Dice Shame - 33 | 'Open House'

Episode Date: May 28, 2020

The party continues searching the mysterious house... Comedy, action and a whole lot of shaming come together in Dice Shame, an Actual Play Podcast of Storm King's Thunder by Wizards of the Coast! Join our GM Jo; her partner Harlan, his brother Alex & their best friends Justin and Rob as they tackle the daunting world of Faerun in this legendary adventure module! Dice Shame is a podcast that welcomes its audience to the gaming table. Like the games they play at home, they try not to take themselves too seriously. The show aims to be entertaining, inclusive, and irreverent, while still taking the rules (somewhat) seriously. Join us every Thursday morning for brand new episodes available on all major platforms including; Spotify, iTunes, Google Play and more! If you haven't checked it out yet... what are you waiting for?!? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

You tell him, Doren. Guys, I hit the jackpot. But I'm in love with the courtyard. We shall name you Paul. Oh, just a raw potato. That's a delicious snack to eat while I walk around this dungeon. Shut up, Salkan. It's okay.

We're going to take care of that wound. Don't you worry. You find an assortment of goods. Goblinos. Frosted mini dwarves. Mordinotes. Calimvorios. Nice.

Harlan, you get inspiration for that. These are good for your soul. Welcome back to Dyshame, episode 33, open house. Come on inside. Come on in, y'all. Man, I want to have a big house party with all our friends. Yeah, coughing on each other. Not during this time, Joe.

We could set up a barbecue in the laneway, blow up the kiddie pool. Passers by, we can just wave and say, Don't come near us, but here's a hop dog. Throw it. I miss having people. Me too. This week's MVP is Stephen Keene on Twitter for his kind words about dice shame. He's just started our show.

And in his own words, can't wait to hear the rest. I swear, I have not paid him. Welcome to the fold, Stephen. Yeah, they're in it now. By the time he listens to this episode, too, he's going to be so tired of us. He could never be. Not Stephen. Not Stephen.

Let's play. Yeah, let's get down to business. So I don't know if you guys have been to the grocery store recently, but I came home with quite the hall the other day, Harlan Canboach. Nice. We decided that we deserve a treat. And we got two different sugar cereals that I'm very excited about.

Both were your favorites. Well, okay, so I previously did get us a box of Lucky Charms that Harlan took care of. Previously, with the Lucky Charms, you bought Corn Pops for yourself that you told me I couldn't touch. Then bought Sugar Cris for yourself and also Honeycomb. Yes, so I actually bought three cereals for me and one for Harlan, if we're keeping track. I thought you said that you wanted a treat. Was it a treat or was it several boxes of treats? A treat is multifaceted in this area.

The treat is called cereal. Do you consider one cereal a treat? One piece of cereal? If you have multiple, one box is many, many treats. You have had 300 treats today. What is the treat quotia? The quantum of treats, the smallest, indivisible. We have a timet cereal, too.

And I know that most of our listeners are American, and so I just wanted to, like... Do you have a Dunkin' Donut cereal? Oh, probably, right? They must have some really cool fucking cereal. They do My sister-in-law goes down to the states Every now and then Yeah, they're treat food

Speaking of treats It's a treat to be hanging out with you guys this afternoon Thank you Ditto Last episode You took care of some Some very interesting little creatures Yeah what the heck were those

They were like red-skinned blood Red-hatted Gnome-type creatures from the Faywile I don't like them. I didn't like them either. They took a lot of my health away from me. Same. Which I was kind of hoping to keep.

Yeah, no, the stab in the gut was not pleasant. And they took my ego because I missed. You're all a little bit worse for the wear, and Oren is a little bit shell-shocked, frankly. Well, thank you so much for bringing me along on this expedition. Aren't you glad you came? Look at all the best. blood everywhere. And Red like skips forward. His, his paws just in like pools of blood.

Is Red actually excited about it? Or is he just trying to like push Oren's buttons? No. Red's actually excited about it. This is like to Red, this is adventure. Like getting in a scrap and fighting. I don't think Red understands the seriousness of like death more so than like to him. This is like a stage play of combat. And he's trying to get Oren excited for it where I think Orrin's taking the much more realistic. Oh my God, I've just seen a man split like a log. Red's way too innocent to push people's buttons in this way. He's just, like, excited.

How are we doing health-wise there, everybody? Oh, less than half. Definitely been stabbed a lot, and now I've got to climb down from this damn gatehouse to figure out how I'm going to get down. And Krayloft sees you up there, kind of holding up to your gut, and he walks over and holds up his hand. Yeah, so, like, I'm imagining this point of him, like, trying to get down on his, like, Jack getting down on his,

his knees and trying to like lower himself down the side of the gatehouse and like maybe Kralath can help like grab his feet on the bottom or something and help him climb down a little bit. If you if you have help you're not going to need to make a role for sure but yeah but it's just real pathetic as he's also like trying to flinch because he's been stabbed twice by this fucking fairy creature in a bloody hat. It's okay we're going to take care of that wound don't you worry. Oh red is untouched by the way yeah of course. I took a simple point of This is great. And Doran, how about you?

Doran's hurting. He's down to 29 hit points. He's looking at his hands. He's going, Doran, you've taken a lot of injury today. He's got, you know, cuts on his hands and, like, cuts on his chest. He's also still drunk, so he's, like, swaying there. Yeah. Anyone who's been around drunk people enough knows that there's a moment where they just stare at their hands and sort of watch.

Yeah, so he's quite injured. On a scale of 1 to 72, how do I feel? I feel about a 29. Ooh, really? Oh, yeah. That's pretty bad. Okay, everybody gather around. I'm going to say a prayer to call him for it.

Physically. Mentally, I'm feeling great. Okay, okay. Come on. Come on over. Okay. It's a base 72 mathematics system. So with those numbers,

Kralov knows what he has to do. He's going to cast prayer of healing as a level three spell. Wow, wow, wow, wow, wow. And so everybody's going to heal 3D8 plus my spell casting ability modifier. three. Kralath rolls them and everyone applies the same number.

Let's do it. I'm ready. Poised. That is a 9 plus 3. So everybody gets 12 5 points back. Yikes. Sorry about that.

What did you roll? That's a really low. I roll the 1, a 2, and a 6. What brings me up to 30 out of 42? It could have been worse. Kellenvore really likes these fake creatures, eh? Well, I mean...

While they're doing this, I want to look around for Zolkin. What is he done during this fight? Right. Like, he led us to this gate and then just pieced out. Is he hiding in a bush or what? So you're standing in the lawns of this villa enclosed within the stone walls. So there's a large domineering two-story building that occupies the majority of this enclosure.

And then off to the west side, there's a stable. And he pops his head out from the stable. And he says, everything's clear in here. You didn't even. do anything, Zulkin, and I walk over, I wonder why you got bit by something invisible when you go hiding in stables when the real shit hits the fan? Orrin, don't be like this guy, I say as Orin's like hiding in the bush still. Zulkin puts a hand on your shoulder, he says, Words hurt, Red.

That's right, they hurt, and so do arrows and sickles. Look at all this blood. This is Doran's blood. Yeah, you're pretty, you're a pretty coward, cowardly. I'm not really speaking clearly. You tell him, Doren. You're a real coward, Zolkin. In fact, Zulkin, why don't you lead the way? And I point towards the... Well, what's he hiding in the stables?

I'll do a perception, sure. I'll lean in past him as he leaves the stables, assuming he's walking out. Yeah, he is. Yeah. So I'll lean in past him and take a look inside the stables where he was hiding. Let's do a general perception.

Sure. With a 16... So the stable house is a stone building. It contains enough stablesage for... I don't think that's a word, but I'm... It is now. For four draft horses, which none of them are currently occupying the stables, you found one of them torn limb from limb on the grounds of this villa already.

I believe you also found some evidence of giant teeth in its haunches. And red, as you lean in, a shaft of moonlight from the open door illuminates a patch of square, cobblestone on the ground of the stable on the floor. May thinks it looks suspicious. There's just like little sweepings of hay that kind of form a squarish outline. I wait till Zolkin leaves and then I slip in. I mean, I don't know whether this is something that was hidden by the owners of this place or if this was something that Zulkin did sneakily.

So I'm just going to go walk over nonchalantly and take a Luxilu. Okay. What does your Luxilu look like? How do you investigate this? I mean, I can't imagine it's like a trap because it's in someone's stable. It'd be very weird if someone's like, ha ha, a spike ball.

Those horses never suspected it. Yeah, no, I'm just going to walk over and bend down and like take out a dagger and sort of pick at the edges. You uncover a three foot square flagstone in the southwest corner of the stable that looks to be a hidden trap door. Bingo, bango.

Oh, yeah. And I give it an open. Well, you try. You try to open it, but it is very securely locked. There is the hole for a key, which you do not have. Interesting. All right, I think I cover it back up with... Hey, and stuff.

Hey, hey, for you. Hey. With hay, and I head back over to the others nonchalantly, with the intention of telling my team, but not Zulkin. Sure, yeah, and Zolkin is just kind of shooting the shit with Kralath. And Red does this for two purposes. One, I don't know what this is, but if it ends up something positive, I don't want Zokin

and necessarily share in on the wealth. And if it's something negative, then we can push Zulkin down it later. My guess, just meta is that it's... I'm so proud of you. Meta is meta? It's meta. You should have just left it alone.

I touched it. I was all fucked up. I dig it. My guess is that it would be a trap door, or not a trap door, but a secret entrance into the building. Yeah. And then I come back to the others and I tell them, hey, you know what I just found? And then I think I saw like a trapped door with a key on it. Really?

Interesting. Well, and you come back, and Doran has already started to kind of investigate this field that's around the building where we're standing in this, in this gated area. So, yeah, you're standing in the yard, I guess I would describe it, of this villa that's... Courtyardard? Yes, thank you. The courtyard of this villa. It's enclosed by a 12-foot-tall stone fence, stone wall. You entered through a broken rear gate, and you're looking at the rear of the villa.

So there's like a back patio, essentially, that does have pillars, Doran. And that's what I'm looking at. That's sort of what I'm investigating. You're also standing directly to the north of a broken wall of the villa. The wall has been demolished partly, and you can see through the hole into a dark room, which you would probably guesstimate to be the kitchen based on the furniture that lies partly destroyed within. Additionally, you had previously investigated

the body of a horse in the courtyard. There's also what looks to be a body of a human on top of the veranda in the back. And actually, that's a good note. I think Wild Doran's doing this, and as I'm explaining to them, the trapdoor, we loot, right? Like, we want to see if there's anything of value

on these sickle-wielding monsters. I'm going to go up to Jack and I'm going to shake off the blood from my mace, wiping it in the grass. And I say, so what do you make of these creatures? You ever seen anything like them before in your books? I mean, I've never seen anything like them before, but they're definitely fairy creatures, which is really interesting. They're from somewhere else.

These ones seem really vicious, though. Like, I'd never suspected. I've always sort of thought of fairies and pixies and that sort of thing is, oh, cute creatures, a little bit of dust, you makes you fly, whatever. these bastards. God. Yeah. Yeah. Doran kind of says from across the courtyard, he's kind of standing outside of this hole in the wall with his axe out and he's just peering in. Doran, again, with his soldier backer and is not going off on his own, but he's still investigating sort of gently, this dark area that looks like a kitchen. Gentle investigation. I was going to say, did you want to

roll a gentle investigation? Yeah, let me just see, do I see anything in the shadows of this hole? 12. It would be a perception if you're just kind of looking around. Okay, so a perception of 15? So, yeah, as I mentioned, a substantial part of the northern wall of this kitchen has been destroyed. Rubble lies on the lawn that you pick your way over and through the hole in the wall door and you observe the disarray within. You see that there are pots and pans, cooking utensils, dangling above some preparation tables in the middle of the room.

and there's obvious signs of a struggle from in here. There are some muddy footprints on the floor, and you see a couple of doors that lead from this room, one of which is open right now. And while Dorn is investigating the back of the mansion and Kralath is speaking to Jack, Red is going to go loot the bodies. Yeah, you're going to look at the body.

Because he's allkin being like, I take the stuff. So the horse body. is, I mean, the horse has no wallet. Look at all this great horse meat! But you want to go and observe the body on the back porch? Definitely that. I'm hoping it has a key. But I also want to check out the Faye creatures as well,

see if they have any, you know, valuables or weapons. So the Faye creatures are armed with these vicious-looking sickles. Pop and ice? The sickles. Cream, dick. These creatures otherwise are not carrying anything that looks valuable, unless you want to hang on to their iron boots, which is striking. Red removes the small iron boots from one of them and puts them into his bag of holding.

So bad. Yeah. I think red is one of those. He's like animalistic, so he's kind of attracted to gross smells. Yeah. Right. What about their caps? How would red look in a red cap?

Oh, definitely take one of those too. As you pick up this red hat, blood comes off on your hands. They're soaked in blood. That's how they're red. Oh, cool. I take on them less. So I take the boots and I take the little hat. And then I move to the body.

Is there anything on the human body? Yeah, so I've described this body as a smear across the veranda. But if you are inclined to go through the pockets of this ruined corpse's clothing, you do find a key. Wow. Well, good. Again, I'll pocket it for now with the intention of telling everybody, but I do want to sort of see what everyone else is doing before. The road to hell is paved with good intentions. Yeah.

The key and the hardware for the trap door are made of two different metals. You don't think that they would match. So this is a key for something else. Kraloth walks over to this corpse and he kneels down with his holy symbol and says, may you rest in peace. What state is the body in? There's a pulpy mass for part of his head and one eye is open, yes. I'm not going to bother trying to bury him, but I'm just going to close that one eye.

I could help bury him real quick if that's a thing you wanted to do. Me too. I'm already covered in blood. And I reach down and I try to pick up as much of this body as I can. Doran watches you start to pick up the shoulders and the upper body and the bottom half kind of falls away. And it stays on the ground. Yeah. So Doran comes over and picks up the legs.

I'll give you a hand here, Kralath. I guess you want to give this poor sap a proper burial. I'm sure he would want to be buried on the property that he lived on. Between two of the trees that the Faye had jumped out of, Jack's going to walk over and just sort of raise his hand up and a big mound of earth comes and piles itself, and there's suddenly a five-foot deep hole there, just perfect to lay this person to rest in.

Kraloth makes eye contact and nods and lowers the hunk of flesh down into it. And Doran lowers the other half of the hunk of flesh down into the grave. Usually we're on our adventures and places. We're on a mission. We've got the next goal. And I think there's just enough, like, booze in our system. They're like, no, no, no. This guy gets on, we're going to honor this guy.

And so there's this moment of like, okay, we make a grave. We bury this guy in him. The earth goes over top. And we like take this whole moment to make a bit of like a space before we move on. We shall name you, Paul. Here lies pole. Sulkin is standing in the darkness underneath one of the trees adjacent to this freshly dug grave. And he's like, whenever you're ready.

You be quiet. This is special adventure friend stuff. God. All right, let's go. Yes, so there is a back door to the villa that you have not opened. You instead are looking through the ruined wall of the kitchen beyond which we have seen that there is a, some disarray and an open door leading into additional darkness. I mean, it would make sense to go in where it's been caved first because we can see what we're walking into, correct?

Yeah, and Zolkin's like, yes, well, when I came through yesterday, I did the same, it's kind of a mess in here. And he leads the way, he picks his way into the kitchen. Can I follow. In addition, I think Kieran should probably be real close, just on top of Jack's head. Yeah, I'm imagining Kieran sort of, once we get inside, pacing around at my feet and then, like, leaping from top of, like, kitchen cabinet to somewhere else that cats shouldn't be climbing around. But when you have wings, it's fine. Knocking shit off.

Just a little bit. Kieran flies on top of something and just stares at you dead ass and just pushes something off. Like a nice delicate antique vase. Oh, what's the matter, boss? For an instant, Kralath is hesitant as he looks into the dark void through the broken wall. And then he remembers and he reaches up and he pulls down his goggles over his eyes and he clicks on a little mechanism on the right side and they were to life and he steps in across the rubble. Zulkin is like, I made it to the study. Oh, all right.

So you all enter. There's a dumbwaiter on the west wall of the room that you see red. Kieran is like sniffing around the door to the dumbwaiter. It's gorgeous in here. the utensils are beautifully wrought. You can even tell, despite the darkness, the furnishings in this kitchen are gorgeous. Even just the quality of the wood, you can almost smell the like cherry wood lacquer of these preparation tables. I feel like Doran is picking up the utensils and like the knives and stuff and holding them up to the moonlight to see like the quality and the craftsmanship

and then putting them back down. And red is like rifling through a drawer taking the silver where, like putting the spoons. You're like, let's get to looting. Yeah. Kieran does little sneeze because of the pungent odor of spices emanating from the open door on the east wall. As you all filter into the room, it becomes apparent that there is a broken door leading into a pantry.

There's a broken door over here. Yeah, didn't you hear the sneeze? Is there any more booze in this kitchen? Yeah, totally. I feel like I stand in the caved-out northern entrance and, like, wave a bottle at Oren, who's undoubtedly still outside. And I'm like, Oren! All right. The bells are ringing. Master Red, if I come in there, swear you'll protect me.

If you don't come in here, I can't. All right. He clambers clumsily over the broken wall and takes the cooking wine out of your hand, pulls off the stopper, and then takes a hefty. swig. A diligent swig. He's very thoughtful about it. And I take it back and I swig as well. Doran hears the cork come out and looks across the room and says, toss it over here under his breath. I don't know about you guys. I'm keeping quiet. I don't want to disturb anything if there's something we can sneak up on. Yeah, yeah. For sure. But I also think we're in this world of a bit drunken that we're playing way more fast and loose than we would. Oh, of course. It definitely

has the feel of like hijinks. Yeah, it's definitely hygiene. I don't know if I've ever seen you guys get up to. I love Jack being like, yeah. I mean, he's sort of going back and forth between those modes. I think he's, I can picture him standing in the kitchen. Kieran's sniffing around. And Jack is just sort of standing in the kitchen, taking in what everybody else is doing. He's maybe standing a little stunned, watching the world spin around him a little bit, trying to be like, oh, is there personal effects in here?

Is there anything that, like, tells the story of who the people are in this kitchen? Who lived? Like, he's studying the ruins of it as if it was, you know, a dig, somewhere because that's his mode. I love the idea. It's almost like a cartoon where like his vision turns to this like tapestry and then it turns back to red and orange and red's like shaking the bottle

and then it turns back to the tapestry and then it turns back to red and you're like which one do you take a step towards? Kralath as you stand you're like over by the stove and a slight noise catches your attention down by your feet

a very fat orange tressum with angry expression on its face is just sitting there looking up at you whoa uh am i hey uh jack did you transform kieran

no i thought kieran was over in the spice cabinet we got our first living host hey i'm just going to talk to the tressum as if it can understand me i guess well we we have a member to the party that can talk to animals no but i can do something like that. And Red sees you guys sort of referencing the Tressum and walks over

drunkenly. And I'm going to use my primeval awareness. So again, I have the innate ability to communicate with beasts. They recognize me as a kindred spirit. And through sounds and gestures, I can communicate simple ideas to a beast as an action. And I can read its basic mood and intent. So I can have a back and forth, but I can definitely communicate to an extent. I can learn its emotional state, whether it's affected by magic, its short-term needs, and any actions I can take to persuade it not to attack. So yeah, and I'm going to read it smooth. Yeah, it's, it's mad right now. Okay. And is it affected by any magic? Not apart from its own innate sort of magic that Tressums have. And you think that it would probably befriend you if you feed it? Yeah, it recognizes me as a kindred

spirit. So I see this, and I pull it a little bit of lambas bread from my bag, and I bend down and give this fat-ass cat some more food. Oh, man, the change that comes over this cat, like, it's once bristling whiskers kind of slick back across its cheeks, and the rough of its neck where all the fur was standing up just sort of dissolves into these jowls as this fat cat just like greedily takes these big mouthfuls of bread. Good boy. And I'm going to just try to, where are your masters, girl, or boy?

Wait, let me feel. Whoa. Boy. It is a boy. I know. And what a boy. It's not really interested in talking to you about that. More so interested in hanging out with you.

I turn to Jack, who is sitting by this, or standing by this thing next to Krelath. And I'm like, you said Tressums innately can view invisible Kree. creatures, right? So this thing would know there's an invisible creature here. Yeah, they can detect poison, too. Tressums are really cool. Again, I'm picturing Jack's saying that, like, buzzed. For some reason, I know you're not, but I picture you holding

like a beer, me like, yeah, dude, man. I feel like, it's now, it's back to that, look back to the tapestry, look back, now it's look back to Jack, he's got the cooking sherry in his hand and he's, you know, it's his birthday still. He's, I mean, yeah, he's been stabbed a little bit. And I stand up and I like take it and like say you can hand back and like, yeah, Yeah, yeah. Hey. Hey, hey, hey, hey.

I hold my hand open for you to toss me the bottle. For sure. Yeah, yeah, it's your turn. Yeah, make a ranged attack. 13. Oh, well, yeah. You can, yeah, you throw it at Doran. Doran catches it. I catch the bottle. I take a swig. There's a pantry back here.

Hey. And I toss the bottle back. Hey. I feel like for some reason Krayloth is very serious through all this. He just buried somebody. Yeah, so every time you can. guys are tossing the bottle back and forth. I'm like,

Hey. Trying to get it. And every time you catch it, and it's a wash of relief. He's like babysitting. But, yeah, Kralath is definitely concerned that, you know,

he's got to look after his party and he really desperately wants to keep everybody alive. All of the doors in this room, like looking around, like there's the pantry door, and then there's a door down where Zolkan is.

It looks like two doors. So there are a total of four doorways leading from the kitchen. Okay. So while everybody's, you know, talking to this Tressum, he's just going to walk over to this door that's just north of the pantry and lean into it and just take a listen at the door.

So you take a listen at the door and you hear the distinct sound of nothing. Okay. What's it sound like? It's like this. Yeah. I think. I think it's clear. I rolled perception. Does that matter?

You can tell me the number. 24. Oh, wow. You hear that the door is locked. That's a very good hearing. So I'm in the northern corner right by Kralov. I see him turn the handle to this door and it's locked. And I like step forward. Yeah. And forgetting that I didn't actually tell anybody, I just pulled the key that I found it in my pocket and try to put it in the lock.

And Kralov kind of steps back, surprised. Doesn't fit. And I'm like, oh, well, you never know. By the way, I found this key. So Doran steps into the pantry, and I'd like to roll a perception to see if there's any traps or anything in here. Sure. Pantry traps for those naughty kids trying to steal cookies at night. What's the sugary cereal?

Oh, it's 21. You find an assortment of goods, herbs, spices, dried food. Goblinos. Frosted mini dwarves. Some more cooking wine, if you'd like. There's some honeynut oats, cereal. cluster clusters of honey, Morridan oats.

These are good for your soul. Calamvorios. Calimborios. Nice. Harland, you get inspiration for that. Yes. I love that. That's great.

And basically with your perception check, you're able to ascertain that this is a well-off household. The food is just starting to spoil a little bit. Is there anything other than spoil? spices that is anything that Doran might want to take just for sustenance. So he'd grab a bag of apples if there's apples there. I just rolled a natural 20 on your behalf.

So pick five things that you want and they're in here. Okay, so there's some like preserve fish, preserve meat. There's some unspoiled potatoes, a bag of unspoiled carrots. He like comes out with handfuls. I love the idea to Doran, oh, just a raw potato. That's a delicious snack to eat while I walk around this dungeon. Oh my God, yes. The real treasure.

A pome to tear. You just finished the last of the apple brandy or whatever, but you find another bottle. Oh, there's an apricot brandy. Yes. And I say, guys, I hit the jackpot. And then everybody's eyes open. Oh, it's not gold, but oh, it's another bottle of brandy.

It's golden colored liquid. Yeah. While I'm outside of the pantry, Red's going to go in and grab a large metal pitcher, and I'm just going to scoop a big, A big scoop of flour. Smart. I like it. That's probably more inspiration-worthy than Calumvorio's.

Well, invisibility as written, anything that is being worn or carried by an invisible creature also becomes invisible. So I feel like if you throw flower on an invisible creature, that it would indicate where the creature is for like one round and then the flower would become invisible too. Do you know what I mean? Yeah, that would be a tough thing too. You would definitely be able to follow tracks in flower on the ground. Oh, even better. But I feel like there's like a limited applicability. Shelf life?

Thank you, Rob. So if I hug an invisible creature, do I become invisible? If it carries you maybe. No, I don't think that's how it works. I don't fucking know. But where is me? I walk up to Zolken, who's picking his teeth with a fork. He's looking at you guys so bored.

Ford out of his fucking mind And he's like, can we, are we going to go or? Shut up, Zulkin. Hey, Zulkin, you got lockpicks? Uh, yes. The hell are you doing? Get through this door. Yeah, you're jerk.

And I like kick his butt as he's going. I don't like you when you're drunk. What do you mean? We've been drunk this entire time. I haven't liked you since I met you. That's not very. Craylo, did you hear what he said? That's not very nice.

To be fair, we did kill many of his men. Yeah, and it's kind of fair because we don't like you either. Zorkin. Yeah, we don't like him. All right, all right. All right. I like him. Okay, so he is going to, you're referring to the door that's just north of the pantry.

The one that Kralath and Red were fooling around with for a minute and found locked. Like Jack was, again, just taking it all in and then it was like, oh wait, he sold himself as a roguish individual. Get to work. Yeah. He makes a big show of getting out his lock pick and of obscuring his methods from with his back as he works because he's not keen on sharing his talents with any of you. We're definitely in a learning mood right now. As a cantrip, I'm going to cast guidance on him.

Oh. So that means I get to add a plus four. Just casually. Does that look like something? I try to cast it a little bit more sleight of hand so it doesn't look like I'm helping him, but I want him to get that door open. I mean, the two that I rolled on the D4 that you gave me for guidance, made me hit the D.C. exactly.

Oh, wow. Way to go. It should be like he's picking it and he's not getting it and you just like wave your hand like a Jedi and it's like clicks and he's like almost confused at it. He's like, oh. He's like, no big deal. Shut up, so kind of. Let's see what's behind it. He reveals a room, a square room that has a barrel of water in one corner

and a staircase that leads down into darkness. Doran is standing at the door that's south of the pantry, the single door that's south of the pantry, and he grabs and jiggles the handle, is it open? It is, yes. And he opens that door as well. Let's the door slide open. So, Doran, you're looking into a dark room that is undecorated, contains four single beds and a small dining table. There are a few chests in here at the foot of the beds.

This is probably a servant's quarters. Without waiting for anybody else, Doran lutes through the chest. Yeah, all you find in these chests are some spare uniforms, it looks like. They're all matching clothes of a kind of drab navy color and some mundane personal effects. I just leave them. Maybe a diary that's like, dear diary, I sure am a servant. So sad being a servant. I really don't have anything else with my life.

But I'm in love with the courtyard master. Oh, Jack wants the diary real big. In the moment now, he's like, oh, this artifact of a time and a place captures something about this. You know, these are the sorts of documents you really want. They teach you the most about a place if you're trying to preserve them. Call it Diary of a sad servant. Diary of a sad servant, it is. And you're not in the room, but Doran kind of picks up and he flips through the pages and he goes,

I think Jack would want this. And he hollers over to you. Jack, you want a diary? Yeah. Who's what? And he throws it. and right towards you. It kind of flitters in the air.

Jack knows how to grab a book out of the air. Rover book grabbing in air. Well, drunk and dashing across the room. This is the one kind of dexterity check Jack will never have to make is grabbing a flying book. He's trained for this his whole life. I think he maybe flips through it a little bit and then like tucks it into his bag next to his spellbook

for safekeeping so he can read it later. The last page just reads, I sure hope we never get attacked by John. All right, and I'm going to go to the last door on the west side, the double doors, that I believe would lead logically to the front door that we didn't actually pass through, correct? It does indeed. And I'll open them. You open these... Doors?

Thank you. I was looking for the word doors, because I'm a little mermaid, motherfucker. What's the word again? Doors. You open these double doors and you reveal a long rectangular gallery. There are some dark curtains that hang over specific places in the walls. And there are a number of different doorways that lead out from this long room. One of them, yes, as you had imagined, does lead back out onto the veranda. So that's the door that leads north.

then there are a set of double doors on the western wall, a single door on the western wall, and then another door on the eastern wall. Additionally, there is a toll wax statue in one corner. Waxy? Wax statue! All right, I turn around to the others and say, oh, right, so we've opened a door that leads down, door and open a door to the servant's quarters. We've got the pantry, we got the way we came in, and then we got this door.

I think we should do this floor by floor. Why don't we get all the doors on this floor done And then we can go downstairs Orn upstairs Dorin continues to walk through the servants' quarters And finds another door I'll start with this door in here Perfect

Dorin finds this door in The servants quarters Perfect and then I'll follow him as well And we'll just go room by room and clear this floor Is this the study's olkin? I didn't come through here Okay So Dorin turns the knob

and pushes the door open, is it open? Yes, so you reveal a dark foyer. This has two double doors on the south side that look like the main entrance to the villa. Okay. There is a plaster shelf lined with some ornate vases or vases, depending on a tomato-tomato situation. Are any of them more than 100 years old?

All of them are. Oh, wow, these are all antiques. Yes. So the shelf circles the room at a height of nine feet. So you're going to have to do some comical jumping in order to get your hands on a particular vase. Well, hold on. How tall are you, Jack? Nine feet.

Probably not nine feet tall. No, no. How tall are you, Jack? Five foot six inches. And I am four foot six inches, which makes us an even ten feet. Ten foot. This is drunk math, though. This is Doran.

So that's one foot. So if you stand on... No, 10 feet. Yeah. Yeah, you can peruse the shelves. And Doran says that, jump on my shoulders, Jack. Yeah, you know, it's... They're antiques.

He needs a closer look at him. I think he's going to scrabble up the back of this dwarf and climb on his shoulders and reach above his head and one by one pull these fancy looking vases down. As you are pulling the vases off of the shelf, Red and Kralath, you enter the room and you see that Doran and Jack are busily looting this room. There is additionally a 10-foot-wide, 15-foot-long rug of exquisite design on the floor. And there are some tapestries on the walls that depict a dragon flying over a ship and pilgrims on camels, respectively.

Cool. Jack, you're pulling these vases off of the walls. and each of these, so there are 16 vases altogether. Each of the vases are worth 25 gold. You know them to have been created by humans. And a vase is a very lightweight object. Oh, right, right, right. You got that bag of holding, let's keep some of these.

Yeah, let's put some in there. Here. And I take them. Whoa, whoa. Hold still. Fels to, fellas. They just throw them in. Yeah.

Kralov is the slowest to get into the room And he follows up behind And he sees Doran and Jack doing their thing Kind of wobbling a little bit This acrobatic stunt Red is up there with his bag The fucking Grinch, the three of you And Kralov holds up his hands

He says, whoa, whoa, okay Jack, get down from Doran And we need to We need to huddle up right now Because we are not going about this smartly Come on, bring it in, bring it in There's like a bit of teetering And with Doren, with all his, you know, self-righteous, I'm not one to pilfer, I'm not pillaging, this is against my lawful goodness.

You could tell the alcohol is starting to get to him because he's like, come on, let's take all this shit, and let's take this too. And oh, hey, here's this, here's this. Like two miners trying to get into a dirty movie. Jack looks immediately ashamed and puts the vase back. on a shelf and jumps down and goes to huddle up very obediently. I know we're all excited about all of the great things we're seeing in here. And I got a little excited about some of that food I was seeing, too. I can't wait to dig into that.

But we got to remember that there are creatures in this house. It is not a secure location. That's right. Those vases aren't going anywhere. So I say we clear out this building of any potential threats. and then we do the taken of things. Does that sound like a good idea to you? Oh, right, Kraloff.

I agree. I mean, I wasn't doing any of the looting, and I, like, gesture towards Doran and Jack were shamed and walking back. But I agree. Let's clear this place room by room and then go to the basement, or maybe upstairs. All right.

Doran, you lead? Okay. Zulkin is, like, leaning against a tapestry. on the side of the room. Shut up, Salkin. Doran makes his way into the next room. Yeah, and Red will follow. So, Doran, you're standing directly in front of this wax statue.

Wax statue. You see that it depicts a regal-looking woman cradling a tressum in her arms. This is obviously a kind portrayal of the ginger tressum that is following right around, meowing loudly for more scraps. The wax depiction of the trestom has a wax rat in its mouth. Is that you, pussycat? Is there any label or description or something that would tell us who this woman is?

No. I go to pick up the tressum. And I try to hold it like the same way that the wax sculpture is. I'm like, look at this shoe. And I like immediately drop it again. I guess it does live here, we at least know, and this must be the matriarch. Looks to be.

So there are doors to the west, two doors, and then there's one to the north, which we assume would lead out back where we came from. Yes. Kralov kind of shuffles past everybody who's looking at this wax statue and makes his way to the door that's across the hall and listens up to it. Okay, so this is the southern one on the west side of the hallway.

Yes. You listen at the door and you hear the distinct sound of nothing. And from the doorway back into the foyer, Zolkin says to you, Kralov, Yeah, so that's where I was attacked. In this room or just where I'm standing? No, I was in that room. as I told you in the middle of rolling up a tapestry. It's probably still in there.

If there is something invisible behind that door, what are we going to do to protect ourselves? And I'll take out that flower. And I'm going to just spread it around the floor outside here to catch any footprints of invisible creatures. Sure. Because, you know, that's why I have it. I'm just going to give a nod towards Kieran.

You don't see anything we don't see, do you? Not in here, boss. We're all standing at this door. Red is still standing next to the wax sculpture. I will just be looking at it. at this wax sculpture one more time, just in case, I do feel like there's something a little funky about it. And I got a 24. Nothing else pops out to you in terms of details about the statue. There's no secret key pressed into a wax pocket or anything, but it does occur

kind of pompous to you that the proprietor probably of this mansion would have a wax statue of themselves basically directly in front of the doors leading into this villa. Yeah, yeah, I push it over. You push the statue over? Yeah, just like into the hall. It breaks. But I, ah, damn. Red.

Sorry. You scare the cat. Jack is, like, injured that he was like, I'm going to be good. I've been scolded by Red. Red was right. I guess I can't play around all this stuff. Then Red goes and fucking breaks the statues. Oh, I'm like, all right.

Sorry. I look at my teammates here, my group of adventures, and I kind of nod in sort of a questioning approval. Should I open the door? Well, what positions should we be in? Yeah, so I'm standing back. I draw my bow, knock an arrow, and I nod. Dora has his hand on the knob. I think Kieran's...

And Kieran's on my shoulder? Yeah, and I think Jack's standing against the back wall, but has taken the time to project his mind into Kieran. So he's going to see what Kieran sees. when the door opens. Hmm. Good thinking. I turn the knob and open the door. You reveal a dark parlor.

Oh. There is a high-backed chair facing a pair of padded couches, a coffee table. And as Zulkin had mentioned, there is a tapestry that is half rolled up on the ground. And, you know, actually,

I am at the back of the group with my arrow knocked. And I'm going to take a step back just so that Zulkin is also in my view, because I don't trust them very much. Sure, yeah. I mean, as you guys move into this parlor, Zulkin moves past red, gingerly stepping over the broken limbs of the statue on the ground. So, yeah, you reveal this dark parlor. There are some thin drapes on the walls, probably covering windows. Kieran does not indicate to you in any way

that there are any invisible creatures in this room. You don't see any forms here that you wouldn't expect in a well-appointed and kind of stuffy-looking parlor. So as I'm using their senses, I might take a deep breath in and sort of use that keen tressum sense of smell to see if I can pick up any creatures or things that might also be here somewhere.

Yeah, role perception. 24. Nice. There are some rats here, not in this room, but probably somewhere in the walls that Kieran is distinctly aware of. Perfect. And also a strange smell that you can't put your finger on necessarily. Why don't you roll a nature check? 28.

Wow. You know from your time in the Arcanariums of water deep rubbing shoulders. with mages and wizards, all of your adult life, the smell of imps. You have been around imp familiars in your life. They're not in the room, but you detect like a strange brimstone-type prickle in the back of your throat that you know, like, oh, yeah, that's an imp. I don't know what you know about imps, but that's what you smell. I mean, can we do an arcana just to put that together so I can know what I can...

Yeah, let's establish it. 25. Shit. Cool. I mean... Wow. Let me give you the nuts and bolts right now. Can IMPs be invisible?

Sorry. Yes, absolutely they can. Oh, well, there we go. They are great at being stealthy. They can change shape. I think they can also be rats, probably. They can be rats. They can be rats, ravens, spiders.

And shoot fire from their chest. No. And you also know that they have some non-magical damage resistance. Are they potentially poisonous as well? Yes. Kieran being sensitive to poison as well, might they taste, touch, or smell anything poisonous associated with the rats in any, or one more than the others or something? No, but now it occurs to you that this is indeed part of the flavor of like Zolkin's smell now.

like you're putting it together like oh shit the wound on his shoulder smells like imp poison yeah okay I'm assuming you haven't shared any of this with us yet no he's just drunkenly like staring into a corner of the room it's funny too because like normally with jack it's like an instantaneous look but because he's drunk we're all just like paused waiting for him to like well it's not even because he's drunk he's not even in his body right now he's like deaf and blind and standing in a corner and he's like what do we do he's inside kieran having a whole moment uh of like you know the like Sherlock Holmesian arrows coming together he's like you know he's looking around or like okay imps familiars are there spellbooks are there are there other magical accoutrement like but it's taking like a full minute if jack is drunk okay when he does this is kieran drunk

yeah how is he seeing like it how does the drunkenness affect his viewing eyes through kieran oh that's a whole question anyway when do you tell us this jack leaves kieran's buying and I sort of step forward from the back of the room. It all makes sense now, guys. There's imps here, which means they're devils. They can hide. They can be invisible. They're poisonous.

They can turn into rats, and Kieran can sense rats in the walls. Can they understand common? Yeah, I believe they can. So this is the moment they just heard us say all this. So you might as well show yourself familiar. I don't know if your master's still here or gone, or what devilish business you're up to. but why don't you appear and we can have a discussion about it.

Yeah. Chicken. Don't make us hunt you down. Yeah. Don't be impish. You are unanswered. Yeah, cowardly imps. Doorkn acts boldly and steps into the room and looks around what other doors are in here.

Yeah, there's a door to the north. You would probably assume that this leads into the same room as the final door from the hallway. And is that the only door? Yep. I'm going to stay close to Doran because I know that he's been hit. He's still kind of hurting. Doran steps in, goes north. Fuck these imps.

I'm a little drunk. Okay. So we'll take them on if they're invisible or even if they show themselves. You know, alcohol adds that extra bit of idiocy. Anyways, he opens the door. You reveal a grand room. Wow. Sheathed in darkness.

Look at this grand room. An iron-wrought chandelier hangs above a black oak dining table, surrounded by eight high-backed chairs carved to look like devils. A fireplace dominates the western wall flanked by red-curtained windows, and there is a handsome, glass-dored wine cabinet that stands against the eastern wall. Hello! Doran, as you move into the room, you are bisoned. Set by Creatures. Everyone roll initiative.

Harlan, what did Red roll? 16. Doran? Six. Justin, what about Kralath? 11. And Rob, what's Jack's initiative? 21.

Nicely done. Doran, you are beset by creatures. Gargoyles. Probably imps, though. I would hope. I see. Gargoyles. Right. This whole buildup was for gargoyles. Yes.

The walled one, two. There are imps in the walls. Oh, gargoyles. Yeah, it's actually both. There are gargoyles in here, but we spent 20 minutes on imps. It's cool. They look gargoyle-ish, because as they attack you, their invisibility drops. And you can see these tiny creatures with oblong faces and red glowing eyes have needle-sharp teeth. they are flying down at you, Doran, and they all try to sting you with their stinging appendages that they have.

I rolled a natural 20. Ooh. And also a 21 and an 18, does the 18 hit you? No, no, no, no, sorry, an 18 did not hit. Yeah, I was going to say you got some new armor, right? A 19. Nice. That natural 20, I'm going to convert to a,

than normal. Good to know. So two hits, two misses. Luckily, you are a dwarf who is resistant to poison damage, correct? Correct. That's pretty lucky. Why don't you make a Constitution saving throw? Two of them? 22? Mm-hmm. And, oh, a 10. So seven, poison damage for the first hit, which you saved on. So naturally as a dwarf, you would be taking three damage, but because you saved on it, you're actually only taking one damage from that successful save. So one damage for the first sting.

Okay. And six damage, which is halved because you're a dwarf, so three damage for the second sting. Beautiful. Four imps revealed just congregating on your dwarven friend. Jack, it's your turn.

Yeah. How hung up are we on being quiet? you guys think zero i pushed over a wax statue they know we here okay so we're gonna try a thing um jack pulls out his orb and steps sort of in line so we can see these these imps over top of of uh you're still back in the parlor right yeah and i guess there's maybe he's looking past dorin and kreliath doren plug your ears all right and dorin does uh fingers in both his ears he just drops his act. So on the, on the, on the center one right in front of Doran, Jack holds out his orb, and for a minute, it looks like the orb shatters into a million pieces. But it's the same

shattering that happens right out in front of them as just all the creatures in there get like wrenched and torn asunder. So a sudden loud ringing noise erupts in that space. There's a 10 foot radius sphere, which I hope catches all of them. And they're going to take 3D8 thunder damage on a failed save and half as much on a successful one. Okay, so Doran's going to make the save as well. Yeah. Constitution. And I rolled a 20 for damage. Ooh, nice. 21.

And these guys all fucking fail. Beautiful. They're going to take 20 damage. Now, the thing that hurts Jack more than hurting Doran is non-magical objects in that 10-foot radius that aren't being worn or carried also take damage if they're in the spells area. No. All the wine. Sorry.

So, Doren, you succeed on your saving throw, but that still just means that you take half damage. So 10 damage for Doran, and then each of these imps takes 20 damage, and they all explode just in little mini fireworks of imp testins. Impestin?

You're welcome. They're all dead. They all die. Wow. Red steps into the room, and he's like, Oh, right, I'm ready to battle. I heard the music. Where are we? And you see the D'Rour? Gorin is just covered in imp guts and dripping with wine,

as the cabinet to the east has also similarly exploded. Um, the imps are dead. And the chandelier just falls. There's imp on the ceiling, there's imp on the floor, there's imp on Doran. Thank you again to our great old one Patreon supporters. Kellen Holman and Christopher Ryan Evans. You two have made it completely possible to be crazy and zany, just as we always have been.

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