The Adventure Zone - The Adventure Zone: Ethersea - Episode 19

Episode Date: December 2, 2021

The Abyssal Auction: Part Six With the auction house's security systems thwarted, the facility's survivors attempt a hasty retreat. Zoox does what Zoox does best: Networking with unidentified, dangerous sea life.Additional music in this episode: "Night I" by Swelling https://swelling.bandcamp.com; "So sorry little girl" by ROZKOL https://rozkol.bandcamp.com/; and "Fearweaver" by Three Chain Links https://soundcloud.com/beardmont/. 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, Ethersea. You all have the journal. Obviously, this yellow smiley face has the AI core. Oh, I took the codite. I will reduce the price that you owe for the journal. 15 Lux. His collar falls off. He is the owner of the Dreams of Debra.

The coral thing is lifeless, right? Yeah. I pull its head off. Oh, fuck. Sabres squid. He's going to just jet straight up with the tongs. ended in front of him to try to damage the squid. But what you do see is a small hole and kind of looks like your security baton.

God damn it. And the batons are gone. Here's something. You hear the low hum of the coral ship that just attacked the upper level of this room. With one of its non-exploded tentacles, it is going to. to reach over and try to grab you. Me? Yeah, dude.

Devo, you see Amber wrapped up in this one tentacle that the squid was holding out of the water. And as it falls, that tentacle goes limp. And you watch Amber plummet and splash into this completely opaque, shadowy water. And in the flash of an eye, she is gone. They'll do the talking parts and the creation And all I gotta do is have my ears open

Whiz me away Macaroy Bros. And Clint Open up my mind Shut up Shut the fuck up Sorry I thought you were okay Open up my mind's eye

Cause I'm Rupert Grins The number one fan of the adventure zone All right. Macquarie Brothers and Dad is filmed before live, Rupert Grant. This is a new thing I'm doing is individual theme songs. Too often, people make theme songs for the show, but they don't make it for the listener. That's good, yeah. I would have spent the time that you used writing that song to start rolling a new character

because of Amber's current situation, but I suppose we should resolve that right now, yeah? Well, the joke's on you. Okay. Because I improvise the song. Oh, okay. So, because there's egg on your face. Why we start? From grace.

That's how it worked. That's what you, that's all you do. That was really good. That's all you do. Why don't you make a death saving throw right now just to, just to kick things off? Okay. What happened to her? Oh, do we need to take a break and explain what happened at the end of the last episode?

You know what for the listeners? At the end of the last episode, you would. were crushed by the cybersquid, and then the cybersquid got knocked out, and then you fell into magically pitch black water. Zooks is also down there having just slain the beast, but is sort of caught underneath it as it falls, and Devo is still up on the surface. I guess aware that, this is fun. Devo, you know that Amber just fell in the water. Zooks, you don't because there's, how would you, right? Okay, right.

So what I need to know is... Let's start with those death saving throw. Yeah. Where do you... Just a flat D20. Is it just a D? Does it keep track of that? Because there's a place where it tracks death saves.

Yeah, you need to mark that in yourself. Oh, okay. Okay, got it. Okay, flat D20. Yes, you're looking for an 11 or above. Here's what we got. What we got is a 6. Right.

That's a failure. So why don't you go ahead and put a mark in the... put a in the failure in the failure got it okay yeah that's a cool yeah I thought but it's good to make sure you know I you would think I was very familiar with a failure column and I can't even find it hmm you only get it when you're dead so or knocked out yeah no no no there's not a grand choir keeping track of all your life's failures and successes uh it's actually a 10 a 10 or higher for a death saving throw oh so the six is still still still Definitely, yeah. Amber, you are, you're unconscious, which I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing when you are also drowning.

But it alone is a pretty bad thing. But your mind is still like active inside of you. I wanted to ask, have you ever in all of your years of, you know, fishery, have you ever fallen overboard and experienced this before? Or know somebody who, who. who has gone into the briny deep. She fell once before when they were on an expedition to look for the blink shark hive. She had never been out on the water before because it was very early, you know, just when society was getting ready to move into the sea. Yeah. And she fell in. Normally she and her family have just been coastal fisher people, you know, using the coasts and what have you. But she fell in and it was terrifying.

Yeah, you got to go where the blink sharks go. Got to go where the blink sharks go. That's what they say. Even though you are unconscious, there is a part of you that feels that familiar feeling right now. maybe a few feet away, maybe a couple of meters away, maybe several dozen, is Zooks. You are underneath this thing. Two of its tentacles have been blasted off and maybe you still have a knife buried in it. Maybe not.

But you feel yourself being pulled down. And as you try to get out from under this turbo squid, you realize that your foot is sort of pinched. inside of its beak and you are, you are stuck. What do you do? Obviously, drowning is not necessarily a concern for you. No, but being inside a big, oaky squid, yeah. Should have thought of that before I jetted up in there. I bet the squid feels the same way about you, Dad.

So let's not throw stones, okay? Yeah. Do you think the squid enjoys you being inside of it? Yeah, I don't know, maybe. You're not deeply inside of it. It's just like it caught your ankle in its beak. Well, just remember, Griffin, not too long ago, he was elbowed deep in the squid. I was hit first, right?

So if it grabbed my ankle with its beak. Yeah, so question stands. What do you do? I don't think he has much choice. I think he just has to keep whacking away in there and doing as much damage as he possibly can inside the squid. I mean, you can't get out, right? Is the Squidsil conscious? It is unconscious.

You dropped its HP to zero. I will tell you that as the dungeon man. Okay. Thank you, Dungeon Man. Yes, of course. I think he's going to try to pry open the beak. How big is this beak? You have no idea.

It's dark. It's dark. There's magical darkness everywhere that you cannot see through. All right. So making a perception check wouldn't help. No, I would... Unless it was really good. How about a nature check?

Sure. His knowledge of squids. I'll allow it. Okay. That would be a three. Don't know much about squids and stuff. Ooh. One just knocked me right.

I'm mine stuff. Oh, man. And you're like Billy Ocean. Yeah. Yeah, you don't really know what the beak looks like at all. It could be four, you know, hooked mouth parts. It could just be like a bird's beak. You don't know.

But you're trapped in it and it doesn't feel great. All right. I'm going to try to wedge with just by feel. Can I reach down to where? Yeah, of course. Okay. I'm going to, first of all, pull whatever part of me is inside the squid out of the squid. I'm going to do a squid exit.

Okay, this is going to be just a strength check then. 13 plus 1, 14. Yeah, I mean, this thing is unconscious. It can't really contest you in this. You reach your finger-like coral down there and pull as hard as you can. And it's mouth prized just wide enough for you to get your foot out of it. It is still, like, confusing what is going on because most of the squid is still above you.

But like, you don't really know which way is up or what. Maybe you can sort of intuit that, well, the squid is falling down on me this way. So that must be up because of gravity. But it's still very, very sort of disorienting down here. Devo. Yeah. The first thing you see as this squid goes down is the jet bridge doorway sort of emerges out of the ground. and you can see the jet bridge that you walked into this facility on.

But, I mean, you also just saw Amber fall in the water. And not only that, that sound of the ship outside is interrupted by two more sort of explosions just above you. You get the feeling that that elevator is like being flooded right now. And in fact, I'll say this. Some water is starting to come out of the elevator's, like closed doors. Okay. I'll tell this was we can't see because this is a podcast of the mind

that for just like half of a second, maybe even less, like, Devo hesitates. And then like, fuck. And like touches his shirt and cast slight. Slight. Light casts light. Oh, I apologize. Cast slight.

On his shirt. Okay. And then jumps into the water after amber. Hmm. How does light affect magical darkness? Yeah. It's magical light. Yeah, I will allow it.

It is, light typically sheds in a 20-foot radius, right? I will say that the spell is limited somewhat by this complete darkness. So I'm going to say it's like just a little bit in front, maybe 10, feet instead. So as you dive in, you cannot see Amber in the immediate vicinity. So he's just going to like do his best doggy paddle that he practiced and is, let's admit it, not very good at to try to like move down. Yeah, well, let the dice decide. Why don't you roll an athletics check for me? And just sort of going by statistics, this should be a good one. Yeah, there it is, baby. 18. That's a 17 plus one.

plus one. All right. You start, weirdly, you start doing that doggy paddle, but downwards, which I don't know if that is even possible, but you feel that like mom lifting a car off their baby energy and you just start powering downward. And you see Amber face up falling downward deeper into the water. Amber, please make another death save for me. It would be great if you could get a better number this time. A piece of that just, the tip just got me, O'Dell. That's a nine.

Just got me. Oh, that got me good. You all right? A piece of that tip just got me. It's a nine. Guys. You got to start rolling better. This is going to be a fucking total party white in the, in the...

Um, okay. Uh, geez. That fear that you were just having because of the, um, because of this like flashback, uh, it turns to euphoria. Like in, in your deep, you know, hind brain, uh, you feel this sense of, of absolute happiness and pleasure. And the dream changes that you were having about, uh, the last time that you fell in. only this time you are just looking at a horizon of green grass everywhere that you look.

And in the distance, there is a figure silhouetted by the sun, and it is an enormous human or a humanoid-shaped being. You can't see features because of the position of the sun behind it. But this thing is enormous. And you start to, you know, think, have I ever seen a statue like this before? And then you see this thing lift its foot and take a step. Zooks. You are freed from the squid. You have an idea of which way is up.

But you also get the impression that if you go crazy down here, you're going to lose sense of which way is up. I suppose you could swim in one direction for a while until you can get out of the darkness. but that's, I will give you that. Give me a perception check now. Jeez. Seven. Yeah, you don't, you do not see anything. What do you do?

I would assume that the magical darkness is also keeping me from seeing the light. The light, yeah. Yeah, well, with a seven. Yeah, I would say with a seven. Yeah, absolutely. That's one of the top things that darkness is good at. You have failed. And I ask that you respect the dramatic irony because right now you have no idea

that your whole crew is down here with you right now. Right. Well, I think he's going to, he wants to surface then, because as far as he knows, they're all up on the surface. Yay, they killed the squid. So I would have to assume that he can still touch the squid, right? Even though it's falling? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Well, then just, he just picks a direction and shoots out at top speed towards his side, keeping his hand on the bottom of the squid until he's clear of it. Okay, so you're going to go right up to the server. You get past the squid, no problem. The squid is not a danger to you anymore. Are you going to swim upward toward the surface? Yeah, and I think that's the only logical thing because he doesn't know where the rest of them are. Yeah, I will do this for you.

Make a just straight up D20 luck check. And that's 10. You shoot upwards and you can see light. You can see the lighted shirt. And in fact, it is, you got so close while swimming upwards that you can see it is, it is Devo swimming down. Technically, I guess that was just a move if you want to do something also. How close is he to Devo? Oh, you're within.

Yeah, I mean, you can, you can touch him. Like you can, you got to him, basically. Okay. Then he swims to Devo. Looks at him. I mean, I mean, sure. Is Devo wearing his vape suit? No.

No, he is not. We can't. We absolutely have to keep calling at that. Well, then, okay. Then I think Zooks would grab Devo and try to head to the surface. No, Devo's pointing so hard. No. Okay, here's what I'm going to do.

First off, Devo, I want you to make a, like, you're just doing it through simipore, right? Like you're just like pointing and nodding sort of enthusiastic. Notting. Yeah, right. Why don't you make a, let's say performance check, right? Okay. Not persuasion? Oh, my God.

Seven total. Two plus five. Yeah, you just, you are doing all these things, but Zooks is just a man on a mission. So now we are going to have a contested athletics check. Okay. I got 13 plus one. 14. Not bad. Let's see, Zooks. Look this. This watches be the Nat 20. Yeah.

It's a seven. Okay. Wow. By, this is awesome because it is Devo's turn now. Devo, you like, amaze yourself with your swimming strength because Devo tries to grab you and go up and you try to communicate with him. Yeah. Zeus tries to grab you and tries to pull you up. But you're like beast mode that you have activated here. like you break off of him, like you pull him down a bit. And yeah, I guess we'll resolve what Zooks does later,

but Devo, you have broken free. Devo pushes off of Zooks, like kicks off of Zooks, and reaches and stretches to try to touch Amber. Try to catch Amber. Okay, are you doing anything to try and find Amber other than just like getting a little bit of extra speed? Well, you said I could see her. Oh, yes.

Okay. Yes, that's right. Okay. You can get there, right? We have firmly established at this point that you are swimming like a demon. So you easily reach Amber. As soon as he touches her, like finger brushes her and his lungs are burning, he screams underwater and casts cure wounds. Hmm. Let's just do this. Why don't you do a Constitution saving throw? That's not my strong suit. You know we should have... Oh, Jesus. You know what they should have,

Dungeons and Dragons? Should have, like, a preparation role that happens after the fact. Like, did I do the thing? Yeah. The difficulty is rated on, like, how logical it would have been. Yeah.

I don't know. There are games that do stuff like that. Like, I think Blades in the Dark has a system like that. A lot of, like, high-star P.Gs do stuff like that. We can like homebrew that into 5E but um okay Devo you I mean you just get choked with with water you are able to get the the vape going and get that salt in your lungs but also you have no breath anymore yeah and you are you are starting to drown um but you have

healed Amber it why don't you roll uh why don't you roll uh Amber you're going to heal for 8. points. Oh, wow. A generous heel. Yeah. Chunky heel. And with that, you are conscious. We can get rid of those two. Just as a, just curious. Can you roll a D20 for me? Yeah, I do want you to roll a D20 for me. I am curious. Alternate universe. In an alternate universe, I rolled a two and died forever. That's the holy smokes. I'm not kidding. That's, that's fucking wild, man. Yeah. So that, the bacon is saved. It's a clutch. For you. For you. Clutch play. Yeah. Yeah, you've traded. Okay, so here's the thing. You two are going to have to make Constitution Saving Throws on your turns now because you are underwater without breath.

But we'll do that at the end of turns. Amber, you are awake. Devo has his hands or one hand on you. You feel like you've been healed. He's done it before. You know that feeling. But he looks panicked a little bit and exhausted. and it's your turn.

If he looks panicked, I'm going to grab him and try to swim for the surface. Okay, you make an athletics check for me. 19 plus 4. Fuck yes. Okay, you are pushing it. You are pushing it pedal to the metal, and you are, you've just got him by the scruff of his neck, pulling him upward. You can also see, like, your hand holding his scruff. You can see a bit of the back of his neck, a little bit of his arm, is starting to turn ethereal.

It is starting to vanish in the way that it did when Debo was exposed in the clam to the water. Yeah, while Devo was curing you, he accidentally made his mom and dad not meet. Yeah, it was. And now it's the whole thing. So you are pushing upwards. You got this. Like you feel that you've got this. But also, you just, like, exerted a lot of energy in not dying.

So you can, you get the feeling that you can make it to the story first if you push it. If you want to get there, you can make a constitution in the saving throw or you can just kick it. Let's push it. Okay. Come on. That's a three. Oh, that got me good. Oh, that got me good.

You all right? A piece of that tip just got me. Okay, you managed to grab him, but you take a deep breath of water as you are going upward. You feel it fill your lung. lungs, and you're going to take six points of drowning damage. But you have made it to the surface as you get up here. And let's just say that water and a lot of other water comes out of you in a pretty gross way. Not Devo.

Devo, you never actually gulped down some water, but you are now on the surface also. My one's fucking hurt. Like my whole chest is burning. Yeah. And Zooks also say that you saw them going upward, right? if Devo was close to you when he swam down. So it is your turn. What do you do?

I suppose now business is done and you saw your party going up, like you wouldn't just hang out. I believe he'll join them. Yeah, of course. All right. You go up to the surface also and pull yourself onto the deck of this hangar bay. And Devo is there too, just laying on his back, catching his breath. Amber is like on all fours trying to get the, the rest of the bad water out.

How good are you at that, Amber? It's probably something you've done before last time you drowned. Absolutely. Okay. I use Mage Chan to pound on her back to help the water out. Yeah, you...

There's no time. It's flooding. Okay, don't make that noise again. Just the folly was rough. No time. No time. We have to get to the choreolas. Yeah, either way.

It's right there. Go. Okay, I'll run for the Coriolis. Okay. Yeah. Devo's like doing his best. I mean, he's very dizzy. Let's say that.

Well, Zook helps him. Okay. Throws his arm over his shoulder and Zooks helps him get to the ship. Yeah, we'll just say that you all do it, right? You just rolled 100 athletics checks. I'm not going to make you do that again. You get back to the Coriolis and just as the airlock door shuts behind you, you hear like a giant metal can just being.

crushed as the station above you implodes. Oh, those poor cards. Yeah, man. What are you going to do? They're in Beef City because of you guys. And we see their batons floating down in water. No, they turn to ash. All right, you guys are back aboard your ship.

You can still hear, you could still hear the, you know, bleached ship that you saw outside, just its engines humming, even though you are still in the dark. Do we have any kind of like sensors are shit in the darkness to know where to go? Yes. I think you can see the wreckage of the station on your sensors. I don't think you get like a topographical map or anything like that, but you know which way to go to not run into the wreckage. Okay, yeah, we just gun it away from there then. Because Roland Arcanic check for me.

Okay. We're not good at this whole room. Oh, my shit. That's a grit fail. That's a natty one, my friends. Okay. You don't know anything about this. spell you skipped uh you know make a dark cloud magic yeah uh you don't know anything about it

and i'll tell you man to mention one d i don't even know if divos think about it it's just like get the fuck out uh you know slap the wheel on and go okay well we're we're out of initiative for right now um so where where's everybody else going on the ship is divo rushes to the bridge god hell i'm gonna run for the safest place of the ship. Which is? Amber's Place. Ambers Place. Okay.

You run to Amber's Place. As you get in there, you see Urchin reading one of your magazines. And he catches eyes with you and then like skitters up the wall and climbs into a... Does he leave the magazine? He does. He drops the magazine. And Zooks, you said you were heading to the bridge to help. Yeah.

I'll run to the bridge to help. Maybe somebody needs to man the... I mean, there's nothing to see. We can't see anything. but I'm going to run and be up there just in case we need to fire off weapons or whatever. Well, that would be on the like weapons deck, right? You don't have the, there is a thing that lets you remote control weapons from the bridge, but you all don't have that yet.

Don't we have flares? They would not work in this water, in this magically darkened water. Only my light work because it was magical light. Yeah. Okay, I'm just going to run up the bridge and see what I can. do doubt. Okay. You have the helm, Devo. Yeah, so wherever the wreckage is, I'm going 180 degrees the opposite direction. Okay. Yeah, I mean, you start up the choreolos and, you know, travel for 30, 40 feet or so, and you come out of the magical darkness, because it's not a

big spell, but you are freed from it. And as you come out of the darkness, make a speed roll. Speed check for me on the ship. Okay, that's a D20, right? It is. Well, that's good. 15 plus whatever. You come out of it at... 15 plus 5, so 20.

Yeah, that's excellent. You come out of it at like a low enough angle that you are below this bleached coral ship and it has not spotted you yet. Yeah, I'm running. D-Vos running. Okay. We are all beat to shit.

Of course. And like, I have only one first level. spell. There's only the drags of some prestige in my spray. Yeah, sure. Just have to get the fuck out. Okay. Then you're going to make another speed check to try and get out of here unseen.

Okay, come on. Let me run. Let me be a little baby coward. Nine plus five, fourteen. Yeah, absolutely. I will give that to you because you just did this navigation role. So you're riding high. Okay. You

very gingerly then. sort of press off to not attract the attention of this ship. And you managed to get away. Was that the one? Huh? Was that the one? The one. The one.

The encounter? Oh. Was that encounter the result of the one that rolled? I'm so sorry. No. No, it's just another bad thing. Are you so sorry? Are you so sorry for not understanding?

are you so sorry for what is yet to go? A little bit of both. Okay, perfect. Great. That was cute, though, that you thought that was it. I prepared this table of a hundred different occasions, and he rolled the lowest imaginable number. Yeah, no.

I can get a squid. A squid is not the hundredth worst thing you could think of. Yeah. Hello. I'm Peewee Herman. You might know me from TV, but I really want to be a DJ. It took some convincing.

But KCRW finally agreed to give me an hour on the radio to play you some music with my friends. Anyway, tune in for one hour of the bestest, most funnest time you'll ever have on the Pee-Wee-Herman Radio Hour. I am personally inviting you to tune your transistor radio in to hear me or go to kCRW.com. Duh. It'll be available for the whole week From November 26th to December 3rd So you can listen to it again And again and again and again and again

And again The Pee-Wee-Herman Radio Hour Was produced by Maximum Fun And can be streamed on KCRW.com Until December 3rd All right, you all are just cruising back I'll give you a little chance to catch your breath You all can take a short rest if you would like

Nice Is there somewhere to count? What comes back on a short rest? You roll... Just put it on the sheet. I see it at the top, right? Yeah, the sheet does it for you. Yeah, the sheet does it for you.

You're just kicking it in Amber's place, Amber? She threw up in the toilet in there. Cool. And then she sat down and stared at the wall for 30 minutes straight and breathed deeply and tried to, like, fucking chill. Yeah, okay. You know what I mean? And now she's, all right. Yeah.

She got a juice box. She was fucking going to kick out. She's good. As you all are out of the water, the little ethereal parts of your body have patched over. Sorry, I just got healed max on a dice. I made me really happy. Fuck yeah, dude. Zooks, are you healing?

Plus three, so I'm healed up. Okay. So you at 29. Yeah, that would bring you to 32. You're 31 hit points max. Okay, yeah, you all are all healed up. Zooks, where are you specifically right now while you're taking your short rest? Um, the galley.

Zook's star. Do we have a galley? I would, well, there's some place where the food is, right? I mean, we have rations. It's, it's more of a, like, closet, right? You guys have, like, the bare minimum living space. So it's a nook. It's like a galley, nook.

It's a nook of a galley, yeah. Like at the hotels where they have, like, pop tarts and two bags and, you know, bottles of water. Yes. Sure. Yes. And it's always like some. whack nickname like Lake Cafe

Yeah The hot The local market Presents Le Caffe The local market Yeah Yes yeah

The fresh The fresh market Okay I'm at our fresh market It's a Dorito It's like you've got like a bag of Doritos And there's Mike and Ike's And there's There's one Mick Ultra

Welcome to Mom's pantry This is just Twix bars It's just twigs bars And diarrhea It's just Twix bars and diarrhea It's that Okay, so he's swelling down

Twix bars and diarrhea medicine Wait, so hold on So Zook does eat food He mashes it into his hole, remember? Yeah, we talked about this. Oh, okay, okay, sorry, it's been a while. He mashes it into whatever hole he uses for his mouth. Awesome.

And he just was starved to death Because getting all up in it with a squid, that takes it out of you, man. By the way, thank you for not telepathically having a moment with the squid. You know, I thought about it. And then you remember what happened last time? I remember how much shit I got from my co-collaborators. No, that was not from Travis.

That was from Devo. Yeah. Devo is very worried about Zook because Zook's is now part clam. It's unclear. Why don't you, maybe you're thinking about that regret, while horking down some good caramel. So I need to make a regret roll? No, actually, I want you to make a perception check.

Oh, God, I'm really good at those. It's perception. It's smooth Sam from here. That's a six. You perceive nothing. Sir, my good sir, you perceive nothing. All right. We're going to hop right from there up to the bridge.

Have we even had a double-digit roll? You had a couple. I rolled good a couple times. Devo, are you resting at the helm or what's your, what's your, okay. I would say that he is, and I'll give you this little gift. Yeah. A little distracted. I would say.

A lot has gone on, so like he's flying, but maybe he's thinking a lot about how kind of, let's face it, fucked up the day was. Okay. Maybe you're just having a moment of self-reflection, not even looking at the helm particularly closely. And then you hear a beep-peep coming from the dashboard. And when you look down on it, you can see that sensor readout of your ship. And behind your ship, there is something approaching. And in fact, the ship looks so unique that maybe you can even, you know, figure that.

out with the sensor. The bleached ship is following you, and it is closing the gap event. What do you do? He is both going to call out through whatever our com system is. Ambien zooks to the bridge, and he's going to attempt to go faster? You could push it, right?

That's one of the gambits. I think you would need to make a speed check because you're not necessarily in position. So you would attempt to beat the eight plus the enemy's speed, which is a four, so a 12. So you can push it. Oh, okay, then you try to push it,

and then you hear, oh God, oh God, push it is bad. Push it does bad stuff. On a success, you become in position nullifying any positional bonuses your enemy may have selected. On a failure, you forfeit your position roll next round, and your propulsion system suffers damage. Oh, that's the one roll. Yeah. You all hear from the back of the ship a... And the propulsion system is damaged.

Your ship's speed has been reduced to zero. Not stopped, but you just mean that plus... It's not stopped. Right. But, you know, maybe just one of your bladders is non-functional. And so, you know. Oh, that would be me. Okay. And then within seconds, the coral ship is right on top of you. Everybody, roll initiative.

Amber's made her way up to the bridge, I should mention. Yeah, I figure when you hear that, p. Where, where's that? And I call, I say, hey. Oh, that's right, yeah. Come up here. Oh, my God. 18. Yeah.

I got an A plus 10. I'm going to change the appearance of my dice and see if that helps. Yeah, that ought to do it. Maybe that'll do it. Zooks? Um, uh,

that's 12. Okay. It's just, just an issue. Don't sound sad. It's just initiative. And it's better than mine. Okay. Better than Travis's.

It's been a bit since we've done ship combat. We start out with a, uh, a speed contest to see who is in position. Uh, so that's just going to be a flat D20. for the choreolus. And Divo, you make that way.

Come on now. I got to choose it. The new dice. Fuck, train. Well, I got a two. I got a two. I got a two. Actually, wait, it's two plus four or six.

You still beat me, though. Okay, you get to, you are in position, and you get to take a gambit. I'll tell you the problem, Justin. Can't figure out how to change the dice appearance. Yeah, that's true. Oh, that explains it. I think, am I correct, Griffin?

And in thinking that the dried coral ship, the bleached coral ship, is much larger than ours? It's not a dreadnought, right? Right. It could still reason. There are people who own ships of that size. You know what? I'm going to say it's about Dreams of Deborah sized, which is larger than the Coriolis. Can we talk?

How do we know that they're attacking us? Why are we in, you know, red alert? They rammed the stations. They killed people. and now they're following us. So I think it's probably safe to assume that they don't want to just hang out. You know what happens when you assume.

You live. Yeah, you survive because you didn't wait to see if the person killed you. Okay. Amber? Um, hmm. Yeah, maybe we buy our time just a little bit,

see what's going on. I hate to make the first move. I don't know what's going on. Oh, sorry. Uh, I'm, we are not going to fight them. We are going to get away. This is, okay. Yeah.

We're all fine with that. Okay, great. Yes. I'm going to take evasive action. Uh, automatically succeeds while in position. You do a daring maneuver to avoid enemy assault. Now wait. What was Travis's initiative?

Uh, they always, the pilot always goes first. His initiative role is for like, if things get on the ship and there is like a, you know, someone attacks Zooks, then, you know, if Zooks gets up, then he's in, he's in. He's in normal, normal order. So roll a speed saving throw, adding your proficiency bonus, which is a two. Well, aren't I in position? You are in position. Oh, it automatically succeeds.

That's right. Yeah. Okay. So what you get from that is you have advantage on any ship combat saving throws you make this round. So I'm going to say to make it more visual and interesting. So now that our bladder, one of our bladders is down and we can't outrun him, he does the thing, you know, where you kind of hit the brakes a little bit and drops beneath their ship. Oh, sure. That's great. So, like, it's hard to get a line, a target on them underneath.

This is hope. Awesome. That is your pilot turn. Next in the order is the coral ship. Let's go ahead and, you know, cash that. check make a speed saving throw with advantage okay so it's just a D20 right I don't have any yes you all see a small like messy cluster of coral that has like large holes almost like a like a orb of spider webs and you see something glowing inside of it as they drop it right right down on

top of the bridge I got a 15 and a 16 okay you see it at the last second and roll out of the way as a some sort of bomb that is emitting this bright, bright light detonates just off the port side.

And then for its second turn, it is going to, yeah, there's more than one. There's more than one being on that ship too. You see a large spike come out of the side of the ship and sort of take a bead

on your ship and it starts charging. Next in the order is Zooks. We need to get the engine fixed. Is this something you can do Zooks? Can you fix the engine? You know what I'm going to do? I'm going to... I need to do a gambit, right?

No, no, no. That's just for the pilot. Oh, I don't do any gambit. No. Okay. You're just a regular... I'll do a gamut real quick. Shell?

I got some cards in my pocket. Yeah, that's real good. I have mutant powers, Sherry. Bons change. Very good. All right, my instinct, now I'm not going to follow my instinct for a change. Okay.

I think Zook's is going to go down and see what he can do for the engine. Okay. You run back the way that you came and you start to head into the engine deck. Make a... Because you were just sort of sprinting through the ship, make a perception role

with disadvantage. Don't need it. That is a 10. Plus one, 11. 11. Yep. And that is a 19. That 19 defo would have gotten you there.

With an 11, you can't tell where it is coming from. For all you know, it's coming from the coral ship above you. But you feel a brief moment of that, like, that psychic connection that you can feel sometimes. That's just your move, though. you have been what can i pinpoint um for and i want to do something to pinpoint where it's coming from uh i will let you do that uh but that that will be your that'll be your action okay yeah all right it's going to be my action let me think of what to make you roll on this uh i don't think arcana oh you know what we may never use this stat for anything else so let's say animal handling

right? This thing only works with animals. So we'll say that that is the official skill for this ability. Okay, all right. Animal handling. That's a 16 plus 3, 19. It's coming from mom's pantry. It's coming very close to where you were just sort of hanging out and getting your energy back during your short rest.

like you feel it without a shadow of a doubt. So we're back up to the top of the order. Well, Amber. Didn't you do, Amber? No. No? Oh, okay. I rolled a 20.

Yeah, you should have gone first. I apologize. Amber, you are up. I want to shoot the ship with guns. Okay. Which one? You have several. Let me look at some of my favorite guns.

Yeah. Okay. I'm going to fire the broadside cannon. Okay. Just like straight upwards. into the ship's belly because you guys are straight upwards

in the ship's belly All right Roll. And I'm gonna say Huff my ass Jizz burgers Nice you the sheep

You 1,000% No they can't Like you guys are In a ship in the water And they are a different ship You know for sure They didn't hear that I think when you call

somebody Gizburger they feel it I said I also said before that I said hail them Open a Calm Oh okay okay Sorry

I didn't hear that part Cross all frequency And then he did, he used our holographic projection technology to send a very clear image of Amber to their bridge saying, saying off my asterisk. That's great. Hey, slow down. I'm writing all this down. Because when I make shit up, I get yelled at. No, no, no.

Dad, do write it all down for the novelization. Right. This is the kind of the stuff when we started working on the balance novels. We were like, shit, we have to go back and listen all that stuff. So go ahead and just write it all in right now. And don't write any context around it. Just write down the sentence, Huff my ass of Jizzburgers.

And just leave it laying around for Carol to find. Should I make that the fifth rule? No, it's not really a rule when you think about it. It's not. It's not you have to huff someone's ass Jizberger. Is that jizz with two Zs? You know it is. Huff my ass JZ.

Yeah, of course it is. Or is it JZ ball? If it's J.I.D could be pronounced. like, yeah. Can I do the roll? Yes, please, Christ. It's a D20 plus three for the sensor bonus. That's a five plus three, eight.

Then it... Even though you are bad dice. Just below them, your shot goes wide. Shouldn't I have advantage? Because we're just below them. No, I'm sorry. Come on. I don't do that kind of stuff anymore, guys.

I know. No, you don't. You used to be right here driven. You used to be cool. I know. You shoot a shot up. It's not that you missed. It's that it like passes through a large crack in like the hall of this, this ship.

In fact, you can see as you aim your shot, this ship is like hollow. It is like a skeleton of a ship. And you can't necessarily see like any personnel inside of it. But your shot just goes through one crack and out another crack. It's just like an incredibly unlucky shot. Seems like I'm the oranges burger who's up in any ass to that. Yeah. Okay, back to the top. Pilot, let's do a speed contest, a position roll. That is 7 plus 4 and 11. Oh, I got a five. And once again, let me put in a little cinematic context here. Assuming that Zooks has gone to fix the engine, Divo's like, all right, let's do it and goes to punch it and nothing happens.

Woo-woo-woo-woo-woo-woo. Okay. Okay, this ship is moving irregularly in ways that ships should not be able to move. It turns so that its port side is facing downward toward your ship, and then it kind of like strafes to the left and drops down right next to you. And as they pull off this maneuver, they get ready to attack. So they are going to use broadside, which is going to be. grant them extra AC against your ships attacks this round.

You get to make a gambit as well. I want to begin escaping, but that does not make sense if our engine's not repaired yet. Well, remember, escaping is a two-turn action. Right, right, right. You set it up on one, and then the next time you win position at any time during this encounter, you can escape. I'm going to begin escaping. Okay, okay, go ahead and, you don't have to roll anything. You start escaping.

Okay, top of the order is Amber. Go ahead and go again because I fucked up last time. Do I need to... The broad side can is that going to reload, right? Yes, the reload tag means you cannot use them again two rounds in a row. Okay. I'm going to fire the slug launcher. I want to redeem myself.

Okay. Go ahead and roll D20 plus three. She waits this time. She doesn't say anything. 15 plus 3. She waits in silence. That is a miss with the extra AC that this ship has. She nods knowingly in silence.

This time when you fire at it, it looks like it's about to hit it head on. And then the hull shifts a bit to create a new crack to just let the slug pass through it. Hey, y'all, this whole thing is fucked. Yes, for real? I know this. Yes. Don't try to. Listen, don't try to shoot.

them and most certainly don't announce like a cool zinger and then shoot them because they ain't going to fly we gotta get out of here uh Zooks it's your turn what can us non-pilots do

Griff like other than I mean you can improvise actions you can use weapons you can use tools if you have any available you can you can repair things can we leave the ship in ship to ship combat.

Sure. I will say that the ships are going full speed, so it would be a bit tricky to catch up. Actually, right now they're probably not, right? Because the ship has made a crazy maneuver to pitch around it, and, you know, the Coriolis wasn't going that fast. So, yeah, you can get outside.

And if you have an idea for something to do, the system sort of encourages that as well. All right, Zuchs, what are you thinking? This psychic contact, he's got to follow up on that psychic contact. Sure, absolutely. And I don't know. It seems to me the best way to do that would be to leave the ship and approach the coral ship. I just told you that you felt that psychic connection coming from somewhere in mom's pantry, which is a boy.

Yeah, where the food is. I think he makes his way to mom's pantry as fast as he can. As soon as you, like, get into the, like, public space of the ship where the pantry is located, you know that the, this, this, this vibe is coming from your bag, which you left in here while you were taking your short rest. He opens the bag and pulls out the skull. Make a wisdom saving throw for me. Jeez. Six. As you pull out the skull, you instinctively feel like.

like a shock run up your body, not like an electric shock, but like, you know, you are a body made out of coral and this made you feel like a human body sensation that you have not ever felt before. You are going to take 11 points of psychic damage. That was just, that is not your action, though. That is just this thing's sort of reaction to being touched by you. I'm going to try animal handling again. I'm going to reach out again. I mean, yeah, you're already touching it. So if you're going to try and break into its mind or lack thereof, this animal handling role is pretty clutch. It's a 12.

I mean, you've spent a long time looking for this thing and are like literally touching it with both hands. I will grant you that you are able to make this link. Hello, who am I speaking to? Hello? It doesn't answer. with words, but you can see the faint outline of a circle that a lot of these, you can tell just from the, in their silhouettes, you can see loads of, of, you know, coral bodies standing in front of it. Fella, I assume there's some kind of communication system, right?

We've talked about this before. I mean, you are using it, right? You asked a question and showed you a picture. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think he communicates to Amber and Devo and says, okay, I know you're going to yell at me, Devo, but I'm in psychic contact with the big coral ship, and there's a bunch of...

Why are you not fixing the goddamn engine? Doing because this thing beamed into my head and wanted to talk to me. Talk to it after you fix the engine. Well, it's a compulsion. We're running away. Well, could we not like stroll away? Fix the fucking engine. 10-4.

And he turns off the CB radio or whatever it is. What do you do? Well, I've done my thing, haven't I? Yeah, but just humor me. I think he tries to... No, I think he heads... He's going to leave. He's going to leave the ship.

You take the skull with you or set it down? Yeah, take the skull. Wait, you're going to leave the ship? I'm going to leave the ship. As you get close to the port side of the ship, as you run to make your way out, the eyes of the skull flash again. And then that bright light that this ship shot out earlier, it flashes too. And you look down at the skull, which is bleached like the rest of the, you know,

entities like this you've seen before. But spreading out from your hands where you are holding it, it is regaining its color. And it is starting to look like the headpiece of a regular brinear. You watch it, it's happening quickly. Like, it just spreads like you've dropped a bucket of paint on it. And when it has finally reached its point of being completely chromatic, the coral ship outside pulls in real close to your ship, almost like it's trying to look in the window that you are looking out of,

and then it peels off. and sails away past the point where you can see it anymore. Maximumfund.org. Comedy and culture. Artist-owned, audience-supported.