The Adventure Zone - Ep. 51. The Suffering Game - Chapter One

Episode Date: October 20, 2016

After a summer spent tirelessly training, our heroes are finally prepared to take on their next, harrowing mission. What horrors -- or fortunes -- await them in Wonderland? I mean, this arc is literally titled "The Suffering Game," so you can probably piece it together yourself. Merle hangs ten. Taako's like a bird. Magnus drops in on an old friend. Happy MaxFunDrive! Right now is the best time to start a membership to support your favorite shows. Learn more and join at https://maximumfun.org/jointaz

Previously, on the Adventure Zone. Uh-oh. What happened to Robbie? Robbie has been thrown into the brig. We're going to be keeping an eye on him for a while. Pringles? Does he love Pringles too much? Was this call for business or pleasure?

Yeah, I mean, a little bit of both. I for sure didn't want to be dragged to hell or whatever it is you do. Sir, I know it's none of my business, but I'm... I'm curious why you haven't told anybody about your kids. I was a really crappy dad, and I was an even crappier husband. You see yourself wearing a red robe, but there's a, like, a next logical thought that would come from that observation. But when you try to think it, your mind just turns to static. It's just tearing you apart and keeping you up at night, and the void fish slams against the wall of its tank.

And it's kind of scary. You had a baby? You have an egg. A quick, bright light flashes and a small, quiet alarm bell rings. What a devilish twist. What other mysteries await us down the winding path toward the adventure zone? Let it begin. What? Let it start.

It is started. Wait, can I just, wait, can I just before we start, start, start? I want to say. It started. But just, but I went back and listened. Can I just say, going back and listening to old episodes, I listened to the last lunar interlude before we did the 11th hour. I had a lot of cool items I forgot to use during the 11th hour. Oh, everybody has lots of cool items that they forgot to use.

I was really hoping for that immovable rod you have taco to pop up during the purple worm chase. That would have been neat, but. I had a magnetic spheres. Don't fucking kibbets. Don't like. I'm just saying there's a lot of stuff. Backseat dungeoneer. Especially like Taco.

Taco uses more of his garbage than anybody. That's a good point. I shouldn't harp on Justin. All right. Yeah, but you did unhaul a lot of stuff that you hadn't mentioned for a long time when you were talking to crap. Everyone lived. We're good. We'll see if you fare as well in this next arc, which has begun.

Oh, okay. Ah, damn it. So things have been closed. Now it's begun. Now is this it? It started. When I said things have been quiet, that was the start of it. Well, actually, Griffin's an hour behind.

He's on Central Time, so it actually hasn't started for, or maybe it started for us an hour ago. It began an hour ago, and you didn't even realize it. Let me start. Hey, let me start weaving the story. We'll catch you up. Weave. Weave away, weave master.

So, things have been quiet at the Bureau of Balance since the conclusion of your last adventure, which was probably a couple months ago because it is midsummer. And it's actually a couple days from the Midsummer Harvest Festival, which was, if you'll remember, that sick carnival that you went to in that first lunar interlude. When we saw all the eyes in the skies? Yeah. It's been almost a year since then. And so the Midsummer Harvest Festival is two days away.

But there's actually, weirdly enough, there's no trappings of that festival going up. Like last year around this time, there were bureau employees coming and going and putting up tents and erecting boots. and preparing decorations and setting up little game tents. But today, just two days out, preparation efforts have been meager at best. Like to cutbacks? Cutbacks. Oh, no, wait. Were we supposed to do it?

Well, the three of you actually haven't been helping. Oh, shit. The three of you haven't been helping very much because the director has had the three of you doing really intensive training, like eight hours a day, every day. Wait, like physical training or just like corporate training? Physical training, a lot of it taking place in that dojo that the regulators have set up. You've been working with Carrie and Kerry and Killian and Noel and some of the other regulators to just like get better. And that's, I think, the justification for you all jumping up to level 12 in your training.

She's been preparing you rigorously for your next mission, the particulars of which she hasn't. shared. She's just kind of leaned on you in your training. And at this point, I mean, it's been a little over a year now. You have a pretty deep personal, like, relationship, even like friendship with the director. But in the past month, she's been kind of cold to you. She's been a bit more... Temperature wise? Like, um, relationship wise. She's been really reserved. During, during training, the friendship that you've, you've, the friendliness that you've seen from her, it just isn't there. She's, she's extremely critical when you're in training, and she also seems extremely

worried. And this morning, while you're on your way to one of these intensive training sessions, you receive a message from the director. It's time for your next mission to begin, and she wants to see you in her office. Uh-oh. and as you enter she is sitting there with one hand on her staff and her her face in her other hand and she looks up as you enter her office and she says come in how I want you to know graven I really misunderstood what you just said and I thought she was holding her staff in one

hand and her face in the other yeah she was just sitting there took her face slash oh Westworld no she was no she just was she looks tired man. And as you come in, she says, how are you boys feeling today? Fine. I mean, I drank my protein, my pre-workout protein shake, and now that's for nothing. I've just got a lot of built-up protein energy now. Way protein or beef.

Both. That's a lot. I call it weef. I've been, I've been binging. Who is this? Orange is the. I've been binging. It's right there, too.

Sounds like that. I've been binging. Orange is a new black. Oh, how is it this season? I feel like it got lost in the weeds a bit. Maybe a few too many characters, but, you know, all in all, not bad. Taco, are you well? Yeah, I'm fine.

You're not my mom. She keeps calling us boys. I don't have to tell you anything in my life. I'm fine. What do you want? I'm, I want to apologize. I'm very busy. I'll say that.

We've been dojo in the hell out of this place. I know. And I'm sorry for leaning on you as hard as I have been lately. I just, I know what's waiting for you on your next mission, and I just want you to be at peak performance. Is it one of those things where it's like either super bad or super good? It ain't super good.

Well, you don't know. Shut up. No, Merle's right. Damn. She reaches into a drawer in her desk, and she pulls out a blue, envelope with a fairly ornate gold trim and she says it's time I tell you boys a story I haven't told you before before you enlisted in the Bureau of Balance before the Bureau was even formed

I foolishly aspired to recover and destroy the grand relics on my own oh I searched for months to locate these relics but I came up empty and that's when I received this and she she holds up that that envelope and, uh, uh, opens it up. And inside she pulls out a flyer. Um, and it's really gaudy. It's really, uh, colorful, uh, and it is advertising in big colorful block letters, a place called Wonderland. And, uh, behind that word Wonderland is a colorful map showing a large circular clearing in a forest called the Felicity Wilds. And on the reverse side of this flyer is a picture of a small copper bell. And it is inlaid with a diamond pattern across its body.

And in a bunch of different fonts, actually, all equally gaudy and ugly, this side with the bell on it reads, The Grand Relic You've been looking for, the Animus Bell. And she hands that flyer to you all to inspect. And she says, on this flyer is an image, and it is, in fact, a grand relic. As the flyer says, it's the animus bell. When I was doing my investigations, I learned its name, but not its capabilities or whereabouts. But here it was, on paper, with a map included. This feels trap-like, right?

Yeah, a little on the nose, isn't it? I mean, I of course researched Wonderland before I made my attempt on it. It is a place where for those lucky enough to be invited or to otherwise be lured into its walls, it promised the fulfillment of any material wish, the rewarding of any prize that its visitors sought out. Hence my personalized flyer here. It is, of course, a death trap, but it was not without its fair share of victory. I heard stories, mostly secondhand, of survivors who made their way out of Wonderland, claiming to have found the prizes that they sought within.

But their accounts of what is inside Wonderland never matched up, meaning that the contents are somehow different for each person who enters it. One person told of a maze full of undead killers, another told of a tomb of horrors. I was overly ambitious. She turns back. She's in like a rotating office chair. She sort of turns her back on you. And she says, my journey through Wonderland was hell, boys. I faced foes, the likes of which I've never seen outside of those walls and psychological terrors that to this day leave me shaken. I abandoned my delve into Wonderland, but only after losing a wager that cost me dearly. With her back to you, she is facing that portrait in the back of the room, the one that I guess I think it was Taco thought had some sort of arcane energy around it. And with a wave of her white oak staff, that image in the portrait changes. And the Lucretia that you see, she's about a 50-year-old woman, disappears.

And there is a young woman in the portrait with the same. same light hair and dark skin that the director has, but she looks a couple of decades younger than the director that you know today. And the director rotates her chair to face you and says, that was me. Not that long ago. I wagered 20 years of my life in a game of chess in Wonderland, and I lost. I'm not a vain woman. I don't care about losing the beauty of my youth, but 20 years is a lot of life to have pulled out from under you.

Why did you wage you that much? Seems like a lot. Yeah. It was what was necessary to progress through Wonderland. I've known about this place since before you joined the organization, but to tell you the truth, I am terrified of it. Because if I lose you boys in Wonderland, we lose everything. But I think the time has come. I know that you're ready.

I, okay, this is Travis OOC here. Yeah. I'm having this moment that I have every time I watch any kind of like, like movie or TV show and like things have happened that some characters know about that other characters don't, where I'm just like screaming at them, like, just tell, just be open in communication and everybody, tell everybody exactly what happened. And I'm sitting here like, as Travis wanting to. to tell the director everything that we know, but at the same time, just not knowing if I could trust her.

I just wanted to share that moment with the audience or with you guys that I have no idea what to do. So Magnus is remaining tight-lipped about what he saw on that piece of paper? Yeah, but it's fucking hard to do that because, like, sure. Magnus is pretty, like, forthright, and I don't even know if I've told Taco and Murrow about it. Okay. Yeah, I think that's an important point.

I think we need to establish. Have we shared our stories with each other or not? Well, I mean, there was a difference between what you guys did on your most recent lunar interludes. You can talk about that, you know, whether or not you want. I actually don't know if all of you listen to that lunar interludes. So this may not even be a dramatic irony situation. You may literally not know what happened in the other boy's stories.

So that's up to you. And we can establish that before we go forward. What have you told each other? Well, now that I think about it, I really, I am impressed upon dork boy not to say anything anybody. So I guess I still want to keep Moxie and Mabas a secret. Okay. Not their names.

Merle wouldn't have shared that then. Okay. I would say that I don't know. Has Magnus told them about the voidfish conversation? I'm going to say no, because I feel like him being a red robe because he are in the picture, not understanding it. He's probably a little bit nervous to tell. and Merle about it because he doesn't want to incriminate himself yeah uh taco did you tell everybody

about your hot date uh no not probably not like i i think that not for any other reason than like taco doesn't seem somebody who shares a lot of that stuff necessarily anyway like i don't think just because like taco went on a date like taco went on a date with death and that sounds Yeah. So cool. Actually, it was not that I'd say it out loud. Yeah.

He may not be able to resist. But like, it is also worth keeping in mind. Kravitz tried to kill Merle for a while there. And it's probably, and it's definitely responsible for what happened to his hand. I mean, I guess Magnus shares responsibility in that.

I just don't want, I don't want anybody to misconstrue it as Taco being like, cautious about talking about his sexuality. It's literally just he doesn't think it's anybody's fucking business. Okay. Especially not these three fucking. fucking clowns that have fixed

on to him barnacle like as he tries to save the earth well okay that's good to know let's let's hop back into the scene then

the director the director is like warning she says Wonderland will try to break you you will face dangerous the likes of which you've never seen

you will face mental and emotional torment but if you stay together and you trust each other you can keep yourself from losing yourself in there. Listen, I know that you went through some real hell in there, and it sounds like you had a

really rough time. This sounds awesome. I cannot wait to get in there. On the other hand, it sounds a little dangerous. No, but like, there are challenges. How about a Killian would, Killian could knock the shit out of this job, I bet. Killian, the grand relic, the animus bell, is still in Wonderland somewhere. I cannot trust Killian to go in and recover it without taking it for herself.

Gotcha, gotcha, gotcha. Is there some, like, buddy, some kind of person or thing that's, like, in charge of Wonderland that we're going to get to fight like another big battle kind of thing? I only heard. It's been a really long time and we didn't really get to have like a big fight in the 11th hour. You will have good fights in there. I guarantee it. I only heard voices. There were there were voices that would give me directions, but I never saw anybody in Wonderland. There were, I believe, other participants in Wonderland while I was going through it, but I never saw them either. Cool. I'm less worried about the fights that you will have and more worried about your emotional state being compromised while you're in there. And then you hear a voice from like immediately. immediately behind her chair.

And I guess Angus has been hiding back there, like the whole time. And he says, don't worry, sirs. I'll be on the radio the whole time. And I can help you monitor your emotional state and help keep you calm while you're in there. So don't worry about a thing. You're going to be coolest cucumbers when you go through Wonderland and the tortures inside. And you are... I'm Angus McDonald, a boy detective, and you're very good friend.

It sounds familiar. Shouldn't there be some kind of little musical sting there when he says that, you know, like leave it to beaver theme or something. Nope. Okay. I tousel Ango's hair and I go, of course I remember Angus. Let me see what you got, kid. How's it coming? Let's see it.

Oh, yeah, of course, sir. He casts, uh, press digitation and a, uh, uh, cast a fucking level zero cantrip. How long has it been? Okay, he cast, the smartest kid on earth. He cast a cantrip. He casts a level once in a while. He casts a disguised self on himself.

And he looks like, uh, he looks like, uh, he looks like, uh, he looks like you as a little boy. He doesn't know what you look like as a little boy. He just looks like a smaller taco. And he says, oh, what do you think, sir? Griffin, a tequito. He says, what do you think, sir? How am I doing? You're still Angus. I wasn't fooled for a second. He transforms back into Angus. Okay, okay. I'll keep it up. That's very, very good, though. They're coming along nicely. The director says, are you boys ready to go or do you have any more business before you blast off. Wait, we're just like jumping right in?

Would you rather spend like 20 minutes buying shorts again or? So, I really like those shorts. They were great shorts. You can't tell us anything about the bell. You don't know what it does or what its deal is. When these grand relics were sort of circulating throughout the general population, there were no accounts of the, The animus bell being used for any dark purposes.

Whoever had it squirled it away nicely, and it never really circulated. So we don't have much information on the animus bell. I need to ask. I've been thinking about it. It's been a while since I've been able to talk to you. I feel like if there are other participants in the maze, we run the risk of running into more red robes. I find that unlikely. their red robes obviously

to my surprise are still in operation but there cannot be that many of them but if we do run into one is there anything the Bureau knows about them anything you can tell us they are extremely dangerous

they cannot be trusted if you see one report it to me over your Stone of Far speech immediately and just run away you are not ready don't listen to a word they say they will lie to you to get you to do whatever they want, but their purposes are evil, Magnus.

They are beings of pure, concentrated evil. But how do you know? I've had my fair share of run-ins with the red ropes. And they've all been evil. Invariably. Any other questions? I got a quick area to run before I can leave. Okay, let's get those going then

Oh wait, I do have a question Okay, pop it off, Magnus What's the, why isn't there a festival in prep? Yeah It will be a smaller To have some fried unicorn dick It'll be a smaller, yuck It'll be a smaller affair this year

I'm sorry boys, but there are Slightly more pressing matters at hand Okay Thought there'd be a better explanation Yeah It's a little underwit There just aren't. Got it.

Okay. I jog back, Taka jogs back to his room, and he gets underneath his bed, and he moves some laundry aside, and he moves the half-eaten Reese's cup. He left, and... He couldn't finish a whole Reese's cup? No, he's watching his figure, and underneath that, oh, there it is. He picks up the flaming, raging, poisoning sort of doom. then he gets he gets and grabs a wash cloth real quick

and wipes out some of the dust and then he puts it on his rack Okay Are you guys ready to go? Is there any chance that Magnus could find where Pringles has been locked up? Ooh, shit

I mean he's in there is a a, not a prison. What's the word for like a military? Brigg? Yeah, he's in the brig. And he's been locked up there for a long time. And I think you've probably like tried to go visit him once, if only to like, maybe

you wanted one of like a dank potion recipe or something like that. But the brig is like heavy lockdown, director's access only or with express permission. and you have not secured that. So you have not been able to visit Pringles. He is on full-blown lockdown. I'd ask for permission. Yeah, can we ask the director for permission? We're being sent into hell.

We probably won't come back. I'd like to say goodbye to my Pringles, please. She says, I'm sorry, no. Pringles is dangerous. He is affiliated with the Red Robs. He cannot be trusted. I I'm there's there's no time also we really need to get this Wonderland mission going so I'm sorry but no you got it okay I just need to go grab something from my room okay I want 100% want to break into the brig fuck okay do you tell the other boys what you're doing no okay uh there are the brig is in a we're gonna take a quick off shoot then

There's a dome, probably opposite of the dome that the director's office and, like, big kind of throne room area is in. It is a fairly small dome, and when you go inside, there is an elevator shaft going down. It's kind of reminiscent of the dome that the voidfish is in, because there's just a single small elevator shaft in the middle, and it is guarded by two guards. And they say, stop right there. What are you doing here? Oh, I have permission from the director to come. I just need to talk to the prisoner for one moment. We don't accept verbal permission or written permission.

She needs to be here in person in order for you to get a trip down to visit our prisoner. Oh, yes, of course, just once and I attack them. Fuck. Okay. What the hell? I'm attempting to attack them non-of-law. non-fatally. Okay, how about instead of doing a full fight here?

Because I think it'll take a while and it'll be something that the other two boys don't get to be a part of. Let's, I mean, let's roll a strength contest. Okay. Two different ones. But I'm going to warn you, Trapp, if this goes bad, it's going to go fucking bad. I got you. Is this a solo mission? Am I, are we?

Seeing this? No. I mean, Travis, it sounds like you were going to get your sword and Merle was going to do something else. It's up to you. I mean, you can tell me now, in fiction, if you can justify it, would you have any reason to follow Magnus around as you guys do your last prep before you go on this mission? Merle was just going to go clear his browsing data. Okay. No.

Gross. Gross. Taco, what about you? I mean, I think it would help if he had magic user. with him, but oh, can you go ahead and do what you think? This is... No, I'm not going to make a run at the Bureau of Balance. No, I'm just saying he would be better off with us.

If he, he's not going to do this with us. He didn't ask for help. He didn't even consult this. This should be a group decision. I know. Well, we may be going on this mission bar, so enjoy. Taco's good out here. Yeah.

So with my bonuses and everything, I ended up with a, with a 19 and a 20. Okay, I rolled a 15 on the first one. one and a two on the second one. All right. Yeah, let's just say you subdue them using like the butt of the of the chancellance. So no stabbing was involved, but you knock these two guys out cold. I put them in the pocket workshop. Okay. Yeah, all right. We're going to have to come up with names for these boys earlier, and later, because now you have captives. Two boys. Now you just have Pokemon. on to these two boys. So I guess later we're going to figure out

who these boys are because now they live in your pocket. I'm going to say the pocket workshop can only sustain two boys at once, though, because I don't want you to have an infinite bag of boys and you just put boys inside. But these two boys, you

do have inside, and you just have them now. Okay, so now you've got these two boys and the elevators unguarded. You go down, the elevator is basically identical to the voidfish one, and when you go down, there is just a small brig. There are six cells in here,

but only one of them is occupied by your old friend Robbie, aka Pringles, who runs up to the cell when you walk in. And he says, oh, fuck, what did he even sound like?

I wasn't expecting Pringle play. Wasn't he kind of like a leadback, almost like a shaggy kind of guy? If not, then the months he spent in prison have turned him into that. He's like, Magnus, is that you?

Oh, shit. I didn't think I ever see you again, dude. Did you bring me my stuff? My Prangis? You know how much I need those to live. Prangos, I can't be here very long. Why are you in here? I have two boys in my...

I got two boys in my workshop. What do you... Why am I in the brig? They didn't tell you? No. It was like treason, I guess, dude. I... I'll be honest.

And nobody... The director didn't believe me. Nobody believes me, but like, something had me go all through the Bureau of Balance, even in places I wasn't authorized to be. And then I just kind of woke up and I was in a place I wasn't supposed to be. And then the director arrested me summarily and I've been down here ever since. What was the place that you woke up in? It was a dark room and I was right by this big heavy vault door. And I just, I know I was in the director's personal space or some of her stuff back there.

and yeah that's that's where they found me man hey can you hey can you can you bring me out of here no i can't i'm sorry i mean maybe i can physically but can you do me a big can you do me a bigger favor what's that can you get me those sweet crisps i crave so much i will get you i promise i'll stop at like fantasy go mart and get you something on my way back my body has a deficiency I got you need vitamin pringles I got it Can you tell me anything you remember

from before your body was taken over and you moved without your control I was in our bunk You remember? Yes You remember the good times? I do focus up please And play cornhole

I know yes I remember the cornhole I've only got like three minutes I was just in our bunk And you guys were out on the mission I was real lonely And then my vision just kind of went red and then the next thing I know I woke up. That's it.

That's it. I hadn't had any Pringles that day, and so I thought I was in maybe some sort of fugue state. Okay. If anybody asked, I most definitely totally wasn't here. Okay. What happened to those guards upstairs? Oh, they're still up there.

Totally fine. Don't even worry about it. Okay. All right. I miss us. Yep. And I get in the elevator. Hey, buddy.

It's Griffin McRoy, your best friend, your dungeon master, and your... your local sheriff. Hey, cut out the crime, buddy. Thanks for listening to Episode 51 of The Adventure Zone. It is the first episode of the new arc, which I haven't named yet. It's 10.03 p.m. the day before it comes out,

so hopefully that will come to me in the next, like, 12 hours or so. I want to thank everybody for listening, and I hope you enjoy this new arc, because I'm excited for where it is going to get to. Got a few personal messages here. If you want to get a message on the show, just go to maximum fun.org slash jumbotron. It's easy to get a message on the show

because these folks all did it. Here's a message for Derek, and it's from Dav, Bert, Johnny, and Clacks who say, hey, idiot, happy B-Day from your buds. One day we'll all do some magical adventuring, but for now we'll have to settle for real-life shit like rafting, light-up guitars, and general drunken gangle-sticking.

Gotta Google what that is to make sure it's not offensive. The only thing I could find was a weird blog about dream interpretation and something about League of Legends. So I'm going to assume it's the latter. The rest of the message reads, we miss you, you lanky goofball, but we'll be together again before Dr. Stephen Fox is one part actual licensed physician. That part wasn't as challenging for me. I do just, happy birthday, Derek, first off, and just to the rest of your friends, just to maybe tone it down next time. so I'm not worried that I'm saying some sort of hate speech in my messages. Got a message here for Jake King Nuggets Lace, or perhaps Lace or Lice.

I don't know, sorry. It's from Mort, Jadzia, Shananana, Amberly, Theodosia, and Peanut, who says, happy B-Day to the best DM. Yeah, I thought maybe most of those were names from Dungeons and Dragons. Though we can't meet regularly, we do love ruining your glorious D&D vision. Thanks for putting up with the fiery poops, the in-game, drunkenness, the real-life drunkenness, questions about who's killable, and the crits on really stupid actions that aren't even a thing.

We love you, Jake. Let's get drunk. Peanut commands it. Most of that could literally just go on the box for D&D, the tabletop game. It could be like the tagline. Crits on things that shouldn't be crits, and trying to kill every character, and ruining somebody's story, all this and more inside this wonderful book. And another message here, I want you to visit Floraverse, that's F, F,

L-L-O-R-A-V-E-R-S-E dot com. It's a colorful open-world multimedia webcomic, slash visual novel slash animated fantasy story experience with fairies, flowers, and cats. Basically all the things. Floraverse is a colorful open fantasy world setting slash web comic, chock full of resources and reference, all in the creative commons for free user participation. If you're into fairy birds on adventures, toy cat demons, living paintings, demons warring against Angels, strange music, videos James, videos James, and animations are surreal adventures of the mindscape, then Floraverse is probably for you. Who's not into those things? If you like

looking at ref sheets of critters or making characters, then Floraverse is definitely for you. That sounds neat. I'm also into fairy bird fighters and strange music and videos James. I'm going to go sign out for whatever service you're providing right now. I want to thank everybody who's been tweeting about the show using the the zone cast hashtag if you do that you might end up as a character uh in this arc uh there's a bunch of them and i still need names for literally all of them uh and uh yeah so so get in those tweets also we just really appreciate it because we don't pay to advertise the show at all word of mouth is the only way uh that we get new listeners and you all are super super great about that and we really really uh appreciate you uh helping us out i also

want to thank Maximum Fun for having us. They're a great podcast network. You can find out all the shows at Maximumfund.org and just go listen to some of them. There's shows like we got this, and international waters and throwing shade and lady to lady. They're all so great and they're all at maximum fun.org. If you want to hear other podcasts that we do, you can go to mackleroyshows.com, and you can check out a ton of shows, both podcasts and video stuff. You can find out all of our contact information again, and mackeroyshows.com. That's it for this commercial break. I'm going to get back into it. The next episode of this podcast is going to be up on November 3rd. Holy shit. That's very late in the year. So we will talk to you then. Bye.

There's going to be consequences to what happened at some point, I think, unless you can figure a way out of it. But if you guys are ready to go, then I guess it's time to go. Magnus, are you freeing your two Pokemon that you've got? Taco or Merle, do either one of you have any, just out of curiosity, any kind of like, mind-erasing magic? This conversation is happening at the hangar as you guys are about to, you guys have sort of regrouped. Yeah. Why do you ask? Just, I'm, I'm, I.

So we don't know that he did this. He hasn't. Did you tell him? Nope. And did you guys follow him? No. Then no. I may need a couple boys' minds around.

erased and reprograms if you've got that. Spell slots, man. Yeah, spell slots. Yeah, they could, uh, okay. I can't just do that. I mean, like, we don't have to, neither one of us know how to do that as far as I know.

Okay, cool, cool. Never mind. Not important. It might come up later. You could give them the, uh, the same mind to raise your tonic we gave, uh, like Jerry and some of those goblins working on the car. Remember that?

Remember that special brew? No, what? What was a special tonic? We gave them where we killed them. That's true. Can we kill these guys? No. No, probably not.

Or maybe you hit them so hard if you hit them, they have amnesia. Did I, Griffin? Oh, no. You are, Avi walks into the hangar and you realize maybe this conversation should wait. and he says, oh, hey guys, I haven't seen you in a while. How you been? Good. I've invited you guys to poker night a couple times, but you never, you never respond.

What's the deal? I don't know how to play. He gets a ball ready for you all to hop into and preps the direction of the cannon. And he says, oh, God, okay. The Felicity Wilds actually aren't that far away, so just get ready to hit the breaks pretty quickly, okay? Okay. Are you guys ready to go? Yeah, Taco rest his hand on the brakes, so he's ready.

Okay. A lot more confident than we used to be. Yeah, this is not your first blast off. Okay, you all load up into the ball. Avi seals it up, and it drops down into the cannon chamber, and you hear him count down, and you rest your heads against the back of your seats and prepare for launch.

And as you fly out of the cannon, You go on not a long trip, but on the way you see some familiar sites. You coast over the black glass circle that used to be Fandolin, and actually over the road from Neverwinter to Fandolin, where your very first journey began. The Bureau is almost right over that area. And just past that road, there's a vast expanse of pine trees, and as soon as you start sailing over them, your sphere begins to, decline pretty quickly. You are dropping pretty fast into this I pull the brakes. Okay, you pull the brakes and very

soon your sphere starts to slow way down and it's lowering very, very slowly, almost like an airplane coming in for landing and it's being brushed by the high boughs of these pine trees but you're descending slowly enough that it doesn't really present any danger and then really suddenly

you come to a stop but you are not on the ground of this forest your ball took a tumble and has gotten sort of stuck up in a thick bundle of branches in the boughs of these trees,

and you're about 40 feet up, and the hatch is actually facing downwards when it opens up, although you are strapped in, so it's not like you have fallen out, but you're in kind of a precarious position of being in this glass ball, 40 feet up,

and the sphere that you came down is sort of suspended in these boughs, and yeah, what do you do to sort of extract yourself from this situation. Griffin, what happens to these spheres when we are, like, when we exit them? Do they, like, get stuck back up? Yeah, automatically the, uh, balloon on top activates and they fly back up to the base. Got it.

How high up are we? About 40 feet. I just jump out. Sounds like no problem for the Vroom, broom. Oh, yeah. Okay. Uh, yeah. So I, Merle, you retrieve the, the, is that what it was called?

I think it's just called it's what I called it. Okay, what's the command word that you say to get it going? Hang ten. Fuck. Yes. Because I'm going to surf on it. I'm not going to ride it. Say no more!

I'm going to stand on it and surf on down to the ground. You are living Merle's truth right now. Yeah, you hang ten on the broom. Hang ten! And you effortlessly make your way down to the ground. Make a perception check for me. Okay. Since you're the first person out.

There's a big fat, too. Okay. You don't perceive anything. Taco, do you shout hang ten when you go down? Oh, yeah. I got to shout the word. Excellent, excellent, good. Hang ten!

I leap out of the bubble, and I throw the umbra staff to Magnus, magnus as I go. We have gotten close, haven't we? Yeah. I say, it's got father's fault. me. And then as I fall, I take advantage of a power that as a transportation wizard, I've had since level 10, I've not taken advantage of it.

Oh, man. That's free polymorph. So I just spread my wings. Holy shit. And turn into just like the most beautiful soaring dove. And as Nillian Furtado's Oh my bird. To caress my wings as I fly.

I'm like a bird. I don't want to fly away. I don't know where my home and it's just like so graceful. Yeah. And dew, I'm like flicking dew off the branches as I fly. And, um, and I blithely float down. I'm going to do a perception check long as I'm out here.

That's a big 11. It's a big 11. With an 11, you, uh, uh, I imagine these events happen fairly simultaneously. When Merle shouts hang 10, uh, you hear what sounds like a few animals roar. Uh-oh, okay. Cool. Magnus, you, uh, so he threw the umbra staff to you. Uh-huh.

As you, as you catch it from him throwing it to you, it jerks out of your hand. Like, it doesn't want to be held by you. And it, uh, actually flies down and lands at Taco's feet. It didn't want you to use it. It wanted to stay with Taco. So now you are still up in this tree. Cool. I'm going to use my grappling hook.

Okay. And I'm going to attempt to grapple a branch. Basically, I want to, like, anchor the pod so I can write it. So I'm not just going to drop out if I unhook myself. Yeah, I don't think this is going to require anything because you're using this grappling hook, which you can only use once per day. You're fine with that, right? Yeah, I'll forget to use it later on anyways.

Yeah, I think you just kind of, like, connect the grappling hook hook to, like, a branch and then you just lower down slowly, like Inspector Gadget style. Before I go, though, I do, since I'm anchored, I want to strap my two boys into the sphere before I drop out. Interesting. Okay. So you're taking that, are you just leaving the pocket workshop in the sphere or are you just taking them out? No, I'm taking them out. I want to keep the workshop.

Okay. You then really quickly, as the boys can't really see, the Merlin and Taco can't really see, anymore. You make quick work as you pull these two unconscious, still unconscious men out of the pocket workshop and tie, tie them up inside of the sphere. I want to leave a note in one of the knocked out boys' pockets that says, Lucretia, if I may get out of this, we have a lot of discussing to do, Magnus. Okay. Let's say that you maybe had that note pre-prepared, because that's a lot of, a lot of business for you to be doing up in this, up in this year tree.

Okay, so yeah, you get rid of your two boys and tie them up inside the bubble. And as you drop down, you hear the balloon deploy and you look up and you can sort of see through the boughs of the trees as the sphere floats away back up into the sky. Should I roll a perception check? Everybody else did. Yeah, roll a perception check. It's a one. You don't even hear the roaring. I don't see the ground.

Where are we? Who am I? You realize the roars are actually coming from above you, and there's a clearing in the boughs, and you can see up, and you see that bubble, you see the sphere floating away in the balloon, and you look up and you see in the sky a huge beast, and it kind of flies between the sun and you just sort of casting a shadow and it makes it kind of hard to see, but it's gigantic and it's got these two gigantic wings. And it roars as it flies directly into the balloon and attacks it. And the balloon pops and that sphere just falls out of the sky.

My boys! From about 80 feet up. And it falls somewhere else into the forest and you, you, you hear a pretty gnarly crash. And then this huge beast kind of does a lap up in the sky, and then it comes diving down directly at the three of you. Oh, no, I feel, can I just say, I feel just terrible about this. I feel pretty good about it.

This thing comes to a sudden halt directly in front of the three of you, and you see it is, in fact, a gigantic beast, and it has two large, scaly, and it has a large, uh, scaly head, uh, and it has some, some fire sort of spouting from the corners of its draconic mouth, but it also has two other heads. One of them is, uh, a, uh, a lion, who is also roaring, and he's got razor sharp teeth in his mouth, and the other is, uh, a goat with two large horns on its head and it's bleeding at you, bleating at you

violently. It is a chimera and let's roll some initiative. Oh, land a gore. I rolled a 16. Two. Twelve. Oh, wait. I get a second

roll. Oh, sorry, 16 plus 2. 18. Okay. I'd say give it to Travis. That's a 6. The chimera's up first. Oh, and can I just as a free action switch my dial to fire on my defender's belt? Yeah, I like the concept of you doing that as like a, oh shit. Yeah.

So, yeah. I feel bad about accidentally killing my boys. I mean, the chimera killed them. If I kept them in my pocket shop, or my pocket workshop, they wouldn't be dead. They may be okay. Listen with the chimera hovering in front of us. I'd be glad to go check on him if you want. I mean, just to make sure they're okay.

No, I just feel bad. The chimera goes first, and it has, again, a dragonhead, a lion head, and a goat head. First thing you all need to do is make a dexterity saving throw, all three of you. That wasn't good. 14 for the kid. Nine. Mine was a seven, but I'm going to go ahead and use Indomitable to roll it again. Yeah, okay.

10 plus 2, 12. Okay. All three of you get caught up in this plume of flame. Dang. You try to dodge out of the way, but it is a huge 15-foot cone, so you have a hard time sort of diving. And as you're consumed with flame, you take each, you take 28 points of fire damage. But I get half damage. Yeah, you're good. Um

Then it Uh Runs up to Taco And with its goat head It is going to try to ram you And you know what? It's probably a ram's head then, isn't it? I mean

If it has rammed horns, right? Yeah Uh That is If it's ramming things, it's a ram. Yeah, it's a ram then. 16 versus AC That's gonna do it.

Uh, it rams you for 11 points of bludgeoning damage and then Merle the lion head is kind of facing you it's going to reach down and try to take a bite out of you

okay that is a crit great it hits you it bites into you for 22 points of piercing damage great

all right excellent feels great that was a lot of damage good work yeah sure was did these As an individual monsters or as one monster?

Yes. Magnus, you're up next. Wait, what? It is one monster made up of different parts. Cool. I'm going to attack it. Okay. Where are you attacking it?

I'm going to attack at the base of the dragon neck. Okay, so you're going to... With what? With my two-handed rail splitter. Okay. Nope, that's not going to do it. Well, let me know. Well, it was a four.

No. Yeah. No. I'm going to try my second attack now and try it again. Okay. Okay, yeah, that's probably going to do it. So, uh, 17 plus seven. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.

Okay, good. Yes. And then I'm going to use goading strike. On the goat to... No, you die. Well, if you use it on the goat, it dies instantly, because that's its weakness. So it has a goat and a ram. So it has forehead.

It has a secret fourth head on its body. So 11 damage plus superiority. And then 11 plus 5. So it needs to do a wisdom saving throw to beat 16. It has a minus 4 to wisdom. So it's a negative 2. What? So yeah, now it has disadvantage on attacks, not against me, and it takes 11 points of damage.

Okay. And now I'm going to use action surge to attack again. Okay. And I'm going to throw the chance lance at the lion's head. Okay. So that's 13 plus 7. It's a 20? Oh, sorry, 21, because of my giant slayers ring. Oh, yeah. This thing is definitely bigger than you. Definitely bigger than me. So that's nine points of damage.

All right. Next to the order is Merle. I'm going to cast mass cure wounds. Oh, okay. On us three buddies. Nice. And it is 3D8 plus my spell casting modifier. So that's a 6. And my spell casting modifier, I believe, is a 3.

So that makes it 9, correct? Yes. Well, 3D8 is three of those. Okay, so 18 for each of us. Roll it three times. I'll roll it three times. Silly. MIROL.

Another six. And another six. I'll be damn. So I was right. Six, six, six. It was accurate. 18 plus three, so we each get 21 points back. One second, wait.

You said 21? Yeah. You actually only heal for 19. For some reason, like, just feels a bit off, Merle. Like, you're, your divine, like, connection that sort of fuels all of your power, it feels a bit, um, just feels a little bit. off, just a little bit weird. So that's, that's 19 points. Still a lot, but it's just a little bit off. Well, okay. That's weird. All right, so 19 points up, correct? Yep.

Thank you very much. Uh, Taco. I needed that very much. Me too. Taco, you're up next. Okay, good. Shall I kill it? Sure. Sure. Uh, great. Awesome. Great. Um, well, I don't know if I'll be able to kill her or not, but, well, you know, we'll give it the old call, let's try. Because bad news for this, son of a bitch, is I can cast level six spells now. So what's it doing right now? I do want to point out, you can cast level six spell because you've only got the one spell slot. And I told Dad this while you were in the bathroom, but I am going to be tracking that stuff, unlike the last part. Well, then, Jesus, Griffin.

It's episode one, though. We got a lot of arc left to go. Yeah, but I like, you know that our show to this point has functioned. on the assumed rest, by which I mean it is assumed that we have rested any time that the numbers don't add up, sort of. Okay. I mean, we go two weeks. Okay, here.

She's going to get real down in Wonderland, so I don't know about that. Here, I got this. I'll try this one. How about an ice storm? Oh, shit. A hail of rock hard. Come on, really? Nice.

40-foot-high cylinders centered on a point within range. So it's basically just like a big-ass high storm, and you've got to succeed in a dexterity saving throw. I probably also have to succeed in that saving throw, don't I? Are you a creature? No. He's a creature. I mean, we got to, like...

Yeah, but I got spell shaping. You don't got spell shaping anymore. I cannot stress this enough. You gave that up when you switched to transportation. I never... I wouldn't say switched. Okay. All right, well, I don't spell shape anymore.

Well, he's turned into a heart. 13 doesn't do it? No. Magnus, how'd you do? Is it dexterity? Yeah. So it's 14 plus 2, 16. Yes, that does succeed.

15 was what we were looking for. All right. Then, so what do I do? You're going to take 2D8 bludgeoning damage and 4D6 cold damage. Man. All right. So let me do the cold damage first. Really glad I dodged.

Me too. Four. six six four wow devastating 20 cold damage and then let me grab that d8 right quick Justin is reaching for the metallic bag with when within which he keeps his die let's see what happens I'll do a good job that's what happens every time six Jesus and four so 10 30 yeah 30 all together It was a big hit. With that hit, the Dragonhead looks pretty bad off.

Now, Magnus, my dude, you do have to take half of that damage, and I am very, very sad. That's fine. You know what? I get it. I think it's what you would have wanted. So that's 15 damage to you, Magnus. Yeah, I'm done at 90s. The Merle Gibbeth and the Taco takeeth away.

I mean, listen, I'm still at 96 hit points, so I'm doing okay. Jeez. I'm a tank. The dragonhead looks pretty bad off after that hit. The other two heads look pretty hurt, but not as bad off as this dragonhead. Because the chimera is up next. The dragonhead tries to barf up a spout of flame, but nothing really comes out. So instead, it is going to snap at you, Magnus, since you goaded it.

Good luck. 19 versus AC. What if I'm at 19? No, on attack rolls, the attacker hits. Okay. Well, then I got a hit. Okay. He bites into you for 13 points of damage.

That's fine. The Ram's head is going to charge at you, Magnus. It's not charging. It's just like standing still and trying to butt you. That's just 15, though, so that's a miss. Yes. And then the lionhead is going to take disadvantage and try to attack Merle. Okay.

That was a 19 versus AC, which I imagine hits, but... It hits. 17 versus AC. No. And my AC is 18. Okay. It gets a, like, its mouth on you, but its teeth do not get through your armor and it retracts. Next up is Magnus.

Because I want the extra AC, I'm now going to switch to one-handed rail splitter and get my shield out. Okay. That'll give me a plus two to AC. Then I'm going to... I'm going to try to get on its back. Oh, okay. We're Dragon's Dog-Maying this shit. now then. Yeah. What would that be? Is that acrobatics or athletics? Um, it's going to try to buck you off. So,

I think it's going to be for you, probably athletics versus my dexterity or straight. Yeah, probably dexterity. Well, uh, I rolled a 21. I got a 16 plus seven, so 23. Okay. Yeah, you, you, you are on this thing's back and you're grabbed on. I guess that's probably one of my actions, right? Is that the move? That is, we'll say that is, I mean, that's one of your actions, yes. Okay, and then I will attack the base of the dragon neck. Okay, we'll say you have advantage since you kind of have a good position on it now. Okay, good, because that was a one.

Okay, so 15 plus 7, 22, 23. That is a hit. Eight plus six, 14 points of damage. Okay, the dragon head, it looks like unconscious now. The dragon head is just kind of hanging limp. Cool. That's it, right? Because you did two actions.

Okay. Merle, you are up. I am going to cast a brand new one. Insect plague. Holy shit. Okay. Swarming, biting locusts. Fill a 20-foot radius sphere centered on a point you choose within range.

A creature takes four D-10 piercing damage, but it has to make a constitution-saving throw. Okay. You're just going to aim that. right at Magnus or like you're gonna just sort of put that one. I'm going to I'm gonna aim the sphere at the feet of the chimera. I don't think that dog's gonna hunt because that would mean you're aiming it into the into the ground. The conceit for area of affected attacks is that they have collateral damage and the only way to like abate that is to plan around it. Okay, I hit him with the sphere. Okay. You got 96 points right Magnus?

Sure. What do what happens? Where does it have all the points you had? Constitution. Constitution you say? Yeah. Yes. Okay, it's the 20. What are... What's up there? Yeah! The crit 20!

The bugs swarm around me. You're dodged in my fucking Neo. All right, so I should need to roll 4D... Well, no, I rolled a 19. I think this thing saved, but it has to move, right? Or else... Creature takes 4D10 piercing damage on a failed save. Right.

Or half as much damage on a successful one. Okay, so there's the half damage. So you still roll damage. Oh, cool. Wait, is that the 10? All right. Seven. Five.

Zero. Oh, that's ten. Ten. Yeah. So what is it up to so far? 22. 22. 19.

Wow. 21. But half that, right? Yeah. Okay. No, half of 31. 31. Okay, so 15 and a half points.

Just 15. Even though I critted, Griffin? Okay, you round up to 16. Yeah. No, wait. Hold on. Even though you critted. That seems unlikely

Um As it takes that It was so constituted though It takes that damage And the lion head Now droops down Uh And is unconscious

And with that The goat head Like bleats loudly And it rears back Uh On its back legs And Magnus you You

Uh Magnus I guess make a Dex save Uh I mean Is it eight Okay yeah You get thrown

off its back to the ground, but you don't take any damage. And the goat head, the only sort of remaining head and the rest of its body extends those wings, and it starts to flap them to fly off. And it gets a few feet off the ground, and then an arrow comes in and hits that goat head right in the right in the dome. And with that, the chimera just instantly falls to the ground dead. And when you look behind you... Oh, please be Hawkeye. Please be Hawkeye.

It's the guy himself. The hawk guy. The hawk guy. You see a few people. You see a half-elf man who is kind of gruff. and dressed mostly in pelts, and he's holding this big-ass long bow in, like, attack position. So he was the one who shot that arrow. He's got a short, shaggy beard and dark red hair.

With him, you see a wood elf who has dark purple hair and nearly identical leather armor to the half elf with the bow, and she's holding this knotted, natural wooden staff. And these two are standing. in like combat poses. And from out behind a tree, sort of cautiously poking his head outward, you see a kind of scrawny human man who is no older than like 20 years old, probably. But he's dressed in like this finery that is white and gold. He is the cleanest thing in a 10-mile radius.

Is there a role, is there a skill that would like let you know who people are? In fourth edition, there was streetwise. Is there anything like that in this game? What would you roll to, like, know who... History? History or insight? I have legend lore. A spell.

Inside. If I describe a person, if I describe a person... How about just make a straight-up intelligence role? Oh. I got an 18. 20. I got a natural four. Magnus and Taco, you recognize this guy.

he is Lord Artemis Sterling the ruler of Neverwinter and the most powerful man in the world But I get the credit on the kill, right? Oh, deaf, okay Maximumfund.org Comedy and Culture

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