Dice Shame - 48 | 'King of the Hill'

Episode Date: September 10, 2020

The final confrontation with the Queen of the Hill Giants is here... 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.

Holy fuck! I like this bird. Doran, my God. Oh, you're telling me. That was incredible. And another great beheading by Doran. That's about six seconds of screaming. Oh, I love this.

Jack is perilously little magic left. What? You're crazy, Doran. Do it. Yeah. If you're not playing D&D, I don't know what you're doing with your life. I know, I know. What you bring, Chief Gah.

Welcome back to Dishame. This is episode 48, King of the Hill. MVP this week is Nikki D. Miller or Jade Limey at Twitter for her amazing artwork showcasing some of our greatest quotes. Everyone, episode 50 is two short weeks away. I'm so proud of all of our hard work. If you love the show, please, please take a minute out of our first. your day and rate and review our podcast. Every rating means more eyeballs and ear balls. We would really appreciate it. Thank you so much. Thanks so much, guys. You ready to do this? Let's do it.

Let's do it. Let's roll. So yesterday I had the day off and I cleaned the whole house. Oh my God. I need to do that. I mean, it wasn't that dirty. What was the part that had been cleaned the least recent? The floors. I mean, Harlan's really great at vacuum. I'm vacuuming all the time, but I, I like to clean the floors Cinderella style, like handsy, niezies with a bucket of water and whatever. Cinderella. It's very satisfying. Wash the dishes. Scrub the curtains.

You can't have a maid. You can order a maid to come. This is true. That's right. In D&D as well. How does, okay, how does cleaning a house work in D&D? Do they care? Do they have the same level of issue?

Cantrix? Is everything just magic? So is everything clean? Mages? I think it depends. Molly Mage? Magic is not that comment. I mean, Chaslov, that dragon dude, had the messiest house on earth, and he had magic.

He could have just had a run through there. So really, it just comes down to personality. In a world where magic allows you to do anything, there are still messy people. In a world. In a world. So, Jack, do you usually clean the kitchen by setting everything on fire? You know, sometimes you've got to take a burn it all down and start over approach. This kitchen is definitely one of those.

Yes. Great job. Wow. Top of the round, Doren, Iron Fist. Ape Iron Fist. D.I. All right. Doren, ape fist.

Oh, roll. So you have a ogre directly to your south. He's right up on you. Both of you just survived this terrifying blast of fire. Yes. What do you do? The great ape lifts his giant fists in sort of a boxing style and takes a huge right hook. to the ogre's face with a 17.

Yeah. Nice. I love the picture of this thing boxing. That's great. It's like Clash of the Titans. Very good. Like a singed dwarf ape. It's dwarf style boxing too.

Rockem sockum. Rockem sockum ogres. 30? 30 damage? Yeah. Oh, mine. Wow. Okay.

Yeah. Your fist connects solidly with his face and he spits out chunks of teeth. That aren't his. He's like, oh, I have to throw up my last meat. He is dazed and almost dead. What do you do? You get that left hook now? And here comes the uppercut.

Hopefully I hit with a 20. Yay. An unnatural 20. Yeah. How much damage? 24 damage. Your hook follows swiftly by this uppercut. You just see the lights go out and his body falls to the floor.

Nice. Slow motion, rocky style. T.K. A bell rings. ding, ding, round over. I mean, this visual is really something. Doran going toe to toe with an ogre,

but Doran is a giant ape and you just punch him to death. I think Jack does one of those jumps in the air, like, yeah. Yeah. Oh, that's cute. Hoping it free and spray. Yeah. Catches himself, it's like, oh shit, I am

boxing, not for me. Let's go. I think I'll take the opportunity to move forward to, uh, move forward to meet the bug bears part way. Roll an intimidation check for me. Ooh. 18. That was a very impressive thing that just happened.

As I start to move towards this. I move my full 40 feet. And you're like stepping over the bodies of these ogres, over the charred corpses of these orcs. And there's still like licks of flames on you from the fireball that happened like seconds ago. Terrifying. Fiery ape that just punched an ogre to death is walking. through the flames on fire towards these bug bears. Red, what do you do?

You see this happen through the open door. Holy fuck. I'll move 90 feet, which is 60 because it's double with feline and then another 30. And that will bring me back into the room basically where I was when I killed the yogurt the first time. Great, yeah. You see Doran's little butt. I mean, I guess it's a big butt. I like this eight butt.

It's still the same size. The butt didn't. Your butt, giant egg. Oh, wait a minute, Kri-Loth. There's still an orc in front of you, isn't there? There's still an orc out here, yeah. Oh, shit. You know what?

Scree will help you with that. Beautiful. She's going to fly at the orc. Scree's a monster. Yeah, scree's incredible. She gives you evil eye, Jack, as you say that. I mean, I say it with all the utmost respect. 13.

To hit? Yeah. Absolutely. Really? Yep. Oh. Nice. And 13 damage.

Okay, well done. You scratch him nearly to death. Nice. I feel like Red has been like whispering things to Scree about Kieran over the years. Oh no. So Scree's got this like. Wait, over the years. Oh, yeah.

We've been friends forever. And Scree's got this like little chip on her shoulder about like Jack and like, oh, because Red innocently is like, Kieran did the coolest thing today. So like Scree has got this little animal jealousy. She's like thinks that Jack is like. Being that her. nature is so aggressive. She's just churning all of this. Oh, she's totally like that. I love it. But red is so just in love with it. Yeah. So Scree dive bombs this orc right beside Kralov and just

scratches his face to absolute shreds. Nice. And he starts batting at the air blindly looking for her. And she's going to continue her fly by and land pretty much right next to me in the north of the kitchen. Kralov, you see this happen. All right. There's an orc directly beside you. And yeah, man, the kitchen's on fire. What do you do? I like this bird And I pull out my mace of deception And I swing at the orc Do it

That is an 18 plus 6 24 Absolutely Yes, how much damage Five points of damage You knock his block clean off Nice Where if there once was a head

There is no longer Smash his head into the rock Yes Way to go, Krayloff Wow Yeah, all right I killed something That a boy

Do you want to move? Yeah Kreloth is just kind of proud of I'm just going to go peer over the cliff and, like, kick a stone down. And then, oh, shit, the battle. So he's going to run 30 feet towards the curtain. Some nice looking clouds on the horizon. So you're, like, right up beside Jack, pretty much.

The two of you're just looking in on this room. Yeah. Fire and fury. Nod respectfully to the wizard. That's some cool shit. That's some really cool shit. It's the bug bear. turns, they are going to fearfully run away from Superdoren.

Oh, no. Yeah. So the bug bears take one look at this flaming ape approaching them. Hello. And they head for the hills. They run east toward the mess hall, screaming and crying like little babies. Baby bug bears. Oh, they're so cute.

Jack and Kieran, what do you do? So I send Kieran sort of tight to the roof through the doorway past the bug bears. into the room beyond and find somewhere to circle sort of around the roof just to give us a sense of what's coming up ahead. Cool. Kieran slash not Kieran. Definitely Kieran. Definitely not an imp from another world. As Kieran previously described to you and as this imp sees, a 200-foot wide hall furnished with eight giant feasting tables that flank the north and south sides of this room. There are two 20-foot diameter holes in the floor that are crisscrossed, with wooden planks and that emit the foul stench and noise of swine below.

You know these to lead directly down into this giant pig pit. The perimeter of the room is ringed by a 10-foot wide, 20-foot-high wooden platform, at top which several goblins stand sentry, their bows straining, pointing at the door. The roof peaks some 65 feet overhead. That's where the familiar is circling right now. oil lamps and wooden sconces and arrows that's pointing north and south provide dim light in the hall. The tables and floor are covered with gnawed bones, empty casks, gobs of grease, hunks of fur and hair, and twisted and broken pieces of armor.

And above all this, Lord's the biggest living thing you've ever seen. Chief Gah. Her obscene mass is slumped atop a large wagon, its wheels and axle. straining under her immense weight. Piled around the wagon are bones and refuse. She clearly does not get up to use the bathroom. Coins and treasure stud the piles of waste like raisins in a cake. Her corpulent body is bedecked with skulls and weapons worn as ornament.

Her nose is pierced by a decorative long sword. She wears a stone well on her head as a fascinator. There's a little goblin arm barely poking out from between two of her belly rolls. like waving just a little bit weakly. What? She's got a couple of hill giants who seem to be standing guard over her. And then there are a few more goblins standing on tables with their bows trained at the doorway through which you are all located. That is what Kieran sees.

Oh my God. So from this room, there is an eastern exit that is blocked by another red leather curtain. There's also some great doors, some iron doors, I guess, that are swung open on the northeastern side. Jack lets everybody else know, Chief Goose in the next room, but watch that door. They got goblin archers on it. And he sort of dashes up, squeezing beside Doran, trying to get to this halfling that was tied up, dressed up near the fire as the bug bears are retreating. Cool. Roll a medicine check.

I would love to. That's a natural 20. Hey! Nice. This is a dead halfling. That's a dead halfling? Yeah, you see as you approach this creature, they're sort of missing a lot of their internal organs and some of their face.

Oh, so not even like close to a life. Yeah. Not even like me. He had to do a medicine check. Missed it by that much. Hey, wake up, wake up. Jack grimaces at the ongoing. ongoing horrors that the hill giants have brought to this place and sort of puts his eyes back

on the door where the bug bears are retreating to. Colbeens. Doran, what do you do? I think, um, Doran. Super Doran's going to chase the bug bears through the door. Super Doran. As he passes by, I feel like the ape sees Jack's reaction to the dead hobbit or whatever it is, small person.

Close enough. To the dead Frodo do do do, do. Baggins. And I pick it up and sort of. of toss it into the fire. Okay. Sort of like in a way, he's kind of like, well, this is cremation. It's not daisheum, if door isn't tossing something on fire.

Yeah. Or being on fire or eating fire. Or being an ape. So I move right up behind the bug bears as they're running through the door. Oh, good. Yeah. You see the one that's closest to you now. Look over his shoulder in fear.

And during the Great Ape is going to take a swing at this bug bear. Oh, yeah. You got a 10 foot reach. You can absolutely reach that guy. Yeah. Get them. And so that is going to be a... That's why you're so good at boxing.

14 to hit? No, I'm sorry. That misses. Damn. It's okay. With the one. And then the other hand. Oh, with...

Fuck you. Natural one. No. No. Fear has increased this bug bear's dexterity and he runs out of the way. Damn. Red and scree. So I'm at the north of this kitchen.

Yeah, you are. And I know there was a big fire. pit in the center. Can I see over the fire pit if I wanted to shoot? No, no. It runs all the way to the ceiling and then it becomes a chimney. Perfect. Okay. Then I am just going to move my full move 60 feet down so that I should be past the fireplace at this point. Absolutely. Um, and scree she'll move 60 feet up next to me. And for her second, she'll move about 30 feet. So she's 30 feet away from Doran and the bugbear. Cool. So she flies alongside red as you run. And then as red, you take up your position, sort of midway through this kitchen.

She thoughtfully circles just a little bit closer to this crew of bug bears and your giant ape friend. Kraloth, what do you want to do? You're standing outside the curtain, looking in, wishing you were part of the crowd. Yeah, and I decide that I'm going to join everybody. So Kralov is going to dash in and he makes it right behind Jack next to the fire. This is so exciting. This is the final assault.

Yes. I just got chills all over my body Finally He's going to shout to Doran Don't go into the next room yet I'm glad you did that Because I was kind of waiting for some direction We should use him as like cover

Literal shield There's definitely those readied actions From them goblins that suck Yeah But he can take those Yeah But it would give us all a chance To catch up and go in together

Yeah Catch up So did you do your taxes So yeah How you been Yeah yeah Have you seen that local sports team? How you been doing?

Oh, good. So two of the bug bears continue to retreat back into this mess hall, and then they turn around and they sling javelins at Doran's huge hairy form. That's a seven and a 21. One of the misses, but guess which one? Seven piercing damage as one of the javelins hits you in the leg. All righty. Oh, no, Doren.

And then the bug bear that you were punching at weighs his options and decides to take a step in closer to you and tries to hit you with his Morning Star. Malay damage. Malay. 14 to hit? So, yes, this one hits. That's 10 piercing damage. Oof, getting down there, 69 hit points. Nice.

Grow up, Joe. Nice. Grow up. 609. Jack and Kieran, what are you? do? Jack and Kieran. Jack.

And Kieran. Kieran is going to fly to the south wall and get up on that same level where the goblins are, but not get too close to one. Sure. Yeah, you're like 15 feet away from a goblin. And I'm going to walk east until I can sort of see this bug bear around Doran's body and just again give it that seething look and snap my fingers and have this big bell ring trying to shake the life from its body.

so it can make you a wisdom save. Cool. 17. 17 will do it so nothing happens. Okay, doork. Doran, it's your turn. I attack the bugbear staying right in front of me with a 27 to hit.

Oh, yeah. Yep. Stomping. And then... Think him down. Doing 25 damage. Wow, yeah. Excellent.

You nearly obliterate him, but he's not dead yet. I feel like I punch him and I feel him crack a lot. Hey, Doran, you've got that range weapon attack as well. Oh, yes, I do. Yeah, basically, it's any thing that you could imagine would be lying around. I'm going to try and then pick up the bug bear that's in front of me. That's not dead yet.

Yeah. And throw him at one of the other two bug bears that are 25 feet away from me. What? Yeah. You're crazy, Doran. Do it. So what am I rolling here, dexterity, I guess, eh? If you'll recall, the stone giants actually picked you up, Doran, and threw you.

This is a very similar ability. I'm just re-skinned it for your ape. You've got experience with this. It should count for advantage, right? Have been thrown, and so you know how to throw. Your strength score is 23. Right. So you have a plus six strength.

Yes. That makes it very easy to pick up a creature like a bug bear and throw him. Right. So I'm going to make a dexterity save to try to avoid being thrown by you. I'm going to give you a DC, we'll say 17 that he's going to have to beat in order to avoid being thrown. It's a natural one. Yeah.

Oh, there we go. Okay. Yeah, so you've got this bug bear, this near-dead bug bear. Now, did you want to throw him at another bug bear? Yeah, yeah. So, 25 to hit.

Excellent. Great. That hits. And it's going to do the same damage as the rock, basically, right? So the bug bear that's in your hand is going to take bludgeoning damage equal to the distance that you're throwing him,

which means he dies on impact. Ah, oh. So, 15 damage plus 29 damage. So 35 damage. He's dead. He's dead. You've killed him?

Yeah. The best part of this is Chief Gha in that room is sitting there. And she hears this. Yeah. And then a bug bear comes flying in, smashes into another bug bear, and both goes skidding across the bone-infested ground just like to a stop. How fucking terrifying.

of an entrance would that be in smashing the table behind them just for real these lip bodies just flopping in and you know what i think happens actually you see dorin these bodies get just pincushioned by a hail of arrows as these like hair trigger goblins like see something come fast through the door and they all just yeah i mean they're gonna re-ready their action on their turn but now you know what's in store for you so fucking good cool great turn brilliant red what happens next red is going to move 30 feet south so that he is across from the door um is there anyone i can look at there should be one more bug bear right yeah there's a final bug bear who's also kind of on the uh threshold of the door yeah i'm gonna no scope this guy it's like through dorin's legs too yeah and i'm gonna use my sharpshooter penalty for this great with a natural twist There we go. First one in a while. Well, the medicine check. Oh, yes. Oh, I'm so sorry. The first one that counts.

Of course, Rob. That is 25 damage. Wow, okay. As I snip this fucking thing. Well done. Red is going to say, scree, go! And she is going to fly in as well. And she is going to attack that bug bear.

Man, now the goblins don't have their arrows trained. They can't just puncture her. Oh, natural one. Oh, no. This dye just went, womp, womp. Swimmy. There's a swing, yeah. Oh, boy, saucy.

So, yeah, no, that one totally fails. Okay. So she's going to continue flying, and she's going to fly back out after missing her attack. Circles around this bug bear. Okay. Dang. He's still alive, though. Kralath, your turn.

Kralov is going to run forward, getting pretty close to behind Doren. The clatter of heavy armor. Exactly. And he's going to throw his hand in the air and... He just don't care. Cast sacred flame on the bug bear. Yeah. Dex save?

It is a deck save. Yes, please. How do you like an eight? Oh, I love that. Very pleased with that. So it's going to take four points of damage. Is it like a beam from heaven or... It is like a beam from heaven, like a spotlight.

Excellent. In the beginning of this campaign, weren't you using your lantern for it? Yeah, I was. I don't use that anymore. I know. It was like so long ago. It almost feels like a different game. Yeah.

Yeah. I forgot you used to use it. It's a level of mastery. That's right. That's right. At one point I had to send it from my amulet and now I can send it from wherever I want. The heavens above. Your finger.

So this bug bear had turned around loose to javelin at Doran, then took an arrow right in the chest from red. He's bleeding, trying to fend off this hawk and then just like almost like a UFO is trying to beam him up. just gets illuminated by this spotlight and turns into dust. So not only does the giant in this room see these bug bears skid across, but then the other one is like trying to run in. He gets hit with a fucking arrow. A hawk goes past him and then, and he just disintegrates in like six seconds.

It's so good. They're like, if you're not playing D&D, I don't know what you're doing with your life. This is too much fun. Okay, great. As a final action, he shouts, let's regroup. Let's regroup. I just really like being able to strike entire groups of enemies off my combat tracker.

Oh, bug bears? No more bug bears. All right. Don't have to worry about them anymore. Doran, you see coming through the far red curtain one more hill giant. This one looks to be dirtier than all the rest, covered in shit stains and refuse. Oh, lovely. And trailing a cloud of flies.

I wouldn't be surprised if that's rock. Jack and Karen, what do you do? Turning to Kraloth and Red, and to a lesser extent, Doren, who's way up there. Do we want to try and taunt them out? I think so. Yeah. If we can focus down, you said there's giants in there, a couple hill giants and the chief? There's two giants and a handful of goblin.

Plus the chief. And Gha. I don't know, guys. Remember, they respect this chief because she's the biggest. Is Doren bigger than the other hill giants right now? Great question. He's definitely of a size with them. When we interrogated that bug bear outside, he said that they respect size above everything else. The reason chief guards being on it is because of how big she is.

Maybe there's an option where we use this to our advantage. There's a chance, but we'd be missing out on an opportunity to lure them out if we go with that plan. Well, I mean, we can yell at them through this doorway. Yeah. I'm thinking, like, there is a play here where I get sort of some shelter up to this wall and, like, shout something. but I don't know what that thing is yet. You should do what we did downstairs say, hey, hey, come in here, come in here.

Remember? How about this? Jack steps up to the eastern wall and uses a little minor illusion to make this booming giant voice sort of echo through the doorway and out into the chamber with Chief Gha and says,

Chief Gah, your new husband is here. Send the other boys away. With Kieran sort of watching, I just want to get a temperature on the room on how they react if there's any like possible that she's going to, like, be interested in that. Kieran watches as the three male hill giants in the room exchange confused looks between each other.

Chief Gah is looking at the door. She's got a club in her hand, but she doesn't make any effort to move. Say something like, like, are you willing to meet him or something? Are you ready to meet your new husband? Like, this is a game show. Behind the curtain down. Behind curtain number one, we've got your husband.

Using sacred flame as a spotlight, he comes in, sparkles from fucking thomiturgy. Chief Gah speaks. You hear her guttural voice, clogged arteries and all. She says, what you bring, chief Gah? What we bring, guys? We bring powerful... Dance moves. Fighting husband.

Yeah. It's definitely something delicious we brought. Too bad you threw that halfling in the fire, hey? Yeah. We bring you giant ape. I am giant ape? No, the giant ape is the food that me, the invisible husband, is now bringing, I guess. The narrative is evolving as we go.

We got to stay light on our toes here. I love the idea. Already cooked, crispy on outside. Yeah, Krayloth turns to Red. There's a couple plot holes here. Jack does like a good job of emulating giant speak and then sort of kind of like walks it back and starts talking a little bit faster

and easing a little bit longer. Well, but actually, okay, hold on just a moment, Chiefka. So the best part that was, Doran and Kralath don't understand what's being shouted. Nope. No idea. Red does, and he's just like, what? I'm kind of looking back at Red like,

I'm bad at this. So, I'm so excited to see how this plays out. So Chief Gah shouts, bring you here. Do you want to take an action or that's about six seconds of screaming? I'll just motion for Doran to go. Okay. Yeah. And it'll give you like a weak thumbs up because I got nothing.

Great. Doran, it's your turn. Okay, yes. What happens now, Doran? Maybe I. So you hear a lot of screaming and giant and then Jack gives you a thumbs up. So then, I love this game so much, Doran. Let's say I do understand to a degree that I'm supposed to enter now.

You know, there's been an exchange of words and then he gives me the thumbs up. Yeah, he'll give a thumbs up and, like, point to the door. And now you're like, great, time to murder everybody. So I move my full 40 feet into the door, but. Yeah, you behold this room for the first time. It's wild. So we're not going to lure the hill giants in this room anymore. Who knows?

I don't know. Maybe you will. I thought that was a good. Good idea. Maybe you will. Time will tell. Doran's a lucky ape. Here's where I would like to roll some deception.

I'm going to try to deceive them and make them think that perhaps I am a gift or maybe a prisoner of some sort. And how do you do this? Maybe I walk in with my hands tied behind, like behind me. And I say, and I'm trying to look. You're like pretty beat up too, right? You're like less, you're bloody. Pre-chard.

It's extra flavor. Right. You also can't speak, though, right? No, but who knows? Maybe he's a very good mime. Seltry grunts. I've rolled a six for deception. For deception?

Yeah. Great. So you walk in all coy and you forget that your hands are by your sides and then you put them behind your back really quick. Yeah, I mean, you probably think that you do a great job. Coquettish. You're like batting your eyelashes, imagining how you might. might seem delicious.

And then I see Chief Good. And I'm like, I throw up a little bit in my mouth. Very poorly veiled disgust. Great. Would you like to take any actions or? I don't know. Do you guys think I should just outright attack at this point? It's your call.

You're right in the doorway. You could, you could pop back out. That's really. Oh. Yeah, maybe, okay. I do that. I move in and then I move out. I'll like right back to the same position.

This is what you can have. Meet you in the kitchen. Go and see what that is. You're being mysterious. Play it hard to get. And then walk, just fucking walk back. Honestly, that's sort of my thinking, too. It's so good.

It's dumb in the best way. I want that. Okay. Yeah. I mean, I don't know. I will. I mean, I don't know. I will ready in action

until something walks into the door. Okay. Because Red is utterly confused. Not to say he's against it. He's just like, Okay, Jack, I got you back. You wanted me to support your calls. I got you, buddy.

And he's just like, going with the flow, happy to see whatever the fuck happens. This is a standoff right here. But he will pull back. I'm going to pull back to this doorway with the hooks. There was a doorway behind us. Yeah.

Because I don't want to die. And it seems like a risky ploy. And then I'm going to bring Scree. She's just. going to hang out, I guess, in this corner. Because she's a combat thing and there's no real combat. Sure, sure. Krayloth, what do you do?

Yeah, Kralath sees red, kind of peeking through Doren's apish legs at this other giant that's walked in that's covered in the refuse. And Kralov, oh, this is dumb. Kralath is going to just poke his head out and begin walking towards the wall where Jack is. But before he gets there, he's going to do his own insight role. Okay. That's 11. The giant has a look of longing and regret.

A giant looks a little upset. Maybe it has to do with it being covered in shit. And Kralov is going to continue his movement and get to the wall right beside Jack, just so that he's right at the corner of the wall so that if something comes in, he's ready. So we have Scree on the south side, and then on the north side of this doorway, there's Kraylock. and then jack you guys are kind of underneath the ledge of the large giant table and pressed right up against the wall red you're sort of back in the dry storage area with the carcasses and dorin is standing right in the doorway just hanging out perfect okay so one of the hill giants

comes through the doorway boom he gets within 10 feet and and reaches out to grab dorin the lucky ape. Anyone want to use a ready to action here? Yes, please. You got to shoot him with some arrows? Yeah, do that. Uh, yes, but I miss anyway. So seven goes wide. The hill giant looks at you red as you fire an arrow. And I wave. Oh my God. And then, uh, he goes to grapple the ape. This may be kind of ridiculous because the ape is so strong. Coquettish Doran really drew the most. Who grapples who? Doran, make a strength check for me, please. Uh, was is going to be a 16. 12, which means you come out on top.

Fuck yeah. You have him in such a position that he can't move anymore. Stalkald, Steve Austin, sleeper hold. Whatever, I don't know. Nice. I don't know wrestling. Sorry for all the wrestling fans out there. So the giant who is flanking Chiefka rushes forward 40 feet, throws a barrel at you.

That's 14 to hit? Yeah. Is it a barrel of monkeys? You take 21 bludgeoning damage. What? Oof. Yikes. Freaking barrels?

Mm-hmm. The far, stinky giant is going to dash. Jack and Kieran, what do you do? This grappled giant, Zippen, injured at all? No. I think we're going to go all out here. Jack mimes like he's holding a bow and arrow in the air, and a shimmering one of force appears with seven or eight arrows beside it.

Wow. He sort of pulls back and lets go. and a whole bunch of magical darts fly towards the giant that is being grappled by Doren, just finding their marks. And I'm using some of that alchemical casting to goose all those arrows.

Holy fuck, I rolled max on all those dice. That's awesome. Yes! So 19187, 1518. 77 damage. That's unconscionable. But that's pulling out all the stops. Jack has perilously little magic left as he like does his best

red impression, like he's been paying attention to all the form and stance and everything to make these magic arrows fly as true as possible as they zip, zap around the arms of this giant ape to strike true at this giant at every opportunity. Yeah, and underneath the blows of these magical darts, these terrifying wounds just bloom and erupt and the giant screams in pain. Red hiding sees none of it. He just hears. And he just hears. And he's like, like with one hand out from behind cover, waves is like, what happened? Something cool?

He like leans out and sees a damage. Like, well done, Kraloff. Whoever. Jackspace falls just a little bit when he knows red wasn't watching. Aw. Doran, what do you do? Doran attacks the giant standing directly in front of him. Great.

I mean, you guys are like all coiled up together. Yeah. So let's say like I'm kind of sitting on top of him, right? Yeah. So his speed is zero essentially. So you're like, yeah, you have him. So I like start. punching him in the face.

Cool. Nice. 22 to hit. Nice. Six. 17 damage. Wow. Nice.

And then that's one punch and then another punch. I hit with 24. Yes. Doing 30 damage. Yeah. You just mash him with your fists until he is unrecognizable and limp. And he's dead. Well done, Doran.

Good job, guys. Red, it's your turn. There are other things in this kitchen, right? Like tables and things? Yeah, there's giant furniture heaped in refuse. Can I hide behind any of it? Does any of it offer partial cover? Yes.

So I'm going to move 30 feet. As if it's a tree trunk, you're kind of behind one of the table legs. Hmm. And just sort of before attacking, I'm going to just shout out. Huck! It's not worth it, buddy. Love is more important. Go back to Moog.

You don't need this. Love! And I'm going to try to do a little bit of a gamble and hope that this extra stinky giant is shrug. Okay. Roll persuasion for me. Roll a persuasion. 19.

Oh, no. That's amazing. Red, you see as the far, smelly giant looks around, kind of confused, and then his eyes well with tears. Oh, no. I'll just sort of double down We won't hurt you

Just leave when you have the chance bud You hear a response from the other room Chief Gah shouting Rock stay She's gonna make a persuasion check against you Nice oh I love this standoff Also I'm speaking in Giant obviously So do you want to do anything else

Does he seem to react to her at all That's hard for you to tell then I will attack this other giant and see if I can't take it out. I don't get the feeling that these giants are very loyal, so I don't think Crux's going to be offended. It's like, that was my friend. How dare.

Yes, that was 21 to hit. Well done. And that was 20 damage. Whoa. Nice. And I'll do another one with Sharpshire Disadvantage because we got a lot of bads. There's a big target.

They are the broad side of a barn. They're easier to hit. Yeah. Not this easy. Eight? No. Nope. Second shot goes wide.

Scree? How do you scree? You know what? Scree's going to start making it towards these goblins. Nice. Good call. She won't make it the entire round, but she's going to move 60 feet to basically as close as she can get to the nearest goblin. As she flies into the room, she's going to take fire.

That's fine. So, two goblins loose their short bows at her. 18 to hit. Yeah. And 10 to hit. No. One of them hits. Three piercing damage.

Oh, she's great. Perfect. These goblins, man, they're on it. Yeah, they're ready. That's their whole thing. Anything scurries in this whole room. We're on it. Kralath, what do you do?

You're right around the corner from this carcass. You saw red fire and arrow into the, dining hall, the dining room. Kraloff is going to run behind Doren, so he's within range of Red and Doren, and he's going to cast Bless. So who are the three recipients? Myself, Doren, and Red. Thanks, buddy.

Giant's turns. So the closest giant, the one that just took the fire from your bow, Hoves into view through the door, picks up the body of a bug bear, and throws it at you, Doran. Is it the same one as before? Yeah, really. Just the mangled body. 23 to hit? Oh, yeah.

Oof. That's 21 bludgeoning damage. Ooh. Dang. How you doing, Doren? Doren's okay. The ape has 27 hit points. Red, you watch as the far giant, the one caked in filth and now tears, starts to shyly.

Retreat. Yes. All right. Do you have inspiration? No. All right. You can have inspiration. Good job.

Thank you. Give it to him. You deserve it. This is indeed Hruck, the husband of Moog, and he's now realizing as things are getting pretty dire here at Gred Hogg that maybe he should go back to his ex. The mistakes I've made. Jack and Kieran, what do you do? Well, I'm going to.

peek around the corner just enough to get eyes on the giant that hucked the body of the bug bear at Doran and look him dead in the eyes and try and ring his bell get that shake the soul out of him so I'd toll the dead on that one that's a natural one oh yes 14 damage as a big bell sound comes just from his whole hollow head trying to shake the spirit. This one sounds like Arnold. And then I'm going to duck back around so that I'm out of sight. Doran, it's your turn. Doran is like now into this game where he picks up the body of the bug bear that's been throwing him and he hucks it back at the giant.

My dad never played catch with me. My dad didn't love me enough to play catch. Yeah, exactly. 21 to hit. Yep. Yeah. I'm imagining the football pass, like the perfect spiral on this body of a... Yeah.

Mangled body. Yeah. Blood's spinning off of it. Ew. It actually comes back to life for a minute. Where I'm... Oh, no. He wasn't fully dead yet.

Okay. 33 damage. Nice. Wow. For the first throw. What do you throw in the second time? Oh, I guess I'll pick up... I don't know.

I don't know. Kralov. He's like caught in the moment. I'm not a bug bear, man. He just reaches behind him to paw at something. I mean, there's like, there's an elk carcass on the ground somewhere. There's like tons of stuff around. Throw a big metal discus, like a platter.

Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Okay, I'll throw a platter. Bomb. 25. Yeah. Doing 35 damage. Nice.

So you throw a plate so hard at the giant that you kill it. It's like this, like, badly designed damage. sharp-edged plate and takes his head off. You know what I love about that? You think, like, Hill Giants don't seem like they're really big

on, like, cutlery and place setting. So someone wanted to have a little bit of class and, like, I'm going to have one plate. There's, like, one plate in here because how many people are, like, sitting down with fork and tables? The most prized plate possession of someone just take a head off.

Nicely done. Well done. And another great beheading by Doren. Well done. Good. Good, thorough. Wonderful. Do you want to move, Doren?

Yes, with that I move right into the room So I'm going to now try and take A, the brunt of the hits from the arrows Yeah, it's funny actually You don't get hit by any arrows Red, it's your turn I'm going to move a little bit north Those 30 feet up so that I have an angle

On one of the goblins And I'm going to fire at one of the goblins Up on the Wall I think there's a goblin to the south That I get hit. There are, there are two goblins to the south On the wall There's one on the northern wall

and there are two standing on top of tables on the northern side of the room. Perfect. Yeah, I'll take the one to the south. Okay. 11 to hit. No. I'll fire again.

Natural 20. Nice. Well done. Not only do we shame dice, but we celebrate them too. We do. We celebrate dice. It's less pithy,

but I don't want to lose that part of our identity. It just doesn't have the same ring. 28 damage. If it had four times the amount of hit points that it currently has, it would still be dead. Nice. So you kill it a lot.

The arrow just rips through the goblin's body and pins it to the wall. Nice. Scree will attack the goblin in front of her with a 14? No, that misses. Damn. She sails by and continues north. Cool. All right, Kralath, it's your turn.

Kralath is going to run behind Doren, and while he's moving, he throws his hand in an arc and casts spiritual weapon in the room close to God. and has his floating scythe go up to her and take a swing. That is a 14 to hit. That hits. I was going to say, she doesn't seem like she moves. Eight points of damage. Yeah, I guess I'll dodge as my actual action.

Cool. Just in case. Doran, you're standing in the doorway and you see this magical scythe appear. You know, it's the work of Kralath, and it slashed. at Gah's massive form. The giant who has been fleeing the room continues to do so, pushes aside the red curtain and is out of sight. Yay!

All right. Jack and Kieran, it's your turn. Jack walks around the corner, squeezes by Doren so that he can sort of see Gah and this spiritual weapon and looks right at her and pulls out his orb and this pulsing sound comes over it, rolls off towards her trying to like shake whatever life is in that body of hers away from it tries to tear her apart and toll the dead she would need to make me a wisdom save 15 uh she passes ah she stares

daggers at you unmoving yeah it's chief guz turn uh oh what's she gonna do move she picks up a priceless treasure box and throws it at you jack oh no 27 to hit uh a 27 will hit me 23 damage I'm resistant to all damage because of a spell Kralath put on me. Is that still going on? That's still going. Beautiful. So half a 23 is 11, right? It is. Make a

concentration check. So the DC would be 10 or 11. I forgot, I rolled a 15 plus my constitution is 12. So you're fine. And I take 11 points of damage as well. We both take 11 damage. Ow! Ow! What are you doing? That was an antique.

Just the shards of broken antique box around me. That's more offensive, really, that crashing against the, like, shield of faith and the warning bond than it is the, you know, actual shards of it sticking out of my jacket. Yeah. I like that more than physically damaged. You're just incensed at her wanton destruction. I mean, yes, destroying the ecosystem here, bad. But also throwing antiques at me. This is not okay.

Um, great. So anyone who can see into the... the room notices the goblins begin to dismount their furniture and make their way along these wooden platforms to slowly and quietly begin to escape the room. They know this building is burning. They're like, uh, let's get out. Nice. Goblins really like to just look after their own highs.

As they should. Doran, it's your turn. You see as Jack gets just totally plugged by this fucking treasure chest. Doran watches the treasure chest come flying at Jack and hit him right in the chest and he picks up the treasure chest. Doran, it might still be okay. It's still good.

And he runs into the room holding it and whips it at the head of Chief Nice. But who made it, Doran? Very good. But who made it? 23 to hit. Certainly. Nice.

35. Wow, good job. Nice. Nice to done. Cool. Yeah, it hits her right in the face and it knocks the well off of her head. And clatter of rocks, showers behind her. And I look back to Jack for some sort of sarcastic comment about the well.

Jack is stunned. Just on every level, every part of this is bad for him. He's still focused on like the crumbs of that chest as it exploded against her hide. It's like, what? Red, it's your turn. Red is going to move. I have my feeling agility back, so I'm going to move 60 feet feet. the room.

Sure. And I have a bit of a wacky idea. It's kind of wacky. It's a little wacky. Just hit Doran. How far is she off the ground? Oh, she's not far off the ground. So she's sitting in the midst of this pile of refuse and treasure and valuables and food

and carcasses. But she's actually on this wagon whose axles are straining under her great weight. And she's maybe five feet off the ground, maybe a little bit less, because it's like bowing under her bulk. So I have a bit of a throwaway idea. Can I aim out one of the wheels or maybe like the axle or something

like what's bowing the most under stress? Roll an intelligence check for me. Oh shit. You can roll a D4 as well right? Oh nice. I rolled an 18. Plus four. Excellent. Oh yeah. Minus one. So like 23. You quickly assess the situation. Your keen eyes

pick out the details of the machinery of wagon underneath her and you see that there is like a weak spot where you would be able to target the wagon specifically that might mess with the thing she's sitting on too bad the wagon's not like able to roll into one of those holes you know what I think red's going to try to math out this problem and think this might be an easy solution so he's going to crouch down close one eye while everyone is sort of rounding her and you know what I'm going to use my inspiration roll to hit the wagon nice no penalty here specific spot on the wagon.

Dirty 20. Oh, nice. All right. How much damage do you deal? Eight damaged. I mean, so it has a hit points of seven. Does it actually? Yeah, so with a loud crack, your arrow sings through the axle on this wagon and you see just

a look of terror in Chief Gah's eyes. Can I read this for you? Because this is amazing. What? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Hitting the axle just for. right. Not only does this end

Gah tumbling to the floor, but she tries to stand up and instead rolls into the nearest pit breaking through the wooden cross beams. She falls 30 feet to the floor, taking 3D6 bludging damage. Oh,

fucking. Wow. So she like cries out. Yeah, rolls into the pit, breaks through the cross beams and falls into the pigs. Holy fuck. Wow, way to go, Harley. Great call. Feeder to the pig.

You should get inspiration back. Well done. Okay. So she's down the hole now. She fell in the hole. She's obviously not dead. That's fucking hilarious. Oh my God.

And the treasure is fine. Yeah. Oh. Red is still posed with his bow. And it's just like silent. You have another shot. Like it's still your turn. I'm like, um, well.

Wait a minute, though. I didn't think about this. She had the conch still, didn't she? It's on the ground, like lying beside the wagon. Oh, oh. Okay, yeah. Then I just like it frozen for a moment. Like, um, and I slowly like stand up.

I mean, you guys can drop out of initiative order if you'd like right now. Fuck yeah. The goblins are fleeing the room. Is she dead, though? She can't move. She's not going to do shit until you go down there. Red just stands atop the hole, just like pot-shotting her. Yeah.

Yeah. Well done, guys. I was kind of thinking that the ape would jump down and land on top of her. I mean, I'd like to look over the edge to see what she's doing. Yeah, she has landed on top of, like, three pigs, and they're obviously dead. But a number of pigs are starting to sniff around her and are, like, cautiously nibbling at her, like, dress and stuff. That's so fucking gross. Yeah, can I, like, coup de grace her?

I don't feel bad at all. Yeah, I think there's that moment of just the pigs closing in and, like, devouring her. There's something, like. poetic about it? I think it's clear, like just the pigs converging on her. Maybe they finish her up. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Cool. Wow. So yeah. I guess so, guys. Yeah.

We have destroyed Chief Go. We just did Gretahog. I think that deserves a little round of applause from me. Good job, you guys. Well, thank you. Thank you all. I mean, yeah. So there's a horde of orcs outside.

There are a couple of ogres and hill giants. But you know that there are some aeroslits on the wall. And I imagine that between using Kieran to scout, and then also having the wherewithal to like peer out the windows, as I'm sure you would just on reflex to try to figure out what's happening outside. You can tell that the cries of Chiefga from this pig basement in the abattoir, they're resonating outside of the hell giant fortress, such that her minions can hear that like it's not going great in here.

You know, the orcs cheer looks with each other and just start wandering away. Wow. You see Hruk leave the animal enclosure Where all the sheep were being kept And he kind of like makes for the woods People just start leaving I mean we also fulfilled Mug's request too Because she wanted him back

So hey that's a double win right there Not only did we kill the chief We also got her man back I mean for however much we want Mug to have a happy ending I want Mug to have a happy ending Unless she's the next Gha You know what Not for a little while

at least. Let us have this, Jack. So let's talk treasure, shall we, guys? Okay. Hidden under where Chief Gah's bulk used to sit under the wagon in these piles of refuse and carcasses and literal actual shit. Yeah. She's been hoarding stuff.

I feel like Jack and maybe even Red moved towards it and they're like, oh, oh, God. And then Doran's like, get me in there. If there's any part of the treasure, It counts as loose earth. I would like to push it five feet away. Disgusting. I mean, yeah, that removes a third of the bulk of this stuff. We're going to try and pile that somewhere off to the side.

That's actually a good filter. You just like lift it all. You like shove it down the hole. It just like piles on top of her. Some of it is looser than other parts. Oh, no. I don't know if somebody wants to be the quartermaster for this, but I'm just going to list it all out. And put it all into the bag of holding.

Right. And then obviously the thing. So you find. in terms of copper pieces, and I'm imagining red being like 31, 32, 33. You find 5,600 copper pieces. Wow. Sweet. 2,200 silver pieces.

Wow. 630 Electrum pieces. Wow. Electrum. 150 gold pieces. Nice. You find the following art objects. Nice.

A wooden rocking horse. A small wooden chest containing a disguise kit. Hmm. A wooden coffer containing six vials of holy water. A life-size wooden statue of a halfling. Interesting. A battered hat with five Cornelians sewn into it. What is a Cornelian?

It's like a red gem. A gold flute. A flower pot carved from jade. And my favorite, a wooden puppet theater with gold trim, along with gold-stringed puppets, wearing bejeweled costumes. That's so cute. Additionally, you find the following magical items, and you know their magic power by touching them and feeling the thrill of magic into your body. You find two potions, a spell scroll, and a heavy, large conch.

Ah, the conch. Creatures unfamiliar to sea life may not recognize this shell. It's a massive example of a sea mollusk, creamy and pink and opalescent in color, featuring a number of horn. protrusions all along the length of its spire. It's two and a half feet long, 20 pounds, and is daunting to carry. There are faint giant runes inscribed along the inner lip of the frills aperture. Interesting. The run for furred, hellig, and Kong, which Jack recognizes and read also to mean journey, sacred, and king. This says journey sacred and king on it, guys, I say as I'm putting the

conch into the bag of holding. It feels like that's gotta, I want to look at that more. That's fascinating. I mean, but also have you seen this puppet theater? Like, I didn't even, like, Jack is walking around all the pile of stuff, not even sure where to start. And look at that halfling. Look at how life's like it looks. I think if you're putting

the halfling statue, the puppet theater, the everything in this bag, you are reaching the limit of stuff that this bag of holding can carry. Well, remember, I also unloaded a whole bunch of stuff into our Nightstone 4 headquarters. So the bag actually doesn't have that much left in it. I didn't take any rugs. I didn't take, I mean, it's got lots of stuff, but like we're talking about a piece of cloud, hair from that giant, a potion of poison resistance. Like the

heaviest thing in there right now is a piece of dry-aged pork. But my studded leather armor and all that other stuff, I left. True. So what do you guys want to do now? What are you going to do with Gredhog? What about finding Orrin with your horses and B, who's in the hills somewhere? I think once everything is settled down and it's sort of made clear that the orcs aren't coming back right now, the topic of what to do with Gretthog comes back up. And I think we turn to Jack, whose initial sort of thoughts were to destroy this thing and we talk. All right, this is done now. How do we unblock this river?

I mean, my first thought is, why don't we just light it on fire and let it burn down? That'll be a clear signal to everyone around. Grudhog's gone and it's going to weaken whatever structural crap is here anyways and then we can sort of come back and see what is left to dismantle of the dam. Before we do anything, I do think it's really important that we get Beliard here to reclaim all these sheep and pigs. They've been starving forever. I think they should come and the real value of this place is within all of the food that they've taken, the pigs and the sheep out front. I think once we are sure that it's safe, we should back to Belliard, bring as many farmers and townsfolk as we can to come and lead these sheep

and pigs back to the farms that they were taken from. If we wanted to hang out here for an hour or two, I could send a letter that would arrive immediately to whoever we want there who could come to us and then there's no chance of people. Oh, that's a good idea. Hey, great idea. Yeah. You wouldn't have to spend the, you know, seven hours getting back to town. Yeah. Well, and Red sort of looks out the window a little bit. I think you guys could stay here. I wouldn't mind trying to find B. Mm-hmm. Is Doren still an ape?

Yeah. There's this moment where I think I'm just looking up at the ape version of Doren, like, are you ready to go back to your regular size? And he does a big sad. Yeah, and I think just with a snap of my fingers, you shrink back down to regular Doren. Like all my clothes are like torn in half. Yeah, and I think just ready for a high five as soon as you get out of there.

Doran, my God. Oh, you're telling me, that was incredible. You're telling me, you, oh my God, you're a giant like the best of them. The memories that I will have. Holy, holy. High five, thanks again. Oh, good job, everybody. Great job, Doren.

Go and find B, Red. Yeah. So I think Kralath and I will go look for B and leave these two in the dust. Sure. What time of day is it right now? It's like late afternoon, early evening. Okay. Well, we'll be back before the sun's fully down.

Perfect. Sounds like a plan. And I think Rob, Jack and I, we will be ushering out any of the... The three of you? All three of you. I'm so confused. Sorry.

Myself and Rob and Doran and Jack, we'll be ushering pigs out so that they're kind of out of the building and we're going to start doing something. Maybe you can use some magic to dismantle the stam. Yeah, I think probably I'm going to write a letter back to Bellier to try and get some of the people here to help and reclaim any of the livestock. That's right.

valuable materials. Cool. Yeah. There's also Goldenfields not too far from the South. Yeah, I'd probably a letter to the sheriff and a letter to Golden Fields.

Golden Fields. Pop, pop, pop, pop. Golden fields. What, what, what? So yeah, Kralath and I are going to go look for B. I'm going to probably head to her last known position. And as we're walking, you know, Red's very hyper-focused now on this.

He's almost like walking a few steps ahead of you. We need to find it, Kralov. We need to make sure she's safe. We'll find her. I'm sure she's safe. fine. It was this hill right here, right? Yeah, I think so. As the two of you travel towards where you left B, you do come across evidence of orcs having fled Gredhog. There are some hasty footprints that you see read, especially as the tracker. You note that there has been recent

passage here, but you don't see any orcs. It doesn't look like anyone's setting up camp. They're all just kind of making tracks. Oh, it's full Eragon. He's like, he's on his knees. He's like, there was a struggle here and then it like cuts back to be like running in the you know and then he pulls up a brooch that she left accidentally oh yeah cool yeah no i think i pick up on her her scent and we had uh head in that direction yeah are you gonna do your primeval awareness thing yeah i think i'd spend a minute sort of just seeing if i can detect any humanoids in a five mile radius yeah there's one right beside you ah oh no oh crayloth you detect your friends back at Gred Hogg. You detect Kralath standing right beside you. You detect B. I mean, you presume she's probably

a couple of hills over. She's not moving. Yeah, I just run without even telling Kralath. He's put it out of his mind completely, the idea of B up until the task was done, and now it's all he can think about. I'm right behind you. Thanks. And actually, on that, Red slows down. I'm sorry, I'm just so distracted, you know, like you were the other night. Yeah, yeah, you're worried for your daughter. We'll find her. Yeah, and you were worried too, right? You've seen better now.

Yeah, to be honest, it's all kind of a blur to me. Despite this being a stressful time for you, as you crest a hill, you're taken with the beauty of this landscape, even marred as it is by the giant's encampment and the damage that they've done to the forest around here. It's still beautiful, the colors of Marpenoth and the gathering dusk. And that's when it starts to snow.

Just a little bit at first. Little pieces of fluffy snow start drifting down from the gray clouds. They're catching in your fur. What? What? Grayloth, what is this? Quickly. And red like dives down behind a rock trying to shelter himself.

There's a spell falling down from the sky. Maybe the cloud giants are coming back. And Krayloth, without paying too much attention. He pulls out his shield and he looks up, bracing for an attack, and then he begins to chuckle. They got Krayloff charmed. Krayloff, I've got a hitchy, don't worry. Oh, it's going to get me. Oh, no!

And Krayloff sticks out his tongue, and he lets a nice, big, chunky flake land on it, and, um, hmm. What, what are you doing? It's refreshing. Try it. What? Huh. All right. He sticks out his little.

cat tongue and oh it's cold oh no is this is this is this snow this is this is this snow we get a lot of it in brovia ah wow cray laugh i've heard wondrous things but i've never actually experienced such an effect i do admit i'm a bit jumpy with all the you know things trying to kill us all the time yeah i hear you snow your voices echo out across the still landscape and red you see some bushes rustle, and then B emerges. Red! B! Snow! What on earth?

Yes, I know. This is what it is. It's beautiful. Ah, Kralov did it. No. Um, I don't think so, Red. What happened? Tell me everything. Everyone is safe. Everyone is fine, and the monster that ran that place is dead. I'll tell you all about it, and how I single-handedly saved everyone.

Did Oren come with the horses? I've got Oren right here. Ah, Oren! Hello, Master Red. Ah, Master, my old girl, and I pet my horse. And hi, shit fart. Me. How you do?

Yes, you are you. It's good to be reunited, you all. Let's head back to everyone. They're keen to make sure everyone's safe. And we take the horses? Through this, like, the beginnings of the first snowfall of the season. Yeah. And as we arrive back at Gred Hogg, what are Doran and Jack in the middle of doing?

I think Jack's moved outside somewhere near the watchtower, maybe, whatever's the least smelly place to, like, sit down. It's kind of an offensive building. Yeah, like there's nowhere in there that's okay. So on the far side of the watchtower, maybe sitting down with his writing kit in his lap and composing these two magic letters to send to Golden Fields and Belliard. I think they include, like, one of those cool 3D maps of the place and, like, the little image of that last moment of Chief Ghe. as the arrow hits the cart and she falls and tumbles down, just so everybody knows, hey, this is what we saw, and then, like, come help us destroy this place,

take the resources back to sort of a request to those two places. And Doran is kind of, he's opened up the big double doors on the southwest side of the basement where the pigs are, and he's kind of broken down a couple of the gates where the pigs were locked in, and he's just kind of letting them head out now to where the sheep are into kind of a general outside of the building area. Yeah, Doran, I feel like you had to clear out a little bit of the rest of Grudhog. Like, there were a few pockets of resistance, especially down in the basement, a couple of more bug bears, another giant that you had to handle by yourself.

Doran by himself is like going through the underbelly of this place in the darkness, in the mud with the pigs. And he like ends up killing an extra giant just by himself. Wow. Yeah. I feel like there'd be a really cool scene where Doran is like kicking through the rubble down there and he comes across the body of Gryhark. Yeah, yeah.

So maybe there's a moment where I like kind of crouched down and I'm, I put my hand on the head of Gry Hark. I mean, his body is pretty savage. Yeah. And I think it was like an accident almost. He's like moving the dead body of the thing and he sees Gry Hark there. And I like touch what was left of his hair.

And I say like, if only I had known you earlier. And maybe is there like some sort of a symbol on him that I can make note of. Jack noticed he was a member of elk tribe of Uthgard barbarians. So he's got some tribal jewelry that probably survived the like scavenging of the pigs. He's got like an holed out elk skull that's made into a thing on his necklace. Yeah, it was like a paldron that was like slung over a shoulder. I pull that off and pocket it and kind of continue to clear the basement. Sure. I put Chief Gush,

she's still, like, moaning, and I put my axe through her throat, and there's a gargle. You put her out of her misery. There's nothing bringing this one back to life. I don't say that. Enter the necromancer. That being said, I continue to sever the head right off, so it's like...

Force a habit. Yeah, yeah. Once you start, it's just, like, walking downhill. You learn that from me. I think the general plan is to wait for them to come, take all of these resources and then you know burn this thing down like jack suggested cool you guys are going to wait here until delegates arrive from belliard and goldenfields i think we could all use a long rest for sure so where are you going to make camp because as rob mentioned this place is pretty gross

there's like gobs of grease and hunks of carcasses and the bodies of your enemies all kind of strewn throughout this whole edifice red would definitely climb that watchtower and probably just throw the bodies of the hobgoblins off the top. Yeah, exactly. And then end up sleeping up there as a bit of an opportunity to wake should something approach. Sure. That's dangerous. And probably make a nice little place for him to sleep up there along with B.

Aw, cute. Sleep over. Like a cat tower. Oh, we're telling like little secrets to each other. Hey, B, are you asleep? What? I was asleep. Hey, pst, where did you?

Oh, I was just thinking of something. And there's just like that all night. What about the three of you? probably camped around the bottom of that tower. I guess maybe if you can lead the horse in pitch a hut. Through the buildings to that next. No, wizards allowed. I'll get you.

Just sending messages up there to whisper in your ear any time you think you're drifting up to sleep. Yeah, I think Kralov's probably going around and gathering up all the corpses and burying them. Oh, it's not easy being a grave cleric. It's hard work. He ignores the hempret lady altogether. even recognize it.

Cool. So you guys take a long rest. Everyone gets all your hit points back, all your stuff. Nice. Yay. Oh, thank goodness. What are you guys thinking about overnight? Red and B are catching up and sharing secrets?

I guess Doran is satisfied, knowing that battle has been successful and that I'm not too concerned now about the retreat that we had done because now we've come back to finish that off. But of course, in the back of his mind, this is when Doren opens up his journal and he's writing down the events of today. But then he comes across this map that he had drawn previously of the Dwarven ruins, which are coincidentally just south of where we are here. That's true. Were those those are the ones that the ring pointed to? Yeah, maybe as you're going through your belongings, you touch that wooden ring again and you remember, you're going.

Yeah, the dwarf kingdom of Bissilmer. Right. That's right, the silmar, thank you. And so, yeah, I've got a little note on it. And, you know, I'm reading my scribbly writing. It's a sticky note in your journal. A picture of a ring I've drawn. And then I turned to Jack in that Boy Scout kind of essence in the tent at night.

I think Jack has also got a map up in front of him. He's got trying to figure out when we could expect people from these various towns. And he's got the sort of chart. starting the course where he's, you know, Cheryl, we're heading up north to go check out Liferliss's shadow top cathedral that he directed us to in Everland. And he's sort of thinking in that other trajectory and trying to have that all mapped out in front of him. And so Doreen kind of turns over. He's lying on his belly now on his bed roll. And he's kind of got his feet up behind him. So cute.

Oh, Duran. Hey, uh, I'm dying. Hey, Jack. Yeah. Um, we're not far from, uh, Bissilemer, are we? By my writing here, it looks like, uh, It's just a little bit south of here. Can you pull it up in your map there? Have you got it? Yeah, give me a second. Because it was just, Jack, you know, imagines it in new existence on this minor illusion map in front of them.

And there it is, you know, only a day or two south of us. Oh, no way. Krayloff kind of opens his eyes and says, what are we talking about? Well, remember those dwarven ruins that figure appeared and pointed to when I put on the wooden ring? Oh, that's right. in the hut. Well, it's just around here. I think that's where Thorold flame, oh, flame tongue.

Yeah, I think that's where he buried his, his famous axe. I could be wrong, but I think there's legends of it being buried there. I wonder if we should go there while we're around here, but I mean, I completely understand it if you don't want to do that, but maybe we can convince Red and B to join us and we could go down and visit that area and explore it. Jack flips through his notebook, trying to find the notes he wrote about that moment. As does my character say, Doris does me. As do we all. Kralath sleepily reaches into his sack and pulls out some dried jerky.

Everybody hits their notes. He said that there is a once grand and important city and that you would find something of great power. Maybe we could go visit the ancient ruins of Bissilmer while we're down here. I mean, we've already done a bunch of stuff that you guys wanted to do. maybe we could do stuff I want to do now. It's definitely worth revisiting. I know last time we were all caught up thinking about old knob bones and where to go next and how we were... Well, yeah, that's kind of what I mean.

I mean, we don't have to, but it would be nice if we could, but... I would love to go there. Up to you guys in Red. I'm in. We'll have to ask Red and be in the morning. Yeah, I agree. We've taken care of the imminent threat here, so might as well explore a little bit while we're in the area. Jack, thanks for a minute.

looks up towards the top of the tower and whispers a message into Red's ear. We're thinking about going to Bissilmer tomorrow. It's pretty close. And you just hear, bingo bingo! I'm in! I think that settles it, Doren. You saved the day here, so we're doing your quest next. All right, and Doreen kind of excited looks back down to his notebook and starts sketching things. We're going to Bissilmer. She's dead, she's dead. And what a gross way to go. Thank you so much for our great Old One Patreon supporters, Megan Shepardson, Adam Fry, Michael and Brianna Weber, and Christopher Ryan Evans.

You make all of this possible. See you soon. Thank you.