny:Thank you Are you for fun or for profit

Benny:At this point, we have it...

Benny:No, no, no, no.

Argyle:Before?

Benny:I was using Mistral Large, which released

Argyle:No, when you got the $5.

Benny:in...

Benny:No, it was another GPT.

Benny:I don't know what made it...

Argyle:I'm really surprised it was $5.

Argyle:It must have been like on a loop or something.

Benny:They just say a bunch of nonsense.

Benny:And also, the games are long as fuck.

Benny:They talk for probably too long.

Argyle:Yeah.

Benny:No this is secret Hitler I getting language models to play Secret Hitler

Argyle:Yeah.

Benny:For fun.

Benny:I don't know how in the world I could make money off of...

Benny:It's so expensive to run these per game, and I keep asking Opus.

Benny:I'm like, can you check and see if we can curb any more token costs?

Anzu:Okay.

Benny:Because this feels expensive as fuck, and it's like, no.

Benny:We fixed this bug and that was it.

Benny:Another bug, like $3 or $5 is gone.

Argyle:You know,

Benny:The game cap is now $1, and I do a check-in with Claude.

Benny:I go, tell me if there's anything weird in the transcript,

Benny:summarize it, whatever, and if it looks good, we'll keep going.

Benny:Otherwise, I'm tweaking and we're restarting,

Benny:and we'll go dollar by dollar.

Benny:But when I hit the $5 cap, I was like, dude, I have $20 on OpenRouter.

Benny:We're going to blow through this.

Argyle:do you have cloud code?

Argyle:Mike?

Argyle:you can tell it's just use your

Benny:Yeah.

Benny:Yeah, I might use that for more of the high, I don't know, more interesting runs.

Argyle:cloud code subscription with dash p

Argyle:you get a lot of use out of it

Argyle:and then that's like the worst you can

Argyle:blow up is your day or

Argyle:your five hour window or something like that but honestly

Argyle:yeah you can try

Argyle:that

Benny:Right now I'm just trying to make sure that the models aren't completely fucking lobotomized and like helping them in the prompt as much as I can.

Benny:But I don't know how much first principles fucking secret Hitler tactics that I'm supposed to instruct these things.

Benny:I want them to come up with shit instead of being like, you can lie about your cards.

Benny:It's like the whole point is lie about your cards.

Benny:It's like, what's going on?

Benny:They really, I mean, at least the ones that I'm using, they could be just completely lobotomized.

Benny:I think I picked a bad model to burn $15 on.

Argyle:Thank you You can also just spend on Codex get a monthly subscription

Benny:But yeah I going to give it to Luna And hopefully given that it recent there like a huge discount for running it on open router right now I won I won get

Benny:absolutely the most psychotic dumb

Benny:people this is a funny thing

Argyle:and just have Codex do the Dashpeak.

Argyle:You'll get a lot of uses, I promise you.

Benny:yeah

Benny:but the

Benny:funny thing

Benny:the thing that i think is funniest is they won't lie they can't lie at least the from the prompt

Benny:and the size of the models they're just not smart enough to lie and the prompt doesn't help them

Benny:enough but what they will do is they will hallucinate stuff that supports their their

Benny:things so they won't say unverifiable lies which are the best ones they'll say verifiable lies like

Benny:what are you talking about i played a liberal policy last round and all of the other bots even

Benny:as dumb as they are, just turn to that person and go,

Benny:the election failed last round.

Argyle:I can hear him.

Benny:No policy was played.

Anzu:Oh.

Johnny:You guys in the same room right now?

Gamemaster:Huh? Huh? Huh?

Benny:And he's like,

Benny:Yeah, we can't hear you, Josh.

Johnny:

Benny:Hello?

Gamemaster:Okay, I can see on Discord the little indicator when it's picking up my audio,

Argyle:Can't hear you.

Anzu:Oh.

Argyle:Can't hear you.

Johnny:Oh, you keep...

Benny:No.

Gamemaster:so if you can't hear me, that's your problem.

Argyle:Man, can anyone hear Josh right now?

Benny:No.

Gamemaster:You know I have the power to just kick you from the call, right?

Argyle:Oh my god, I can suddenly hear Josh. Wow.

Benny:I have his volumes into zero, but now I can hear him.

Gamemaster:Yeah, unfortunately I don't get to override your local settings for my volume.

Benny:That would be like the zoom request to unmute feature

Gamemaster:That would be funny.

Benny:that pops up like this terrifying box.

Benny:It's just like, host wants you to talk.

Benny:Like it how it feels every time

Gamemaster:So are you playing Secret Hitler with LLMs

Benny:Uh-huh, I'm not playing if I was playing I would win every time because these things are absolutely stupid

Gamemaster:Why?

Gamemaster:Are you just having them play against each other?

Benny:Uh-huh, I want to see what they do

Gamemaster:Why?

Benny:I thought it'd be funny

Gamemaster:Okay.

Gamemaster:Yeah.

Benny:to read some of the transcripts

Benny:and some of them are funny

Benny:but sometimes it's just like

Benny:Lena

Benny:looks at Otto's

Benny:whatever

Benny:party affiliation card

Benny:Otto's a liberal

Benny:Lena's a fascist

Benny:no one asks

Benny:and Lena doesn't make anything up

Benny:Otto's a fascist

Benny:no one asks what is Otto

Benny:what did you see

Benny:no one cares

Gamemaster:I mean, because they can't actually think things.

Benny:well no no but this is the thing there have been like weird tactical flourishes

Benny:like i've only run like three or four games of these and in towards the end with my prompting

Benny:they would be absolutely stupid in discussions like just completely forgetting what the fuck

Benny:is going on even though i'm holding their hand with they have their own notepad to write round

Benny:by round thoughts uh there were two executions somehow fascists got six policies played which

Benny:as far as i understand it doesn't really happen in normal play six fascist policies is crazy

Benny:um but there were six played so there were two executions a fascist president killed the leading

Benny:liberal like the one that actually had the best idea of who was a fascist and the uh liberal

Benny:president killed the leading

Benny:fascist after

Benny:that was like the next round and I was like

Benny:holy fuck wait these are the most tactically

Benny:correct things you could have made

Benny:like you took out the best voice

Benny:convincing everyone else and then they're just like

Argyle:Have you tried...

Benny:aww

Argyle:Have you tried giving them a personality on Game Start?

Benny:um i want to do that later

Benny:i want them to comprehend the game vaguely before but also too far with the role playing

Argyle:Yeah, so you'll be like, you are an idiot.

Argyle:Or you are calculating, and you are.

Benny:they're like the first transcript i'm reading i'm like i'm gonna throw up this is fucking this is

Argyle:Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.

Benny:dumb. It's like,

Benny:are we sure we should

Benny:nominate Boris? Do we trust him

Argyle:this uh i was trying to play make a dnd game the problem was a lot of these issues one line was

Benny:to lead with integrity? And I'm like, shut the

Benny:fuck up. This is a game. Shut up.

Benny:What are we talking about, integrity?

Argyle:really hard so i did gate it behind checks which was fine but at the end of the day for me it was

Argyle:just cost it's like it's so expensive to run a decent one and also so i looked online also i was

Argyle:thinking about like trying to open source the pathfinder assistant or like something like that

Argyle:because technically i could charge for it based on the licenses i think um i forget the rules but

Argyle:like the way the licenses are made that like if i buy the content or something like that and they

Argyle:don't allow like generation of it whatever whatever it is um but the community in general just really

Argyle:hates AI.

Argyle:So I don't think it'd be worth it.

Gamemaster:genuinely understandable.

Argyle:And 5e wouldn't be worth it, because

Argyle:Hasbro.

Gamemaster:Well, yeah, you definitely

Gamemaster:couldn't do it for 5e, but I also do understand

Gamemaster:generally the negative opinion

Gamemaster:that people

Gamemaster:in creative fields have against AI.

Argyle:My thing is that

Argyle:I wouldn't want to release a product

Argyle:to stop people from playing

Argyle:the game. I was mostly trying to come with

Argyle:like some game that you could play with if you don't have friends.

Argyle:But the other thing that I would actually want to surface to people is just like something you can ask about rules because it sucks pathfinder not enough people ask

Gamemaster:you I mean like generally I think the response to that is read the book

Argyle:stuff on reddit so no model knows how to answer it it fucking sucks

Argyle:that's just not that's just not like inclusive for a lot of people they're

Gamemaster:Okay.

Benny:To be fair, you need to have a very high IQ to understand an object.

Gamemaster:I think...

Argyle:just not going to be able to memorize all these fucking facts

Argyle:there's a surprisingly large amount of people that like i know played the indeed i've been

Gamemaster:Yeah, I think you...

Argyle:playing for years and they don't grasp

Argyle:5e there's no way of most of the

Argyle:population even has the capabilities to

Argyle:play Pathfinder

Argyle:no you just have to be like a nerd

Benny:well to be fair I was doing a

Johnny:So, Jorge, what you're saying is that everyone in this group is smarter than the average

Argyle:that's really good at memorizing these

Argyle:types of facts like that's your brain

Argyle:needs to be wired to memorize these

Argyle:types of facts you're not smarter than

Gamemaster:Yeah.

Argyle:these people you just know how to that's

Argyle:it that's all your brain works and

Argyle:I know.

Johnny:bear.

Johnny:Mike, how did you know that I love Rick and Morty?

Benny:the Rick and Morty copy pasta

Benny:well the reaction wasn't consummate

Gamemaster:No, we all knew that.

Argyle:Yeah, I know.

Johnny:was so high.

Benny:you guys don't think I'm funny

Benny:nerd

Anzu:did go through a phase back when we first started playing where i read the player's handbook like

Anzu:crazy and i knew like the page number of where most of the classes started like so it does happen

Gamemaster:I mean, it's one of those things that you'll get over time playing, where you'll offload

Anzu:but it takes being you know a special kind of person

Argyle:yeah

Argyle:that's also

Johnny:or you get to a point where you can only play with people who also know the rules like I have friends here

Gamemaster:onto the GM to know for you.

Gamemaster:Or you have to look stuff up during the game, which is what we do.

Argyle:yeah but it so hard to look stuff up in pathfinder i feel like it so much harder than yeah

Gamemaster:We look stuff up It happens No it not you have a search bar

Johnny:who I run a campaign

Argyle:yeah and like one of my friends from high school she's been playing dnd like

Johnny:for them so I don't play I don't technically play

Johnny:but I know the rules and then one of them tried running a

Johnny:short mini campaign and I

Johnny:trounced all the other characters I know it's not a

Johnny:competition but their characters were bad

Gamemaster:It is a competition.

Argyle:every day or every week for years and like still doesn't know a lot of rules granted

Gamemaster:But I...

Argyle:she's not the smartest but a lot of her team apparently doesn't either

Gamemaster:I don't...

Argyle:because it's dnd i think dnd is way more forgiving than pathfinder

Gamemaster:See, like, I think the problem there is that you are attributing...

Gamemaster:Like, there is a difference between knows all of the rules and needs to know all of the rules.

Gamemaster:You know?

Gamemaster:Like, they've been playing for however long, successfully, without knowing the rules.

Gamemaster:Right, but that...

Gamemaster:But my point in general is that, like, I think you are fundamentally confusing wanting to know all of the rules with needing to know all of the rules.

Benny:Also, wait.

Johnny:There can't be a split in the party, though.

Argyle:Yeah.

Gamemaster:I highly doubt that they are unable to learn the rules.

Gamemaster:Like, fundamentally, there just aren't that many rules to learn in either system.

Johnny:It's either everyone knows the rules or no one knows the rules.

Johnny:And if, like, some know the rules...

Gamemaster:No.

Gamemaster:No, there definitely can be.

Gamemaster:Because, like, if some players have a tolerance for other players not knowing the rules and just being like, oh yeah, you do X, Y, and Z, like, it's fine. You make it. It's a collaborative effort. I don't think there's any need to be like, this idiot doesn't know the rules.

Johnny:I don't think it lasts long term though.

Argyle:I don't know.

Gamemaster:Counterpoint, critical role, like flat out.

Johnny:If there's people who like, okay, in the beginning,

Argyle:Agreed with Noah.

Johnny:in the beginning, if some people don't know the rules,

Johnny:you can pick up the slack.

Johnny:But like in a long running game where you're like,

Johnny:I know all the rules.

Johnny:How do you not know what your proficiency bonus is?

Argyle:Yeah and they had to leave D Yeah but did they make a new system because they were too stupid to play it

Benny:you I sorry Josh

Johnny:What I thought it was you dude

Gamemaster:No they didn they currently play D They made a new system because they wanted some way to like address a more narrative campaign

Gamemaster:They still play Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition.

Gamemaster:They have hundreds of hours in Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition.

Argyle:Also,

Argyle:so

Argyle:also I straight up

Johnny:It does feel like...

Johnny:It does feel like they sat down, though,

Gamemaster:Like...

Benny:That's so funny.

Johnny:and they were like, you have to lose.

Gamemaster:I'm not...

Benny:I know you're not intending to be like,

Benny:no, no, no, they didn't dumb it down.

Gamemaster:It's...

Benny:They just opted for a more narrative-focused system, okay?

Gamemaster:When I say narrative-focused, I mean it's because...

Benny:You don't have to know things.

Argyle:stopped watching Critical Role

Gamemaster:The reason I say narrative-focused as to qualify this is specifically because if you look at, just percentage-wise,

Argyle:because they were so dumb

Argyle:um

Gamemaster:where the rules in both D&D and Pathfinder fit in the three, like, tenets of, like, social exploration and fighting,

Gamemaster:that you generally see across these, something like 85% of the rules in both systems is for fighting.

Johnny:If you want to do a narrative-focused campaign without fighting, there's better TTRPGs.

Gamemaster:They are primarily games about fighting other things.

Gamemaster:Which is great, unless you want to make a campaign in which you're not fighting things.

Gamemaster:At which point, why are you bothering with Dungeons & Dragons or with Pathfinder?

Gamemaster:I'm not saying go to Daggerheart.

Argyle:Tanner, what were you going to say?

Gamemaster:Like, go to some other system, do...

Gamemaster:Sorry.

Gamemaster:Exactly! Like, the reason you play these games is because you want to do fighting,

Benny:I didn't

Anzu:Oh, that was just to make a dumb comment.

Johnny:Oh, wait, no, we got to, I know it's out of context now, but I want to hear it.

Gamemaster:but if you don't want to do fighting, then don't play Dungeons & Dragons!

Benny:yeah Tanner

Benny:oh no I'm going to make one too

Argyle:You had raised your hand.

Anzu:Definitely keep going.

Argyle:Okay.

Benny:I'm going to make one too

Benny:yeah

Anzu:I was going to say I have...

Anzu:Oh, no.

Argyle:So do most of your other parties know the rules?

Anzu:It was something along the lines of

Gamemaster:Okay.

Anzu:I get along very well with the ignorant, I believe.

Anzu:Because we were talking about

Anzu:can you play with people who don't know the rules?

Argyle:Do they not?

Benny:and your level of rage

Anzu:It varies, I will say.

Johnny:I, okay.

Gamemaster:I don't think everybody feels rage at somebody else not knowing the rules in the way that

Anzu:Person to person, it definitely varies.

Anzu:We...

Benny:is it correlated

Benny:well okay don't single me out here

Gamemaster:you do.

Benny:because Noah also earlier was like

Benny:don't you hate when people

Gamemaster:Yeah.

Benny:you can't even play with them after like a couple of

Benny:sessions

Johnny:I'm going to, I'm setting my ground.

Johnny:if after a couple of sessions, not even a couple of sessions,

Johnny:but after like a few months of playing together,

Argyle:agreed agreed

Anzu:Oh, I mean, there's definitely a minimum level.

Johnny:this person's like, how do I roll to attack?

Johnny:Why are you even here?

Johnny:What do you mean you're a rogue who's asking what sneak attack is?

Argyle:don't don't tell this to josh he's pro people who are lobotomized blank

Anzu:Like, you should be able to run your character

Anzu:at least to a degree, yeah.

Gamemaster:well

Argyle:but also like i think there's also a difference between knowing the rules which i'm not even

Gamemaster:no I like

Johnny:Josh is throwing narrative play.

Anzu:Yeah.

Johnny:Listen, just because every time we have to do a counteract check, everyone has to spend

Argyle:saying you need to know, but saying that

Argyle:Pathfinder is so annoying

Argyle:to index

Argyle:information. Like, if it's a cut-and-drive rule,

Argyle:sure. But, like, there's so

Argyle:many rules that, like, the Sage advice

Argyle:are so helpful for.

Johnny:five minutes rereading the rules every single time.

Gamemaster:yeah

Gamemaster:I'm not saying that there aren't bits of Pathfinder that are annoying and that it's, like, difficult to figure stuff out to, like, go back in and do that.

Argyle:Mm-hmm.

Gamemaster:And sure, like, having a tool to help with recall there might be useful.

Gamemaster:But I think that is ultimately a pretty small fraction of the rules in Pathfinder.

Gamemaster:Like, sure, counteract checks. We have to go back.

Gamemaster:Every once in a while I have to go and figure out again how dragging works because we want to do that and it's not easy to find in the rules.

Gamemaster:Stuff like that. There are definitely pieces that are annoying to like have to go back and all that kind of stuff.

Gamemaster:But I think it does a disservice both to Pathfinder and to the people learning how to play the game to be like oh this is the hardest nerdiest system Like there so many stupid people that could never learn how to play

Johnny:you Oh wait

Argyle:you How do you

Gamemaster:Pathfinder unless they had Claude to tell them how to do it. Like, I say Dungeons and Dragons.

Argyle:How do you describe Pathfinder to people that play D&D?

Gamemaster:I say Dungeons and Dragons with a slightly different rule set.

Argyle:But if you had...

Argyle:What do you say, Noah?

Johnny:Am I telling people, like, what I...

Johnny:I'm like, oh, I'm gonna go do what I'm, like, doing tonight.

Argyle:know what I'm saying?

Benny:I don't even try to explain it.

Gamemaster:Hi.

Johnny:I'm like, oh, I'm playing Dungeons & Dragons.

Johnny:But if someone's like, what's the rules that you use?

Argyle:Like, if you want to,

Argyle:if you want to describe Pathfinder

Johnny:I use, like, oh, we...

Johnny:It's like Dungeons & Dragons, but you want more rules.

Argyle:to someone who plays Dungeons & Dragons,

Argyle:how do you describe it?

Argyle:That's how I describe it, too.

Benny:I go, listen, if you're playing 5e, there's no fucking way you can understand what I do.

Johnny:Like, do you just go, do you watch Rick and Morty?

Johnny:Is it your favorite show? Do you understand it? No?

Johnny:You can't play Pathfinder?

Argyle:Yes.

Benny:I go, I just go direct.

Anzu:I usually tell people that it's a little more complex,

Anzu:but that comes with more customization.

Benny:I go, what's your education background?

Benny:And then depending on that, I usually go, here's the rule book.

Benny:And I hand it because I keep copies.

Benny:If they have what I consider to be high enough, like latent IQ from their education, I'll hand them the rule book.

Anzu:

Johnny:Patrick Bateman shit is this

Benny:And I'll go, you could probably go through this in an afternoon then.

Benny:If not, I go, don't even fucking worry about it.

Argyle:i read that uh iodine itself has contributed to millions of iq points specifically in the u.s

Argyle:the last few decades because it makes you smarter so i ask people do you have iodine

Argyle:your salt and then if they say no i don't even bother that being said i know multiple people

Argyle:like even some people

Johnny:Thank you insane

Argyle:that are

Argyle:postdocs in physics

Argyle:that are chemists

Benny:Thank you No but that

Argyle:that are like yeah my friend group it hard for us to play 5e so we have to use foundry to keep track of the rules And I like you guys are stupid You couldn even live in Pathfinder You wouldn understand

Gamemaster:you I mean we

Johnny:like I'm a physicist

Johnny:smart don't understand D&D

Gamemaster:We play Pathfinder with Foundry.

Johnny:stupid immediately

Johnny:creators

Johnny:we don't use it

Gamemaster:but we would have used it for 5e

Argyle:Yeah, we didn't need it for

Argyle:5e, is what my point is.

Gamemaster:if we were remote

Johnny:It's a sheet track of the rules.

Gamemaster:sure

Argyle:no but what i would say what i would say is if we were in person i think i would prefer not to

Johnny:We use it for the aversion.

Gamemaster:yeah no if we

Argyle:use foundry that much if we were in person for 5e i thought the whiteboard but if we're

Gamemaster:were in person no but we're remote

Argyle:but wait though if we were in person if we were in person for pathfinder i would still want

Gamemaster:we're remote we like

Gamemaster:we used shmeppy before

Gamemaster:as yeah and used foundry

Argyle:Foundry. In fact, we went

Argyle:to Noah's. We were all just like,

Argyle:we cannot use

Gamemaster:right but okay so so then i guess my question there is is are you physically incapable of

Johnny:I think we totally could.

Argyle:Pathfinder in person.

Argyle:What the fuck are you...

Gamemaster:playing pathfinder like pen and paper is it beyond it is beyond your can you cannot do it

Argyle:I don't think it'd be pleasurable.

Argyle:I don't think it'd be fun,

Argyle:I'm gonna be honest with you.

Johnny:I think that the amount of friction it would take

Gamemaster:I...

Johnny:for every time we need to find something on our character

Johnny:sheet and go through all of the numbers would

Argyle:yeah

Johnny:slow play down to a

Johnny:crawl.

Gamemaster:I...

Benny:agree, because when I play

Benny:a new character, either in 5e or

Benny:Pathfinder, and I don't know the gameplay loop,

Benny:I get the gameplay loop either from a

Benny:blog post or written down somewhere like,

Benny:here's what you should be doing with off-actions, and

Benny:get a mental idea of

Benny:attack, move, do whatever.

Benny:So if it

Benny:was like, oh, well, you have to keep track of all the

Gamemaster:Thank you so so like a lot of this is you guys don know your characters that well

Benny:different auras that are stacking and all the different effects,

Benny:just have a cheat sheet of like

Benny:15 to 20 possible auras or

Argyle:50 to 20

Benny:mods that I have.

Benny:But it's a 15

Argyle:you gotta remember

Benny:Listen this is Pathfinder alright If it was 5 I would say 5 but it fucking Pathfinder If someone has a plus one to interact with regal golems someone has a plus one to interact with books that aren

Argyle:circumstance item

Argyle:item

Benny:Yeah, that aren't that sharp.

Benny:Yeah, exactly. Circumstance, item, fucking status.

Benny:No, no, no, no, no. So...

Gamemaster:in that

Gamemaster:you don't need to

Benny:You didn't even ask me my educational background.

Gamemaster:keep track of any of the individual

Gamemaster:pluses or minuses because we're using

Gamemaster:foundry. I do not believe you're

Gamemaster:incapable of doing so. And if we were

Gamemaster:in a world where we were playing pen and paper, I think

Gamemaster:you could learn pretty easily.

Gamemaster:Unless you guys are dumber

Gamemaster:than I think you are, which you're not.

Gamemaster:Unless, you know, maybe you

Gamemaster:are, and I'm misrepresenting

Gamemaster:it. I know your

Gamemaster:educational background. I lived with you while you were doing it. Um, besides that, like, I,

Gamemaster:a lot of the stuff you're talking about of, oh no, does this guy have circumstance,

Gamemaster:or does he have a status, is he a feared, or whatever, or anything like that, is solved,

Gamemaster:first of all, by the GM. For the most part, the player does not need to keep track of that.

Gamemaster:And also, by having a piece of paper with a pen and writing, like, plus one minus one on it.

Gamemaster:I, like, these are not insurmountable things.

Gamemaster:People played Pathfinder before people had computers.

Anzu:I think that tracking all of the active statuses is probably the hardest part if you're translating

Gamemaster:Like, I, I don't know.

Argyle:yeah like all 12 of them

Argyle:what were you gonna say

Argyle:all i'm saying is yeah go ahead

Argyle:I mean

Anzu:it to paper. As Josh said, you can do it if you have just a little tracker to the side of your

Anzu:sheet of what's currently affecting me but it definitely foundry makes that much easier by

Anzu:just baking it right into the rolls and stuff like that

Argyle:I also think that when D&D was first created, it was really complicated and it was hard to find information, which is why less people played it.

Argyle:And then as they made it easier and easier, more people play it.

Argyle:And I personally like Pathfinder better because I have a computer.

Argyle:I don't know if I would have enjoyed it as much in college.

Argyle:Or even just learning about how to play a tabletop RPG and the first one being Pathfinder and then Googling shit and just having like nothing.

Argyle:I think it would be pretty difficult.

Argyle:Yeah.

Benny:yeah especially because like what there's 10 times the dnd content as far as like character

Benny:builds and like just general oh like someone connecting sparse or or far away knowledge to

Benny:like make something interesting in dnd there's like 10 times as much content as that for that

Benny:when compared to pathfinder and pathfinder has like 10 times the complexity so on an effective

Benny:basis there is 1% as much

Argyle:And I think the most important thing for both systems is OrkPub and Pathbuilder.

Anzu:I have been spinning up a new campaign for my folks back home,

Benny:coverage

Benny:of Pathfinder as there is in D&D.

Benny:That's why you

Benny:asked Claude to do it.

Argyle:If there weren't those things, I think these would be so hard.

Argyle:You just have to know a bunch of books.

Benny:Oh, making a character.

Anzu:which I've been using the last two one-shots to help worldbuild for.

Benny:you used us for land development

Anzu:but we did

Johnny:Thank you unless there some references

Gamemaster:that's a spongebob reference right okay just because i know that mike has said it before

Anzu:character creation just

Anzu:by hand

Anzu:we did level 2

Anzu:and it was arduous

Anzu:yes I did

Anzu:very good Josh

Benny:this is much better exactly Exactly

Anzu:oh that was nice

Gamemaster:and i couldn't remember the context around it but generally speaking if

Gamemaster:mike has said something previously it a Spongebob reference Correct Yeah Um yeah either way I like

Anzu:hmm you Hmm

Gamemaster:my, my pushback is specifically against, I see it a lot online of people being like, oh, Pathfinder

Gamemaster:is this big and scary and difficult thing, and also 5e is better for that kind of stuff, and I

Gamemaster:think it just comes from i i think ignorance is the wrong term but like whatever the negative

Argyle:I'm not going to.

Gamemaster:connotation equivalent of putting up on a pedestal is and that everybody's like oh it's so hard i

Gamemaster:refuse to learn it and like psych themselves out of it if that makes sense i just don't think

Gamemaster:fundamentally it's that difficult a system to learn like if we were talking about fatal then

Argyle:I'm not going to...

Gamemaster:maybe but you have good reasons not to learn fatal or gertz or any of those like old school

Gamemaster:systems. I think tabletop RPGs are the most approachable they have ever been.

Benny:i i will say i think it suffers from the same problem that like a lot of math suffers from

Gamemaster:And that was happening before computers.

Benny:and it's like an issue of prereqs so like if you were to learn pathfinder there is a way to

Benny:naturally like expand someone's knowledge of pathfinder like as they play or like i don't

Gamemaster:You guys had some trouble.

Benny:know in a simulated or tutorial or something but instead you get this huge book and it's just like

Anzu:I'm still building bad characters.

Johnny:Never forget the Moonlight Stalker fight.

Benny:character action one action two it's like you don't learn it in a way that's natural so you

Benny:just get like an entire new way of thinking thrown at you because remember we we did pathfinder after

Benny:playing um dnd for years so it was like oh yeah

Argyle:We had some trouble.

Argyle:We had a lot of trouble.

Gamemaster:You guys had some trouble.

Gamemaster:Wow That is true

Argyle:No.

Benny:Tanner, have you ever won a new character?

Anzu:you I know you run the numbers

Johnny:It just a problem that Taizo hates Tanner personally

Argyle:You just picked bad class I kidding I kidding Anzu gonna become a barbarian

Benny:Just let Benny know.

Argyle:You know, Benny's strong

Argyle:because Opitz was very confident

Argyle:there. And then when I

Johnny:You know,

Argyle:asked about Benny, it was like,

Johnny:didn't say...

Argyle:whoa, whoa, whoa, wink.

Johnny:Oh, hang on, hang on.

Benny:This is a party member.

Benny:Are you sure you want to attack him?

Argyle:I should make it fast.

Anzu:Dude.

Johnny:Is Anzu's movement speed reduced

Benny:Oh yeah, Anzu? Two shots, he's done.

Argyle:He's like, fuck that bird.

Argyle:He has a chip on his shoulder.

Johnny:because of the chip on his shoulder?

Benny:I feel like it's increased.

Johnny:How does that work?

Anzu:They kind of...

Anzu:The motivation it gives me kind of cancels out

Anzu:with any weight that it carries,

Johnny:Okay.

Anzu:so it's actually kind of net neutral.

Benny:Has he ever had...

Argyle:Anzu's just Tom Brady

Anzu:I keep it low FODMAP.

Johnny:Awesome.

Gamemaster:What?

Argyle:we should ask what Anzu eats

Argyle:does he eat inflammatory foods

Argyle:or is he too scared

Argyle:are you also on a

Benny:Jesus.

Argyle:do you know someone also on a low FODMAP journey

Argyle:that's a deep hole Tanner

Argyle:okay

Benny:Yeah.

Anzu:My brother has looked into it here and there.

Argyle:I have some family members doing low FODMAP

Benny:So he's eaten complete slop.

Argyle:and every time someone hears about it for the first time

Argyle:they're like what the fuck is that

Benny:He's having ground beef and rice and.

Anzu:Mike I should specify

Johnny:I'm looking it up right now.

Gamemaster:I am somebody hearing it for the first time and have no idea what the hell you're talking about.

Argyle:it

Anzu:my brother is not doing low FODMAP

Anzu:he is into low FODMAP

Benny:Oh, so he's looked at it and decided he wants nightshades and whatever instead of just having ground beef and rice.

Argyle:FODMAP Josh is

Argyle:they've realized that there's a

Argyle:there's a group there's a bunch of allergens that can

Argyle:affect a lot of people's IBS or IBD

Argyle:and then what you do is you go low FODMAP the idea is you it elimination you eat none of those things after a month you reset your gut bile and then you introduce things and then you can figure out what categories might be causing it

Johnny:you God my entire diet is FODMAP

Argyle:So there's a category that's like garlic, onions, things like that.

Argyle:It might be fruit tans, or it's just like berries and watermelon can be causing you problems.

Argyle:It could be gluten.

Argyle:It could be – yeah, yeah, yeah.

Johnny:All I eat is FODMAP.

Argyle:I'm fine with FODMAP, but I just know there's different people that do it.

Argyle:and it's a i've known people that thought they were like gluten-free but then it turns out they're

Anzu:Right.

Gamemaster:But this isn't a thing you'd go on to like lose weight.

Argyle:like why do i always feel like shit they actually wasn't like a it was like a fruit tan things like

Argyle:there's some wheat fruit tan that's actually giving them triggers but also like other things

Argyle:were doing it's like it helped them figure it out yeah

Argyle:no no no no no this is this is to stop shitting yourself or constipation

Gamemaster:This is a thing to go on if you have IBS.

Argyle:i'll be right back i cannot do the recaps you don't even need to wait for me

Benny:Well, I should look into it then.

Johnny:It's a pretty serious thing, but the way you described it was...

Gamemaster:Valiant.

Argyle:because i don't remember but i'm listening

Gamemaster:Well, yeah, we actually have two recaps to do here.

Gamemaster:We have one for whatever last session was, the last campaign session,

Argyle:No villain points.

Gamemaster:and then we also have one for the one-shot,

Gamemaster:if anybody wants to do that.

Anzu:Josh, this is a bit unorthodox, but do you want to give that recap?

Gamemaster:It's not technically relevant to the campaign at all,

Gamemaster:but it is fun.

Anzu:Or are you going to be talking enough tonight that you don't want to do that?

Gamemaster:The real question is, what do I get if I do the recap?

Gamemaster:Do I get a hero point?

Anzu:That's a great point.

Anzu:I forgot that there was stuff on the line.

Argyle:I don't want him to have a villain point.

Argyle:I'll do it.

Gamemaster:I get a hero point.

Gamemaster:No, I'll do it and I get a hero point

Gamemaster:and I get to use it at some point if we fight anybody today.

Argyle:Dan, are you screwed?

Benny:Holy shit.

Johnny:I'm trying to think of what we did last session.

Benny:I have four complete pages of notes.

Johnny:And I don't remember anything else that happened.

Gamemaster:God.

Benny:We did a lot.

Johnny:Last session?

Gamemaster:I'm going to do a really quick run-through of what I think happened in Tanner's one-shot.

Gamemaster:I may miss things, because I don't actually really remember.

Gamemaster:We were a bunch of orts.

Gamemaster:There was a nerd.

Gamemaster:there was

Gamemaster:god what's the archetype for

Gamemaster:for Jorge's

Argyle:Already messed up his first recap, guys.

Benny:Go live.

Anzu:Josh, were we a bunch of orts?

Johnny:Wait, wait, who was the Goliath?

Gamemaster:yes Tanner's already raising his hand

Gamemaster:you're right

Anzu:Or did somebody...

Gamemaster:there were two orts

Gamemaster:and there was somebody who didn't properly

Gamemaster:read the prompt and showed up

Gamemaster:with a goliath

Gamemaster:um

Gamemaster:Jorge

Argyle:We don't need to talk about that.

Gamemaster:Jorge was a goliath and ended up

Gamemaster:wearing green face paint

Johnny:Oh, I wasn't in the one shot, and that's what I do in the one shot.

Gamemaster:um

Gamemaster:he was in green face there was there was a nerd there was an edgelord and there was a guy in green

Benny:He was in green face.

Johnny:Wait a second.

Argyle:I was also though the only one with the completed

Gamemaster:face um no no no no no no i had a completed character sheet i just didn't give it to tanner

Argyle:character sheet so take that

Argyle:laughing

Gamemaster:i had one too clarified i sent it to him as soon as he pointed it out completed um either way the

Argyle:laughing

Gamemaster:three of them were told, hey, you gotta hunt this thing. Uh, some of them had various disagreements

Gamemaster:about if they needed to do it that were resolved pretty quickly with, like, hey, you gotta go do

Gamemaster:it. We had to go hunt a chule, which is like a big insect guy. Um, walked into the forest. God,

Gamemaster:what was the first thing? What happened before the monkey? Oh, yeah, there were some bugs. Uh,

Gamemaster:we had a chance to avoid the bugs. We chose no. We're gonna go fight the bugs. We fought the bugs.

Gamemaster:the bugs were fought. Once we were done fighting the bugs, we kept walking. We kept walking. We

Gamemaster:found a monkey I wanted to fight the monkey but they said no Feed the monkey They fed the monkey That was good The monkey liked being fed It walked away We kept going We got completely surprised

Gamemaster:There was no way around it.

Gamemaster:It just happened that the, the troll, like, snuck up on us and attacked us.

Gamemaster:We start fighting it.

Gamemaster:It starts spawning new enemies.

Gamemaster:The three of us decide we don't want to, like, go stop the spawners from making new enemies.

Gamemaster:so the spawners continue to make new bugs over time

Gamemaster:as we go through each of the rounds.

Gamemaster:Eventually, Tanner takes pity on the fact that at the rate we're going

Gamemaster:there will be 20 adds coming in at the end of a round

Gamemaster:and there's no way we can fight that.

Gamemaster:So the monkey shows up and beats up the spawners.

Gamemaster:And then eventually we beat the big bug

Gamemaster:and then we clean up the little bugs.

Gamemaster:And then we go home.

Gamemaster:And that's it. I think that's what we did, right?

Gamemaster:yeah

Argyle:Josh is just rude.

Anzu:I will note that

Gamemaster:that was the plan

Anzu:everything you said is correct

Anzu:except the pity part.

Anzu:The monkey

Anzu:in my notes

Gamemaster:it's good that that was there though

Anzu:if you had fed it, it was going to

Anzu:come and squish some of the X-Acts.

Anzu:So

Anzu:it would have been

Gamemaster:because we fully

Gamemaster:were not looking at the spawners at all

Gamemaster:it was spawning three around

Anzu:yeah.

Gamemaster:we could not kill three around

Gamemaster:so the fact that the monkey came and squashed him while we focused on the big guy was very

Benny:give me orange me eat give me give me orange me eat me orange me

Gamemaster:helpful because we would have died otherwise

Gamemaster:that is true and uh mike did some monkey sign language um

Benny:i've managed to shoehorn in a joke on give me orange me eat

Gamemaster:terrible

Benny:give me

Benny:oh I do it

Gamemaster:I will

Gamemaster:unless anybody denies it

Gamemaster:I think that was a pretty good recap

Gamemaster:I get a mythic point who wants to do a recap of the previous session Noah were you volunteering Or no I thought you Okay Noah not volunteering

Anzu:you Oh no we just made you do one

Johnny:Hello No I don

Gamemaster:Is anybody volunteering?

Gamemaster:I can do a recap if no one wants to.

Benny:we'll go through all my notes

Benny:now I hope I've delineated the session

Gamemaster:Mike has a bunch of notes.

Gamemaster:We'll see how much of them are right.

Benny:we started by

Benny:chatting a bit with the machine god

Benny:he got a little defensive

Benny:we felt a little bad

Benny:because we were asked like

Benny:can you take this over with your big army of

Benny:machine people

Benny:and he's like I don't fucking have that

Benny:what are you guys talking about

Benny:listen I got enough

Benny:I have enough

Benny:I used to fucking rule this strider asshole

Benny:don't fucking

Benny:we gathered some blue liquid

Benny:when we came out

Benny:there were some new upgrades

Benny:to

Benny:Hildebrandt

Benny:have turrets.

Benny:Oh no, the RunGunners have turrets.

Benny:Hildebrandt has a dish.

Benny:I don't know.

Benny:We took a look

Benny:at the liquid. We figured out that it was

Benny:very intentionally imbued

Benny:with the magic that it has

Benny:to react a specific way.

Benny:Let's see.

Benny:Protectorate.

Benny:They've expanded even

Benny:further their power as seen by a big tree.

Benny:The church's aurora is much bigger.

Benny:Necrolog is abandoned, but honestly, low-key, they're like dead people anyway, so how would

Benny:we even tell if they're still there?

Benny:Prime Meridian was unchanged.

Benny:Verdant Holdings experienced a schism.

Benny:I don't know.

Benny:Some other people have minds.

Benny:I don't know what AL is.

Benny:the abbreviation. I started abbreviating

Benny:because Jess was talking quickly Oh yeah so we have an alpine city thing beginning um some skyscrapers radiant arms got nothing uh pls

Argyle:Ha ha ha ha ha

Anzu:you you lantern society

Benny:uh oh yeah a lot of paved of yeah well that i know i just call them pls normally

Benny:um yeah there's a bunch of upgrades turning heavy um we Ætherion limited that one i wouldn't

Gamemaster:Ætherion Limited is AL.

Benny:remember uh oh let's see we learned a little bit about aurelia um whether she was reincarnated or

Benny:not and people getting mad some dalai lama shit going on uh benny uh hung out at the gym

Benny:trained a bit of the crew members a lot of people weren't into it they'll die

Benny:first the menagerie is seven days away see

Argyle:They didn't let me last turn, actually.

Gamemaster:He...

Benny:Argyle attempted to remedy a very powerful hag's curse we'll leave it

Benny:Oh he did a bunch of meditating then in there in their area

Argyle:Yeah.

Gamemaster:He attempted to get rid of it twice already,

Gamemaster:so I didn't let him reroll,

Gamemaster:but he did some prep for maybe when he levels up,

Benny:nice

Gamemaster:he can attempt it again.

Benny:um

Argyle:Josh broke the rules.

Benny:Anzu

Benny:was like staring at shit

Benny:and like yo I think

Benny:I think I'm getting somewhere

Benny:and we're like yeah hurry up cause

Benny:your sister's life is on the line

Benny:um

Benny:yeah he realized that he needs a living reference

Benny:to the Herald song

Benny:it's kind of convenient because we want to go there anyways

Benny:a bit inconvenient because

Benny:I mean do we need her alive

Benny:I guess we do now

Benny:it's harder

Benny:let's see

Gamemaster:Wow.

Argyle:With pink feathers.

Benny:so they're around another heart

Anzu:I will say,

Benny:the timekeeper

Benny:timekeeper is likely already dead

Benny:Anzu's sister Galzu

Benny:which sounds like a Muppets name

Benny:is in a

Benny:is in a town called

Benny:Tali

Benny:Galzu

Anzu:this I have to own.

Argyle:Wait, that's the real name?

Benny:All right.

Anzu:When I was making the names of the rest of my family members, my siblings at least, I wanted to keep the Z-U at the end as a tie between the different children.

Anzu:And I was literally just going through different sounds and syllables in my head.

Benny:All right.

Anzu:And I did not intend for gal as the female short-term phrase to become the girl.

Argyle:hey

Benny:Gelsu.

Anzu:It's Galzu, but it's spelled with an A,

Gamemaster:Yes.

Anzu:and I didn't even think of that until we started playing,

Anzu:and Josh said it out loud, and I was like,

Anzu:shit, that is not good.

Gamemaster:Girl Anzu is Galzu. That's just how it is.

Benny:Dadzu.

Gamemaster:I mean, at least you didn't name your brother, like, Gaizu. It could be worse.

Argyle:hey

Argyle:tanner in your backstory do you ever have two women talk to each other without talking about a

Anzu:No.

Anzu:yes because

Benny:oh my god

Argyle:guy oh very good not talking about met

Johnny:Oh.

Gamemaster:That's true.

Anzu:Galzu and my grandmother

Anzu:work very closely together

Anzu:right

Argyle:oh very very forward

Anzu:they talk about business actually

Benny:hopefully not businessmen

Benny:yeah they're blending into a town

Anzu:mhm

Benny:where there's a bunch of

Benny:weirdos

Anzu:A little racist to the mongrel folk That fine

Benny:Let see The twins are making us a shield And then we go into the tithe

Argyle:you Yeah it goes up

Gamemaster:Thank you you uh you you pay 29 for the tithe the next cost is 34

Benny:So, rings light up.

Benny:There's some fucking crazy guy

Benny:swinging around the rings.

Benny:We pay 34 for the tithe.

Benny:We check our scheme.

Benny:Everyone's chill.

Benny:next also oh yeah i'm sorry i have 29 and then 34 i just saw the 34 um yeah and then uh people seem

Benny:okay except for of course the schism divert on holdings um we've got a big old crater uh where

Benny:they used to be um identified as foul play this is not what happens when they fail the tithe

Benny:unfortunately.

Benny:Now we have 12 remaining.

Benny:Someone else dropped.

Benny:We don't really know. It could be

Benny:Ætherion or

Benny:the RunGunners.

Benny:I guess it could also be Mockp,

Benny:the Ministry of Cultural Progress,

Benny:because we went by and didn't see signs of life

Benny:but didn't see signs of destruction.

Benny:And then

Benny:Anouk and I

Benny:are kind of like pissing themselves

Benny:because a sibling of Ranga showed up.

Benny:It's usually a bad omen.

Benny:It was the bifurcated man.

Argyle:I was really confused for a second there.

Gamemaster:I

Benny:And yeah, that's kind of it.

Benny:Oh yeah, we also figured out

Benny:that maybe someone with the blue liquid

Benny:could have blown Verdant Holdings off.

Benny:In the bad way.

Benny:In the bad way, yeah.

Argyle:Great job, Mike.

Gamemaster:I

Gamemaster:I offered for you to run a one many times if you really wanted to say that and be in a position of power where you could hand it out anyway great job mike you get a mythic point um

Argyle:You get a mythic point.

Argyle:I'm sorry.

Argyle:I hope I didn't screw up for Mike.

Argyle:I just always wanted to say that.

Argyle:you My one shot just me giving out mythic points

Johnny:you That it

Gamemaster:yeah

Gamemaster:yeah no uh that was that was great that was pretty good coverage i don't think anything

Gamemaster:there was incorrect.

Gamemaster:Only thing that I don't know if you

Gamemaster:explicitly said, so I'm going to call it out.

Benny:Right.

Gamemaster:The city of Tally

Gamemaster:in the Strider

Gamemaster:is around

Gamemaster:the heart Tally,

Gamemaster:hence the name.

Gamemaster:Just to clarify, both

Gamemaster:the city and the heart within it

Gamemaster:are called Tally.

Benny:Right.

Gamemaster:Tally is

Gamemaster:the timekeeper. That was correct.

Gamemaster:You didn't get anything wrong. I'm just

Gamemaster:throwing that out there to be extra

Gamemaster:confusing. Yeah. But yeah, other than that, that was all correct. Does this work? It does.

Benny:Nice.

Argyle:Oh.

Gamemaster:I had no reason to believe that it would, but, you know, sometimes just things break.

Gamemaster:um

Gamemaster:okay yeah so we

Gamemaster:pick up today's session

Gamemaster:where we left off

Gamemaster:two weeks ago's

Gamemaster:session

Gamemaster:you've paid the tithe

Gamemaster:uh

Johnny:I can see we could pick up while still talking to the twins.

Gamemaster:gosh I can't remember if you guys

Gamemaster:actually went to sleep

Gamemaster:after speaking to the twins

Gamemaster:I think the answer is you didn't

Gamemaster:um but also

Gamemaster:yes Noah

Gamemaster:Yeah we can do that So you guys are just you in your conversation with Anouk and Anaïs they had just mentioned that a sibling of their patron Renge had been on the Strider and had deemed the events therein as important to whatever the fuck the narrative is doing which I imagine is as unclear to the twins as it likely is to you guys at this point

Gamemaster:But, you know, he's made himself known. He's around.

Gamemaster:That's just kind of a thing that's been happening.

Gamemaster:And so you're all packed into... I guess it's not actually as cramped.

Gamemaster:The workshop in your Fane is less cramped than the one that you had in Ginny's Fane back at the Sin and Tonic.

Gamemaster:Mostly because you have managed to power up Eerie more than Ginny was.

Gamemaster:Like, if you were to power skill the two of them, Eerie is a stronger art at this point.

Gamemaster:By necessity.

Gamemaster:But still, something of interest.

Gamemaster:So you guys are packed into, but not really packed because it's not that cramped, the workshop where Anouk and Anaïs and occasionally, occasionally, oh gosh, I wanted to call her Elisha, Ichel from Radiant Arms have been doing some of their work.

Johnny:I'm not going to deny.

Gamemaster:Ichel's not currently there.

Gamemaster:It's just the four of you and the twins.

Gamemaster:Anything else you'd like to do while you're here?

Johnny:Just to recap.

Gamemaster:Yes, I do not see a world in which our patron and your patron and this third entity are

Johnny:You think that if at least three of the narrative are watching us, they're all probably watching us, right?

Johnny:I'm going to pitch something to the group.

Gamemaster:watching and the remaining two are elsewhere, you know?

Gamemaster:It is rare that two of them appear in the same place, so it stands to reason.

Johnny:This may be crazy.

Johnny:I don't know a lot about a lot of things, guys.

Johnny:I'm not the smart one here.

Johnny:I don't do many of them.

Johnny:I don't do a lot of the smart stuff. I don't hit stuff too hard. I know a good story. And

Argyle:I like the idea.

Benny:I'm feeling heroic.

Johnny:We want to win. We want to be the heroes of the story.

Gamemaster:and i will say

Johnny:And there's only one of these fucking narrative guys that roots for the heroes.

Johnny:So what if we try reaching out to the Menhir and get them on our side?

Argyle:Can we trust them?

Johnny:I don't know. Can we trust him?

Johnny:Look at a nine and a knuck.

Johnny:Wanna...

Argyle:What's an earth?

Gamemaster:I don't know how to answer that. In that, I would trust Renge to the ends of the earth and back,

Gamemaster:and I also know that she would dispose of us in an instant. Sorry, this is a translation from

Argyle:What's an earth?

Gamemaster:the common saying into English.

Argyle:Okay.

Gamemaster:A la Tolkien.

Gamemaster:I would trust

Gamemaster:that so long as we are

Gamemaster:necessary for whatever she is doing,

Gamemaster:we are well-treated

Gamemaster:and the like. But

Gamemaster:ultimately, I do not profess

Gamemaster:to know what is going on in her head

Gamemaster:insofar

Gamemaster:as I don't actually know if she

Gamemaster:has a brain as we understand it they are forces of nature so to speak um that said i think so long

Gamemaster:as you play the part that something like the men here um would wish for someone to play

Argyle:Thank you you When

Gamemaster:i think that they would support you in that effort uh with the the caveat there of um

Gamemaster:So long as you're the chosen hero of one of the narrative that paints a larger target on your back for the rest of the narrative to interfere, if that makes sense.

Gamemaster:For instance in Insuperlex the insurmountable the issue that the challenge is the trials that stands in front of the heroes is less empowered to act against things people

Johnny:you This may just be my massive ego speaking

Gamemaster:that aren't the heroes, if that makes sense.

Gamemaster:Not to dissuade you, it could be a boon.

Johnny:but I'm pretty sure we're already the heroes of this whole story

Gamemaster:there

Johnny:I don't know what Grayson's doing out there

Johnny:but it can't be good

Johnny:as far as I know

Johnny:maybe there's another hero walking around the strider

Johnny:and they're here for that

Johnny:I feel like

Gamemaster:there is no limit on the number of heroes

Johnny:there can only be one protagonist though

Gamemaster:there can be in any story

Gamemaster:depends on perspective

Gamemaster:just

Gamemaster:this is untrue

Johnny:I guess

Gamemaster:I know of

Gamemaster:many stories in which there are groups

Johnny:Yes, both hastily. Well, I still want to be the protagonist of the story.

Gamemaster:of protagonists

Gamemaster:and the point of view of the story changes between different groups of protagonists.

Gamemaster:I am not dissuading you. I am just warning you.

Gamemaster:If you feel that you are currently under the radar, you will no longer be,

Gamemaster:should you successfully gain and then accept an offer of boon from one like the Menhir.

Johnny:All right, just hold on.

Gamemaster:That is the other thing.

Argyle:Let's do it.

Gamemaster:I do not know how to contact the Menhir, so this is up to you.

Argyle:Can you like put us in contact with them?

Argyle:You can't like put in a good word.

Gamemaster:I feel estranged, perhaps.

Argyle:Aren't they kind of like your aunt or uncle?

Argyle:who our patron like the judge you think Aut gonna put us in contact with one of the siblings it that kind of rude if we do that we not do a favor for

Gamemaster:I think you are more likely to get traction asking your patron for access to the Menhir

Gamemaster:than us asking ours.

Gamemaster:Either that or you will have to find your own path Ought Ought is more likely to do so than Renge

Johnny:You think we're better off just trying to...

Gamemaster:Correct. This is how he works.

Argyle:can you like Johnny just like

Argyle:I don't know like talk to them for us

Argyle:yeah

Johnny:Talk to the men here?

Johnny:Yeah, I can try.

Argyle:I can help pray with you

Johnny:Okay.

Johnny:Give me 30 minutes to get a stage together.

Gamemaster:yeah are you saying guidance or aid i will allow either um for both i suppose

Johnny:I'm going to run around and find some cardboard.

Argyle:Can I try to from a religion point of view

Argyle:Help guide him

Argyle:I was just

Argyle:I meant more of just like a religion check

Gamemaster:well yeah i mean you can do a guidance and also if you want you can do a religion-based aid

Argyle:But I'm happy to do a guidance

Argyle:Okay.

Johnny:Yeah, I'm just going to get a bunch of cardboard and cut it up and make it look like a bunch

Argyle:Yeah.

Gamemaster:if you like, while Johnny runs around and is putting together a small stage on your front lawn for a show.

Johnny:of really bad Menhir.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Johnny:Like a middle school Menhir.

Gamemaster:To clarify, you have a reality-bending heart and you're within its fame.

Gamemaster:You could ask it to just render actual men here in the area.

Argyle:Yeah, let's do that.

Argyle:Let's do that.

Gamemaster:You don't need to do...

Gamemaster:If you want to do arts and crafts, you can.

Johnny:I'm going to do arts and crafts because I feel like doing this by hand has more meaning.

Gamemaster:I'm just saying Johnny has more resources at his disposal to use if he would like.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Gamemaster:Absolutely.

Gamemaster:Wonderful.

Gamemaster:So I will say then, it will be a crafting check to put together.

Gamemaster:Johnny doesn't have to be the one to do it, but somebody has to do a crafting check here

Gamemaster:if you're arts and crafting up these men here.

Johnny:I can't use theater lore for this.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Johnny:Okay Thank you

Gamemaster:So the thing is is that I probably going to make you roll a theater lore check or I guess performance check for the actual thing you doing

Argyle:And it'd be,

Anzu:you All right

Gamemaster:Because I assume that's what you're working towards with building a stage.

Gamemaster:And I don't want you making the same check effectively beforehand.

Gamemaster:This is a team effort thing.

Gamemaster:So it's a crafting check.

Anzu:I'll help.

Argyle:if Anzu's instructing the heart

Anzu:30.

Gamemaster:No, because Johnny said that he wanted to do this with arts and crafts.

Argyle:can he do it occultly

Argyle:because he knows of men here beings

Argyle:yeah

Gamemaster:And so what is happening is we are treating this as an impromptu ritual.

Argyle:okay

Gamemaster:One of the secondary casters is religion, and you've already done that.

Argyle:34

Gamemaster:One of the secondary casters here is crafting, and it looks like Anzu will be taking that.

Argyle:34

Argyle:That's so embarrassing

Anzu:30.

Anzu:oh jeez Jorge rolled in chatter that's kind of it's a little gauche

Gamemaster:30. Okay, 34 and 30.

Benny:Oh, fuck, dude.

Johnny:I support Jorge rolling in chatter.

Gamemaster:Oh, that's so lame.

Anzu:uh never mind it's fine

Argyle:Guys it's because I'm Latino

Gamemaster:Shame.

Benny:Oh, fuck, dude.

Gamemaster:Shame.

Benny:Oh, fuck, dude.

Gamemaster:Wow.

Argyle:Yeah yeah

Argyle:pieces of shit

Argyle:and we were level

Johnny:...

Gamemaster:You guys were level 17 in Campaign 2

Gamemaster:when you

Gamemaster:crafted the needle and you first spoke

Johnny:Yeah.

Gamemaster:to the...

Gamemaster:Okay. Just double

Johnny:Yeah.

Gamemaster:checking. It was either 17

Johnny:It was...

Gamemaster:or 16. I can't remember which

Gamemaster:of the two.

Argyle:infinity when we met them in the first campaign

Argyle:because we never met them

Argyle:no 20 for the Menhir

Gamemaster:That's not true.

Gamemaster:Yeah, you met the men here.

Johnny:It was...

Gamemaster:You didn't meet the rest of them.

Gamemaster:uh

Gamemaster:okay

Gamemaster:do I have a

Gamemaster:this is too

Gamemaster:a little bit

Benny:Okay.

Gamemaster:No, this is still two.

Gamemaster:Why do I not have...

Gamemaster:Is this what I was going for?

Gamemaster:Yeah, this is.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Gamemaster:We've had the two secondary casters.

Gamemaster:Now we have the actual primary caster,

Gamemaster:which in this case is Johnny.

Gamemaster:You've set your stage.

Gamemaster:You have the Menhir crafted pretty convincingly for the limited resources you're working with.

Argyle:my religion check have helped him decide a number

Johnny:We don't have a number in this world.

Gamemaster:A pretty convincing set of Menhir.

Gamemaster:Just for my own sake, how many Menhir did you make?

Gamemaster:No.

Gamemaster:Nope.

Gamemaster:Uh, no.

Gamemaster:No, Færrin does not have a magic number.

Argyle:How many things were on the strider?

Benny:20.

Johnny:I like 20.

Gamemaster:Or, not in a way that you guys would understand it, at least.

Argyle:Maybe we should do that.

Gamemaster:There are 20 factions on the Strider.

Gamemaster:Or there were, when everybody was alive.

Argyle:20, 16, 21.

Argyle:I like those numbers.

Gamemaster:Yes.

Argyle:13.

Johnny:Is 20 counting the Harlequins?

Gamemaster:19 without.

Argyle:Sorry.

Johnny:I will stand in the center of the Menhir.

Gamemaster:20?

Gamemaster:Okay.

Gamemaster:20 men here.

Gamemaster:What does Johnny do?

Gamemaster:20?

Johnny:And first I will take my sunglasses fold them up put them in my short pocket And as I do I will summon Mythic Power And I will immediately use that to

Gamemaster:Okay Okay

Gamemaster:Sure.

Johnny:perceive the threads of fate.

Johnny:And then...

Johnny:I will

Johnny:look up at the sky. I will look around.

Johnny:I'll say, men, here's my name is Jonathan Scaff.

Johnny:I have seen the sky fall.

Johnny:I have journeyed across the land and I have died again and again and again.

Johnny:You want heroes.

Johnny:We are your heroes.

Johnny:Come to me now and choose me.

Johnny:You need a hero for your story.

Johnny:whatever lies beyond the void, whatever is at the end of the song is the most important thing in the world.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Johnny:You need a champion?

Johnny:We are willing.

Johnny:I'll pull up my book of poetry and I'll begin to recite a poem there.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Gamemaster:I will let, in this case,

Gamemaster:either performance or theater lore.

Gamemaster:Your choice.

Johnny:Oh, most difficult performance.

Gamemaster:But...

Johnny:Is that a circumstance or anything?

Argyle:second corner.

Gamemaster:I get it.

Argyle:No, I'm sorry.

Argyle:I was just trying to get him in there and I figured

Argyle:heroes, shadow box

Argyle:and thing.

Gamemaster:I understand.

Gamemaster:No.

Gamemaster:Okay, we had a 34 and a 30.

Gamemaster:Which means...

Gamemaster:You have a minus 4 to this check.

Johnny:Or is it just a...

Gamemaster:One second.

Gamemaster:It is a circumstance penalty It a minus four circumstance penalty to this check

Johnny:Okay so with my virtuosic performer which gives me a plus two circumstance it just minus two

Johnny:And then with perceived the threads of fate, I have advantage on this.

Johnny:so I will roll this twice

Johnny:for the drama

Argyle:heroism

Gamemaster:What?

Johnny:okay

Argyle:okay cast heroism

Johnny:that's not bad

Argyle:that's too late

Argyle:it gives him a status

Gamemaster:Uh, maybe.

Johnny:oh

Gamemaster:What does heroism do?

Argyle:bonus I believe

Argyle:cool

Gamemaster:What?

Johnny:okay

Gamemaster:I guess this is technically a skill check.

Gamemaster:Yeah, you could spend a heroism if you like.

Gamemaster:Uh, then you have a plus one status bonus to this roll.

Johnny:Okay.

Johnny:Okay, so that last one's 29.

Argyle:Critical failure.

Gamemaster:Wait, what? Where did you roll this?

Johnny:Yeah.

Johnny:Oh, I'm in foundry.

Gamemaster:Oh, I see. I see. I see.

Gamemaster:Absolutely.

Johnny:I have advantage on this.

Johnny:I'm not done yet.

Johnny:I'm still not done yet.

Johnny:Do such bad rolls.

Argyle:Why?

Gamemaster:Okay.

Johnny:Yeah, I don't think I can use let's try that again.

Johnny:So that's I think it's just a isn't isn't it a reaction to use a mythic point?

Gamemaster:might not be.

Gamemaster:One second.

Gamemaster:Oh see here we talking about looking up rules

Anzu:Yeah this is really slowing down the game

Gamemaster:It's called rewrite fate, right?

Gamemaster:Is a free action.

Argyle:It just...

Anzu:Oh.

Johnny:Okay, so now I will try this one more time.

Gamemaster:So whatcha doing?

Argyle:Yeah.

Gamemaster:Ooh.

Argyle:Yeah.

Gamemaster:Okay, so I actually think you got a higher number than you rolled.

Johnny:Let's try that again.

Johnny:Yeah, I think that's everything.

Argyle:Oh!

Johnny:I thought

Johnny:no I think it's

Gamemaster:Does Let's Try That Again let you reroll with Mythic?

Johnny:because it's not a mythic thing

Gamemaster:No, I understand. It's re-roll the triggering skill check and use the new result.

Johnny:um

Johnny:oh

Gamemaster:Rewrite Fate is re-roll the check with Mythic Proficiency taking the new result.

Johnny:Oh.

Gamemaster:Technically, I believe if you use, let's try that again, on something you already spent a Mythic point on,

Argyle:Yeah.

Gamemaster:the re-roll is with Mythic Proficiency, because that's how that would work.

Johnny:Oh.

Gamemaster:And I...

Johnny:So if I'm a master in performance, then it's an additional.

Argyle:4.

Gamemaster:Four.

Argyle:41.

Johnny:So I got a 41.

Gamemaster:For 41.

Johnny:41.

Gamemaster:For 41, which, to clarify, the DC here was 40.

Gamemaster:Because that is constituent with a level 20 skill check.

Gamemaster:Um...

Argyle:What are you talking about?

Johnny:I am the greatest bard of all time

Gamemaster:So...

Johnny:all by myself

Gamemaster:It took a little bit of...

Argyle:Your friends helped you make it harder.

Gamemaster:Yeah, your friends made it harder.

Johnny:I did this with no help

Argyle:Yeah.

Gamemaster:Yeah, uh...

Gamemaster:Unfortunately, they were both, um...

Gamemaster:They were both failures.

Gamemaster:But it happens.

Gamemaster:Uh...

Gamemaster:Okay.

Gamemaster:all four of you are on stage

Gamemaster:is just Johnny up there on stage doing it himself

Argyle:I'm there

Benny:All four

Argyle:I'm there

Gamemaster:okay

Gamemaster:all four

Benny:Where the choice cuts

Argyle:Penny's shadowboxing

Gamemaster:Benny is shadowboxing

Benny:As holy as possible

Argyle:I was looking as holy as possible

Gamemaster:in the corner

Gamemaster:um

Gamemaster:okay

Argyle:holding his like axe or something

Argyle:laughing

Gamemaster:so

Gamemaster:you're like

Gamemaster:pleading out into

Gamemaster:just into the open air uh you have developed a little bit of a um

Gamemaster:of a uh an audience Anouk and Anaïs came out to watch you just to see what the hell you're doing

Gamemaster:uh they do not expect it to work to to be clear um and uh like salvado and some of the people

Gamemaster:um from from turny and heavy have come out because they think you're just doing an impromptu

Gamemaster:poetry reading, perhaps with some strange decorations and the like.

Gamemaster:And so people are sitting around watching you do what you're doing, which, to their surprise,

Gamemaster:gives them a little bit of a start when the four of you, and in fact the entire stage itself,

Gamemaster:including the little cardboard cutouts, cease to exist.

Gamemaster:They just fully disappear from what they watching And it isn like isn like a bomb goes off Uh there isn a crater or anything like that It the space where the stage and all

Gamemaster:of you and all of the decorations were, uh, is just gone. And it's just grass, undisturbed,

Gamemaster:like nothing was ever there in the first place. Um, that isn't something that the four of you

Gamemaster:notice, however, because the four of you

Gamemaster:actually, I think, technically

Argyle:This Othello.

Anzu:Othello is a hero, to be fair.

Johnny:Yes.

Gamemaster:five, because

Gamemaster:Othello will be brought along

Gamemaster:for the ride.

Gamemaster:He's coming with.

Gamemaster:Othello is a hero.

Gamemaster:This Othello is

Gamemaster:the same as the old Othello.

Gamemaster:And you just had to do a little bit of bird sacrifice

Gamemaster:in order to get him back

Gamemaster:is what happened.

Anzu:For the term mental gymnastics...

Gamemaster:sure

Gamemaster:you had to do some mental gymnastics

Gamemaster:and also bird sacrifice to get him back

Gamemaster:anyway the five of you

Gamemaster:the four main members of the party and Othello

Gamemaster:on stage

Gamemaster:doing various tasks

Gamemaster:mostly related to

Gamemaster:watching Johnny as he

Gamemaster:pleads into the ether

Gamemaster:there is

Gamemaster:a familiarity to the spot that you end up in.

Gamemaster:First of all, the first thing of note is

Gamemaster:something I have described every single time you have ever teleported

Gamemaster:is that there is this sensation of something in your gut being pulled upwards,

Gamemaster:like an intense sense of vertigo, and that doesn't happen here.

Gamemaster:One moment you're standing on the strider, you're talking to people,

Gamemaster:and then the next you are in an empty white void.

Gamemaster:A familiar-looking empty white void to many of those who have been here already.

Gamemaster:This is an almost entirely featureless expanse with this soft rolling white fog covering both the floor such that you cannot see your feet as well as what would be the ceiling in as much this place could have a ceiling only broken up by in this

Gamemaster:case, three interesting features. One of them, off in the distance, is this brutalist mass of concrete,

Gamemaster:a hunk of a building that stretches from the floor to the ceiling. It is...

Gamemaster:From those of you that have been in a different place of what is clearly the Black and White,

Gamemaster:there is no way for you to know that that is the Pharos and it is in a different spot

Gamemaster:geographically compared to where it normally is, in that normally you're at point A and

Gamemaster:you're looking at it, and now you're at point B and you're looking at it, and despite there

Gamemaster:being absolutely no way of you knowing that you're in a different spot, that you're at

Gamemaster:point B, you know that you're at a different spot than you were previously. That's the first

Johnny:the second interesting concern

Gamemaster:interesting feature. The second interesting feature is a set of craggy gray rock pillars,

Gamemaster:much closer to you than the Pharisees, jutting out of the white mist that covers up the floor.

Gamemaster:doing a quick swivel, none of them look

Gamemaster:alike to each other, each of the two

Gamemaster:rocks are, each of these two

Gamemaster:men here, because that's what

Gamemaster:they are, are

Gamemaster:different from each other

Gamemaster:and as you do

Gamemaster:a quick 360 looking around at each

Gamemaster:of them, you cannot

Gamemaster:keep track of all of them, despite the fact that

Gamemaster:they never move

Gamemaster:there are more

Gamemaster:and less than what you had

Gamemaster:designed your

Gamemaster:little cardboard cutouts to be. They don't stay put once you're not looking

Gamemaster:at them, but they are present. Third, something that does stay put while

Gamemaster:you looking at it leaning up against one of the men here generally in front of the direction that you guys are facing is a tall humanoid figure completely pale almost emaciated

Gamemaster:thin stick figure-like, with really large mitts for hands and exaggeratedly large feet as well.

Gamemaster:Its face is a Giant perfect white sphere, almost entirely featureless except for a massive grin

Gamemaster:from knot ear to knot ear across it.

Gamemaster:This is ought, of course.

Gamemaster:It has got this weird gangly, lanky, leaning-on pose on one of the men here.

Gamemaster:Clearly not earnestly attempting to get comfortable,

Gamemaster:and more giving a cartoon facsimile of leaning up against a wall waiting for you guys.

Gamemaster:It is, in some sense, an obvious performance.

Gamemaster:The four of you, uh, have appeared, sorry, the five of you have appeared in this space.

Argyle:um our guy was going to put his he's holding his axe ceremonially he's going to put it away

Gamemaster:The rocks certainly don't talk first.

Gamemaster:Uh, Aut doesn't seem particularly inclined to say anything at the moment either.

Gamemaster:He's just looking at you, waiting to see what you're gonna say.

Argyle:and then like tuck his hands into his sleeves

Gamemaster:Aunt will say,

Argyle:like a priest with his waistcoat

Johnny:Step forward.

Argyle:and just try to look

Argyle:pretty holy

Argyle:and then just

Argyle:nods Johnny

Argyle:I step behind him

Johnny:Ought.

Johnny:Menheres.

Johnny:I see you have heard my plea.

Gamemaster:Now, I thought we were friends.

Gamemaster:I really did

Johnny:We can be friends.

Johnny:I can be friends.

Gamemaster:If we were really friends

Johnny:We can be friends with more than one person, Ought.

Gamemaster:you would have come to me for help

Johnny:But you would have... you would have wanted...

Gamemaster:I could have helped you.

Gamemaster:You know I could have helped you.

Johnny:Yeah, but you would have wanted something in return and we really didn't want to have to do a whole eye for Anaïs thing.

Gamemaster:Oh.

Gamemaster:Well, that's just hurtful.

Gamemaster:You want to take and take and take and not give?

Gamemaster:That's selfish.

Johnny:We didn't take anything from you. We didn't ask anything from you.

Gamemaster:Yeah, but you didn't want to give either.

Johnny:Yeah, because we weren't taking anything.

Gamemaster:I would have helped.

Gamemaster:I'm just saying,

Gamemaster:I don't know

Gamemaster:why you think

Gamemaster:my sibling

Johnny:I assume they wouldn't.

Gamemaster:would give you stuff for free.

Gamemaster:I don't know.

Gamemaster:What was the thought process there?

Gamemaster:You assume they wouldn't.

Gamemaster:You assume that there would be

Gamemaster:a give and take, so to speak,

Gamemaster:with my manier friend.

Johnny:Listen,

Johnny:we are happy with our relationship with you,

Johnny:but the men here, from what we know,

Gamemaster:I don't know.

Johnny:is the heroes.

Johnny:And Inse Perlix showed up,

Johnny:and he's the mountain.

Johnny:and we need all the oomph we can get.

Gamemaster:Clearly not all the oomph you can get.

Johnny:We need all the oomph we can get without causing another Raelion.

Gamemaster:Hmm.

Gamemaster:You know, I have to say, I am a little disappointed.

Gamemaster:Sometimes heroes have to blow stuff up.

Gamemaster:I don't think you're really set out to be a hero if you're trying to avoid outcomes like Aurelian.

Johnny:I think your idea is...

Argyle:In the background

Gamemaster:Sometimes an area is filled with evil people, and it just needs to go.

Johnny:No, that's what people who have no moral Scale do and believe the end justifies the means.

Gamemaster:And that's what heroes do.

Argyle:In the background

Gamemaster:The end is the means.

Argyle:Argo whispers to his

Argyle:Patriots, we did blow up a lot of

Gamemaster:Sorry.

Argyle:shit, guys

Argyle:We did try to blow up someone we didn like I mean we did try to blow up a sovereign nation but I sorry

Johnny:Yeah but not all companies Not all country Not all country On track Stay on track Stop getting nitty gritty Stop getting nitty gritty

Gamemaster:Thank you I will say

Argyle:It's just factually correct.

Argyle:And you know,

Johnny:You're too nitty gritty here.

Argyle:I'm kind of forced to factually agree with things.

Johnny:We'll huddle after this.

Gamemaster:listen

Gamemaster:if you don't want to

Gamemaster:avail yourselves

Gamemaster:of your friends help

Gamemaster:and you want to go and you want to ask other people

Gamemaster:that's

Johnny:Never heard someone say that.

Gamemaster:fine.

Gamemaster:I'm okay with it.

Gamemaster:But we're not friends anymore.

Johnny:Aunt, we never went behind your back.

Gamemaster:I just want to make that clear.

Gamemaster:Because I thought we could be friends.

Gamemaster:And it's clear we can't.

Gamemaster:Because I'm not friends with people who go behind my back.

Gamemaster:You did.

Johnny:But also, I don't think I can be friends with someone who blew up my country.

Gamemaster:I don't know

Benny:Are we ever behind your back?

Johnny:bet he says having ran behind his back

Gamemaster:people are pretty good at uh

Gamemaster:yes

Gamemaster:listen I see

Gamemaster:very little benefit here

Gamemaster:to standing here and arguing with you

Gamemaster:you are at best

Gamemaster:marginally evolved monkeys

Gamemaster:I was talking down for your benefit

Gamemaster:clearly that's not worth it

Gamemaster:for me! And he will wave his hand, and those of you who have a tattoo on you that is the mark

Johnny:I will spit on the ground after him and say that that's for my wife, you fucker.

Gamemaster:of ought, those three dots, will feel an intense, searing pain where those three dots are.

Gamemaster:It subsides pretty quickly, and he will pat the men here and say, good luck!

Gamemaster:and he will just poof

Gamemaster:out of existence

Gamemaster:as you are left in this ring surrounded by the men here

Argyle:I will kneel as well It respect

Benny:you I don know if we need a kneel

Anzu:you I guess I kneel sure

Johnny:and then I will kneel before the men here

Gamemaster:hmm If you staying standing that fine

Argyle:Benny.

Benny:Does it answer kneel?

Gamemaster:Oh.

Anzu:Sure.

Benny:Benny is the same height, so we'll just stand.

Johnny:we're all segmented by now

Johnny:Bird doesn't need it.

Argyle:Or doesn't kneel?

Benny:He's playing both sides.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Gamemaster:Three of the five party members kneeling.

Argyle:Or doesn't kneel?

Johnny:Oh, no.

Benny:Odds are like, I'll kneel, you stand.

Johnny:Oh, no.

Benny:If they kill everyone that's kneeling,

Benny:you're good to go.

Johnny:Oh, no.

Gamemaster:The men here don't say anything.

Gamemaster:Actually, you've never heard the men here say anything.

Gamemaster:This is your first time interacting with them.

Gamemaster:What is the plan here?

Gamemaster:Most of you are kneeling.

Johnny:I'll look with men here's we're here we came to you or what's the deal

Argyle:if Argyle can help

Argyle:he will talk about how he's trying to do what's right and just

Argyle:and his whole mission is to better

Argyle:this entire world and he's hoping

Argyle:that the Medihears can help him and the group do that

Johnny:The occultism does not have the minus four, though.

Anzu:I guess I could do that if I'm allowed.

Gamemaster:Can I get...

Gamemaster:I don't know how to interpret this.

Gamemaster:Can I get an occultism check, please?

Gamemaster:Or a performance check,

Gamemaster:but with a minus four circumstance penalty.

Gamemaster:Or both.

Gamemaster:Correct.

Argyle:Amen And Argaon little speech was trying to draw from his religious teachings of the judge but he has heard that some of these beings can like the twins are with the host and this

Johnny:I do the I do the 9th 4th

Anzu:Thank you Got to use my hero point very early today

Gamemaster:You are

Argyle:so he's kind of hoping that maybe there's like a motif that both support that they can piggyback on.

Johnny:I think I still have, uh, perceived the threads.

Johnny:Yeah, I am proceeding with it.

Argyle:And heroism's still up.

Argyle:And it's heroism with the men here, so remember that.

Anzu:Oh, do we all get the heroism?

Gamemaster:Okay.

Argyle:No. No, no, no.

Argyle:Just Johnny. I didn't prepare, guys.

Argyle:I could have given us all it, but I didn't know.

Anzu:Jeez, still pretty bad.

Anzu:I got a 28.

Johnny:I crit.

Argyle:Oh,

Gamemaster:That's pretty good.

Argyle:buh-bye.

Johnny:I rolled a nat one and a nat 20.

Gamemaster:That's pretty good.

Argyle:Take it, honey, give it.

Gamemaster:I used my mythic point to make you re-roll that.

Johnny:I will, I'll look at it and say, I'm so tired of evil and of bullies and of being so unable

Anzu:...

Gamemaster:No, I'm joking.

Gamemaster:Okay, 38 crit.

Johnny:to stop everything and on everything I will, the word will reverberate out into the black

Johnny:and white.

Gamemaster:There is a sound like a bell being struck, a pretty low tone chime emanates out of the

Gamemaster:Menhir directly in front of you, which is followed up by a slightly higher pitched chime,

Gamemaster:slightly further back behind you from one of the Menhir out of sight, with another chime,

Gamemaster:again a lower tone, although slightly different tone than the first one. And it continues like

Gamemaster:this for a few moments, where the Menhir chimes with itself, where different Menhir

Gamemaster:make different tones.

Gamemaster:And with a 38 crit, there is,

Gamemaster:to be clear, this is a completely

Gamemaster:different set of notes

Gamemaster:than the Voidsong.

Gamemaster:Like, it is pretty obvious

Gamemaster:from hearing it that it is not

Gamemaster:what has been rumbling around

Gamemaster:in the back of your head for almost a year

Gamemaster:at this point.

Gamemaster:But

Gamemaster:there is, with the

Gamemaster:38 crit, there is something

Gamemaster:to be said for how

Gamemaster:it feels in your head

Gamemaster:when you hear it that makes you think

Gamemaster:that it is related in some way.

Gamemaster:And I think

Gamemaster:on

Argyle:Oh.

Gamemaster:like on a 38 crit

Gamemaster:I think there is this connection

Gamemaster:that Johnny makes

Gamemaster:to

Gamemaster:oh

Gamemaster:this is what

Gamemaster:deities sound like

Gamemaster:when they speak in their own

Gamemaster:language

Gamemaster:that's what this reverberating

Gamemaster:around in my head is

Gamemaster:that's what these

Gamemaster:harmonies are

Gamemaster:and with that all four of you uh regardless of whether or not you rolled a check um what

Argyle:Five.

Argyle:Or five, those.

Argyle:I have a question.

Gamemaster:all five of you actually i don't know if othello's intelligence score is high enough

Gamemaster:we'll say it is um will experience the message that is being communicated to you in a

Gamemaster:in a way below words

Gamemaster:through the harmony itself.

Gamemaster:And you are speaking to a being

Gamemaster:that is not using your language.

Gamemaster:It is fragmentary.

Gamemaster:It is showing you things.

Gamemaster:And it is difficult for you to grasp onto

Gamemaster:any individual piece to interrogate it more.

Gamemaster:But you all catch fleeting,

Gamemaster:it's not telling the future

Gamemaster:it is showing you what could be I suppose there is a very quick fragment of the four of you or at least you

Gamemaster:assume the four of you, four silhouettes, huddled around a rock in the middle of a storm somewhere

Gamemaster:with six looming figures looking over you. The six figures not immediately visible who they are,

Gamemaster:but six figures looking over you.

Gamemaster:And then that fragment leaves.

Gamemaster:And then there is another fragment, again, four silhouettes,

Gamemaster:not immediately obvious that it's you,

Gamemaster:stood in front of, at first glance, the sun,

Gamemaster:radiating energy down on you.

Gamemaster:But for just a split second as the vision starts to fade,

Gamemaster:as that fragment gets snatched away from you as well,

Gamemaster:you can see that it isn't quite the sun.

Gamemaster:It's almost got this crack-like shape in it.

Gamemaster:And then another fragment, again, of four silhouettes,

Gamemaster:somehow looking more haggard than before,

Gamemaster:in as much as a group of four shadows in the shape of people can be,

Gamemaster:with a long crisscross.

Gamemaster:some amount of light being held in your hands or in the silhouette's hands,

Gamemaster:the four of you collected around it.

Gamemaster:And yet, despite four people being gathered around this light,

Gamemaster:there are 12 shadows extending out from you along the floor.

Gamemaster:And then another fragment.

Gamemaster:And this time they do resolve, well, it's the four silhouettes in the center,

Gamemaster:in what looks to be the place that you are,

Gamemaster:or perhaps directly outside

Gamemaster:of the Pharos

Gamemaster:the four silhouettes standing in front of this

Gamemaster:large concrete monolith and five visible figures stood between you and that

Gamemaster:between you and the Pharos. They are a group of rocks, a bifurcated man, a door,

Gamemaster:an old lady with arms that are much too long for her frame, and a strange stick

Gamemaster:figure, homunculus-looking humanoid.

Gamemaster:And then that fragment goes away too,

Argyle:I accept.

Gamemaster:but it lingers with you,

Gamemaster:this

Gamemaster:unspoken question

Gamemaster:of

Gamemaster:can you?

Gamemaster:Will you?

Gamemaster:And then the

Gamemaster:tones stop from the men here.

Argyle:We will.

Argyle:we have to stop the ashen pack

Anzu:Leave the bird alone.

Johnny:The same question asked of every hero.

Argyle:i look at the other two that are quiet the other three that are quiet

Johnny:The heroics are in the journey.

Anzu:It can't speak.

Gamemaster:Can somebody do me a favor and roll a d100?

Anzu:Yeah, of course.

Argyle:I've been trying to fix the world my entire life,

Anzu:I've been chasing this for the last year

Benny:Yes.

Anzu:I don't intend to stop

Anzu:fascinating

Argyle:not just a year, but I understand the sentiment.

Benny:Yes.

Argyle:Benny's the only one who didn't accept.

Argyle:Why is he...

Argyle:Yeah.

Benny:Nobody accepted.

Gamemaster:Six. Okay.

Argyle:ah ah you

Gamemaster:Benny did accept Just to clarify all four of you did accept right Okay All five of you did accept

Benny:Okay Okay

Johnny:you you you You heard the bird

Gamemaster:Yeah, no, Othello is traumatized by now.

Gamemaster:There is...

Gamemaster:There is a...

Gamemaster:shift in the fog,

Gamemaster:directly in front of the four of you,

Gamemaster:between where you are and this ring of men you are.

Gamemaster:And out of the fog comes a pedestal rising out of the ground.

Gamemaster:And on that pedestal is a very ornate firearm.

Gamemaster:um it is made of some kind of uh white almost ivory like material filigreed with the purest

Gamemaster:most reflective looking gold you've ever seen the gold itself almost shimmers in a way that you do

Gamemaster:not, uh, you do not recognize. It's almost ethereal. It's got this quality to it as the, uh, the firearm

Gamemaster:lifts up out of the fog that it's, it's almost leaving a slight afterimage as it travels upwards.

Gamemaster:Uh, and next to it on that same pedestal is a small, uh, paper box, unlabeled, um,

Johnny:I will rise and I'll walk towards it.

Gamemaster:like made of some kind of stiff card, almost.

Gamemaster:Okay, absolutely.

Gamemaster:Nothing jumps out at you or anything.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Johnny:I will open the box.

Johnny:What's in the box?

Gamemaster:Inside of the box are...

Gamemaster:They look like...

Anzu:Jorge is just making plans.

Gamemaster:spikes, almost, about this big, made out of the same strange gold that you had seen filigreed

Gamemaster:on the firearm itself.

Gamemaster:Oh, no.

Gamemaster:Absolutely.

Gamemaster:They look like they would fit into the chamber of this firearm.

Johnny:17.

Gamemaster:There are 17 in total.

Johnny:Wow.

Gamemaster:17.

Johnny:I will...

Johnny:What is the gun?

Johnny:Does it look like a rifle or like a six-shooter?

Gamemaster:Like a handgun, like a revolver.

Johnny:I will pick it up and go,

Johnny:I guess I'll learn how to use a gun,

Johnny:and then I'll pick up the bullets.

Argyle:I start thinking it.

Benny:Give it to the bird.

Anzu:I guess we could kind of check this out

Johnny:I'll look at the stones.

Gamemaster:The Menhir do not say anything further.

Johnny:Godkiller bullets?

Anzu:when we get home.

Johnny:Yeah.

Johnny:Can I put these in your sleeves?

Johnny:Yeah.

Johnny:Mod.

Gamemaster:There is a tone from the men who are closest to you, and obviously you don't speak rock,

Argyle:Thank you Great Great

Johnny:17 bullets geez We won let you down Well thank you How do we leave

Gamemaster:but there is a very there a gratefulness in it and also a bit of melancholy He doesn respond any further

Argyle:Where?

Argyle:Just to double check.

Argyle:Do you have like any symbol for identifying other men here followers?

Argyle:I didn't take one of odd.

Argyle:I was curious if you have.

Gamemaster:It doesn't respond.

Argyle:Okay.

Argyle:we will do you justice

Anzu:I'm just going to close my eyes.

Gamemaster:Come on.

Argyle:and I'll just like

Argyle:wait I don't know

Gamemaster:Sure.

Gamemaster:Absolutely.

Gamemaster:It's comfortable.

Gamemaster:The environment of the Black and White is such that it is exactly body temperature and body humidity.

Gamemaster:It's like being in a deprivation tank, a sensory deprivation tank.

Argyle:I'll just pray to the men here and the judge

Gamemaster:so you close your eyes and you immediately

Gamemaster:feel yourself become one with the world

Benny:Is it the kind of thing you pray to?

Johnny:I'm just going to put my sunglasses back on.

Gamemaster:it is disorientating

Gamemaster:absolutely

Argyle:and just assume at some point

Gamemaster:mhm

Argyle:they'll kick us out

Gamemaster:sure

Benny:Or is this more like...

Benny:Because I don't know.

Benny:It's not like it's...

Benny:I mean, it is helping us, but I don't think it's...

Benny:We're supposed to be heroes.

Benny:We're supposed to go through struggle.

Argyle:if you

Benny:I think this accelerates the struggle.

Benny:I'm not sure if it's a deity wishing to be worshipped

Johnny:I guess I'll also just close my eyes.

Benny:but I don't know

Argyle:that's a great idea I will take that up in prayer

Benny:oh humble men here

Benny:who do not want me to pray to them

Benny:I think I think we have to shoot one of us

Argyle:please give me a sign if you do not want me to continue my

Gamemaster:Okay you guys are still in the Black and White inside this menhir

Argyle:yeah

Johnny:okay okay uh just Do we just leave the men here

Johnny:What if I just walk outside the men here?

Argyle:to the Pharos

Gamemaster:Yeah, you can

Gamemaster:absolutely just walk past the menhir

Gamemaster:into the rest of the Black and White.

Gamemaster:Are you walking in any particular direction?

Johnny:I'll walk towards the Pharos.

Argyle:yeah

Gamemaster:Okay, sure.

Gamemaster:You start walking towards the Pharos. You get like

Gamemaster:20 steps

Gamemaster:before in front of you you see the Menhir and some of your friends.

Argyle:Humble men here, may you grant us access to leave this place.

Argyle:We hope to be back soon, if you allow it.

Gamemaster:There is...

Gamemaster:There is a chime this time.

Gamemaster:It is...

Gamemaster:definitely sad.

Gamemaster:I don't think you have a great way of placing where that sadness is coming from, but it is a chime of mourning.

Argyle:anything else we should do

Anzu:I try to count the men here again.

Anzu:...

Gamemaster:No roll necessary, they are uncountable.

Anzu:...

Gamemaster:Uncountable.

Anzu:...

Argyle:can you come with us

Anzu:...

Gamemaster:There is another soft chime, and Johnny, you feel a reverberation in your box of bullets.

Anzu:...

Gamemaster:They resonate with it.

Argyle:oh

Argyle:So we can, so these are the men here.

Anzu:they're really like bumming me out

Johnny:We have to shoot the men?

Argyle:We have to kill the men.

Gamemaster:Thank you They are uncountable

Anzu:in a way that makes me feel like

Anzu:something bad's gotta happen for us

Johnny:We have to kill ourselves?

Anzu:to get home

Johnny:What's going to happen here?

Argyle:We really don't have to kill the men here, right?

Benny:aim the gun aim the loaded gun at one and see if it starts freaking out listen i don know guys This is pretty chill compared to political hell on the fucking Strider so

Argyle:you Are there 17 stones here

Anzu:you They uncountable

Johnny:you You have to shoot one of us to get out of here

Benny:We can't get

Gamemaster:You have no way of knowing how many men there are.

Argyle:Well, I think it's more important that the men here

Argyle:arrives than one of us, so we should probably

Argyle:try shooting one of us first.

Benny:What?

Johnny:All right.

Argyle:You can do me.

Johnny:I mean, I've died a whole bunch more.

Argyle:Yeah, put it to my head.

Argyle:...

Benny:Hold on, hold on, hold on.

Argyle:...

Benny:We brought a bird with us?

Argyle:...

Johnny:Get the bars.

Benny:Benny will point it.

Johnny:Hold still.

Benny:Benny will point it.

Benny:Is that acceptable?

Benny:I don't know.

Benny:We've all decided independently that there's some sort of a bloodlust going on here,

Argyle:Does it make a chime?

Benny:and something needs to die for us to leave.

Johnny:What if I put the gun up to my head?

Gamemaster:No.

Argyle:When you hold it up to the bird?

Argyle:What about to one of the rocks?

Argyle:Does it make a chime?

Johnny:Does it make a chime?

Benny:Maybe it's sad that we forgot the word to go back or something.

Argyle:There's 17 of them, so that's way more than us.

Benny:Do we have to do the whole death thing again?

Johnny:Oh. I walk up to one of the men here and I say, please let us go back. Please let us go back. Please let us go back.

Gamemaster:Ooh, rule of three.

Gamemaster:There is a soft, melancholic chime as response, but you do not go back.

Johnny:Okay, three of us have to die.

Argyle:We need to keep...

Johnny:To die and reconstitute?

Benny:Like we have to die and...

Argyle:Just shh.

Benny:I don't know.

Benny:You're the expert on dying.

Benny:Do you think dying would help us here, Johnny?

Argyle:You can just shoot me, Johnny.

Benny:Hold on, hold on, hold on.

Anzu:Oh, yeah.

Johnny:He's always gotten me out of sticky situations before.

Johnny:Yeah, I can just shoot myself in the head and see what happens.

Argyle:Nah, you can just shoot me.

Argyle:What do you want us to get shot?

Benny:Anzu, hold on.

Argyle:Someone's got to get shot.

Benny:Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.

Benny:Anzu, can you identify the gun and bullets?

Argyle:Ha ha ha ha ha ha.

Anzu:Can I see the gun?

Johnny:Yeah, he handed the gun.

Anzu:I look and I go,

Anzu:holy gold!

Anzu:Do you see this thing?

Johnny:Hahahaha!

Benny:...

Argyle:I also roll a religion while I'm looking at it.

Anzu:And then I'll, I guess, try to identify magic on this unknowable weapon.

Gamemaster:Terrible.

Gamemaster:Yeah, absolutely.

Gamemaster:Roll...

Gamemaster:Take your favorite of

Gamemaster:Arcana

Gamemaster:Religion, Nature, and Occultism.

Anzu:I guess we'll do nature.

Gamemaster:Sure.

Anzu:My favorite.

Gamemaster:Yeah, you can do a religion if you want.

Anzu:We'll roll occultism.

Gamemaster:That's both fine.

Anzu:I got a 30.

Argyle:Let's see.

Benny:21.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Argyle:I will...

Argyle:I'm trying to find my religion thing.

Argyle:Where the fuck is that shit?

Argyle:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Argyle:Okay.

Argyle:Are we doing this with Mythic?

Gamemaster:You don't want to keep the 21? You don't think that's enough?

Argyle:No.

Argyle:I don't know.

Argyle:I didn't have a Mythic.

Argyle:No!

Argyle:Real Mythic.

Argyle:Fuck.

Anzu:Nice try, nerd.

Gamemaster:So the highest we got is a 30.

Gamemaster:Haha, nerd.

Argyle:I summon Mythic Power and get another Mythic Point back.

Gamemaster:Okay, you can't use it now.

Argyle:I know.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Gamemaster:With a 30,

Gamemaster:you would know that this firearm is called The End.

Gamemaster:That it Normally when you like look to identify something you effectively pulling apart the

Argyle:Just you Just

Gamemaster:individual little harmonies inside of that that constitutes the magic effect and the like.

Gamemaster:When you do this, when you do that similarly, for whatever reason just in your head,

Gamemaster:it's you've never heard a question mark before, but that's what you get when you're

Gamemaster:when you're trying to figure out what this thing does. It's just question marks.

Argyle:Maybe this will be enough.

Benny:You don't use one.

Anzu:And can I roll up for a needle as well?

Gamemaster:Uh, you may.

Anzu:Similar.

Gamemaster:Similar.

Argyle:Maybe this will be important enough for Anzardi as a mythic point.

Gamemaster:You don't have to. I'm not making you.

Anzu:Alright, I'll summon mythic power first.

Anzu:Well, I'll summon mythic power.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Benny:You're the first one to go in the bullets bloodlust.

Anzu:Well, I got a 21, so I could use my mythic point for my summon mythic power that I just did.

Benny:Allegedly.

Anzu:Yeah, I guess. Whatever.

Gamemaster:Are you?

Gamemaster:Hello?

Anzu:Guys, we have to stall for the rest of the session after this.

Gamemaster:Hello?

Anzu:Whatever we do next has to be really...

Anzu:34 is better.

Gamemaster:34.

Gamemaster:Do you know what's super neat about these weird gold needle things?

Anzu:They got no magic in them.

Gamemaster:They're not magic.

Gamemaster:Man, they're not magic.

Anzu:Yeah, it's crazy.

Gamemaster:it's a weird material certainly

Argyle:So you're saying that we should shoot each other,

Anzu:Guys, I feel like these men here probably wouldn't be that sad if one of us had to get shot.

Johnny:You think we have to shoot the men here?

Gamemaster:but they're not magic

Argyle:or you're saying that they're probably sad that they have to get shot?

Anzu:There's the second one.

Gamemaster:...

Argyle:I'm going to be honest with you.

Argyle:I be very surprised if they needed this nice of a gun to shoot one of us A regular gun would have done that

Benny:so if we shoot them if we shoot them with a gun do we go back or do we get something additional

Johnny:Yeah Yeah

Benny:because I'm trying to square this away

Benny:like if I was an all knowing stone

Benny:I don't think I'd be like

Benny:oh well the only way to get back home is to

Benny:dome one of us with this sick ass gun

Benny:I'd be like

Benny:that's kind of ridiculous

Benny:but

Benny:I don't know I'm not a bunch of

Benny:stones

Benny:No.

Argyle:I guess we got...

Johnny:I mean, I guess it depends on...

Johnny:It's sort of confusing on where we are,

Johnny:because if we're doing a hero's journey,

Johnny:is this death of the mentor, or is this our death?

Argyle:I think it's Deathly Mentor.

Argyle:I'll grab the gun.

Argyle:What do you guys think?

Argyle:Oh, now I go to...

Argyle:Is that, like, our guy?

Benny:No.

Argyle:You've never seen him cry before, but he's kind of tearing up.

Benny:Oh wise, wise men here.

Argyle:Please, please stop me.

Johnny:Yeah, many of you, if this is not, oh, we just already prayed to you, if this is the wrong move, say something.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Benny:Oh wise, wise men here.

Benny:Wise.

Argyle:This reminds me of a story of the judge

Argyle:where he had one of his sons

Argyle:go up a mountain and go to sacrifice

Argyle:one of his others.

Argyle:Please stop me.

Argyle:And he pulls the trigger.

Gamemaster:Pulls the trigger, pointing it at the men here. Or one of. Okay. There is a quieter click than you'd expect from a firearm. As, I assume, did you load it? Yes, right? You can say no if you didn't load it. Okay.

Argyle:Yeah.

Anzu:Yes.

Anzu:No, we definitely loaded it.

Argyle:No, that would have been too smart to not load it.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Gamemaster:You loaded it.

Gamemaster:There a very soft click as one of those 17 spikes fires from the gun embeds itself in the menhir and that menhir crumbles And the other menhir around it crumble as well

Gamemaster:And you are in this empty field, the empty Black and White,

Gamemaster:just the Pharos in the distance.

Gamemaster:And then you're back on the stage.

Gamemaster:For you, some time has passed, but for everybody else,

Gamemaster:you blipped out for just the smallest amount of time.

Johnny:I'll grab Onik by the lapel.

Gamemaster:Like you ceased to exist in the middle of a blink,

Gamemaster:and you came back by the time the blink was done.

Gamemaster:And the twins will, of course, rush up to you,

Gamemaster:having seen you disappear for a split second,

Gamemaster:and Anouk will say,

Gamemaster:What happened? Were you successful?

Johnny:Oh, fuck.

Johnny:I think we killed the Menhir.

Johnny:We'll shove them out of the way.

Johnny:Show's over.

Johnny:Everyone leave.

Gamemaster:yes Argyle does have a gun with 16 bullets

Argyle:bullets now?

Johnny:Fuck, there's 16 bullets. No!

Argyle:Oh my

Gamemaster:well to clarify

Argyle:goodness.

Johnny:No!

Gamemaster:the gun itself has 5

Gamemaster:in it right now because you fired 1

Gamemaster:and then the rest are in that box

Argyle:Yeah.

Gamemaster:there aren't 17

Argyle:Oh my god.

Gamemaster:barrels in this gun

Argyle:This is so

Johnny:The 17 shooter.

Argyle:bad, guys.

Gamemaster:uh

Johnny:Show's over. Everyone leave. Everyone leave. Get out of here.

Gamemaster:Excellent. Can I have... I need somebody to roll a d100 for me.

Argyle:I don't know if you should be rolling anything else

Benny:I got it.

Johnny:Come on.

Gamemaster:10. Yeah. Yeah, you roll...

Benny:I got it.

Argyle:holy shit

Johnny:What did the six do?

Johnny:Oh, God.

Benny:10.

Benny:Is this actually rolling a D100?

Benny:I guess.

Johnny:What is happening?

Benny:It's too low rolls.

Benny:They're going to bring us back, and they're going to be like,

Gamemaster:Uh, no.

Benny:Aut now.

Benny:Shoot Aut.

Benny:What?

Benny:every every d100 i just keep getting a 10 or lower and we have to dome the entire narrative

Johnny:Oh, he's doing the water.

Argyle:we're gonna stand trial

Argyle:in the hague

Argyle:or killing one of the nerds.

Argyle:guys they're not dead forever right right guys that's not all of them that's just one of them

Benny:I think it kills gods

Johnny:I don't know.

Gamemaster:So here's...

Argyle:they didn't just give us a gun to kill narratives that's fucking crazy

Johnny:I don't know.

Benny:hopefully

Johnny:Yes, the god killer.

Benny:fingers crossed

Benny:it is the end

Gamemaster:Okay, so I'm at an interesting point here, because I didn't know if we would get here.

Gamemaster:You rolled a 10, which is a failure or success, however you want to interpret it.

Benny:okay

Argyle:this

Argyle:No.

Gamemaster:It is things happen on a Scale of things don't happen to things happen.

Gamemaster:And like the thing that I'm working through is the things that happen in this particular instance is that it is immediately obvious to those related to the Menhir what just happened to the Menhir, which is a new experience for those related.

Argyle:Oh.

Gamemaster:to the Menhir, because that's never happened before.

Gamemaster:And there's been a lot of time for that to have never happened before,

Gamemaster:if that makes sense.

Argyle:

Argyle:Oh.

Gamemaster:But you guys are the heroes.

Gamemaster:So there's only so much that they can directly do to you,

Gamemaster:because they are still bound by the plot.

Gamemaster:and so with with the things happen on that role the question is is how far

Gamemaster:can those who are very very very very angry with you and everything that you represent

Gamemaster:do things to you in such a way that it doesn't grievously injure them if that makes sense

Gamemaster:And so I think what I want to do here is there are four of you and I need four rolls to be made

Argyle:you Oh my god I do a d6

Johnny:you I take D4

Gamemaster:Somebody's gonna do a d4, somebody's gonna do a d6, somebody's gonna do a d8, and somebody's

Gamemaster:gonna do a d12.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Johnny:I got a four.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Argyle:Okay, I got a five.

Benny:D12.

Anzu:Was the other one a D10 or a D8?

Johnny:Oh, these are really good.

Benny:You got a 10?

Gamemaster:D8. We skipped D10.

Gamemaster:internet connectivity issues

Argyle:Oh, no! Who was the D10?

Johnny:Oh, no, these are such good rolls.

Anzu:Oh, it's my bird.

Johnny:Oh, no.

Anzu:I'll have Othello roll the D10.

Argyle:No, I meant...

Argyle:Tanner, what died that would have been a D10?

Gamemaster:hello

Anzu:What?

Benny:Can I

Gamemaster:oh cool

Johnny:Oh.

Benny:connect?

Argyle:I...

Benny:We can hear you.

Gamemaster:I said I'm having internet connectivity issues

Argyle:I first too.

Johnny:Okay.

Gamemaster:because you all froze for me for half a second

Gamemaster:you all rolled

Gamemaster:exceptionally

Gamemaster:well on those roles.

Gamemaster:So, bravo!

Gamemaster:Bravo!

Gamemaster:There's no way in

Gamemaster:whatever the equivalent of hell is

Gamemaster:for the narrative that they're going to show their face

Gamemaster:to you at the moment

Gamemaster:given the imminent danger

Argyle:Yeah.

Gamemaster:you pose

Gamemaster:and have immediately proven

Gamemaster:with this gift

Gamemaster:of the men here.

Gamemaster:Um, so you are lucky in that none of them will show up directly in front of your face

Gamemaster:and attempt to do anything, uh, uh, negative to you.

Gamemaster:Uh but something that has been at least partially established here um is they can first of all interact with other people on the strider but second of all interact with the strider itself

Gamemaster:there is

Gamemaster:a jolt

Gamemaster:as I had mentioned before

Gamemaster:this intense sense of

Gamemaster:vertigo as you feel your gut being

Gamemaster:pulled out from underneath you

Gamemaster:as the scenery around you changes.

Gamemaster:You were, for a good period of time at this point,

Gamemaster:navigating through a version of Færrin over and over again

Gamemaster:that is kind of idyllic and pastoral and untouched by humanity

Gamemaster:and its derivatives, effectively.

Gamemaster:You hadn't been to a Joker world in a while, so it had been relatively the same site over and over again, maybe slightly displaced each time as the Strider does walk forward a little bit.

Gamemaster:That is no longer the case.

Gamemaster:You are first immediately struck by what you attribute to cold, because it immediately sinks into your bones.

Gamemaster:but it isn't quite cold. Cold is the wrong term because cold implies things like ice and snow

Argyle:Oh no.

Gamemaster:and just kind of a general reduction of temperature and that isn't what you feel here.

Gamemaster:Instead what you feel is this immense pressure to stop if that makes sense. It's not cold it's just

Argyle:Oh no.

Gamemaster:nothing. It's just

Argyle:This happened already to the strider.

Gamemaster:you're in

Gamemaster:some version of Færrin certainly looking out And you can roll a perception check if you like to get your bearings around you But this environment feels gosh what is the term What that not how you say inequitable

Argyle:Thank you That not good

Johnny:you Inimicable

Gamemaster:Inequitable?

Gamemaster:I can't remember the word.

Gamemaster:There we go.

Gamemaster:This is, this is what I get for seeing words and then never saying them out loud.

Gamemaster:Inimicable.

Gamemaster:Just to your presence.

Argyle:I rolled one.

Johnny:It was 35.

Gamemaster:And if it's any consolation, it's not just yours.

Gamemaster:You can see that those around you are cringing similarly as this kind of chill seeps into them and beats their nervous system into not wanting to move.

Gamemaster:What did we get for perception checks?

Argyle:Yeah, yeah.

Gamemaster:And you are making me look up.

Gamemaster:I can't remember the name of this particular Joker world, so thank you for this.

Argyle:Johnny just had to put on a performance

Johnny:Okay, I didn't think we'd have to kill the men here.

Argyle:performance

Argyle:yeah

Johnny:In what world could I have predicted that?

Johnny:There's like the one thing Josh tells us is that they're all powerful.

Johnny:We're level 8.

Gamemaster:Mm-hmm.

Johnny:We usually don't get a god killing weapon until at least level 16.

Gamemaster:Listen, you asked to be put onto the path of a hero,

Argyle:your fuckers are crazy

Johnny:I mean, it makes sense.

Gamemaster:and the men are at a plan designed for the hero.

Gamemaster:You want to be the hero so bad, you get to be the hero.

Argyle:most many

Argyle:well I mean

Johnny:Now the...

Johnny:I mean, the narrative won't show up in person

Argyle:I mean Aut should be on our side right

Johnny:to fuck with us.

Argyle:he just gave us his whole speech but sometimes he's got to blow up

Argyle:shit to do right

Argyle:he should be on our side right

Argyle:he just gave us his whole speech about bombing

Gamemaster:I'm dumb because I like went through my notes to figure out what this place is called and then when I read it I'm like

Argyle:people. Shooting should be fine.

Argyle:35.

Benny:Breezy, breezy place.

Johnny:I got a 35.

Gamemaster:Like, oh, yeah, no, duh.

Gamemaster:What do we get for perception?

Benny:No.

Gamemaster:Yeah, Freezy Beezy, please.

Gamemaster:It's the name of, like, the Mario 64 level that you have to jump through and play with the penguin.

Gamemaster:That's what it is.

Gamemaster:Like, Chill Chill Peak or something.

Gamemaster:35.

Gamemaster:Looking outside the strider.

Gamemaster:First of all, first thing of note is you've been here like 12 whole seconds, and you haven't moved away.

Gamemaster:The Strider is not moving at the moment.

Gamemaster:It has been stopped.

Gamemaster:But that does afford you a little bit of time to look around and get your bearings,

Gamemaster:take a good view of the area outside the Strider.

Gamemaster:It is dead, for lack of a better term.

Gamemaster:there is no

Gamemaster:dirt

Gamemaster:there's no grass, there's no trees

Gamemaster:geographically

Gamemaster:it looks to be about the same as where you were

Gamemaster:it's just as if somebody had

Gamemaster:stripped all of the organic matter

Gamemaster:right off the surface

Gamemaster:of where you are

Gamemaster:it is just endless

Gamemaster:rock

Gamemaster:the sound of howling winds

Gamemaster:drives at you as there's nothing to dampen

Gamemaster:any kind of

Gamemaster:global forces like wind and the like.

Gamemaster:Somehow, something that you had not thought possible

Gamemaster:until you were here,

Gamemaster:you can see that there are two suns in the sky,

Gamemaster:both exceptionally dim.

Gamemaster:Still there, but dim.

Gamemaster:Like covered with a thick film of dust

Gamemaster:that is stopping most of the light from passing through.

Gamemaster:the various sources there.

Gamemaster:No immediate life of any kind outside the Strider No animals or anything like that Also I don think you would have been able to see water like the ocean from where you were

Gamemaster:but you would have definitely been able to see a river or something of that nature completely drained here.

Gamemaster:No water, just scoured rock.

Gamemaster:And it's cold. It is unpleasantly cold. It is deathly cold.

Argyle:I'm just quick question.

Benny:What a great way to describe it.

Gamemaster:Five.

Argyle:How many members of the narrative

Argyle:were there before the men here's got shot?

Gamemaster:Correct.

Argyle:So now there's four.

Gamemaster:Correct.

Argyle:OK.

Argyle:Was there in the men here's visions,

Argyle:was there a scene where there was four people looking at us

Argyle:instead of five?

Argyle:Or there was just one scene with five, right?

Gamemaster:Yeah.

Argyle:Okay.

Johnny:narrative looking at us. They were all there.

Gamemaster:I think the twins probably would have ceased to exist for a second.

Argyle:Okay.

Argyle:Great.

Argyle:I look at the twits.

Argyle:Are they hostile?

Gamemaster:and then after a long

Gamemaster:pause they will pop

Gamemaster:into existence

Argyle:Yeah, back up.

Anzu:Yes.

Johnny:I back up.

Gamemaster:and both

Gamemaster:you know

Gamemaster:the scene in the Harry Potter

Gamemaster:movie where

Gamemaster:Dumbledore calmly asserts

Gamemaster:that he thinks Harry may have put his name

Gamemaster:into the Goblet of Fire

Gamemaster:to

Anzu:Yes.

Gamemaster:not-French twins

Gamemaster:pop into existence,

Gamemaster:swivel face you,

Gamemaster:and they're both

Gamemaster:walking towards you arms out in complete disbelief What did you do

Argyle:We just asked to be his heroes

Benny:you There no way to leave

Johnny:he told us to do it He gave us the bullets They

Argyle:and then he gave us this thing that

Argyle:he told us to shoot

Argyle:he didn't let us

Gamemaster:You could...

Gamemaster:Surely you could have,

Gamemaster:once you realized that you needed to shoot,

Gamemaster:one of these great all-powerful beings,

Gamemaster:you could have said no.

Argyle:we tried

Argyle:he just made us wait forever

Benny:if you ask to be a hero,

Johnny:Listen, Anaïs, Anouk, with great power comes great responsibility.

Gamemaster:I...

Benny:if you ask to be given heroism,

Benny:have it blessed upon you.

Benny:And the thing that gives you heroism,

Benny:hands you a gun and points at their forehead.

Benny:What do you do?

Gamemaster:You deny the call! You go back home! You live an uneventful life!

Johnny:Did you guys not know that?

Benny:It's not a bad idea.

Gamemaster:This is... this is too much responsibility. Where the fuck are we?

Argyle:We go open the book.

Benny:That they didn't tell us.

Anzu:That's a great question.

Johnny:And we'll get inside.

Gamemaster:hmm

Johnny:I yell.

Benny:Yeah, let's take this inside.

Benny:Let's take this inside.

Benny:We gotta put the gun there

Anzu:Well, just before we go in,

Anzu:we knew that we were coming up on a cold place called Glacier,

Anzu:but that had a lot of ice.

Anzu:We're not seeing ice, correct?

Gamemaster:correct

Johnny:Yeah, this is just...

Gamemaster:nice

Argyle:We have our book of the,

Gamemaster:absolutely

Argyle:we have our traveler's guide to the galaxy.

Argyle:Can we take a look at that?

Argyle:Um,

Gamemaster:you can

Argyle:how secure is the Anzu shadow?

Anzu:What?

Argyle:Where do you want...

Anzu:Oh, my sleeves.

Johnny:Yeah, we gotta...

Argyle:Do you want me to walk around with it?

Johnny:We gotta hide this thing.

Anzu:I don't do shadow stuff.

Argyle:Oh, sorry.

Anzu:I do...

Benny:Who cares?

Anzu:Yeah.

Johnny:You put it in the sleeves.

Benny:Slippery sleeves.

Johnny:Shove the end of the sleeves.

Argyle:How secure is it?

Anzu:And, like, what's the DC to get in there?

Gamemaster:While you guys are figuring this out Anouk and Anaïs at the very least will put together they work on casting a spell that I don think any of you would have interacted

Argyle:No, is it like...

Anzu:Probably not.

Anzu:All right.

Argyle:Is it like more...

Argyle:Is it...

Argyle:Where should we put this, guys?

Johnny:Hide it.

Johnny:In his sleeves.

Argyle:Do I...

Argyle:yeah Yeah

Gamemaster:with previously. A shell, almost, of energy extends out from a central point that

Gamemaster:they cast it, and it's it's a hundred feet in radius. It covers a pretty large

Gamemaster:area and inside the air is temperate. It's not it's not chilly in here.

Argyle:I'll take at least

Anzu:I'm putting it in my sleeve and then we can

Gamemaster:There's no particular wind flow or anything like that. It's just calm. I

Gamemaster:apologize. Continue figuring out where to put the gun.

Gamemaster:Okay. Absolutely.

Anzu:make a different plan later.

Anzu:Alright, let's consult the map

Argyle:some of the bullets

Argyle:no no no

Argyle:you should keep them

Argyle:don't fucking lose that

Gamemaster:Okay, so you guys are headed back inside, inside of Leer's chronomantic shell, and you

Argyle:Yeah.

Gamemaster:are, what, you're pulling out the Atlas, just to take a look-see?

Anzu:Yeah, see if anything matches

Anzu:is the description of this dead and withered place.

Gamemaster:Absolutely.

Gamemaster:Absolutely. Well, so you do have an advantage of, if you recall, the first foldout map does

Argyle:Yep.

Benny:Oh.

Gamemaster:give you, like, your direct location from Prime all the way out voidward. So it is disconcerting

Argyle:Mm-hmm.

Gamemaster:when you are not on the map.

Argyle:Can I see if there's no grass outside the strider, right?

Argyle:There's no weird blue or green grass.

Gamemaster:There's no grass outside the strider. It is completely scoured.

Argyle:OK.

Johnny:Who has Chuck's totem?

Johnny:Where's the totem?

Argyle:Okay.

Johnny:I

Gamemaster:Yeah, you can take out the little figurine of Chuck if you want and crush it to summon him if you like.

Johnny:I

Johnny:Yep, cross new

Gamemaster:Is that something you're doing?

Gamemaster:Okay, absolutely.

Gamemaster:You crush it.

Gamemaster:There's a puff of smoke and a...

Gamemaster:Oh, gosh.

Benny:Okay.

Anzu:Huh.

Johnny:Machine gone.

Gamemaster:Yeah, I think the answer here is that you crush it and a desiccated corpse wearing the attire that you are familiar with of the Harlequins just kind of shows up and then collapses because nothing's holding it up.

Anzu:Well, that's interesting.

Johnny:Machine gone.

Johnny:we have

Benny:We didn't shoot him.

Johnny:every resource we have

Argyle:yeah

Gamemaster:Yeah, I mean, it happens right in front of the twins

Benny:If the twins see this, maybe we didn't shoot him, okay?

Johnny:um

Johnny:We got a big problem.

Benny:systems check

Gamemaster:and also everybody else that you are keeping in your base.

Argyle:yeah call out to machine gun

Gamemaster:Yeah, if you call out to the machine god

Gamemaster:and you hear back from the machine god...

Gamemaster:Yes?

Gamemaster:Define big.

Argyle:Yeah.

Gamemaster:No.

Johnny:Can you see through my eyes?

Johnny:Okay.

Johnny:I paint a very pretty word picture of what's happening right now.

Gamemaster:Absolutely.

Gamemaster:And he will say,

Gamemaster:that is unfortunate.

Johnny:Machine God, it used to be your job to keep the Strider moving, right?

Gamemaster:In a way, yes.

Gamemaster:Yes No maybe no maybe I don think the issue is with Tali

Johnny:The Strider is not moving If we kill Tally can you get the Strider moving again

Argyle:you Thanks

Gamemaster:I think the issue is

Gamemaster:with whatever power

Gamemaster:source your friends have

Gamemaster:been harnessing

Gamemaster:to move

Gamemaster:through the horizon

Johnny:As in there's no power source?

Argyle:The Harley Quinns are dead.

Anzu:What is...

Johnny:What happens if we look up?

Gamemaster:I... it is above the strider, not within, so I cannot check it.

Gamemaster:But if something has stopped stoking the flames, as it were...

Anzu:Yeah, what is the rings?

Johnny:What's it look like up there?

Gamemaster:Straight up?

Gamemaster:Oh! The rings, the rings are still... they're intact!

Gamemaster:But they are not moving.

Anzu:Did they, under normal operation, have a glow within them?

Anzu:I forget.

Anzu:Okay.

Gamemaster:No.

Argyle:What does the tithe say we need to pay?

Johnny:There's

Argyle:Does it say anything?

Anzu:I look to

Johnny:We need to do another time.

Gamemaster:Yeah, the tithe has stopped at 34.

Gamemaster:It doesn't appear to have updated at all.

Anzu:wait give me just a moment

Anzu:is it Ishelle

Anzu:yes

Gamemaster:From Radiant Arms?

Anzu:Ishelle are you able to

Gamemaster:Yes.

Anzu:call upon your

Anzu:Harlequin

Anzu:Less.

Argyle:why

Benny:I'm afraid that.

Johnny:So, just to track the chain of events here, Johnny put on a play.

Gamemaster:I guess so.

Gamemaster:Reach in, take out a figurine of not Chuck, but somebody dressed very similarly, crushes it, and the corpse pops out and collapses to the ground.

Argyle:mm-hmm

Gamemaster:Yep.

Johnny:We blipped out for 30 seconds.

Argyle:mm-hmm

Johnny:Then the strider stopped.

Argyle:mm-hmm

Anzu:Less.

Gamemaster:Mm-hmm.

Gamemaster:what no actually that all took place in the course of like a second and a half like for you guys it felt longer because you were spending some of that time in the Black and White and talking to the men here and killing the men here

Johnny:And that all took place in the course of about five minutes.

Benny:you the people are like

Argyle:...

Gamemaster:and all that fun stuff, but, like,

Gamemaster:for everybody else it was like a second and a half.

Argyle:...

Benny:setting up folding chairs like this is gonna be good

Benny:like man ears please

Benny:here are please make us heroes

Argyle:...

Benny:and then we disappear reappear

Benny:ahhh and then the strider

Benny:stops

Benny:okay first off do we because from my understanding when events like this happen

Argyle:You know, maybe we all need a new name.

Anzu:We gotta go

Johnny:oh we really are the heartbreakers

Argyle:Johnny S. Skyfall.

Argyle:We should just have, like, I don't know, like...

Argyle:World Stop.

Argyle:Archival World Stop.

Argyle:Okay.

Anzu:We gotta go to the

Anzu:Harlequins part of the Strider

Argyle:Uh...

Benny:the central governing body is no longer existing in the same power.

Argyle:Yeah.

Anzu:I'm going to seize the power.

Benny:Power vacuum, looting, rioting, and power seizing.

Benny:I don't know if we want to walk around willy-nilly right now.

Argyle:Should we go take our car?

Benny:Go for it.

Gamemaster:Yes.

Argyle:Drive over?

Argyle:Or just run over ourselves?

Benny:Will we be able to?

Benny:can we have machine

Benny:machine god

Benny:can we can we get a

Argyle:He's useless up top.

Gamemaster:Yes.

Benny:systems check have you noticed any

Benny:irregularities in the last

Benny:30 seconds start appearing on

Benny:movement patterns

Gamemaster:Oh, yes.

Benny:energy patterns whatever else

Benny:what what if and what

Benny:what are those

Gamemaster:The entire, uh, gosh, forward aft? The prow? The prow of the Strider, I suppose, is pockmarked with

Benny:sure

Benny:Thank you Everyone dead everyone died everyone died We did too

Gamemaster:portals to somewhere Strange creatures with many fingers are crawling out of them

Argyle:We should go get our alliance

Johnny:you wait they pouring out

Argyle:and head over there I don't know man

Argyle:uh

Johnny:what what was that where the harlequins were

Gamemaster:Hmm?

Gamemaster:Mostly, well,

Gamemaster:almost entirely restricted specifically

Gamemaster:to the forward-most

Gamemaster:segment.

Gamemaster:Yes, that is where the Harlequins were.

Argyle:let's

Benny:I think we'll yeah we leave them here to defend

Argyle:yeah

Argyle:let's go boys

Argyle:the question is do we get our allies or not

Argyle:no no I meant like

Johnny:i don't think we should go in there alone

Johnny:oh yeah yeah

Benny:let me try yeah

Argyle:do we get the Protectorate and the Scale

Argyle:yeah we let's ring

Johnny:yeah

Johnny:going in there alone is crazy we'll die

Argyle:him

Argyle:we ring in our

Johnny:I think we're I think we're past

Argyle:if we ring them in Grayson's gonna know though

Gamemaster:Yeah, sure.

Argyle:All right.

Benny:Yeah.

Johnny:know it or not

Benny:Okay.

Johnny:this is bad

Argyle:Grayson's going to use this to attack our allies.

Argyle:But that guy's a conniving bitch.

Johnny:Can we hop on the screen real fast and send out the SOS?

Argyle:We really shouldn't.

Argyle:No, no, because we can grab the Void Hearts ourselves

Argyle:and use it to power our heart.

Argyle:unless you do you guys want to

Benny:I'm mildly okay with that

Gamemaster:mildly okay

Anzu:Get the car.

Argyle:yeah

Benny:It is going to be dangerous

Gamemaster:Okay.

Gamemaster:Absolutely.

Benny:Yeah

Gamemaster:So, sorry, did you end up using the skein or did you not?

Argyle:I think we do it

Johnny:Okay.

Argyle:you're gonna go

Johnny:Okay.

Benny:Yeah

Argyle:let's head on

Johnny:Nah, I would have stopped.

Argyle:should we try to pick up

Benny:I'm going to go directly to the Harlequins.

Anzu:Well, what are we just going to sit around?

Gamemaster:Absolutely.

Gamemaster:Okay, so you guys get in the car and start heading on over to, what is your first stop?

Gamemaster:Where are you going?

Argyle:no we should probably just

Argyle:is this a suicide mission

Argyle:I know I talked us into it but is this a suicide mission

Argyle:no no I meant

Argyle:do we tell it so here's the thing here's what i'm saying real quick we got 30 seconds we're

Anzu:So we need to leave everybody to defend our hearts.

Johnny:Yeah.

Argyle:gonna do this in game in like a minute guys uh primary didn't still on the Scale with the other

Argyle:guy so he'll probably inform the other people if we tell our parties they could go grayson

Argyle:could make another move and kill people or try to backstab people where we get the hearts because

Argyle:he tried to backstab people in that other party so he definitely will do that

Argyle:Is that the best thing?

Argyle:And then we just try to take care of this ourselves?

Benny:Yeah.

Anzu:At least to scout it out.

Johnny:Can we just run in?

Gamemaster:Okay, absolutely.

Argyle:Yeah.

Argyle:OK, sounds good.

Johnny:Yeah, give it a quick look.

Johnny:Okay, let's go.

Benny:We don't contact anyone we go

Argyle:Let's go.

Argyle:Yep.

Gamemaster:I'm just setting stuff up.

Gamemaster:I feel perhaps understandably, this was not planned.

Argyle:You're probably one of the most safe people right now, to be honest with you.

Gamemaster:So you have to give me half a second.

Benny:really

Johnny:You had a different plan for us today?

Gamemaster:fine.

Anzu:Guys, do you think my sister's okay?

Johnny:If go kill tally get your sister

Gamemaster:You're the one who's like, hey.

Gamemaster:No.

Anzu:Yeah, that's a good point.

Anzu:Maybe we should go there.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Argyle:Thank you Make one

Gamemaster:You guys are driving straight

Gamemaster:towards the Harlequin's town.

Gamemaster:Or perhaps what remains of it Can I get a perception check

Anzu:I not going to do it

Johnny:Thank you I don see anything

Argyle:All right.

Argyle:31.

Gamemaster:31. Okay, so you're really in general looking up for two things here. First

Gamemaster:is, you know, where are we driving to? What's awaiting us? The second is, are

Gamemaster:people, other interested factions perhaps, going to investigate? With that role, I

Gamemaster:think, with the 31, I think you guys are, by virtue of being the people who got

Gamemaster:everybody into the circumstance, a little ahead of the curve at the moment.

Gamemaster:Everybody else is still kind of scrambling, trying to figure out what's happening.

Gamemaster:You, a little bit, know what's happening.

Gamemaster:And as such, you are first out the door.

Gamemaster:As you're driving past the other factions and their slices going in,

Gamemaster:you can definitely see commotion in the distance as people are trying to figure out what is happening.

Gamemaster:But nobody is hopping into a car and driving in your direction yet.

Gamemaster:Um, that said, the other half of what you're looking for is looking at where you're going.

Gamemaster:Um, and it seems that something in the transition, something in when you were moved from where

Gamemaster:you are, from where you were to where you are, appears to have not sat well with the

Gamemaster:technology the Harlequins were using to move you voidward.

Gamemaster:some about that didn't go right

Gamemaster:um and it has in at least a little bit uh seems to have backfired on the Harlequins in that area

Gamemaster:as evidenced by the fact that, as you approach,

Gamemaster:it is very obvious that where used to sit

Gamemaster:the constructed little town that the Harlequins were operating out of

Gamemaster:is now an amalgam of purple energy

Argyle:Amen.

Gamemaster:taking chunks out of what used to be the town.

Gamemaster:The town itself is relatively small.

Gamemaster:It was effectively two roads in a V, but where it used to be people and houses and roads are instead chunks taken out of the floor with this deep purple light filtering out of it, or these strange masses of purple and blue and white growing out of those orifices that have now been materialized almost in the area.

Argyle:Okay.

Gamemaster:and not quickly

Gamemaster:but definitely

Gamemaster:in a

Gamemaster:volume that

Gamemaster:you had already seen things come out of

Gamemaster:the one portal that showed up in the ballroom

Gamemaster:and that was one

Gamemaster:relatively small

Gamemaster:tear in existence

Gamemaster:caused by this old man

Argyle:Yeah.

Gamemaster:that couldn't pay the tithe

Gamemaster:whatever this was seems to have taken a whole

Gamemaster:lot more people pretty quickly

Gamemaster:and as such there is

Gamemaster:a direct

Gamemaster:linear relationship between

Gamemaster:the fuel that tore

Gamemaster:open these holes in the town

Gamemaster:and the things coming out of them

Gamemaster:both in volume and in

Gamemaster:size

Gamemaster:I

Gamemaster:let me see

Gamemaster:do I have a way of

Gamemaster:so this isn a perfect match actually I do two things as a you going to have to use your imagination a little bit We all in Foundry right So this isn what

Gamemaster:it looks like, to clarify, but the purple portal in the middle bit is like the

Gamemaster:same general coloration of what I'm going for. So if you imagine that, but

Gamemaster:But then superimpose... yes.

Argyle:I can see it though

Johnny:It says I have no token in this scene, so I cannot see what...

Gamemaster:Oh. Good.

Argyle:I

Gamemaster:Yeah, Jorge can see it, and that's all that matters.

Argyle:I

Johnny:Oh no!

Gamemaster:Okay, so imagine that general effect, like waves of purple energy coming out of this deep, endless, bottomless pit into somewhere.

Gamemaster:And then just superimpose it upon the actual thing that you see in front of you.

Argyle:So those are different holes for void hearts that are okay.

Gamemaster:If I can find this.

Gamemaster:It is somewhere.

Gamemaster:One second.

Gamemaster:There it is.

Gamemaster:Here.

Gamemaster:Just, like, ignore the blue.

Gamemaster:Pretend purple instead.

Gamemaster:Yes.

Gamemaster:that have been

Argyle:give haste prepared

Gamemaster:pulled out of the space.

Argyle:Johnny

Benny:And invisible.

Anzu:Why are my hit points so low?

Johnny:Yeah, yeah, always.

Argyle:silence tasted Benny go in

Johnny:Let me know when you're ready.

Argyle:yeah

Benny:And invisible.

Argyle:I will silence Benny

Johnny:I will, I'll just start popping things.

Argyle:yeah

Johnny:You'll sound some.

Johnny:Okay.

Argyle:oh

Johnny:Uh, I will cast haste.

Johnny:Where is this item?

Gamemaster:Oh, no, you should be at regular hit points.

Anzu:Should I be at regular hit points?

Benny:You're a psychic?

Benny:Oh, yeah.

Gamemaster:You had signed on before anybody else and you were moving your mouse around and clicking

Argyle:I'm going to still expend that heroism I used earlier, though.

Anzu:Oh, I must have moved off the screen when you did it.

Johnny:It's all expensive.

Gamemaster:things, so I just injured you. I wasn't sure if that would actually be visible.

Anzu:That's funny.

Anzu:Is that in the history of the chat?

Argyle:Okay.

Gamemaster:Probably.

Anzu:Oh, Anzu takes 50 damage.

Anzu:Yeah, look at that.

Gamemaster:Yeah, I just injured you.

Gamemaster:Do I not have this anymore?

Gamemaster:Where are they?

Argyle:Do you want your second level or your fourth level silence now?

Benny:Jason.

Anzu:I feel like we just totally derailed the whole campaign.

Johnny:I think you want fourth level because it moves with him.

Argyle:Both should make him silence.

Argyle:Right?

Argyle:One is just 10 feet around him.

Argyle:But we're not going in with him.

Argyle:that's the one and then move forth

Gamemaster:Yeah. Yeah, you absolutely did.

Johnny:Yeah.

Anzu:Oh my god.

Johnny:I was like, this will be great! It'll give us a leg up! It'll give us...

Argyle:no no this guys this is good we had the problem of how do we get rid of the harlequins now we

Argyle:just gotta get rid of everyone else

Anzu:No, this was not good.

Argyle:i have a second and fourth because these are the same spells i had prepared when i

Anzu:I should have...

Johnny:Yeah, maybe just drop a second level silence on them.

Anzu:I should have

Argyle:fought the other thing.

Johnny:Oh shit, oh shit, they're everywhere.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Anzu:shot my bird.

Benny:Yes.

Johnny:Why am I in the front?

Argyle:All right, Benny's silenced.

Johnny:Okay.

Johnny:Venue of Godspeed 2?

Benny:I can pop Godspeed.

Johnny:Okay.

Argyle:All right, go get a Voidheart, Benny.

Argyle:Come back and I'll give you another silence.

Johnny:Anything else?

Gamemaster:Okay just before we do this I have depicted relatively accurately the area that you coming up upon Like not to Scale by any means but we going to assume that you

Johnny:Nope.

Argyle:Mm Mm

Gamemaster:coming up from the south and this is what remains of the town except purple.

Gamemaster:And these things are starting to come out, these weird amalgamations of hands

Argyle:Mm-hmm.

Argyle:we go get back up guys

Gamemaster:in the shape of a creature. You've seen them before. You've seen these hands of

Gamemaster:the void.

Benny:Mm-hmm.

Johnny:I also popped heroism.

Gamemaster:My...

Gamemaster:I guess the question here is, you want to run in, you want to grab a Voidheart?

Benny:Stop.

Gamemaster:From where?

Argyle:Is this nearest one, the nearest blue one,

Argyle:is that a Voidheart thing?

Gamemaster:Yes, it is.

Argyle:Yeah, let's see if it works.

Argyle:We're not going with Benny this time.

Argyle:We've learned our lessons.

Argyle:Silenced and hasted.

Johnny:He's got that too.

Argyle:And just to make it sheer,

Gamemaster:Okay.

Benny:Easy enough.

Johnny:We got to stay outside of 100 feet of these things.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Argyle:the second level silence would still silence all this.

Gamemaster:Let's see, do I have the original map we used?

Argyle:Yeah, he can't make any sounds.

Argyle:Great.

Gamemaster:Oh, I think I do, kind of.

Argyle:Maybe we can get two.

Gamemaster:One second.

Gamemaster:Where are you getting that number from?

Johnny:They have 100-foot reach.

Johnny:I thought they were reaching

Argyle:Yeah.

Benny:I thought they had like a 1500 foot

Anzu:I mean,

Gamemaster:It was more than 100 feet.

Benny:reach or whatever

Benny:pretty much

Argyle:Oh, yeah, it was 500.

Johnny:what was it a thousand feet?

Argyle:I think it was 500.

Johnny:wait was it more than a hundred feet?

Johnny:is there nowhere we can go that these things can't hit?

Argyle:It was 500.

Johnny:oh god is it a thousand?

Argyle:Should we go get the Protectorate?

Gamemaster:It might have been 1,000.

Gamemaster:I can double-check in a second.

Gamemaster:I'm looking for an image.

Johnny:am I dropping zero?

Gamemaster:these things do have they have reach a thousand feet Okay

Johnny:I don't want them to die

Johnny:I mean I guess it depends on what happens when

Argyle:You're right.

Johnny:Benny does this

Anzu:we could just use the gun on

Benny:135.

Argyle:Ah no that no

Johnny:1 2 3 4 5 he sort start blowing god bullets on these things Oh I dropped a zero

Argyle:how speed can Benny move in a turn

Benny:135.

Johnny:Wait, I have one more thing to give Benny as a last ditch.

Benny:Oh, not 135.

Benny:170?

Argyle:Do you think we could silence the car and then just drive?

Anzu:Ride and true potion of emergency escape.

Johnny:I'm going to give you, you don't have to drink this right now, but I'm giving you this potion

Benny:180?

Johnny:of emergency escape in case you need it.

Johnny:No, if you...

Johnny:I'm sorry.

Benny:Go right into a portal?

Anzu:...

Benny:It's silent

Benny:like every accurate space film or just see us

Argyle:Ha ha ha ha.

Johnny:They have echo sense or tremor sense, so they can track us because there was basically a gap in what they saw.

Gamemaster:From my own edification, what mechanics do you remember of the Hands of the Void?

Gamemaster:Okay.

Benny:they have very far reach attack of opportunity

Benny:yeah they understood that the there's just like a hole

Benny:where they sensed so they imagined something was there

Gamemaster:Yeah, I just wanted to clarify that you guys were aware of what they could do.

Benny:They made it up.

Argyle:I should just do a fourth, huh?

Anzu:now

Gamemaster:Just, you know, for specifically the whoever is silenced, these things will know you're there.

Benny:Mm-hmm.

Gamemaster:Okay, that's fine.

Anzu:I will say

Anzu:if we're doing a second level silence instead of a fourth

Anzu:it's not an area that is silenced

Anzu:it's that just the creature doesn't make sound

Anzu:is that

Anzu:no I saying I saying that better

Gamemaster:Oh.

Argyle:oh yeah Oh yeah

Gamemaster:Oh.

Johnny:It might be different Because Bor was like a whole area but now it just him

Gamemaster:Oh Oh Oh oh oh oh One second

Gamemaster:The target makes no sound.

Anzu:That is distinct.

Gamemaster:That's, that is distinct.

Gamemaster:That is separate from the aura that silences all sound.

Argyle:Mm-hmm.

Gamemaster:That's a good point.

Gamemaster:Yeah.

Gamemaster:I don't think that they would notice that

Argyle:Great.

Gamemaster:like they didn't notice that he's there because

Gamemaster:it's not an aura

Benny:I got it.

Johnny:Okay, Benny, you got this.

Gamemaster:uh

Johnny:Benny's just yelling.

Benny:I got it.

Gamemaster:okay

Gamemaster:uh alright okay so

Gamemaster:just run over the plan for me

Gamemaster:one more time. You have Benny, he's been

Gamemaster:god-speeded, he's gonna be level 2 silenced.

Argyle:and hasted

Anzu:I think...

Johnny:he's gonna start running in

Gamemaster:The rest of you...

Benny:yeah

Johnny:grabbing boy hearts

Argyle:is he hasted

Johnny:yeah he's hasted

Benny:and God speeded

Johnny:hasted and heroismed

Anzu:This is not a solution to the whole problem, Josh.

Anzu:But I think what's happening is

Anzu:Benny's going to run into this closest portal

Anzu:and try to pull that heart.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Anzu:And then we're going to go from there.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Benny:I think we're going to flee

Benny:I think we're going to try to get out

Benny:as soon as Betty has the heart

Argyle:You don't want to try to go for two?

Benny:I don't know if we can...

Johnny:We'll see how long we get after we get the first one.

Benny:Let's get the first one.

Argyle:Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!

Gamemaster:Okay.

Johnny:If we get the first one.

Argyle:Ha ha!

Argyle:Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!

Benny:I don't think we can...

Benny:I think we would have difficulty with two of these, let alone eight.

Johnny:I think we just turned this into a survival sim.

Benny:Although, how baller would it be if we're like,

Johnny:What?

Benny:no, no, we will complete the grand task.

Benny:And it's like, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang.

Benny:Get all the hearts get all the hearts

Argyle:Ha ha ha ha ha ha.

Benny:It's like now we can get all the cool-ups

Argyle:Ha ha!

Benny:Upgrades. Just like completely short-sighted.

Johnny:Give us more ammo.

Gamemaster:Not bad.

Argyle:Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!

Benny:Like, we get

Benny:like five turrets and nothing else.

Argyle:Ha ha ha ha!

Benny:They gave us to go to use it.

Benny:I don't know. I thought they'd give us more ammo

Benny:at some point.

Johnny:We killed the guy giving us ammo!

Benny:We bit the hand that fed.

Benny:And now we're fighting more hands.

Benny:This is the revenge of the hands.

Johnny:I don't know.

Johnny:It wasn't like we bit the hand.

Johnny:And it was like the hand jammed our mouth open and shoved its fist in and went, bite

Argyle:I like how the twins are like, no, you live a normal life.

Benny:How about us?

Gamemaster:Yeah.

Johnny:down, bite down!

Argyle:You say no.

Johnny:You walk away!

Gamemaster:No.

Gamemaster:Sometimes you're allowed to say no.

Gamemaster:But you don't have to say no.

Gamemaster:And that's important.

Gamemaster:And somebody said yes.

Benny:It's just like, don't you guys think you're going to have to

Benny:fucking, you guys aren't going to get shit for

Johnny:You did.

Gamemaster:Um...

Benny:free like you're gonna have to give something up and we're like all right and then we just

Argyle:guys i i didn't i don't want to brag but

Gamemaster:Yes.

Benny:and now he's like wait what the it's just like dude you even told us

Benny:someone might be giving something up

Argyle:argyle so far has the most impressive kill of all of our campaigns just putting it out there

Johnny:Is this the earliest you've ever derailed a campaign this hard?

Benny:uh

Argyle:this might be the hardest we've ever derailed a campaign

Gamemaster:It's the hardest you've ever...

Johnny:I'm so sorry.

Gamemaster:It's not the end of the world.

Benny:So the many are like sitting around like some tiny stone table Like so what we got to do is to really make a hero sacrifice Because the Voidsong and all this stuff it very important

Gamemaster:Like, there are still things that are happening.

Argyle:Yeah.

Gamemaster:I'm just scrambling in the moment to get, like, battle maps and stuff set up.

Gamemaster:But it's fine.

Johnny:I thought it would be like a quick side thing.

Johnny:We're like, great, now we have a new ally.

Gamemaster:No, unfortunately, the Menhir...

Gamemaster:So, like, the Menhir had plans.

Gamemaster:You've just accelerated them substantially.

Gamemaster:It's fine.

Johnny:Tanner looks so Thank you Josh said it was a level 20

Benny:We have to sacrifice ourselves for the hero's benefit.

Benny:We have to kill ourselves.

Benny:And then like, yeah, yeah.

Benny:So whenever the heroes get powerful enough for us to visit them, then...

Benny:Hold on.

Benny:Someone's calling.

Benny:Hello?

Benny:Heroes?

Benny:Oh, fuck.

Benny:Guys, they're calling...

Johnny:It was level 20 that I hit to do that.

Benny:They're calling...

Benny:Oh, fuck.

Benny:they're calling right i know it's early but do you guys want to live any longer yeah i mean i was

Gamemaster:Okay, so...

Johnny:So did we do this 12 levels early?

Benny:we were already planning on dying so just give them the gun and we're we're out

Gamemaster:Sorry, I've been jumping between two different maps.

Johnny:What about the boats up there?

Gamemaster:Okay, so you guys are...

Gamemaster:Uh, I mean, for distance sake, let's put you by these radioactive barrels.

Gamemaster:Ignore the fact that they're radioactive barrels.

Gamemaster:I'm working with maps that don't always fit.

Gamemaster:Over there.

Johnny:Okay.

Gamemaster:So this is generally the distance you're supposed to go.

Gamemaster:We're still saying, like, because technically you're coming from south,

Gamemaster:so you're still going for this one on the right would be the closest from where you're approaching.

Gamemaster:This is just the distance that you're traveling.

Argyle:Agreed.

Gamemaster:So the first step here is you're in this car.

Gamemaster:I assume you're not driving the car into what used to be the Harlequin town to do your investigation.

Argyle:No, no, no.

Gamemaster:Unless you want to.

Gamemaster:That is an option.

Gamemaster:Okay, so the car is, um, back where I suppose Benny and Anzu are right now.

Argyle:Okay.

Gamemaster:It's like tucked behind a rock or whatever.

Argyle:Okay.

Gamemaster:It has not immediately attracted attention.

Gamemaster:That's fine.

Gamemaster:these weird hand amalgams and the like are not um are not like on the lookout for cars Um so you can you can park behind an area You you set up behind one of these rocks uh on the entrance to town You

Gamemaster:gone in, you've peeked, you've seen these pustules, almost, of this void-like energy popping, and

Gamemaster:these weird hand amalgams coming out of it. You have taken your nine-year-old, and you have buffed

Gamemaster:him to all hell um he is the quietest fastest nine-year-olds on all the farrens at the moment

Benny:Run

Anzu:No, no, it's still the other hole.

Gamemaster:i can be pretty confident in saying that um and then your plan as benny is to

Gamemaster:run okay

Benny:into this hole.

Gamemaster:no so the the closest one is the one on the right just to clarify

Anzu:...

Gamemaster:like we're doing this because I don't have enough map space

Gamemaster:normally you guys are

Benny:Okay.

Gamemaster:the like

Argyle:No, no, no, no, no, no, no.

Benny:Fair enough.

Gamemaster:I'm going to use Argyle as a measurement

Gamemaster:sorry Argyle

Gamemaster:um

Gamemaster:you're a hundred and

Gamemaster:like a hundred feet away

Gamemaster:give or take a little more than that

Gamemaster:you would normally be a hundred feet south

Gamemaster:I don't have map space for that

Gamemaster:so instead you're a hundred feet

Gamemaster:west but imagine

Gamemaster:that it's south

Gamemaster:So you have the advantage here.

Argyle:Wait, wait.

Argyle:So just before I clarify,

Argyle:before we start,

Argyle:is this other

Benny:yeah definitely we'll get back to you on that one

Johnny:I guess we'll see where they go.

Argyle:thing 35 feet above as well?

Gamemaster:Yes, it's 35 feet above the closest one.

Argyle:If things are going well,

Argyle:feel free to get to it.

Argyle:Ha ha ha ha ha!

Benny:so Benny will do the uh I guess the hundred

Gamemaster:Okay.

Gamemaster:Okay Benny has the advantage here I going to have you roll a stealth check but it is a little bit of formality because these things do not have eyeballs They only have tremor sense and they can only see things that make sounds and you are not making sounds I think it technically like echo sense it not tremor

Gamemaster:sense, but it's equivalent. Very good job with that second level silence. You are

Gamemaster:not just undetected, actually I think you are, you're not just hidden, you're undetected,

Gamemaster:which means that they don't even know to search for you at the moment.

Argyle:Oh, is it too late for me to add one more spell to Benny?

Benny:17.

Gamemaster:So what did you get for stolen?

Gamemaster:17.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Gamemaster:One second.

Gamemaster:I need...

Gamemaster:Oh, where did this go?

Gamemaster:I just had it.

Gamemaster:I lost it.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Argyle:If so, it's okay.

Gamemaster:Yes it is.

Gamemaster:Where did I put this?

Argyle:Okay.

Argyle:That's only four rounds anyway, but that worked.

Gamemaster:Oh, that's why.

Gamemaster:It's over here.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Gamemaster:I go here.

Gamemaster:I get...

Gamemaster:Benny is the one jumping in.

Gamemaster:So I put Benny down there.

Gamemaster:And then I do...

Gamemaster:this.

Gamemaster:um

Gamemaster:Benny, you pass

Gamemaster:through the

Gamemaster:opening towards

Gamemaster:this void heart or something like that

Gamemaster:and you pass into an area that

Gamemaster:is, I don't have a map of it, so use your

Gamemaster:imagination, a

Gamemaster:reflection of the area you currently

Gamemaster:are, except the ground

Gamemaster:and the walls, not

Gamemaster:really walls, the sides of the rocks and all that kind

Gamemaster:of stuff have turned almost elastic

Gamemaster:almost rubber, and there are all

Gamemaster:these hands and arms and faces pushing up against the elastic of the ground, trying

Gamemaster:to push their way through but not being able to pierce whatever the elastic ground gives

Gamemaster:That said, there are things in the area with you. There is, first of all, much in the same way that you had seen

Gamemaster:the first time you entered one of these portals onto the other side. There was this mass of

Gamemaster:tendrils of all manner of colors, but all trending towards the same purple as the rest of the void, and in the center is this

Gamemaster:chitinous orb floating overhead. A void heart, as you would know it, as you have experienced.

Gamemaster:experienced it once. The area is almost entirely empty. Besides you, it seems that most of

Gamemaster:the things that had been existing in the physical space had made their way outside, had exited

Gamemaster:into the town itself. That said, I say mostly because there is one thing still left in this

Gamemaster:area, a behemoth of a creature, a gray-skinned, almost featureless face and body.

Gamemaster:But it moves strangely.

Gamemaster:It moves on a radial, three-legged torso, almost spider-like in its tripod legs as it

Gamemaster:navigates around, almost stalking at the edge of this area.

Gamemaster:Above that radial three-legged torso is a radial three-limbed upper body.

Gamemaster:Each of these three arms add a weird

Gamemaster:bend to them. It doesn't match biology as you would expect it.

Gamemaster:You've never seen a creature like this before. And sat on top is a featureless

Gamemaster:facsimile of a face.

Gamemaster:And it stalks the area around where the Voidheart is pacing back and forth Not quite touching it but standing around it

Gamemaster:I will, I suppose, just for everybody else so they can see what I'm describing, but I think you already know.

Gamemaster:Oh, I don't have an image on this anymore. Oh, that's crazy.

Gamemaster:One second.

Gamemaster:I went to Archives of Nethis to get a picture of it,

Argyle:Wait, there were a creature in Nethis?

Johnny:Good.

Gamemaster:and I couldn't because they're not on Archives of Nethis anymore.

Gamemaster:So instead I'm going to do this.

Gamemaster:Yeah.

Gamemaster:This particular creature was on Nethis.

Argyle:Huh.

Argyle:I don't know if that's the answer on there.

Gamemaster:They weren't called that, but like that particular, this image, which you have seen before in another campaign in a different context, you have seen this creature before.

Benny:Nice.

Gamemaster:Benny, it does not seem to have noticed you. It is focused on the Voidheart, pacing back and forth around it.

Benny:Benny's going to run up to the Voidheart

Benny:and time it so that he is not

Gamemaster:Okay, for the rest of you, just so that you can watch, I'm going to put you here.

Benny:within distance of the Quailant.

Argyle:so bad

Johnny:Okay, it's just a Quail on non-Othessian.

Gamemaster:Your characters are not in the portal and do not have the ability to interact with it.

Benny:Oh yeah, I've been looking at this

Argyle:oh

Benny:the whole time. It's terrifying.

Argyle:so the void

Benny:Mm-hmm.

Gamemaster:Yeah, it's completely different.

Johnny:Terrifying.

Johnny:Okay.

Gamemaster:Let me see.

Johnny:What's happening this session?

Gamemaster:Yeah, listen.

Argyle:my theory is that that she got blown up like you know when those other people grim blew up those other people And they became shadows Except this is the shadows The void

Johnny:you You think this is like the shadow version of

Gamemaster:Não.

Argyle:Dacia.

Johnny:Because we saw the city in yellow, so we know it's still out there somewhere.

Argyle:Yeah.

Argyle:Maybe it's the city in purple.

Argyle:What color is the grass?

Argyle:That we saw the.

Argyle:The ashen packed in.

Argyle:Was it purple?

Benny:Red.

Johnny:Oh my God.

Gamemaster:Ele está cor-redo.

Argyle:Blue, blue.

Argyle:Nah.

Gamemaster:Este círculo é o Void Heart, está lá.

Gamemaster:Ok.

Gamemaster:Você começa a andar em direção a ele.

Gamemaster:Você quer, tipo, pegar quando está aqui.

Gamemaster:Oh.

Benny:Yeah.

Gamemaster:Um segundo.

Gamemaster:Há paredes.

Gamemaster:Vou tirar as paredes.

Gamemaster:um absolutamente uh as you walk up to the void heart uh i'm gonna roll a perception check to see if this thing senses you

Benny:Nice.

Gamemaster:37 no it doesn't

Benny:I'm going to start tugging on the heartstrings.

Gamemaster:Ok, você pode pegar o coração.

Argyle:He gets to finish the other two actions, right?

Gamemaster:É uma ação de interação para pegar o coração.

Gamemaster:E então nós vamos entrar na iniciativa.

Gamemaster:Porque se essa coisa não notou você antes, ela definitivamente notará você agora.

Gamemaster:Então, faça-me um favor.

Gamemaster:Correto, eu estou deixando ele terminar as outras duas ações.

Argyle:Oh, thank God.

Argyle:Thank God.

Argyle:No no no no no Oh no

Gamemaster:Vamos Arcaio o portal de tr We gonna Arch is the portal back Okay

Benny:Okay Okay

Johnny:Yeah you

Benny:Oh.

Benny:I don't know even the odds are of me running a 38 or higher.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Gamemaster:We do start with you.

Argyle:Yes.

Benny:So wait, I have two actions.

Johnny:Got that plus one from heroism.

Gamemaster:You have two actions.

Benny:I run back to the portal.

Gamemaster:Uh, I'm going to need you to make an athletics check to bring the Voidheart with you.

Benny:Of course, of course.

Johnny:Cool.

Benny:Of course, of course.

Gamemaster:Ooh.

Gamemaster:Okay!

Benny:Oh, my goodness.

Benny:45.

Gamemaster:A crit natural 20 for 4d total.

Argyle:That's perfect.

Gamemaster:Um...

Gamemaster:I don't think this guy has anything he can say to you

Gamemaster:um

Gamemaster:what's your movement speed

Gamemaster:45

Benny:45.

Gamemaster:uh

Argyle:Yeah.

Gamemaster:and what was the range here

Gamemaster:I think you had just enough

Gamemaster:yeah you had 90

Benny:That's 90 feet.

Gamemaster:it is literally just enough

Argyle:Yeah.

Gamemaster:you spend your remaining two actions

Gamemaster:lugging this void heart behind you

Gamemaster:as this

Gamemaster:creature

Gamemaster:notices that it's happening

Gamemaster:but you have a crazy amount of godspeed on right now and you um you make it out easy peasy um

Gamemaster:so we're going to flip back to the other map

Gamemaster:uh which is this one oh wait actually before we do this i need to select this guy um okay

Gamemaster:We flip back to the end of the map. It is the end of your turn.

Argyle:It's whose turn?

Benny:Nice.

Gamemaster:You are still silent. None of these creatures are aware of you. Your three companions over on the side do see that you pop out.

Gamemaster:It's the quellons' turn.

Gamemaster:Oh, actually, you still have one more... no, you don't. You do? Right, you're hasted. You have one more action. You can move 45 feet if you like.

Benny:I do.

Argyle:Wait.

Argyle:Kasted.

Gamemaster:You didn't cast invisibility on him.

Argyle:Do we actually see him or is he invisible?

Argyle:Oh, I thought you did. Never mind.

Benny:Yeah, no, it's just the silence.

Johnny:I'm casting many things.

Gamemaster:He's very quiet, but you can see him with your eyeballs.

Argyle:Cool. I thought Johnny was doing that.

Gamemaster:It's the Quellant's turn.

Gamemaster:One second.

Argyle:Holy

Benny:Benny's face.

Argyle:shit.

Benny:Oh, God.

Johnny:No, the Quailong can all come out too.

Johnny:No, no, no.

Gamemaster:Benny pops out of the portal,

Johnny:We gotta get out of here.

Johnny:We gotta run.

Gamemaster:runs 45 feet in your direction,

Gamemaster:at the...

Johnny:We gotta get in the fucking car.

Gamemaster:Less than six seconds later,

Johnny:We gotta go.

Gamemaster:three arms grab the edges of the portal

Argyle:Tanner, Tanner, Tanner.

Benny:Cool.

Gamemaster:and start pulling themselves up,

Gamemaster:and you can see just the upper half of the Quailant.

Gamemaster:Something I am going to do is...

Gamemaster:The Quailant technically doesn't have enough actions to do this.

Gamemaster:It is one action short.

Gamemaster:but I'm going to do it anyway

Gamemaster:because I have a mythic point

Gamemaster:and I'm choosing that that's how that happens

Gamemaster:it's going to

Argyle:Tam.

Benny:Oh, we'll save.

Anzu:I can't believe Jorge is blaming me when he's the one that shot the stupid men here.

Johnny:It's insane.

Gamemaster:cast crushing despair on Benny

Benny:Yay.

Benny:Benny's great at those.

Benny:Uh.

Anzu:also roll yeah Also roll

Gamemaster:mhm

Benny:Okay.

Gamemaster:That is true This is all Argyle fault Also I would love it if the three of you could roll initiative for me please Yeah Just so that we have a good idea here

Argyle:Markel immediately shoots this thing Okay

Benny:35.

Johnny:Oh Thank you No

Gamemaster:35?

Gamemaster:Absolutely.

Gamemaster:Benny is slowed by the crushing despair on him.

Argyle:Yeah, and he's not Latino, so you can shame him.

Anzu:Oh my god.

Johnny:Roll a perception check or...

Gamemaster:That is the end of the Quailan's turn, however.

Johnny:Oh, I rolled a perception check instead of initiative. My bad.

Gamemaster:Um, okay.

Gamemaster:I will...

Johnny:I'm Jewish. Hey man, come on.

Argyle:Oh my god, I feel like an idiot.

Gamemaster:Yeah, that is true.

Gamemaster:He's a member of the tribe.

Gamemaster:I can't say anything about that.

Gamemaster:Even if it is ridiculous what he did.

Johnny:This is really embarrassing.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Gamemaster:that will bring us to

Benny:Yeah.

Johnny:Um, do we have the car?

Gamemaster:Johnny

Gamemaster:so the car is right now where Anzu is

Johnny:Are we still with the car?

Gamemaster:you guys can like

Johnny:I'm going to run over to the car and start it.

Gamemaster:get out of the car without an issue

Gamemaster:but the car is where Anzu is

Gamemaster:okay that is

Gamemaster:allowed

Gamemaster:Okay.

Johnny:And then... I will cast Illusory Creature!

Gamemaster:Okay.

Johnny:And I will put it between Young Benjamin and the Quailant.

Gamemaster:Absolutely.

Johnny:I don't know if this will do anything, but there's a big Quailant with googly eyes between

Johnny:Benny and the real Quailant.

Gamemaster:Absolutely.

Gamemaster:I am terribly sorry but the Qualon is immune to illusion effects and so it doesn do anything

Johnny:Yeah I kind of thought that might happen Two of my things My third one

Johnny:I will...

Johnny:Run out of the car, start it.

Johnny:That's probably two actions. That's three actions.

Johnny:Alright, that's all I got.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Johnny:Car's running.

Johnny:I will scoot out of the...

Johnny:I'll try and scoot out of the driver's seat into the passenger seat

Johnny:so Benny can just take the wheel.

Gamemaster:Absolutely.

Gamemaster:It's Argyle's turn.

Argyle:Sorry, I don't think that...

Gamemaster:No, it cannot remove sled.

Argyle:I'm just trying to see my feet that lets my

Argyle:heal remove effects. I don't think it can remove slow.

Argyle:It definitely can't remove slow.

Gamemaster:I'm sorry.

Argyle:Yeah, there's nothing for me to do, I think.

Argyle:I'll cast Benediction

Argyle:and then get in the car.

Argyle:and try to

Gamemaster:Okay.

Argyle:increase the AC of the car

Benny:the car has AC

Gamemaster:Okay.

Argyle:yeah

Gamemaster:Okay.

Benny:so I'll get my car

Gamemaster:If that's the end of your turn, it's Benny's turn.

Gamemaster:Benny, you are slowed and quickened.

Gamemaster:So you have three actions.

Benny:actually wait how far was that

Gamemaster:Yeah, absolutely.

Benny:was that 50 feet

Benny:I think it was 50 feet

Benny:so I guess that's two

Argyle:Already started.

Benny:so that my third action would be to start the car oh

Gamemaster:The car's already started.

Gamemaster:Because Johnny spent one of his actions to do that.

Benny:good point i drive away

Gamemaster:Okay, you start driving away.

Gamemaster:Absolutely.

Gamemaster:Make a reflex save for me, please.

Benny:the old reflex um

Benny:you just double check when this is used

Benny:No I don use it Uh Mythic

Gamemaster:Thank you 33

Benny:Oh wait, hold on. Let me make sure I have a fucking Mythic point.

Benny:33.

Gamemaster:Okay, with a 33

Gamemaster:The 33 in this particular instance is

Gamemaster:You were all making a bunch of noises

Gamemaster:You were starting with the car and starting to drive away

Gamemaster:So of course the hands of the void

Gamemaster:Have taken note

Gamemaster:Of you

Gamemaster:And so one of them did send

Gamemaster:A bolt of this phlegmy purple energy

Gamemaster:Your way

Gamemaster:But you do swerve out of the way

Gamemaster:Anzu, is there anything you'd like to do

Gamemaster:As the car is barreling

Gamemaster:Back in, I assume the direction

Gamemaster:of your fame, unless you have somewhere else you're trying to go first.

Argyle:Do you remember how Anzu cast the vector screen?

Anzu:I'll just throw a vector screen behind us, just to give us a little more time, like maybe block one more projected pilot on our way out.

Gamemaster:Absolutely, that's a good shout.

Gamemaster:Also, I'm sorry, I forgot to make Benny do this.

Gamemaster:Benny, you have to attempt that save again against Crushing Despair.

Gamemaster:Are you asking me or Anzu?

Argyle:You did this

Anzu:I don't remember what I said last time,

Anzu:but it's definitely like...

Argyle:when you were driving.

Anzu:He definitely would hold his hands out

Argyle:Yeah.

Anzu:and harden the air immediately behind the car,

Anzu:which then stops being immediately behind the car

Anzu:as we drive away.

Anzu:But it kind of...

Argyle:I just remember this.

Argyle:It felt like Dragon Ball Z

Argyle:when you were like,

Argyle:wah, wah, wah.

Anzu:Hmm.

Gamemaster:Okay, absolutely.

Gamemaster:You put up a vector screen.

Benny:out of mythics.

Gamemaster:We will see how that applies.

Gamemaster:It brings us back to the Quailon.

Benny:Uh...

Gamemaster:The Quailant is going to start by feeding on Benny's emotion.

Gamemaster:Oh, actually, no, never mind. You're too far away. It doesn't feed on your emotion.

Gamemaster:Can it do anything about you?

Gamemaster:It can put you into a spiral of despair, but that doesn't really do much.

Gamemaster:You're actually pretty far away, which makes most of its spells...

Gamemaster:What's the range on these spells?

Gamemaster:30 feet? 30 feet?

Gamemaster:15 feet?

Gamemaster:I think you're lucky

Gamemaster:in that all of its spells require you to be closer

Gamemaster:so that it could feed on you.

Gamemaster:Yeah, no.

Gamemaster:Okay, so it will actually just...

Gamemaster:It can't attack you, so it will continue

Gamemaster:to pull itself

Gamemaster:out of the portal

Gamemaster:into the open.

Gamemaster:But it has no real way of attacking you.

Gamemaster:So it's just gonna stay where it is. So now we're going to do... you're in a car, you're driving pretty quickly.

Gamemaster:So what's really going to happen is I'm going to have the five hands of the void that are closest to you

Gamemaster:are all going to attempt to

Gamemaster:take a car.

Gamemaster:And so at this point what we're gonna do is I'm gonna say that

Gamemaster:we're gonna have one more round of everybody gets to go if they have anything they'd like to do.

Gamemaster:And after that all five of them are going to attack you and attempt to take down your car

Argyle:Okay.

Johnny:Josh, I have a question.

Gamemaster:You see them readying up and and

Argyle:Sounds good.

Gamemaster:Like you're not hit it. So they know this is gonna happen

Gamemaster:Hmm

Johnny:I have a spell called Noise Blast.

Gamemaster:Okay

Johnny:I don't think it will hurt these creatures,

Johnny:but can I use this as sort of like concealment to get like a really loud shout behind us

Gamemaster:Yeah Yeah I let you try that

Argyle:you simultaneously I be casting my fourth level silence which I had already told you I prepared

Anzu:Auditory Smokescreen Auditory smokescreen

Johnny:yeah

Johnny:how do i send this to

Argyle:on the car so now there's there's that

Gamemaster:That is true.

Gamemaster:I don't know what you pressed, Noah, but on my end it looks like there's this big chat box

Gamemaster:and it just says Noise Blast in it, and that's it.

Benny:That's the same.

Johnny:I tried to just drop the spell directly in because there wasn't an option to send it

Johnny:because it's through an item.

Johnny:And so it's just a little noise blast.

Gamemaster:Yeah.

Gamemaster:Noise Blast.

Gamemaster:Okay, absolutely.

Gamemaster:You're not actually, obviously, within range to do any damage to them with the spell,

Gamemaster:so you're just doing the auditory thing.

Gamemaster:That's great.

Gamemaster:Argyle is casting a 4th-level Silence on you guys,

Gamemaster:so that is now covering the entirety of the car.

Gamemaster:Which means you are concealed, which will make it a little harder for them to target you.

Argyle:and we're blessed

Benny:I don't think

Gamemaster:Anything else?

Argyle:benediction benediction sir and then um i'm gonna whisper to benny

Gamemaster:And you're benedicted?

Gamemaster:Which, cast benediction on yourself, because the AC might matter here.

Argyle:yeah

Argyle:benny did you get two or one

Benny:Betty can hear you because of the silence.

Gamemaster:True.

Anzu:I think it's very obvious that he's holding one large Voidheart.

Johnny:Benny's dead silence driving.

Benny:You have to pass him a note.

Benny:Or he's just like...

Benny:It's just...

Benny:Hands.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Gamemaster:Absolutely.

Anzu:I'll just re-up a new Vector Screen.

Gamemaster:it is not strong enough to stop the attack outright but it does give them a minus two circumstance penalty to the attack roll Okay so here what we going to do

Anzu:I don't know if it's powerful enough to stop their...

Argyle:How far is this card moving?

Anzu:you Like fine

Gamemaster:What?

Argyle:How fast is this card moving?

Gamemaster:Hmm.

Argyle:pretty good pretty good that's not per action right that's a round it's pretty good

Benny:It's pretty good.

Gamemaster:528 feet around.

Gamemaster:It's, uh, I, like, I...

Argyle:i know you're gonna let one one round go through i'm not gonna try to stop that i'm just curious

Gamemaster:If...

Gamemaster:If it were moving at 60 miles an hour,

Gamemaster:it'd be moving at a hundred and se...

Gamemaster:It would have a movement speed of 175.

Argyle:I wasn't questioning.

Gamemaster:So, 175, I guess, is its movement speed.

Gamemaster:You are still definitely within range, they have a 1,000-foot range, but you won't be

Gamemaster:in range after this round.

Argyle:Yeah.

Gamemaster:So, okay.

Gamemaster:So I have five Hands of the Void that I'm going to make attacks for.

Gamemaster:They all have a minus two circumstance penalty because of the vector screen.

Gamemaster:They'll have a minus two status penalty because of the sonic, not the silence, the other one, the noise blast.

Argyle:Silence.

Argyle:fuck that

Anzu:Noise blast!

Gamemaster:And they all have to make a DC five flat check to even target you because of the silence.

Gamemaster:So I'm going to do that first.

Gamemaster:I'm going to do the one first just to see.

Gamemaster:I'm just going to roll five DC five flat checks to see how many of them I actually get to make as attacks.

Gamemaster:One of them I failed.

Argyle:Awful Yeah Cool Yeah

Benny:That guy blows up

Anzu:you Statistically that seems reasonable

Gamemaster:Okay so four attacks go off So if I click this button I can add

Gamemaster:noise last

Benny:I don't want reasonable or statistically.

Benny:I want murder.

Benny:And evasion.

Argyle:I'm just the reason we're in this mess because he's a chip on his shoulder.

Argyle:I can't read so I wouldn't

Benny:If you were like, I bet those motherfuckers don't think we can steal another Voidheart.

Anzu:Noah, does your shirt say bard in very large text?

Johnny:Does it say Bart in very large text?

Gamemaster:still circumstance.

Benny:You know what?

Benny:I'll show them.

Anzu:That's amazing.

Anzu:I just noticed that.

Anzu:That's so good.

Argyle:yeah actually

Johnny:Is it because you're Latino?

Anzu:Oh, so.

Anzu:Okay.

Argyle:Yeah, yeah. What were you going to say, Tanner?

Benny:Tanner, we can't say anything.

Anzu:interesting

Johnny:It all connects.

Gamemaster:Landowners, the most oppressed of the classes.

Argyle:What were you going to say?

Benny:We're not proud of an oppressed minority,

Johnny:Mike, aren't you a landowner in, I'm blanking on the country?

Benny:unless you consider...

Benny:Algeria?

Argyle:Yeah.

Johnny:Aren't you an Algerian landowner?

Benny:Is that an oppressed class?

Benny:I don't think so.

Argyle:Yeah.

Argyle:Tanner could say something.

Argyle:Tanner has thick enough eyebrows to say something.

Benny:No, but wait...

Argyle:Okay.

Benny:What, because he's Italian?

Anzu:Eddie.

Johnny:No, no.

Gamemaster:I'm attacking Benny four times.

Benny:He's technically a minority?

Gamemaster:The first was a 33.

Benny:That hits.

Gamemaster:The second was a natural one.

Gamemaster:Oh, I was hoping it would let me just re-roll this again.

Gamemaster:I don't want to have to re-add all the stuff.

Benny:We can just say they miss.

Johnny:Yeah, that works.

Gamemaster:That's so sad.

Gamemaster:Uh,

Gamemaster:okay, well, I'm just gonna, I'm just gonna,

Gamemaster:I could just do this manually.

Gamemaster:Uh, 1d20

Gamemaster:plus 19.

Gamemaster:Second one missed.

Gamemaster:Third one.

Gamemaster:It's a 33. That hits.

Gamemaster:Fourth one.

Gamemaster:34. That hits.

Gamemaster:I'm sorry.

Benny:Benny is unconscious.

Anzu:Yeah, that's pretty good.

Gamemaster:You are going to take 30 points, then 39 points, then 43 points of slashing damage.

Gamemaster:In rapid succession, three bits of mucus shoot through, they puncture through the window of this car,

Gamemaster:and just like one, two, three, combo into Benny, knocking him unconscious, slumping at the wheel.

Gamemaster:I'd love a reflex save from whoever's riding shotgun to grab the wheel from Benny as he falls unconscious.

Argyle:I think it's Johnny.

Johnny:I think that's me.

Johnny:I can't do it.

Johnny:It's this.

Johnny:Oh, God.

Johnny:I have no backups.

Johnny:25?

Argyle:That's good.

Argyle:For our level.

Gamemaster:I'm so used to guys.

Johnny:Josh, our 25 is really good.

Argyle:Yeah, Josh, just because he's using his level 20 DCs at 8.

Johnny:A lot of people are saying how good a 25 is.

Gamemaster:What'd you get, a 25?

Argyle:Yeah!

Benny:Okay you you

Johnny:It's just lunging over my wheel.

Johnny:It's just...

Gamemaster:A 25 is a success.

Johnny:It's been 10 minutes since I put on this play.

Gamemaster:Level 8 is 24.

Argyle:Yeah!

Gamemaster:I just have to...

Gamemaster:I'm so...

Gamemaster:Like, you guys rolled a 40.

Gamemaster:Like, of course I have to be like,

Argyle:Oh so Johnny still had heroism yeah okay

Gamemaster:is a 25 really good?

Gamemaster:A 25 is a success for a level 8 DC.

Gamemaster:Johnny can...

Gamemaster:Just about Johnny can lean over and grab the wheel so you don go swerving off the there no road you don go swerving

Johnny:I Thank you

Gamemaster:just off to the side

Gamemaster:um

Gamemaster:we're gonna

Gamemaster:we're gonna keep going that was Johnny's turn

Gamemaster:let's do Argyle I'm just gonna do one

Argyle:yeah yeah

Gamemaster:loop through let's do Argyle

Gamemaster:um

Argyle:um

Argyle:so i'm going to do two things

Argyle:I'm going to reach over and cast

Gamemaster:Benny has to make a fort save because he's undead, right?

Argyle:heal one action

Argyle:because with touch, reach

Argyle:where's my spell, sorry, I'm stupid

Argyle:the wand, not the hand

Argyle:heal, we're going to do one action

Argyle:roll heal

Argyle:yeah, yeah

Gamemaster:That's true.

Gamemaster:Benny heals 16 points.

Argyle:alright so that's a one action heal

Argyle:and then

Gamemaster:He is conscious again.

Argyle:then what I'm going to cast on Benny after this

Argyle:is something different

Argyle:I'm going to cast spiritual renewal

Argyle:and Benny now has

Argyle:fast healing for the next four rounds

Argyle:so you can't die

Gamemaster:Nice.

Argyle:we've confirmed when you have fast healing you can't die

Argyle:um

Gamemaster:Correct.

Argyle:and then

Argyle:that's flourished.

Gamemaster:Mm-hmm.

Benny:Yes.

Argyle:So I have one action left.

Argyle:I'm going to

Argyle:treat wound battle medicine.

Argyle:17!

Gamemaster:Okay.

Argyle:There you go, buddy.

Gamemaster:And with all of that healing,

Gamemaster:Benny gets knocked unconscious,

Gamemaster:Johnny grabs the wheel,

Gamemaster:Argyle brings him back up and Benny just springs back to alertness still in the driver seat foot still on the pedal Still going I assume you use your three actions to drive out of range of those creatures Okay absolutely Definitely done

Benny:you Yes

Benny:

Gamemaster:They don't have anything else they can use to stop you at this point, and so you leave behind

Gamemaster:the newly emerged

Gamemaster:Quailant

Gamemaster:and all of those

Gamemaster:Hands of the Void.

Argyle:I don't like the way his tone implied that it was our fault.

Johnny:Well, I appreciate that, Josh.

Gamemaster:Okay, fine.

Gamemaster:Now that you've lured the

Gamemaster:Quailant out of the void

Gamemaster:that it was in,

Gamemaster:make your way back home.

Johnny:It was our fault.

Anzu:all we wanted was to be direct

Anzu:we don't want to beat around the bush

Gamemaster:Um, and you, uh, you head on back.

Argyle:So let's drive immediately back to our heart.

Argyle:and get on our skein and just start telling people.

Benny:Yeah.

Johnny:We will begin.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Argyle:We won't mention that we took a void heart.

Argyle:We'll just start telling them the shit that happened.

Gamemaster:Absolutely.

Argyle:Not about, okay, all we mentioned is that we investigated it.

Argyle:We found there's more of those things and some bigger fuck.

Gamemaster:Yeah, okay.

Gamemaster:Absolutely.

Gamemaster:you go back

Gamemaster:you do a little bit of a gossip tell-all

Gamemaster:on the skein

Gamemaster:let them know you found

Gamemaster:those big guys at the area

Argyle:Yeah.

Gamemaster:I do think

Gamemaster:you will be fielding

Gamemaster:immediately questions upon your arrival

Gamemaster:from all of the various factions

Gamemaster:including the twins that are living with you

Gamemaster:and then if you go to the skein

Gamemaster:and you tell people that this is happening

Gamemaster:you will be fielding even more questions

Gamemaster:from the people who don't live with you, but are concerned about this recent chain of events.

Gamemaster:I will say when you arrive home there was a chill that had been settling into your bones that you had perhaps not really registered because it had settled a little more slowly than you had been expecting that does get dispelled once you come home but it is something to keep in mind as the longer you are out there

Argyle:Mm Mm Good to know

Gamemaster:the more this chill will set in.

Gamemaster:But you weren't out for very long, so it wasn't really an issue in this particular excursion.

Gamemaster:Yes.

Argyle:So I remember last time when we got a Voidheart, we did two things.

Benny:Hmm.

Gamemaster:Mm-hmm.

Argyle:One, we dropped it for a little bit so it shrunk.

Argyle:We did not do that this time.

Argyle:Second, we didn't do a full Voidheart transfer to get some extra boons.

Argyle:Can we load this bad boy up in there too?

Gamemaster:When you load this bad boy up in there, you mean you want to feed it to Yuri?

Argyle:Yeah.

Gamemaster:Yeah, absolutely.

Argyle:Yeah.

Gamemaster:before you even put it in, you can tell

Argyle:hmm

Benny:So

Johnny:Get inside.

Gamemaster:this thing is worth 80 energy.

Argyle:yeah yeah

Gamemaster:Um,

Gamemaster:you can absolutely

Gamemaster:walk by all the

Gamemaster:people being like, what are you, what is this?

Gamemaster:What's going on? What's happening?

Gamemaster:Where did you guys go?

Gamemaster:What did you come back with?

Johnny:Get inside.

Johnny:Stay inside.

Johnny:Get the fuck inside.

Gamemaster:Uh,

Gamemaster:and you can head over to Eerie,

Gamemaster:uh, your prize in tow,

Gamemaster:if you like, and you can feed it right in.

Argyle:do we do we get any of the effects now

Gamemaster:Yes.

Argyle:since

Benny:you did we have a choice last time we could either put all of it towards void

Argyle:do we think if we put all of it

Benny:effects half of it towards void effects half it towards energy or all the towards energy

Argyle:or half of it we'd get any void effect

Argyle:would it be guaranteed if we put the whole thing in

Gamemaster:This is the second time you're adding something void-like into your heart,

Gamemaster:so you gather it would give you a chance to perhaps get something interesting and new.

Gamemaster:Yeah.

Argyle:there what do you guys want to do yes if

Johnny:Do it.

Argyle:can do it man

Benny:Put the whole thing in?

Johnny:It's been a real big swinging day.

Gamemaster:Absolutely.

Benny:Yeah.

Argyle:yeah

Benny:Why not?

Benny:It's all fucked anyways.

Argyle:why the fuck not

Gamemaster:Absolutely.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Gamemaster:So you feed the entirety of the current void heart in terms of void bolstering and not in terms of energy reclaiming, is what you're saying.

Benny:Mm-hmm.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Gamemaster:Absolutely.

Argyle:you know what after this let's go get some more

Argyle:energy and just pop it back

Argyle:it

Gamemaster:Yeah, go for it.

Gamemaster:You feed the void energy, the void heart, into Eerie,

Gamemaster:and there is a split second where it looks like nothing at all has happened

Gamemaster:before you see that Eerie, which, if you can recall,

Gamemaster:is structured like this long scroll with a number of seismographic-looking instruments

Argyle:okay

Gamemaster:drawing on it as it scrolls downward.

Gamemaster:you see that the ink that it was using used to be black and is now purple and it leaves

Argyle:yeah you will make those checks

Anzu:I bet on both

Gamemaster:almost this chitinous Scale-like residue in the areas where it writes. But other than that,

Gamemaster:it doesn't really feel like anything's changed. I'd love an arcana or religion check please.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Anzu:heck

Argyle:yeah

Anzu:Arcana starts with an A

Argyle:yeah

Argyle:all right

Argyle:and that will do

Argyle:28 plus 19.

Benny:Yeah.

Anzu:so it's going to be towards the beginning

Anzu:Indeed, Noah, indeed

Argyle:I'll reroll that with my last method now.

Argyle:I'm a master, so plus 4.

Anzu:I got a 26, which

Benny:

Benny:Yeah.

Argyle:I got 28.

Gamemaster:Okay Um 26 and a 28 are I hear both very good rolls Um they are both successes Uh you have um by virtue of doing some things that were not immediately detailed to you unlocked a secret benefit to your heart

Argyle:Uh Ha ha ha ha Huh

Argyle:Ha ha ha ha.

Gamemaster:You have earned the Arcane Dampener, which gives a minus one circumstance penalty to anyone casting magic in your Fane that isn't a member of your faction.

Argyle:I would have taken the 80.

Johnny:That's really good.

Argyle:I'm kidding, I'm kidding.

Gamemaster:Too late!

Argyle:This is dope.

Argyle:That's actually really important.

Argyle:Does it also make their DCs worse?

Gamemaster:It's like a minus one to everything, so it does, it reduces their DCs, it reduces the

Gamemaster:rolls that they make.

Argyle:Yeah.

Gamemaster:It just doesn't, like, it doesn't affect their saves or anything, because those aren't them

Gamemaster:casting spells.

Johnny:That's cool.

Argyle:Yeah.

Argyle:All right.

Benny:Not bad, not bad.

Anzu:So...

Johnny:Oh my god.

Johnny:What, uh, so what do we do?

Johnny:How do we get this started?

Johnny:Anzu! Mind Bird!

Argyle:So we...

Argyle:We should chat with our skein.

Anzu:Yeah, listen, everybody.

Argyle:I think the rule is...

Argyle:I think we need to start launching Crusades.

Anzu:The Harlequins have been devastated

Anzu:by some kind of incursion of these...

Argyle:We're in between voids.

Anzu:Void creatures.

Anzu:I don't know where we are.

Anzu:Kadou, I mean, we're not on the void map.

Gamemaster:um

Anzu:Does this seem like anything that you've encountered in your shipping lanes?

Gamemaster:um

Gamemaster:kata will say

Gamemaster:uh i don't actually

Gamemaster:think that we are i mean i think we still definitely on the horizon somewhere um i mean that that much is is pretty clear because the area between individual things in the horizon

Argyle:you Yes

Gamemaster:is called the slip and that's a not fun place to be uh but you would know if you were there

Gamemaster:you know if anything it's closer to those that weird void heart thing that you put in

Gamemaster:no so we're on the horizon somewhere

Gamemaster:but if we're not

Gamemaster:in this atlas

Gamemaster:that gives us like only

Anzu:Correct.

Gamemaster:really one of two options

Gamemaster:we are either starward somewhere

Gamemaster:or we are beyond

Gamemaster:where the atlas

Gamemaster:ends voidward

Gamemaster:the atlas ends

Gamemaster:at the wall voidward and I feel

Gamemaster:like we would know if we passed it

Gamemaster:because we'd be like real close to the Voight song.

Gamemaster:So I think we've been pushed pretty far starward

Gamemaster:because I'm not familiar with whatever Joker world we're currently on.

Anzu:that is tough um yeah josh can i kind of focus on the Voidsong and

Gamemaster:Yeah.

Gamemaster:yeah make

Anzu:see if i feel like since it was so recent that we moved i don't know

Gamemaster:make a lore check

Gamemaster:it's not actually your lore

Gamemaster:I'm just using that as a stand in here for

Anzu:yeah my feeling is that the incremental steps that we've been on are imperceptible

Gamemaster:you know

Anzu:but making such a big jump in a short time.

Argyle:That's a crit based on our DC.

Gamemaster:that is a reasonable thing to say

Gamemaster:that's not crazy

Anzu:You said a lore check?

Gamemaster:yes

Gamemaster:34 is pretty good

Anzu:Oh? 34?

Anzu:Is that any good?

Gamemaster:34 is pretty good

Gamemaster:okay so what I will tell you

Gamemaster:with the 34

Gamemaster:is two things first of all

Gamemaster:this is

Gamemaster:I was going to say this is the quietest

Gamemaster:it has ever been in your head the Voidsong No actually it is This is the quietest it has ever been in your head the Voidsong No actually it is This is the quietest it has ever been in your head

Argyle:you oh no

Gamemaster:since you first heard it.

Argyle:we're further than the Giant

Gamemaster:Yeah.

Gamemaster:There has been an incident,

Gamemaster:sorry, an instance,

Gamemaster:of when it quieted down to around this level.

Gamemaster:And that was when you had seen the Giant.

Argyle:No.

Benny:We are.

Anzu:We're really far starward, which is not where I want it to be at all.

Johnny:So, how do we even get back?

Gamemaster:Of note, perhaps, as it is marginally quieter.

Argyle:Guys, guys, do you remember that there was a wall with the Giant?

Argyle:I really hope we're not on the other side of that wall, which I think we are.

Benny:Guys.

Johnny:okay so let's say there's a wall maybe maybe

Argyle:That's true.

Benny:We go with the flow.

Benny:Big portals open up on one end of the structure.

Benny:We go grab a void arm.

Benny:We don't care.

Benny:We're studs.

Benny:We smoke our stogies anywhere.

Johnny:the wall

Johnny:I think order of operations

Benny:Last I checked, we were just given something,

Benny:and now we're the closest we've been to taking out one of the six.

Johnny:while I figure out how to get the ship back up

Johnny:I think it's really important that we go and kill Tali

Argyle:All right.

Benny:Yes.

Anzu:Now, okay.

Gamemaster:Tell our compatriots to lock in.

Johnny:and take the heralds off the board

Johnny:we can't have another faction

Johnny:running around right now

Argyle:We should go into this game first.

Johnny:Everyone else walk in.

Argyle:Tell our compatriots to lock down.

Argyle:And then we go for tally.

Argyle:Yeah.

Johnny:We're going to go do something else.

Johnny:That is real.

Anzu:Lock the fuck in, gentlemen.

Anzu:Now, just to push back on that a little bit, are we sure that the Herald folks are a higher priority than

Benny:it doesn't

Anzu:in the absolute deluge of void happening.

Johnny:I think this is sort of...

Anzu:Uh,

Anzu:I don't know.

Benny:usually play itself out

Johnny:This is sort of like things we can control.

Benny:yeah

Johnny:I don't know what to do about this.

Johnny:I don't know what to do about the deluge.

Johnny:But if we can take the heralds off the board,

Johnny:that's one less thing we got to worry about.

Johnny:And I might give...

Anzu:I'm not sure.

Johnny:Anzu, we can do so much with just you.

Anzu:I'm not sure about that.

Argyle:Yeah.

Anzu:Listen, my brother's not here, and his name isn't even close to that.

Johnny:Imagine if we had Galzu too.

Johnny:And your brother, Brozu.

Argyle:Yeah.

Anzu:Exactly.

Johnny:Manzu.

Argyle:What about...

Argyle:Okay.

Argyle:We should...

Argyle:Okay.

Argyle:Now this is...

Argyle:I regret that I've even thought about this.

Anzu:You were a hero.

Argyle:I was once a pillar of goodness and just, forthright.

Argyle:That being said, should we before...

Argyle:To be right, to be a hero and to do what we absolutely must,

Argyle:should we lure some of those void things to Grayson?

Argyle:He's right next door.

Anzu:I'm not even sure we're going to have to do that.

Johnny:Yeah, I'm plugging it in.

Argyle:should we get on our skein and start talking

Anzu:I felt like I was trying to address everybody.

Gamemaster:I think, Tanner, you were, as Anzu, talking on the scan for a little bit, weren't you?

Johnny:Yeah, I'll tap on the screen.

Argyle:yeah i meant like open this up for them to say anything

Johnny:It's going.

Gamemaster:Or was that not happening?

Gamemaster:Yeah.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Argyle:and i know this probably is next session but

Gamemaster:Okay.

Gamemaster:Um.

Gamemaster:Yeah.

Gamemaster:Well so I think that the first initial things that come in are the Scale is what going on are you okay what happened Prime Meridian is you went to the Harlequin town What did you find there Anything good

Johnny:you Thanks for that one

Argyle:you We don want to answer

Gamemaster:Hildebrandt is...

Gamemaster:Are you the reason we stopped moving?

Gamemaster:Why do you have all of this information in such a short period of time?

Gamemaster:We're all scrambling.

Johnny:We skipped that one.

Argyle:Well, should we tell them?

Argyle:Okay, so we could tell primary

Argyle:and we got one of the void hearts.

Argyle:We went in, we took one.

Benny:I don't know.

Anzu:Yeah, I mean, we tried to close, you know, but we were overwhelmed.

Johnny:Yes.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Argyle:No?

Argyle:Wait, I'm asking the group.

Argyle:Should we say that?

Argyle:Oh, yes or no.

Benny:Maybe.

Argyle:Yeah, we tried to close one.

Benny:Of course, we're heroes.

Argyle:Yeah.

Gamemaster:It's heroic what you did.

Argyle:We are heroes.

Gamemaster:It was for heroism.

Argyle:Yeah.

Anzu:Honestly, they would respect having two sides to that coin more than probably most.

Argyle:Um.

Gamemaster:Fair.

Argyle:Yeah.

Gamemaster:um

Gamemaster:okay but like in general

Argyle:Um.

Argyle:Okay.

Benny:Yeah, I mean, fucking...

Anzu:All right, Benny.

Johnny:What was the you say?

Gamemaster:it's a lot of clamoring

Gamemaster:uh uh on on this game

Gamemaster:uh so I what I would love

Gamemaster:is I need a diplomacy

Gamemaster:check um

Gamemaster:to get everybody to calm the fuck down

Gamemaster:you know

Gamemaster:oh sure

Argyle:Well, I still got one spell left.

Johnny:Give everyone a pep talk.

Argyle:I still got one of these left.

Benny:So, apparently,

Argyle:You take that.

Benny:I've never talked on the skein before,

Benny:and apparently

Argyle:I was gonna say

Anzu:Oh my god.

Johnny:Everyone calm down

Benny:Can you bring the Menhir back with that role?

Gamemaster:so you're giving your heroism to Benny

Gamemaster:Margot

Gamemaster:you have to stop doing that

Gamemaster:dude

Johnny:I actually

Gamemaster:that Noah has rolled three 20s and two 19s this session

Argyle:I wanted to try to aid him

Argyle:with my warfare lore

Argyle:but what's the fucking point?

Johnny:I get

Johnny:and they both go like this

Johnny:huh

Argyle:they show up we immediately shoot them

Johnny:Listen, I have never rolled better

Johnny:and I have never created worse results

Gamemaster:Your...

Johnny:for us

Gamemaster:That's true. That's absolutely true.

Johnny:It's because I'm wearing this shirt

Gamemaster:Your mode this session was 20.

Gamemaster:that's true

Johnny:both a lucky and an unlucky shirt

Argyle:Yeah.

Gamemaster:it is a roll high shirt

Argyle:Yeah.

Argyle:This is seducing the dragon.

Benny:A lot.

Gamemaster:I mean really

Gamemaster:we can't fault

Gamemaster:Johnny

Gamemaster:because Benny is the one who rolled really low

Gamemaster:on 2D100s

Gamemaster:multiple times

Argyle:That's true.

Gamemaster:plot

Gamemaster:anyway

Gamemaster:with the 4D everybody is clamoring

Gamemaster:they want to know what's going on

Gamemaster:They want to know why you know what's going on in any amount.

Gamemaster:But Johnny is, if nothing else, pretty good with words.

Argyle:he's the hero

Gamemaster:As a bit of an understatement.

Gamemaster:Heroism coursing through his veins.

Gamemaster:He can talk everybody down.

Gamemaster:They still want to know why you know what you know.

Gamemaster:They still want to know what you found.

Gamemaster:All of that kind of fun stuff.

Gamemaster:but they are not necessarily freaking out on you about it, if that makes sense.

Gamemaster:The one thing I will note is the Protectorate will have responded to you,

Argyle:No.

Gamemaster:but it is neither, gosh, what's her name, Tamara? Tamara Riau?

Gamemaster:Because they both did immediately go out to figure out what's going on

Gamemaster:as soon as the whole Strider did its thing.

Gamemaster:So you are talking to, you can tell, like,

Gamemaster:one of the servants that they brought along with them for the ride

Gamemaster:is manning this game at the moment But everybody else you can calm down They do want to meet in person to hash out what happening um but since you have somehow become the de facto leaders of this particular alliance

Gamemaster:just by virtue of walking everybody and and asking them to join and keeping on top of it and all that

Gamemaster:kind of stuff. I think they are

Gamemaster:with that role deferring

Gamemaster:to you to

Gamemaster:organize a

Gamemaster:powwow.

Argyle:that's good i just want to clarify one thing they're asking how do we know this stuff i feel

Benny:And we could also

Gamemaster:Mm-hmm.

Gamemaster:Yeah.

Argyle:like our story should have been very simple something weird happened we summoned chuck

Argyle:chuck's dead isha summoned muck muck's dead we go see harlequins we grab a heart i think that's

Gamemaster:Hmm.

Gamemaster:That's fine.

Argyle:very standard yeah yeah yeah oh yeah we have a we have a research guy that's very yeah it's also

Gamemaster:If that's the story you're going with, that's the story you're going with.

Gamemaster:It's...

Gamemaster:Yeah, you got a guy.

Benny:sense of like, oh, well, where are we?

Johnny:Research portal.

Benny:We're clearly not where we used to be.

Benny:voidward, we're somewhere starward, etc.

Benny:We got a bird.

Benny:Yeah, we have a bird.

Benny:Birds know where they're at.

Gamemaster:Absolutely.

Argyle:okay okay so obviously i don't think we need to decide right now but guys it also maybe we

Gamemaster:Yeah.

Argyle:one, shouldn't do it in our place because

Argyle:everyone kept telling us about don't invite

Argyle:people over to your place.

Argyle:And two,

Argyle:do we want the other people in our group

Benny:We should have this in like the front lawn.

Argyle:to be around them

Anzu:Echo outside.

Johnny:The front lawn where you can't be outside for too long or you die.

Argyle:and then they can't look them in the eyes because they know

Argyle:we did some weird black magic

Argyle:with ours?

Benny:Maybe we should set up like

Benny:some outdoor space in the

Benny:driveway.

Benny:Oh yeah.

Argyle:We could put him in the courtyard.

Benny:Don't we have like seven rooms now?

Gamemaster:Yes, you would have gotten a new room, although...

Benny:Did we get a new room with the

Benny:heart?

Benny:Perfect.

Benny:second War room this is the one that is a place

Gamemaster:I actually believe you promised the second room already.

Argyle:Okay.

Argyle:how much energy would we get

Benny:Oh, fuck.

Johnny:Have they set that up yet?

Gamemaster:to Radiant Arms so that they could make a distillery.

Benny:It's gonna be goth themed.

Benny:There's gonna be bats hanging from the ceiling.

Benny:Whatever weird void shit is going on is...

Gamemaster:But we will pick up next session with you guys figuring out what the hell to do.

Gamemaster:well so there were a few things um basically the general process of what happened here

Benny:Nice.

Johnny:So if Mike had rolled super high, would none of this have happened?

Gamemaster:is you rolled ridiculously high to convince the men here um to like show themselves in front of

Gamemaster:you um the men here saw that you were no longer friends with odd which meant that you were

Gamemaster:equivalently free agents. And then we got a really, really, really low roll, which meant that the

Gamemaster:men here at this point, tired from backstory reasons, see that you guys have the chance of

Gamemaster:making a real change. And so it's kind of put all of its eggs in one basket with that roll.

Gamemaster:I think the answer is, had the roll not been as catastrophically low as it had been, it might have taken a bit more of an extended before the death of the mentor bit there.

Gamemaster:But instead, like with that low roll, it was it was effectively like, I don't know if I can continue anymore.

Argyle:No!

Gamemaster:These people have got it.

Gamemaster:and then it made a very, very big leap

Argyle:No!

Gamemaster:to, like, give you guys that option.

Argyle:No!

Gamemaster:And then, you guys come back,

Gamemaster:we got another catastrophically low roll,

Gamemaster:which meant that the narrative was both

Gamemaster:aware of what you had done,

Gamemaster:cognizant of the power you now hold and were willing to spend some of whatever resource they have that lets them do things to make life very bad for you

Argyle:you you just for my compatriots do you know what some interesting things about

Gamemaster:Because you did kill their sibling.

Gamemaster:I mean, like, obviously there's context behind that, but the rest of the narrative either

Gamemaster:doesn't know or doesn't care.

Gamemaster:So yes, Jorge.

Argyle:number 16.

Benny:What?

Johnny:Yeah.

Gamemaster:M-E-N-H-I-R.

Benny:Uh-huh.

Argyle:We got 16

Argyle:gods right now.

Argyle:We got 6 gods right now.

Argyle:We got 6 evil gods. That's 12.

Argyle:And there's 4

Argyle:narrative left.

Benny:Wait, how do you spell men here?

Johnny:Yeah.

Argyle:That's one bullet for

Argyle:each of them.

Johnny:M-E-N-A-N.

Johnny:That's wild.

Argyle:We got enough bullets

Argyle:to just clear house.

Anzu:I guess we should have said no?

Gamemaster:Hmm?

Argyle:That is...

Argyle:No.

Anzu:Been like, wait, we're not ready.

Anzu:We're not the heroes yet.

Argyle:We did burn a bridge with Aut,

Johnny:Yeah, it's the end.

Argyle:So I feel like we kind of...

Benny:It's the end.

Gamemaster:Yeah.

Argyle:You know, I thought the bullet would kill one of the rocks.

Argyle:I didn't think it would kill all of the rocks.

Gamemaster:But that's what it did.

Argyle:Yeah, yeah.

Gamemaster:It's the end.

Johnny:Oh, jeez.

Benny:I don't even know how to...

Benny:So, the last vision

Johnny:So there three visions

Benny:was us

Benny:the narrative and then the Pharos So is the narrative in our way of doing something and the Pharos represents that doing something

Argyle:6 plus 6 plus 4. That's all the bullets.

Gamemaster:Hmm

Benny:So will we have to kill the rest of the narrative?

Johnny:So there's three visions, right?

Johnny:With us sheltering in the storm,

Johnny:we're sheltering on a rock in a storm

Johnny:with six figures around us.

Johnny:I'm going to go on a limb and say the rock is Færrin

Johnny:and we're just kind of sheltering there

Johnny:and the six gods are the big ones.

Argyle:Echo fragment.

Johnny:The second vision was us looking at the Godhome, I think.

Gamemaster:Therefore.

Johnny:Six figures.

Johnny:And there's four visions, right?

Johnny:One was us holding that power.

Johnny:And then there were 12 shadows.

Argyle:12 gots.

Johnny:Echo Fragment, 12 shadows.

Johnny:I'm going to say that's both the Ashen Pact and the Big Six.

Johnny:and then the last one was

Johnny:the narrative stand between us and the Pharos

Benny:what we have to kill

Anzu:And why did the men here want us to do it?

Gamemaster:Субтитры создавал DimaTorzok

Johnny:I think that's how we

Benny:everyone in the Godhome

Benny:and all of the six outer gods

Benny:and then kill the narrative

Benny:to what end I wonder

Benny:but get out of way

Johnny:get out because the Pharos

Johnny:is the pathway between

Johnny:I think it's killer

Benny:why are we killing all these people

Johnny:yeah

Argyle:Well, now I kind of do.

Benny:Murder-suicide?

Gamemaster:Спасибо.

Johnny:I mean it makes sense why he wants us to kill the Ashen Pact

Johnny:and the narrative

Johnny:I don't know

Benny:Does killing the narrative make sense?

Johnny:I think from his perspective

Benny:I've never wanted to kill any of them.

Johnny:it makes sense

Johnny:because they've been controlling the story

Johnny:and he's tired of it.

Johnny:Jeez.

Argyle:This is...

Argyle:I can believe Argon the most powerful character I ever wielded so far I thought Lev was it but

Benny:you We got

Gamemaster:Argyle killed a member of the narrative

Argyle:Lev didn't have this.

Gamemaster:I don't know if that necessarily makes him a good person.

Gamemaster:I guess it depends on what your view of the narrative is,

Argyle:Mm-hmm.

Gamemaster:or the men here specifically.

Benny:We got two needles in campaign one, right?

Benny:I don't know

Gamemaster:One needle.

Benny:we got one needle in campaign one

Argyle:We got two.

Johnny:The right submission

Gamemaster:There were two, technically.

Benny:we got one needle in campaign two

Benny:two okay okay

Benny:two in campaign two

Benny:and now we have 16

Gamemaster:Uh-huh.

Benny:well yeah but that's

Gamemaster:Well, you had 17.

Gamemaster:You used one.

Benny:that's the price of admission

Benny:the price of admission was one

Johnny:would shoot the gatekeeper.

Gamemaster:Yeah, no.

Gamemaster:It's escalated.

Benny:16 is a lot

Gamemaster:There's...

Gamemaster:Yeah.

Benny:Wait, hold on.

Gamemaster:There's a lot of players in this.

Johnny:The

Johnny:The payoff across three campaigns is really amazing, though.

Argyle:You said R.

Gamemaster:in this particular setting.

Gamemaster:I don't know if you've noticed.

Johnny:Remember when we were just floating through void space and we were like, oh, some rocks.

Johnny:And now we're here.

Benny:Yeah, I didn't pick up that they were weathered.

Benny:Like, we saw them before.

Benny:Were they more pristine the first time we saw them,

Benny:and now they're, like, weathered and worn down, or...?

Gamemaster:They are substantially more weathered this time

Gamemaster:than the first time you had seen them.

Benny:Yeah.

Johnny:They are.

Argyle:they were.

Anzu:What was wearing him down?

Gamemaster:What? I said they were. I didn't say they are. No. Not only did I not, like, I'm not

Argyle:Oh, I thought you said are.

Johnny:They are.

Gamemaster:playing weird time they're secretly alive tricks with you. Oh. Oh yeah, no. No, you

Argyle:No, no, no.

Argyle:I didn't think you were. It was more somber.

Argyle:It was like, Josh, they're not alive anymore.

Argyle:Well, so here's the good news.

Gamemaster:killed them.

Argyle:We did burn a bridge with Aut,

Argyle:but it looks like

Gamemaster:That's the good news.

Anzu:I agree, actually.

Argyle:it was going to happen anyway

Argyle:because after we shot his brother there was no

Benny:Yeah.

Anzu:Oh my god.

Gamemaster:I mean, I disagree with that, but sure.

Benny:because now

Argyle:i know what i'm saying is if we shot him he would have been mad anyway so

Gamemaster:You had burned the bridge with him before you shot them at here.

Gamemaster:Like...

Gamemaster:Yeah.

Argyle:he's a bad mentor

Anzu:Oh my god.

Gamemaster:Yeah.

Benny:we're literally going to walk into

Argyle:he's a bad

Gamemaster:Yes.

Argyle:he's a bad

Benny:Anytime we walk into a room with one of the remaining gods or otherworldly beings on this, we're like, which one of you is bad?

Benny:And we're just going to be like fucking throwing around.

Benny:Oh, fuck.

Benny:Put that down.

Benny:It's like, no.

Benny:Tell us which one is bad.

Benny:Him.

Benny:No, no.

Benny:It was him.

Argyle:Okay.

Benny:He's bad.

Benny:Who?

Argyle:One other quick thing, Josh.

Gamemaster:Yes.

Argyle:I don't mean to jump a gun.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Argyle:But in terms of milestone leveling,

Gamemaster:So you're gonna jump a gun.

Benny:A gun.

Johnny:Yeah.

Gamemaster:Uh-huh.

Argyle:do the men here count as a milestone?

Argyle:I know it's quick.

Gamemaster:Yeah, you level up to nine.

Argyle:if this was xp we'd be 30

Gamemaster:You level up to nine.

Gamemaster:And there's no way to have gone through that and not, like,

Gamemaster:full disclosure, I did not have on my checklist of what counts as a milestone

Gamemaster:this.

Gamemaster:But yeah, this is a level up.

Gamemaster:I think that it would be crazy not to be a level up.

Anzu:All I wanted was to reach the Voidsong.

Johnny:I was up in Aspen this week, I was thinking about it, I was like, oh, this would be a

Gamemaster:Yeah.

Benny:Thank you you but i mean were my roles really bad the second one the second one was

Gamemaster:Well, you shouldn't have pissed off the narrative then.

Johnny:good idea, because then, you know, we don't really like the heroes, that's great, it'll

Johnny:give us a little boost, we'll have someone on our back.

Anzu:All right well you not allowed back in Aspen That what I say No more thinking Noah

Gamemaster:It was That was a really good idea though like just generally speaking i mean you looking for

Johnny:uh you you you you

Gamemaster:allies you get allies i it's just a combination of ridiculously good roles combined with

Gamemaster:ridiculously bad roles uh just mean that sometimes things happen that's that's what that's what role

Gamemaster:playing is.

Gamemaster:Yes.

Gamemaster:You got a 6 and a 10.

Benny:yeah but what is

Benny:I thought you meant it's on the Scale of does stuff happen

Benny:and doesn't stuff happen

Benny:like if I got a hundred both times

Gamemaster:Yes.

Gamemaster:Yeah.

Benny:would have been like the men here

Benny:make you guys level 15

Benny:and then they duplicate

Gamemaster:No.

Gamemaster:So, if you

Benny:...

Gamemaster:got

Gamemaster:above a 10 on

Benny:...

Gamemaster:both of those rolls,

Benny:...

Gamemaster:on the first roll,

Gamemaster:It would have given you, like, a mark to prove that you are a friend of the Menhir,

Benny:...

Gamemaster:that you could have, like, then parlayed into more stuff at a later date.

Argyle:Hey guys.

Gamemaster:It wouldn't have become immediately campaign relevant now.

Gamemaster:On the second roll, you guys would have had some time before the narrative tried to interfere,

Gamemaster:and they would not have pushed you as far back as they did.

Gamemaster:You just ended up on the things happen Scale both times.

Gamemaster:like it it isn't actually mike's fault to clarify um but you know sometimes sometimes the dice do

Argyle:Yeah.

Argyle:No, it is my small.

Argyle:Totally my small.

Benny:Oh yeah.

Gamemaster:the land on the yeah we're doing crazy things because like i am generally not a fan of the

Gamemaster:i rolled a natural 20 crit can i jump to the moon type of play but i do think it's very fun

Gamemaster:when you guys roll really high to interact with really powerful things and then roll really low

Gamemaster:to have those powerful things do stuff.

Gamemaster:Sometimes you just gotta throw a wrench or 40

Gamemaster:into a campaign.

Anzu:you haven even begun to look at the level five spells

Gamemaster:It's fine.

Argyle:I can do my spells on

Benny:you We going to go kill Giant

Johnny:Thank you I taking synesthesia

Gamemaster:Yeah I sorry You got stuff But you It a sorely needed power which Jorge has already sent me an update to It a sorely needed power because the people here are scarier

Argyle:dart though

Argyle:yeah

Gamemaster:You're in a harder area now than you were before.

Gamemaster:It happens.

Johnny:I have that now.

Gamemaster:Because that did...

Benny:...

Argyle:well

Argyle:so two things

Argyle:one

Argyle:we need to clear

Benny:Ooh.

Anzu:You can't use the corpse of a dead

Johnny:What are some of these?

Argyle:the top part

Johnny:Oh, this is crazy.

Argyle:we need to clear the bottom part

Argyle:tally then we need to

Argyle:get the groups to work together

Argyle:to then start a new way

Argyle:of moving and maybe we power

Argyle:our strider with the corpse of Giant

Argyle:yeah

Benny:Actually, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.

Argyle:wait wait wait

Benny:what if we feed the corpse of Giant

Anzu:desi in a power things.

Johnny:Great.

Argyle:Yeah.

Anzu:Oh my god.

Gamemaster:Ooh.

Benny:to eerie

Benny:and eerie powers the strider

Gamemaster:Ooh.

Anzu:No.

Benny:and we hope

Anzu:Give it to Machine God.

Benny:that machine god doesn't get jealous

Gamemaster:We're kind of...

Benny:what do you think

Benny:how much do you think Giant's body is worth

Benny:do you think it's like 100 or

Benny:150 energy

Gamemaster:Probably, yeah.

Benny:120.

Gamemaster:Like, at least 125.

Argyle:Yeah, if we can...

Gamemaster:We're getting into real

Gamemaster:bring-me-the-flayed-body-of-preservation

Gamemaster:type stuff.

Argyle:Yeah.

Anzu:Dude, I feel sick.

Johnny:I'm here very fast.

Gamemaster:I don't know

Argyle:It would also be so funny if

Argyle:Giant has, like, life sense,

Argyle:like the Necromancer's, like, hit point seconds,

Argyle:looks at us at his feet, and he's just like,

Argyle:what are these stupid things?

Argyle:And then little eight-year-old pulls out a shiny gun,

Argyle:shoots it.

Benny:Word would spread quick They be like do not There is a tiny gun that will kill you Oh God Are the researchers that we bombed I don know An eight showed up with a gun and shot Giant to death

Argyle:Alright.

Argyle:That's, uh...

Argyle:woe to spread the word oh laughing

Gamemaster:Thank you it it is actually a little unfortunate because there would have been a way

Argyle:laughing

Benny:Please, please.

Benny:We don't know how else to explain it.

Argyle:laughing

Benny:We'll be like, I saw an eight-year-old in the tubes.

Benny:That eight-year-old has killed Giant and blown up a quarter of the city.

Argyle:laughing

Benny:We can't let that eight-year-old get near anything.

Benny:Then he has to...

Gamemaster:back to Færrin Prime

Argyle:I don't know.

Benny:That's true.

Johnny:Oh, God.

Gamemaster:from where Giant is.

Gamemaster:But you blew it up.

Gamemaster:That's an easy way back.

Benny:We burned the boats, now we have to kill

Benny:the Giant.

Johnny:Oh, no.

Gamemaster:Anyway, this is all

Gamemaster:a next time on

Gamemaster:Does Next Week Work?

Benny:Yeah.

Gamemaster:Next Week Monday?

Gamemaster:Okay.

Benny:Mm-hmm.

Gamemaster:Okay.

Gamemaster:okay so we'll just have to tpk next week so it's not a problem

Benny:yes

Anzu:As a heads up, though, the following Monday and Tuesday will not work for me.

Johnny:No way.

Anzu:That's the 31st and the 1st.

Gamemaster:yeah

Anzu:Seems like that's where we're headed anyway.

Johnny:No way.

Benny:so tempting

Gamemaster:you guys

Johnny:We walk in.

Anzu:Unless we just start shooting people with the gun.

Gamemaster:easy way to get grayson out of the way yeah

Johnny:Hand things.

Benny:it's so tempting

Anzu:Grayson!

Benny:if we're in a teepee

Gamemaster:I will

Benny:just be like, you know what,

Argyle:yeah

Anzu:Indeed.

Benny:motherfuckers, you gotta get your

Benny:hands on this goddamn gun.

Benny:Bam, bam, bam.

Gamemaster:see y'all next week then

Gamemaster:send me your updated character sheets

Argyle:yeah

Argyle:fifth level spells boy

Anzu:Indeed.

Gamemaster:if you're not Jorge

Gamemaster:thank y'all

Anzu:Very well.

Benny:Sure.

Gamemaster:and I will

Gamemaster:yeah you got some fun stuff

Argyle:awesome

Gamemaster:Have fun leveling up.

Benny:oh

Anzu:Bye. Oh my god, bye.

Benny:alright

Benny:Please.