The Adventure Zone - The Adventure Zone Versus Dracula - Episode 29

Episode Date: August 1, 2024

The monster hunters enter Dracula’s tower to defeat their enemy once and for all. Dice sounds by Tal M. 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

The doors to Luminow Tower are slammed shut behind the three of you, and the din of battle from outside is immediately silenced. It is replaced by the sound of wind and a sort of low, resonant, whistling high above you. You are standing inside the base of Luminow Tower. Your eyes follow a ladder extending from the floor up 50, 60 feet into the air. The exact length is difficult to gauge because the ladder appears to lead directly up into this swirling cloud of fog at the top of the chamber. Inside that fog, you see these random streaks of amber light kind of pulsing through, which are providing the only source of lighting in this room. What do you do? I'm going to tentatively throw a piece of jerky into the amber light to make sure it is not dangerous to flesh.

Make an attack roll with the jerky against the swirling fog cloud. You're throwing a piece of jerky feet straight up into the air, which is not nothing. When I do it, it's going to be sick. Hold on. I could do it. I'm just saying like, I don't want to brag or anything, but my years of playing AAA ball,

I think would really pay off there. 18, man. 18, sure. 18. You chuck it straight up into the cloud. It gets major hang time, dude. You hear it clang as it actually goes through the fog cloud. It hits the ceiling.

What is this jerky made out of? Beyond the fog cloud. Clang? Heavy iron content. Are you certain? That's the sound effect we're going with here? When it falls back down, you catch it, and it seems to be fine. It doesn't appear to have been, you know, roasted by this cloud.

Yeah, that makes sense. It was nacho-dynamic flavored, so it's paraplegia. Right. It's a ladder, right, through a big swirling cloud? That's right. It seems like we should climb it. Is there nothing else in the room? any, I don't know.

I'm going. I'm going. Okay. Okay, yeah, you climb leaving behind the pile of magic crystals. I knew it. No, yeah. You set up climbing the ladder as you approach the cloud, the whistling gets louder and louder. But as you head up through it, it's weird, climbing through a sort of solid cloud of fog.

but as you scale the ladder and you reach the top, your hand passes up through a hole onto solid ground and you all climb into the lantern room atop luminow tower. Boom. I'm not looking at World 20. I assume Grimbing just puts something cool. Swirling miasma of energy and light.

Yeah, Dad has described the setting actually quite well. The contents of this lantern room are striking, but not nearly as eye-catching is what you see out of the floor to ceiling windows surrounding you. Is it a swirling miasma?

It's a swirling miasma of light and magic. Can we talk about the bats though? There's a lot of bats. Look, Ms. Griffin is maybe the closest to a Wiki-How illustration the way it is depicted is that there's a big wooden tower. It looks kick- In the middle, there's some sort of weird metal thing.

A lantern. And it's a swirling vortex, like, all around it. And then in the, there's like a circle just lying on top of this. An inset. An inset. Yes, yes, Strauss. It is an inset. Also depicted bats.

There's just like this picture. But it's like the concept of bats. It's just like a circle of the idea of bats. Many, many bats. And there's bats, too. Fill it in. You get it. The idea of bats.

It looks like, it looks like it's a comic. cover, it's like, in this issue, something about that. Special appearance, but I hate that. It's letting you know that the swirling vortex has won the Newberry Bat Award. They did it. Okay. Stop making fun of my final boss fight battle map. Damn it. I love it. It's very me as much. I'm there. You are. I'm scared to the idea of best. You can see this vortex sucking in all the clouds and light on the horizon outside into the luminos tower, like just right below your feet. And you feel for the first time in years the warmth of the sun, not coming from above you, but just sort of from around you as its rays are being siphoned into the tower. A shadow passes across your party as a massive colony of bats, easily numbering in the thousands, flies by, sort of soaring around the tower in a circle in a sort of defensive formation.

At the center of this circular room atop the lighthouse is the lantern, which is massive. It is like 10 feet in diameter. and it is enclosed in a small sort of chamber composed of heavy brass and thick glass, sort of like the holding chamber that you saw in Frankenstein's lab so long ago. Through this sort of lantern chamber on the other side of the room, you see a skeleton that is sitting in a chair with a silvery steel wired helmet on its head. and this skeleton is surrounded by this shimmering force field of nearly opaque amber light. Crouching by this barrier, looking at the skeleton within, is Count Dracula, or at least A Dracula, as evidenced by the bolts in his neck.

He stands and examines the three of you, and he takes a deep breath, and he says, You bunch of fucking buttholes. Yep, that's Dracula. Okay, man. You have destroyed the most beautiful gift. This primitive uncultured world has ever received. Sorry, could we have a moment? Thank you.

Are you all feeling this? The sun? As I got up here, my muscles felt stronger and my bones more dense. I believe I believe it's vitamin D So Griffin I'd like to roll insight To see how my abilities have improved I did roll an actual ass one

You got a crit fail Everybody roll insight We'll see how the vitamin D improves here Did the people of Luminow have a system for this With their gummies or something I got a 21 total Griffin Holy shit. I got a seven.

Now, okay, Travis, you are definitely sure it had no material impact. You're stats. It does not seem to improve Lady Godwin's state. Maybe it has something to do with the sort of tangible disconnect between your head and your body. You feel great, but you can't quite figure out any more than that. Philo, there is no effect. You are a puppet. You don't no longer have vitamins, and I'm very, very sorry.

But you've just unleashed the power of the sun. You feel a potent primordial energy flowing through you. And you can go ahead and recover whatever missing spell slots you may have. That's why he's the best in the biz, folks. There you go. That's teamwork. That's teamwork. Justin pops it off, Travis slams it down.

Griffin finds where it fits and Dad's there to watch it off. Watch it happen Yeah And dad nods Like he had something To do with it Yes Just as I'm

All according Yeah Dad Weeps from the sidelines Is it Is it pride Is it sadness Is it

Is it Is it Is it Is it Is it Where he thought We'd all end up Himself included

No way to say All right I gave Travis Superpowers With my joke Travis You have Superpower

Uh Dracula says Do you fancy yourselves the heroes of this story because history will not remember you as such of that I can assure you. Is that rhetorical man or was that because I can answer it? No, it was like having a conversation. Okay, yeah, no man.

Hero isn't really what I was going for. Like, so long story short, Invisible Man killed my brother. My brother made me promise to take, wait, are you real Dracula? are you one of the, like, Dracula clones? Let's not pretend like we don't all know exactly what the situation is here. I am a Dracula, but I am also Dracula. And he gestures to the skeleton inside of the force field. Does that skeleton have pointy teeth, Griffin?

It does indeed, Travis. Okay. Okay, so I need to take his teeth if we want to make it a fish. and then I'm going to turn them into jewelry. And then, if I'm not mistaken, I think I need to get on a boat to England. Yes, there's a real lack of leadership over there. Yeah, and because I'm the king. So we, oh, we killed, okay, let me jump back a little bit.

We killed on the god. I took Scalver. I'm the king of England now. He's interim pope. You be terrible cardinal because we are actually very careful. about that around these. Yeah, interim turbo cardinal. No Pope's allowed.

Great. And, uh, let's see what else. Don't say no popes allowed. Everybody has to have a boss. You know. It's a turbo cardinal. Well, no, I think I'm the Turbo Cardinals boss. If I'm the king of England or, you know what?

I actually don't know the structure of that. That has led to many beheadings. So, yeah, we need to. Can I, excuse me, can I ask a question? Yes, go ahead. Dracula. Why aren't you burning alive? Oh, good question.

In the sunlight, it is tempered by the lighthouse as the piece is being sucked in. It is not in its pure form where it can irradiate my bones and turn me into fiery ash. Okay. That's not like a secret to my weak point. It's something that we were very careful about. Oh, okay. You wouldn't want to share that with everybody. I swing Jennifer Myers at the lighthouse.

Okay. Go ahead and make an attack roll. I'm trying to catch him by surprise with a natural 20. That's, yeah. Holy shit, juice. You should know something. Well, don't swing that, please. I forgive you.

This is spite. Okay, roll damage. I mean, this is an incredibly sturdy sort of room that you are attacking, and yet with a Nat 20, it is for sure going to get in there, man. That's 23. Jesus Christ. Pretty good. Pretty good.

Considering, hey, folks at home, that's 2D12 plus 3. I just got a 23 to give you the scope of the effectiveness of that. Basically just below as good as it could have been. All right, man. I mean, yeah, man. Follow-ups and nine, so we can just ignore that. Yeah, don't get fucking greedy juice. You, you...

I get it. It just would have been. been very funny if it happened again. That's all. You, that's why I said we can move fast. You swing Jennifer Myers in a wide arc, uh,

just sort of horizontally in front of you. Dracula at first looks sort of annoyed that you are acting so childish in here, but in slow motion we watch as the axe like a knife through butter, uh, slices through three of these massive brass bars that are surrounding the center of the lantern chamber where the lantern actually is, immediately shattering the two big glass panes between them,

creating easily a eight-foot wide hole in this chamber in the center of the room. And his face immediately turns to like shock and awe and says, Oh, okay, so no more monologuing then, huh? Do you want to know the most fucked thing? I wasn't even raging yet. And then I activate my rage, just to be clear.

Okay, let's roll for initiative. Oh, no, man, hey, wait, you can keep monologing. Oh, please, yes, don't let me interrupt you. Yeah, I want to make it clear. We can do two things at once, man, so if you want to keep talking... A man! You can even go. If you want to go, you can leave.

A man? What is a man? A miserable little pile of secrets. But enough talk. Oh, shit. Hold on. He bends down and he picks up a wine glass in a bottle and he pours himself a glass of wine. He said, can you say a thing about the man again?

Oh, yeah, yeah, give a... Hey, man. What is a man? Okay. A miserable little... Fuck, just, let's fight. Wait. Wait, are you telling me you drink wine?

Yeah, I thought, like... famously have said, I don't drink. Why? It's a thing you said before, man. I don't think I actually said that. What he said? What he actually said was, I don't drink. Why?

And then he's like, I should. Okay. Yeah. Let me try it, man. Whoa, this sounds better than blood. Blood is gross. I should have been drinking wine the whole time. Jesus Christ, boys, you got some good initiative roles going here, huh?

Okay, I got an 11. Mm. Three. Four. plus six, ten. Yeah, they weren't good, Griffin. Yeah. Okay.

First in the order is the Dracula clone. He is going to run towards your party. He's going to post himself up right here next to Godwin and Brother Philo. he's first going to he can do so much shit man who Dracula yeah yeah how about delight a planet

for a century you know what I mean yeah feels weird maybe the most lovable villain yeah well not a joker yeah watch it Traff okay he is going to

first he's going to is going to charm you, uh, Lady Godwin. Uh, I need you to make a DC 17 wisdom saving throw. Ah,

my strong suit. Let's see, man. Hi, how about a 17? Wow. Wow. Oh, wow.

Holy shit. An ice cold 17. No boosts. He looks at you. No fakes. Holds out a. Straight red chaser, no,

do not fake the funk on a nasty duck there. Uh, He holds out his hand in front of him and points a crooked finger towards you, and he says, My child, let me get a quick bite going. As he attempts to charm you. But you feel yourself unsuade. Yes, my leash. And I start walking towards him.

Make a performance check for me. Because you have definitely... Again, all my natural talents. You have done this, I think, exact. That is a exact one. Yeah. Perfect. A concrete one.

Oh, man. Straight, no, chase. That's rough. All folk has been faked on this thunk. Okay. As you approach him trying to pull off this same maneuver on him, he is going to swing a crooked claw at you, nearly critting 19 plus 9, 28, which hits.

Oh, man. I have got to change my tactics against Dracula. Yeah, you got to keep it fresh. Okay, man. Sorry, did you say 29 points of damage? No, he rolled a 28. The exact number that he does. You feel this scratch of his razor-sharp claws just sort of rake across your torso.

You take seven points of slashing damage, and then you take 13 additional points of necrotic damage. It feels really bad where he has scratched you. It's a super, super-duper-bad feeling. Okay. Wait, one second. Do you have a reaction? No, but I do. have resistance to bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage.

Oh, fantastic. Then you would take, recover three points. You're the slashing damage of seven. All right. Hey, it ain't nothing, man. That shit adds up. It's round one. Next in the order is the colony swarm.

The colony swarm is going to smash through these windows on the eastern side of the room. Oh no. Oh, no. Just sort of soar through your party. Missing everyone. It looks like a bunch of aliens airbrushed the top of their flying saucer. Yeah. It's sick, bro.

You know what would be kick ass. A bunch of bats. Okay, everybody make a dexterity saving throw, please. Trying to beat a 15. How about a dirty 20? Dirty 20 is higher than 15, yes. Oh, just, just got it. 15.

It's a Dex Save. God, went on a Dex check. Ah, yes. Dex saved. Well, that, for that, I have a 20. Wow, you all saved. Okay. These bats fly just sort of through your party.

They sort of, some of them collide with you clumsily. But as they soar through the southwestern wall of the room, you find yourself largely unscathed. Next in the order is Lady Godwin. You have the Dracula clone up next to you, having just scratched at you. You have the lantern chamber in the center of the room that you have basically smashed a gigantic hole in. And on the opposite side of the room is the Dracula Prime skeleton in his chair with the force field around it. I am going to try to chuck fakula into the lantern. I've had a real mixed run with trying to throw people into things this season.

And I really feel like narratively, it would be so satisfied. The character growth. Right. I'll be able to really, when it counts, throw someone into something. Okay. Make an attack roll against Dracula. If you hit, you will not do damage, but you can move him five feet back, basically right into the lantern.

All right. Let's get this going. Hey, that's interesting. Let's speak on that. Huh. That is, I have again found my friend the one. All 19 of his little buddies were there, but I bumped into him again. What are the odds?

He's so eager. Your, it feels like it is kind of frightening, Lady Godwin. It feels like your body is not responding to the commands that your brain is sending to it. Maybe it is the pressure of the situation. Maybe the vitamin D is actually bad for you. But maybe it is also the Dracula necrotic magic that is coursing through your veins with a scratch. But you just can't seem to get a whole line. I thought I was in a triumphant movie.

where it turned out what I'm in is like a Cohen Brothers movie We're doing the same thing over and over again Eventually leads to my downfall You know like my inevitable downfall You do that was only one attack though You have a couple of those I think you get done Okay oh shit Everybody is looking at me

Yeah everybody's like I can't believe Lady God would try to throw somebody again You know what I mean? Right yeah And they're all like they and they start to turn away Oh no And then I stand up And I'm sitting down

Did you sit? I sat down Just for a second We've been there I'm so sad You know when you try to throw somebody And it breaks your heart so bad That doesn't have you have to sit down for a second

Just a little crisscross Applesauce and think about life But then I start standing up And putting my hands on his hips And he is like gingerly taking my hands back off his hips Like it's sad at this point You know what I mean? But then

Tell him what happens And ask her film You roll another attack roll And Your finger gets stuck in his belt loop It kind of twists weird And it hurts your finger a lot And you pull your arm

shoots backwards like Oh fuck You fucked up my Dracula fucked up my finger with his belt loop Dang it So now Now was a 12 by the way That was a 12th

So now Gryvitt everybody Please, everybody has counted me out of this way. Just come on. You've got to be keeping me. It's so sad. He like puts his hand on my shoulder like, it's so sad. But then, peak boomer cringe. But then Griffin.

Tell him what happened. Tell him I put my hands somehow. My scarred, battered his up on the hip. And then they're gonna tell him what happens. He says, Comedy rule of threes, huh? You actually do it with your feet. You put your feet out instead of your hands, and he's like you're going to do an airplane.

He's like, what are you? No. Not with the feet. You're trying to push me with the feet. This is humiliating. That's a 14. My dead skeleton is watching. You're embarrassing yourself in front of me twice.

The bats laugh outside. I would prefer. Everyone remember a few minutes ago, remember? Remember hitting the thing? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. It was so... What have you done for me lately, aside from trying to push me three times? Next in the order is you have move if you want to move and take an attack of opportunity.

I sat down and stood up a second time. You're finishing off your movement. Fantastic. I jumped and played. All right. Mutt. Burn it. You are up.

Okay. Well, so we know throwing in doesn't work. I'm not squishing. I'm not skipping up. Well, it seems like you guys have him well in hand. I'm going to go for the Skellington one. Okay. But before I run over, I'm going to, hey, Philo, with your permission,

can I grab something off your vial belt? Yeah, what do you want? I'm going to take the The vial of Onblood that he collected from the river Interesting, okay Yep, yep, yep Yeah, I take one of Filos's files

From his phylactory Okay And I then go sprinting over To the Skellington Okay So real quick, tell me, like You said it's invisible barrier, Griffin No, I said

it is a, it is, you can, it is hard to see through it. It is clearly made of, you know, light and magic and stuff. You've seen sort of similar applications of, uh, of this like amber light before, but this is, this seems pretty, pretty solid. Okay, is the amber light? Yes. Okay, so I pour the blood of the god of nighttime onto the bone from the god of nighttime that I collected in the cave. Okay. And I slam that nighttime God blood bone into the wall of light. That's very, very good. As you reunite this blood of On with the bone of his giant buried corpse,

you feel something, you feel some reaction taking place that I don't think you necessarily understand. Give me an Arcana check. You've done something here that is wild. Well, that's a five. Interesting. Could I do an Arcana

check? No, I don't... Let him get up in there. He's already watching. You know what, Griffin? I'm going to use my inspiration. Oh. For this. Okay, cool. Well, don't say for this. I think it makes follow...

Yeah, Philo, if you want, I think it's totally... on the ball because he was already engaged in it. It's not random. For sure. Give me an Arcana check, Philo. Shit, I got five gold pieces. That's only 12. You both feel a presence.

God is moving in this Chili's tonight. You feel a presence in this room that is familiar. I think you hear a voice in your head. Time seems to slow the swirling of the light outside dims somewhat as time slows down all around you. And mutt, you hear a voice say, yes, now you need my help. Interesting.

Didn't seem to matter quite as much when you were striking me down. Are you going to be catty about it or do you want to take down Dracul? I would love to It would be far easier If I was still You know a huge Powerful skeleton What is he look

What is he looking like right now? Like what are we seeing? I don't think you are seeing I don't think you are holding this bone blade that has been Oh not me I'm looking at the ground and kind of weeping softly to myself Yeah I'm holding the bone to my ear like a phone

Yeah You don't see him right You just you are in this You are in a dark, slow space. Justin, I heard that and I loved it. What'd you say? The phone is free with the Sports Hill is trying to screen. He says,

I have plenty of time. I would rather find a champion who perhaps didn't kill me. I suppose I could help you out, though, if you were willing to scratch my back a little bit. Oh, my God, this shit again. What do you want? You didn't know?

I mean Travis, it will surprise you to learn, Trave, that I, Griffin, McElroy, your brother didn't think that you were going to commune with a dark god. That is. Hey, bud, from this perspective, that's on you. I do think that if you didn't think Travis is going to try to commune with a dark god. Yeah. Is it your first day?

Come on. He says, you make a pact with me that I know. I know you have so recently come into a position of power. I would like some... I would like a pact with you. Nothing crazy. I'm not going to control your mind or anything, but, well, the night is half the day,

and so I would like to have perhaps a little bit of influence on the crown. What do you say? It won't be the night man. And you'll be the day man. I'll tell you what, monthly bone phone conversations with me, God of Night, I just sort of giving you check-ins on how your rain is going and what you might be able to do better. Just going to cost you 30% of your rain.

You know what? It sounds reasonable. Yeah, I like the balance of day and night, and that's been real fucked up here. So, like, yeah, man, okay, cool. I wasn't going to be a very good king anyways, if we're being honest. Like, I wasn't thinking I was going to nail it.

So, like, okay. Give me another Arcana check. I did so good on the first one. Yeah. Just worry about fucking it up. Oh, 17 plus one. It was a slow rollover from 10 to 17. Okay.

18. You feel something changing inside of your soul, and you get the idea that this promise you are making is not one that can be easily broken. That isn't to say he is poisoning you or, you know, even tricking you now. necessarily. He is just this, this pact is a capital P pact. And it is one that he will expect you to, to, but I just have to talk with him once a month because he's lonely. Yeah.

Yeah, man. That's fine. All right. Oh, wait. On the phone for real and real life? Yeah. I got to talk to Griffin once a month. I'll do this voice the whole time. Okay. I would actually love that. I think, I don't know if that was meant to be a deterrent, but it You feel this uncomfortable, for a moment, swelling like a balloon in your metaphysical self, and then time catches back up and this darkened bone blade swipes through the hard light barrier surrounding the skeleton of Dracula Prime, and it vanishes. The what vanishes? The force field surrounding Dracula Prime.

So just to establish, now I have Scalibur, the glowing sword of holiness, and a dark bone blade. Yeah, you have a lot of question. Just regular crossbow because someone destroyed my dad's, like, ancient, beautiful crossbow that my granddad gave me. Okay, cool. And I can't throw. Okay, great. And this is round one. It's a good, and one of us is Pinocchio.

It's a good team. The boy, the boy pubbed it with no strings. All right. I'm going to say that's probably it, right? I think that sort of combining those two reagents and then attacking with it is a good turn's worth of actions to have taken place. I think so too, yes. Okay. Philo, it is now your turn.

again, just to paint the picture, we got Godwin engaged in sad combat with Dracula clone right next to the hole in the lantern, sort of chamber in the center of the room. On the opposite end of the room, Mutt has just taken out the barrier surrounding the skeleton of Dracula Prime that is wearing that silvery metal helmet on its head. Outside the window is the swarm of bats. What do you do? They are outside the window. They are outside the window.

Okay. I want to inspect the helmet around... Okay, yes. You can... Can I investigate it? Yeah, I mean, do you want to investigate it before you move over there? It's up to you. It'd be a little bit harder.

There's some shit between you and it. Yeah, let me move over there. Okay. And do an arcana check. Okay, give me... on the helmet. Yes. You look it over trying to...

Jeez. Eleven. Okay. With an 11. This is the same device in some ways. The same device that turned you into the state that you are in. This is some sort of transference of consciousness sort of tool. It appears to be...

a lot less ramshackle than the one that was used on you. You get the sense that maybe that one was a beta, a prototype, and that Dracula probably saved the good stuff for himself. That is what you see. Do I see how to remove it? From his head? Mm-hmm. Pulling it.

Lifting it. Upward. Like a hat. Okay. All right. Um I am going to I still have actions left, right?

Yes, I mean so far you've just run across the room and looked at something. Okay, I'm going to You don't have to sound so dismissive, Griffin. No, I'm not trying to sound dismissive. It's what he's done. So far, you flapped your little puppet feet over and used your stupid wooden eyes to look at something.

Dumbass brain. I'm going to, I'm going to drop, I'm going to drop, I'm going to drop The file, the vial, the filo vial, the filo, anyway, the bottle that has many, sick. Has many filo in it. Okay. Fucking hell.

You. And then I'm going to cast enlarge on it. Oh, yes, baby. Okay. All your chickens are coming home to Ruth, Griffin. These are not my chickens. It's my chicken. I didn't make these.

make these chickens and I don't approve of their existence, Travis. This is my chicken. These chickens are abomination. How dare you attribute these chickens to me, sir? I would never. Uh, okay. Uh, okay, enlarge. Yep.

Give me a moment, please. Mm-hmm. Okay, so. This is actually the same spell I used to turn it into. Correct. Mini-4-low. I was just checking. So this is an action.

You are able to, you pour your body out of the vial, and you enlarge it. Just back to regular size? Are you giving it a little, like, a few extra inches? No, no, no. No, let's just take it back to regular filo size. Come on, six feet. You make them pretty big. You make them six feet.

I'm going, you know what I want from you, Mac? I want a wisdom saving throw as you look down at your dead. somewhat bloated formaldehyde reeking body on the ground, just to see if you get a little bit freaked out by this site. That would probably be no because that's a 16. Yeah, and that's in a lot of ways, even weirder, isn't it? Yeah, it's weirder. You dump out your dead-ass body.

I'm looking it around in a bottle for like 30 episodes. That's true. It doesn't smell great. As it reappears, you see suddenly Van Helsing appears on the other side of it, looking down at it, sort of alarmed and looking up at you. And he's like, is that you? Well, well, that's the old me. That's the old me, Abe. It's, matter of fact, he looks real old.

Yugh. And sorry about the smell. Wouldn't know. What is the game plan, dude? because I'm, are you moving out? I'd rather not reveal that in front of the, you know, D-R-A-C-U-A-I. It took you a second. Okay, then what's the plan?

What are we doing? I don't know. I'm freeballing it. Not applicable. He kind of gives you a curious look, and then he vanishes back into the void inside of, the puppet. Okay.

Is that all you're doing? Do you have a bonus action? Anything else? I don't know if I have any bonus actions left. Okay. No, I think that's, I think that's, that's it. I think I'll take a defensive stand in front of zombie Philo or whatever we want to call it. Okay.

I have added Philo's body to the map. We are back up to the top of the order. Count Dracula looks at you pitifully, Godwin, and says, Let me show you how it's done. And he is going to attempt to throw you backwards out of the window. Hmm. That is, there is a rudeness there. There is a tremendous rudeness to that decision he has made.

So, nine plus nine, 18. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, he grabs you by your, the lapels of your battle tunic. I don't know what Lady Godwin is wearing. And he chucks you backwards. You try to gain, ah, I mean, you stretched out. I made Godwin too tall. She's 10 feet tall.

Okay, he throws you back. You feel the window immediately give way against your weight and the force of this throw. I need you to make a dexterity saving throw to avoid going over the edge. Got it. That is a seven. On a seven, you reach out for. the ledge of the window and you do not get it. You see the room vanish as you begin to plummet.

You are just sort of beneath the surface of the window as we move on. With that, Count Dracula... Wait, wait, wait. Wait. I have a danger sense. Oh, that's right. You get to make another dexterity saving throw. Make it a, hey, juice, make it a better one.

What about the exact same one? How does that fucking spin? What are the odds? Has that spin you, you dizzy bitch? All right. Get him. Godwin begins to fall. Dracula turns into a cloud of mist and flies over towards you, mutt.

And he's going to try to bite you, dude. Oh, wait, no, he can't do this to you. He's just going to attack you. As you are sort of paying attention to the skeleton of Dracula Prime, the clone vanishes, turns into a cloud of mist, reappears behind you. He sees the bone dagger in your hand, and he laughs, and he says, a sucker's born every minute, huh?

And he's going to swipe a claw at you. That is a 26 versus AC. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You take eight points of slashing damage, and you take 15 more points of necrotic damage. Yeah. Okay, that is going to do it for his turn. Next in the order is the colony swarm.

The colony swarm is going to go after you, Godwin. Insult to injury. They are going to fly across you as you begin falling out of this room. Go ahead and make a dexterity saving throw with disadvantage, as you have nothing to really leverage. Well, then I get add. Just regular, yeah, just cancels out. Trying to be a 15.

12. 12. That does not cut it. This time, you feel a few errant bites and some slashing of the hard bony wings of these bats. And you take 11 points of slashing damage. You are now up Godwin. You are, you have just begun. gun to fall. Six seconds of combat. It passes every round of combat, so you are still sort of suspended

in the air. But end of this turn, you are going to be falling very, very far, very fast. Okay. I reached my bag. I grabbed my hand. Okay. It still has a rope affix to it from the last time. Okay. And I'm going to throw my hand back at the balcony. All right, man, this is going to be an attack, right? This is you launching a arranged object trying to hit a target.

We're highlighting the biggest problem with D&D, where everything has to be contextualized as an attack. Like, this couldn't be less of an attack. I'm throwing my hand at a balcony. I mean, could be slight of hand. There's nothing slight about the action that is taking place right now. It's a slight against God. Yeah, it's a slight against me.

20. Fuck, nice. You throw your hand upwards and it sails into the room. The rope grows taut for a moment. You feel it pulling away. And you actually feel some sort of psychic connection

with your hand still, right? You can tell that it has actually grabbed onto the top rung of the ladder that is just inside the room. and you swing forward and you are now repelling. You are about 10 feet down from the... I actually, I'm not repelling yet. I let the force of the swing carry me in, so I slam against the wall.

Okay, you slam against the wall of the tower pretty hard. How much damage? Well, let's see. I guess we can run this as one 10-foot fall. of force, basically, so you take six points of bludgeoning damage. Never had someone elect to take damage before. It's an interesting strategy, cotton. It is.

Well, the first thing is, and then I slamming the wall. I need to stay pissed. Okay. And the second thing, I start climbing up. Okay. Make an athletics check for me. Ten. Absolutely.

Yeah, no, this is not a difficult athletics check. You are not far from the top of the window, and you have a grappling hook. It is, I think this is going to take all your movement. This is pretty treacherous, but you are able to scale your way back into the room. And it doesn't seem like Dracula, Dracula basically has his back to you now. He has not noticed your arrival back into the tower. It's that, but I'm hurt. She gets thirsty.

And I'm going to throw Jennifer Myers at Dracula. So the lantern is sort of right in between you and Dracula. Right. So the cool, what's going to kick ass is. You're going to want it. You're going to curb your lid. It's going to cart. Griffin.

No, it's going to go through. And then hit him. And it'll be all charged up with like lantern power. Yeah, Griffin. If you want to throw your big axe through a lantern and another. wall of this chamber. If you create again, sure. Um, if you, no, man, okay, you're right, bending it. I'm going to bend it in the air. Yeah, that's a way easy role. Like Beckham, man. No, wait. I, I, no wait, Griffin, I do have one hole in it, right? You have one hole in the, yes. I made a hole already.

I'll just go through that one again. Okay, this is a circle, this chamber, right? So you have smashed out basically one quarter of the circle. Okay. So you can go into this center chamber. I got it. You go in, but you can't get out. I keep coming back to having to bend it around, Griffin. I don't know if that's something I've worked on. I will let this happen with it, but you're going to have disadvantage on your attack. You're good at attacking, so it might still go, but this is a patentedly insane. What if I switch it to the javelin?

What if I use my javelin? A curved javelin toss still, I think. I feel like I could hit the hole a lot easier than javelin and make a new hole. Right, a javelin wants to go through An axe going through, I know, that's a big question You can throw an axe or a javelin at the lantern In order to hit Dracula It would need to smash through the wall

On the opposite side of the circle And then still hit Dracula Griffin, you're the one who took on my move action I don't know what to tell you This isn't my fault If you hadn't taken my move action We wouldn't be doing any of this Yeah

I think if you want to to try to do a curved battle axe throw, that's cool. It's just going to try to do it, and I'm going to roll extremely high, okay? All right, let's see. Here it goes. I believe you can fly. I'm leaving the room for a minute. I'm going to leave for a second, okay?

I'm just going to leave for it. Okay. I mean, yeah, you roll the crit one, so you don't even really need to roll the second one. They don't get lower than that. You throw Jennifer Myers trying to curve it. Do you throw it around the right side or the left side? We go on clockwise or counterclockwise. You throw Jennifer Myers and it just, it doesn't curve.

It just goes straight and it bounces off the wall and lands on the floor on the left side of the room. And Dracula turns around like, oh, you're back in the room. Thank you for not trying to sneak up on me. Oh, no. How's the fight going for you pretty bad, it seems. Next, unless you have another. I guess you could. You do have one more.

attack roll. You could try to... Fuck yeah. Now I've got a clear line of sight, don't I? Yeah, but now you have your javelin. You don't have a clear line of sight. What are you talking? It's still... From the... Griffin. He can't... He walked around to see what had happened. You told me. He did not walk around. He wouldn't take it fucking... He said he walked around because he was curious.

He would take an attack of opportunity from mutt if he did that. He's not there. Okay, so he didn't walk around to see what happened. Here we go. You're gonna... But you're gonna curve this javelin. Curve it. So fucking good. Curve it. 23 hits, but let's see. But next one, 19 hits. Yes, it does.

As he turns, he's kind of like laughing at your dumb axe on the ground. And then he sees defying the laws of physics and God and Isaac Newton and Griffin. And me, a giant javelin making a beeline in a beautiful parabola straight towards his gut. Go ahead and roll damage. Seven, all right. It catches him in the stomach. He very annoyed, pulls it out and throws it to the ground. And that is your action.

Wait, what about my frenzy? Yes, I suppose, do you have anything else to throw? More jerky, perhaps? Yeah, I have one thing. The Toby Slayer. Okay, you throw up. 13. Fuck me. That misses.

He looks down. Wait, I got disavits. Hold on. It may be worse. Yeah, okay, 13. 13. So what happens is you throw your axe, trying to curve it around the room.

It lands on the floor. He looks back at you and kind of just laughs it off. But then a javelin does get him, and it curves. And he stands up like, what? How the fuck did you? And then you throw your sword, and it just lands on the ground. And he's like, I'm confused as to what?

Okay, can I be honest with you, Dracula? I'm looking around at the evidence in some of the times we have to listen to our bodies and our heart as much as our brains. I think the first time that I broke some of your stuff and then hurt you pretty bad,

I think I worked through it. This is all I can conclude is that I no longer have a deep and burning desire to destroy you. I feel like I've worked through my stuff. Oh. This is big. This is big.

You see, it's skin. Huge. The feeling is decidedly not mutual. I can't intellectualize this. Okay. These are your two weapons laying on the ground. Just to remember that you don't have them right now. Yeah, no, it's helpful.

Thank you. All right. Next in the order is Mudd. I'm going to two-handed swing Scalibur at him. Oh, wait. First, I point at him and I say, you're, you're my, I'm going to kill you, man, you're marked. Get marked, bitch. Something like that.

You get marked you a piece of shit. Something like that. He looks up at the glowing red arrow HUD element floating over his head. He's like, oh, cool. Yeah, man, you marked. What's that mean? It means, oh, I'm going to get you. Not like that.

This is where I'm going to use this ratio, because I'm going to get it. him. Okay. That was a 10, which misses. That was a 10, which I don't think would hit the Dracul. The relentless bloodletting... Oh, but that's a main. That was a... That's not going to hit him in the... No. You slash... Okay, cool, man.

Yeah, but this time, but this time for real, and I use a second attack to get him. Okay. Oh, stay there. Oh, no, it's got to be a great. Uh, it's 12. No. three quick swings at him and three easy sidesteps.

He is making this look like child's play, as he is avoiding every attack you all leverage at him. Anything else you're doing in your journey? I mean, no. Okay. Philo, you are up. You are standing right next to the skeleton of Dracula and your re-enlarged dead body.

Um, um, um, Philo says, well, it worked great the first time. And he snatches the helmet off Dracula Prime and puts it on brother Philo. On the body. On the body. Hmm. Oh. That's very interesting. Isn't that interesting?

Isn't it? I thought so. I mean, it can't be a, I will say this ad, demonstrably. It can't be going worse. You know what I mean? Like it can't. It's going to have an effect. An effect, which almost has to be net positive at this point.

Yeah, sure. I want a roll for this. This is a big move that you are doing. And I don't know that we've established that the reversal of this process is like possible. But I want you to roll an Arcana check to see how effective this is at sort of fucking up his. grasp on the tower and the city and everything. Okay. Allow me.

How about 24? Fucking hell. Wow. Yeah. Wow. Okay. Here's what happens. The second that you put the helmet on your dead body, you see the helmet activate,

and you see power coursing through. the wires that are sort of tethering it to the floor behind this chair that the skeleton is sitting in. Immediately, the lantern in the center of the room begins to flicker. It appears like something is glitching out. As it flickers, the vortex outside begins to flicker. You see quick flashes of the city of Lumino below you. From their perspective, they see the sun reappear in the sky a few times as it seems like something is happening to the tower. This effect, I think, is a lot on your body.

It is horrifying, I think, what happens as your body catches flame. suddenly and begins to... Wait, me talk on my Pinocchio body? Yeah, you gotta be more Susieferi, brother Philo's body.

Your dead corpse on the ground as Dracula's essence is attempted to be pumped into it and he is resisting. You hear a scream reverberating through the walls but

he fends it off as your body is destroyed. What are the biological effects of the fucking smell at this point? It sucks so bad. Because I feel like I am being absolutely torn to shreds over here with the olfactory. Mut actually lost its sense of smell after a bottle rocket incident, so it's fine. Yeah. He burned his stinky old corpse with Dracula farts and it exploded everywhere. Disgusting. It's no good. Give me a constitution saving. through everybody in the room as I

in my big mouth. Is this from the Stitch? Yeah, man, it's 17. 17. You're fine. You're a puppet. 14. There's that 20 when I needed the most. Stinky bad smell, make your tummy hurt much. Everybody else is fine.

Oh, no. What you see as the situation kind of stabilizes is that in this window of time that Dracula lost his grasp on the tower and everything it was devouring and broadcasting

you see this clone of Dracula and he looks absolutely dazed his eyes are cloudy and he seems stuck frozen in place you have temporarily for a round of combat, you have incapacitated the clone of Dracula. Sicking, boys.

The colony swarm of bats is still flying around the tower, and they are, in fact, next in the order. They are going to sensing the incapacitation of sort of their main guy in the room right now. They're going to fly in and attack both brides. brother Philo and Mutt. Good luck. Make a dexterity saving throw, both of you.

Little do you know, I don't have the N.D. Beyond pulled up yet. The ultimate defense. Can't make him. Can't make a roll. I'm not in the universe. Despite being distracted a little by the ash all over his feet from his former self. Right. Fylo rolls a 16.

Perfect. I got a Nat 20. Whoa. We share. On the bats. Yes, you are. Now I'm skitching with the bats. Crave that lathery wage.

That's the power of love. Okay, mutt, you just execute a flawless, sort of like resident evil dodging the laser trap, quick time event. Can one of the bats high five me as it goes by? It can high one you. But yes. I mean, listen, a wing is just a hand. Have you seen those things?

It's fingers. I don't want to talk about that. Okay. It's just true, man. I don't know what to tell you. Philo, as you were sort of bending over your own ruined body, you made yourself small enough that the bat's also zoomed right by you. And back out the northwest window.

Next up is Lady Godwin. Lady Godwin, you are enraged, you are blood-raged. You have just thrown two of your weapons, well, three of your weapons around the left side of the red. One of which hit, and the other two are laying on the ground right now. You made a point. That's what matters. Yeah, sure. Yeah.

Next. Okay. You are next. What do you do? Well, let's see. It's a new voice. That's my thinking voice, Griffin. Is it British or Western?

Well, let me contemplate on that. Lady Godwin was in a bit of a scrape when we last left up. How are we going to get out of this one? Is this why your turns take so long is because you have an old Southern narrator inside your head dictating your actions before you do them? Wait, you don't? Not usually. Oh.

Okay. Mine's more of like a Southern Dandy type, but that's just me. I'm going to... Oh, there is also the hole in the center of this chamber you have smashed into the sort of like lantern housing unit. And most of the windows in this room have also been smashed. part by either your hurled body or the swarm of bats. So what's, what in the center, what am I looking at in the center area? You are looking at the lantern.

You are looking at the titular lantern that actually illuminates and shines most of the light here out of luminow tower. This was, you know, the spotlight that was searching for you below. Like, it is the thing that made that. And it's what Dracula Prime. Skellington was connected to, right? I mean, Dracula Prime is wired sort of into the ground, right? Like, his domain is this tower, and then therefore everything that this tower kind of can see.

Everything the light touches. Everything the light touches, right. So he was controlling that. He is still, for all you know, also still controlling that. But he is all up in the space. I think I'm going to head on. So the placement of the, I see two. weapons on the ground.

Yes. What's the furthest away? That would be your axe. Okay. And the closest to me is your, the Toby Slayer. Okay. And at least you javelin that returns. That's the only, that is ironically the only one that hit.

So, yeah. So where's that? That's in your hands again. Okay, great. I am going to walk over and. and pick up, uh, my weapons. Okay. Nice.

No problem. Cool. That was an easy part of the adventure. Now I'm going to hit the, the center lantern with the axe. Okay. It's hard as I can three times. Okay. Wow.

Kick ass. Let's, uh, let's see it. That's, uh, 18? Uh, an 18 hits. Okay. You need to clear 10 damage on, go ahead and roll damage on that. You have to clear 10 damage in order for it to count at all. And what is that called?

Sturdy? Sturdy. Well, no, I can't quite get there. Yeah, so you, I mean, you connect, right? But this lantern is solid brass with a thick, thick glass aperture. 22 hits. Let's see that damage. That is 13.

Oh, that's max damage. Oh, no, it's not a deep 12. 13. Plus two from my blood rate. Uh, kick ass, yeah. Okay. Uh, okay, 15 damage to the central lantern. Your second, uh, attack, your axe gets stuck in a bit, uh, into the-

I need plus two actually for the rage as well. I don't think that's automatically added in. Oh, uh, did you check? There should be a little box that you can check to set yourself as raging, which will then, I believe. Well, if that's true, then just point of order. Well, there's a point. Plus two plus two for blood rage and regular rage would have hit.

That would be a chance. Yep, yep. That is a good point, Travis. Thanks, Traff. No problem, brothers. I'm glad I'm here to do your math. There's a button that makes it. I like that.

In Travis's mind, that character was generated because he added three numbers together. That's the bar on Matt. Three single-digit numbers. What a nerd. David Kromholtz over here. Fuck, that was a targeted deck. It's a good one, though. I think just at David Kromwell.

It might have just been targeted at me and my buddy, David Kromholtz. Okay, so that is two hits then. You got 10 on the first when you add the four to it. And then when you add the four to this 13, that is 17, that is 27 total points of damage for your first two attacks. I mean, the first one, you leave like a decent gash in it. Second attack, it's like you're chopping a log. Like you crack into there.

And now there is light that is pouring out of this kind of, you know, slit-shaped hole that you have cleft into the side of the lantern. You have one more attack if you want to continue this assault. Okay, now that one is a four plus six.

No, your third one, you try to keep hacking into this hole that you've made, but you swing just a little bit wide and it sort of skirts. I'm exhausted, I think. I'm physically. I'm tap, man. I've, it's been a rough run for me. I am glad to be attacking a non-moving target.

And I'm out of people to throw for the moment. I guess the grids work to my weapon. Okay, as you withdraw your axe from your third attack, that kind of glances off the top, light is pouring out of this lantern, filling this small sort of containment unit that you are now standing inside and pouring out into the room itself.

The bats have to have burst into it. The bats did not. Dracula, a clone of Dracula, you see his cape start to catch fire. Is he getting it like pure now? Is there like without the filtering, he's getting it uncut? Give me, maybe an Arcana check or maybe just a perception check or investigation. Okay. I wish, do you want me to just choose the highest one when you say stuff like that?

If you can justify how you are using the relevant stuff. You're saying that you would be open to any of those checks. Okay. I think, I don't know. Fuck. I'm not good at any of these, but I, Archana makes the least sense. I'm just going to look here. Okay.

No, I got a 19. Yeah, 19 perception check. This light is, it is hurting your eyes. It feels bad to look at this light. It's not the same kind of amber color, actually. This is like brilliant, white, radiant, straight up. sunlight. You feel like it is a hot, arid day as you stand in this chamber. And Dracula, you can tell with such a high perception check, you see the back, the hair on the back of his

head start to kind of like wither up. And it looks like a terrible sunburn is kind of forming on the back of his time. Can I tell you, Griff, I'm really kicking myself. Because right before this encounter, I did have mutt go to the optometrist. And he got his. pupils dilated. And I wasn't worried about it because it's been nighttime this whole time. Oh, man. Sometimes, when we're not recording, one of us will, like, call

the DM and be like, hey, I want to go on a quick adventure by myself. And so Travis did that last night, and he was like, Mutt has to go to the optometrist. He doesn't want to. It's on his to do list for a long time. He made the appointment like six months ago. He didn't know he was going to conflict. It was so long ago.

Yeah. And the only things that happen is that Mutt got his pupils dilated, and he found the dagger of a hug tar, the time splitter. Oh, but that cancels each other out. Okay, great. Cool. Cool. Yeah. That, I feel like when I make a six months appointment at the doctor, that's all, that version of me is always the truest and best version of myself.

Exactly. Like, that's, oh, six months from now, I'll have all this for doing the work. Yeah, this will be so easy for me, not even a problem. Like, six months for now, absolutely. That guy's got. No. He'll remember. No way.

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No ring the bell. This is Biz, and this is the final season of One Bad Mother, a comedy podcast about parenting. This is going to be a year of celebrating all that makes this podcast and this community magical. I'm so glad that I've found your podcast. I just cannot thank you enough for just being the voice of reason as I'm trying to figure all of this out. Thank you and cheers to your incredible show and the vision you had to provide this space for all of us. This is still a show about life after giving life.

And yes, there will be swears. You can find us on maximum fun.org. And as always, you are doing a great job. Okay, next in the order is Mutt. Hey, Griffin. Yeah. I got two questions for you that I think we should have asked sooner. Okay.

One, is there anything inside the lantern, like, moving around? Is it, like, because the last time we saw this apparatus, it was hooked to a thing, and there was a puppet boy inside, and, like, a creature or whatever all wrapped around it with, like, tendrils and shit. Yes, sure. I mean, give me a... give me an investigation check or an arcana check. Hmm.

You're like up, up against Dracula and this apparatus, so I think this would be doable. They're the same. So I'm going to say it's an investigation check. It's an 11? Yeah, okay, with an 11, this is functionally doing the same thing, only instead of transferring, you know, Van Helsing or Philo's consciousness into a a puppet body, it has transferred Dracula into the tower. You are standing inside the puppet boy. Only the puppet boy is a giant tower that he is, you know, in control of. Is, and the second question, the skeleton of Dracour, is it moving, it's dead, right?

Yes, it is, it is a skeleton. It is a dead skeleton. I shouldn't say that snarkly. This is a scary world. skeletons can probably come to life, but he is not moving and has no organs or skin. Okay, cool. So then there's two things I want to do. First and foremost, let's close this loop. Whip out my DeWalt Vampliers, and I'm going to pry those teeth out real quick. Okay. Easy, easy work.

Give me a DC-10 slight of hand check. So you attempt to do this work. It's a little crazy in here. There's bats all over the day. place. That's a 14 plus 4. I believe that's 18, sir.

Yes. Am I adding that correctly? Yeah, thank you so much, Dr. Puzzles. That's all right. That's the human calculator. Is his name? The human, thank you the calculator. Okay, yeah.

Easy. They come out. They feel heavy in your hands. They are clean. They are pristine. These are Incredible trophies you're holding. Perfect.

Okay. Finally, my brother's ghost can rest. You see your brother, whose name I don't know we ever said out of. Rusty. We said it many times. Old Dusty Rusty. Because he was a filthy fucking man.

He appears in front of you, and he says, oh, dang, bro, you did it. Cool, man. I'm so proud of you, brother. Have fun in heaven. Do a scene. Travis, do a see. Oh, hey, bro.

Hey, bro, you got those teeth, I see. I did get them teeth. I also had a fight with the Invisible Man, but we like... Yeah, and you killed him too and avenged me. Thank you so much, brother. I'm so glad that you killed the Invisible Man Graveyard Jet. Just let him go to heaven. Yep, that is...

Oh, that is... Tell us. My man. Kill him rid of us. I think we all know that that is not where I am heading. Straight to hell for old Dusty Rusty. Yeah, man. You did murder a lot.

lot of folks and all that embezzlement didn't help. There was also all the lust. Yeah, bud. Hell yeah, brother. Yeah, I better hit the road. Hey, real quick. Yeah, before I go, thank you so much for killing the Invisible Man. But also, do you

ever think about, like, the remarkable amount of generational trauma we inherited from our parents? Yeah, but look at me, now, I'm King of England, man, so... It's worked out pretty well. I'm just saying, man, like, worth it? Man, I'm so happy Travis Figgily solved.

Yeah, I mean, you have become king. Them royals got figured out, man, because eventually, yeah, you push hard, right? And you don't let your kids have any fun. You make them kill the Chupacobo and they're four years old. And I don't want to talk about it anymore. Oof. Okay. He's gone.

So that's solved. Hey, I got an idea. And I reached in my bag. And. Now, what? I don't. Do you think that removing the teeth from a skeleton would count as an action? Oh, yeah, I was going to give it to Godwin.

I was going to give something. Can I give that? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You could throw this, and I hand Godwin the stick of dynamite that we bought at Mistopheles' place that we never used. Holy shit. Okay. Oh, that's what would be much more efficient. Yeah, man, now you cracked it over.

I figure you just get that in there and yeah. Of course. Do we have an exfiltration? Oh, good question. Um, we could jump or the ladder. I beat. What's the ladder?

You only gave me one option. I don't know, which is the full. Oh, no, no, no, sorry, man. L-A-D-D-E-R. I can't spend it. Right. Them over there, they're kind of a vertical staircase. Yeah.

Of course, yes. So we could just like, we'll start climbing down. You check it from there. We go the rest of the way. Skedaddle. Skiddle, Latta, slathe. Yes. All right.

What do we do with that? Could I point at Dracula's corpse? No, that's what I'm saying. You just blow the whole thing, right? Oh, my. And wouldn't that be fun because you get to explode them into smithereens? All right. Okay.

Brother Philo, you hear your friends discussing this plan to just blow up the lantern. And considering the fact that it's dynamite, a lot more than just the lantern with this stick of dynamite, you, what do you do? How's your buddy's health? You know, I've been better, I've been worse. Godwin? Godwin's bloodied, right? I'm in bad shape. Finally, was going to cast Healing Word on Lady Godwin.

Okay. When you cast this spell using a spell slot of second level or higher, the healing increases by 1D4 for each slot level above first. So it usually does 2D4 plus 3. So do I double that? You would just roll 4D4. Plus 3. Wow.

That ain't bad. Yeah. So 11 plus 3, 14 points of healing Lady Godwin. Nice. 14 points? Yes. And do I still have an action I can do? I believe healing word is a bonus action, so yes. Okay. I toss her the one remaining healing the lexer that I have. Trying to like smash it on her to like execute its effects or what's the, if we want to

Baldersgate this to say you chuck it at her with your action to expend it. Am I close enough to hand it to her? I mean, you would say, you would not take an attack of opportunity so you could certainly walk over there and give it to her. Oh, I moved over there too, diddo. As you gave God. Okay, cool. Yeah.

We want to be over there anyways. Sure, sure, sure. Okay. Then Pilate says, you know. Here comes the airplane. Open up the hangar. That means open up. Yeah, but you didn't give any context to Griffin of what that.

Are you pouring in? That was kind of weird. Yeah. Okay. Can I just pour it down the lady Godwin's throat? There you go. That's up to Godwin, I guess. Godwin?

Numbies? I guess. Okay. I suppose. How have we never had one player, feed another player. A potion like a baby bird. Yeah, how's it not come up? Drinker regains a number of hit points equal to two D4 plus your intelligence modifier.

And of course, my intelligence modifier is what? Your business. It's your business. It's up at the top, dad, where it says intelligence, and then you have a modifier listed in it. Oh, okay. Well, here comes the roll. Okay, that's four plus six. So that's ten more points of healing.

Cool. Take 10 points more of healing, Lady Godwin. Nice. I'm killing it now. This exchange of sticks of dynamite and potions and healing and recovery is going down in this brief window of time where you have incapacitated the clone of Dracula. And did nothing to him in that time. And did absolutely nothing to him, which I think, frankly, was super chill of you guys. That's respectful.

He was burned somewhat by the lanterns light. However, that effect has ended. And he turns and looks straight through this lantern right at you, Lady Godwin, and says, What do you have there? Tasty little hot dog for your gracey human body. Um, he says, uh, were you thinking about blowing up my tower? No. Well, just to make sure.

He is going to try to charm you again. Uh, I need you to make a wisdom saving throw DC, uh, 17. Well, good, roll good. That's probably your strength, right? Is a, uh, oofa, dufa. Did you roll a zero plus two? No, I got a, I don't have a, I don't have a wisdom modifier, so it's just two. You fight it as hard as you can.

You are looking at Dracula and as you see him through the glass of the lantern, you see him through the glass of the windshield of the car that destroyed you. And you try to fight off this feeling inside of you as that hatred and that rage that you are. embroiled in begins to dampen and change. And with another rotation of the lantern, you see through the glass a trusted friend named Count Dracula whose words

are to be heated and whose physical body must be protected. You are... I know I should be disappointed about being charmed, but as actual play podcaster, it's real hard. to not feel like it's a whoop-hoo, like the old,

the old taradactyl just whistled break time. Yeah. It's a little, take it a little easy. You don't have to be that creative to be charmed. Well, you are, you are not under Dracula's control. However, whatever Dracula requests of you must be interpreted in the most favorable way possible. Gotcha. Would I still attack him?

No, he's a trusted friend. Okay, got it. Okay, perfect. I understand. A charm creature can't attack the charmer or target the charmer with harmful abilities or magical effects. The charmer has advantage on any ability check to interact socially with you. Dracula looks at you and he is going to turn into a cloud of mist and vanish. And when he reappears, he is staying.

standing right in front of the ladder. And he looks at you, Lady Godwin, and he says, Let's get this party started, huh? Yes, let's kick it off. Light it up. Let's light it up. No, light it up. What do you mean?

He looks down at the dynamite you're holding. The bats are going to fly in. It is now their turn. They fly in right into. to the three of you that are standing side by side and sort of like occupying the same space as Dracula as well. However, they don't attack you, Godwin.

Mutt and Philo, give me dexterity saving throws, please. We should have killed him while he was stunned. Crit 20, 21. Hell yeah. Nice. I have seven plus seven, 14. That is insufficient. Mutt, it's like these bats just form kind of two columns that sweep over you and Philo.

You see Philo, again, is his tiny body easily kind of able to curl up in a little ball and avoid the bats attacks, but there is nowhere to hide from the portion of the colony that is attacking you. You take seven points of slashing damage. Godwin, however, the bats don't attack you. Instead, they just kind of form like a tunnel, right, that is kind of, like putting blinders on you. So all you can see is Dracula. And he says,

uh, don't you want to go out in a blaze of glory? Light it up, Lady Godwin. Light it up. I want to die. I'm pretty sure. No, I trust you pretty implicitly,

but I think you miss reading me. We've grown apart. Uh, You ought to trusted friend. Make no mistake. But like, if Slice came to me and he was like, hey, blow yourself up, I was like, get in. Like, no way.

Fucking no way, dude. No way. You are a trusted friend to me. I'm not going to blow myself out. That would actually be the kind of thing. Listen, I don't want to get too in the weeds with, like, therapy and stuff. But that's a good sign that that is maybe not a healthy friendship. And then maybe you need to set some boundaries, you know?

You need to talk to Slice. Let's interpret it. this way. This is what I like. It says here, each time Dracula or his companions do anything harmful to the target, it can repeat the saving throw ending the effect on itself on a success, right? Maybe that's what we interpret this as, right? He is doing something harmful to you by ordering you to light this dynamite. So I get another check. So you can have a wisdom saving throw here. DC-17, same as last time. If you failed that, I think it would be pretty hard for you to argue that you shouldn't listen to the advice of your trusted friend

whose request you're supposed to honor in the most favorable. Nine. All right, let's do it. Fucking A! All right. All right, I like the wicks. Now, I'm still pretty nervous,

and luckily, it's a pretty long wick. It's got to be long. So this wick is actually a six-second wick, which means at the end of Godwin's next turn, the dynamite is going to explode. When you say WIC, could you mean fuse by any chance? Damn.

Yeah, probably. Fuse is just an exploding. A candle is just a non-exploding. Actually, you know what? Now that I, actually, yeah, now that we're talking about it, what we mean is a fuse. Okay. A wick, it's for a candle. All right, Dad.

That's one for Dad. You're right, Dad. That's one for Dad. One for Dad. You're right, Dad. Okay. Okay. If you want to do a bonus action here, Lady Godwin, you know, it's not like you can't do your own thing. You just can't act against Dracula. I can't act against Dracula. Right. I'm going to move these bats out of the way. They've flown, they scattered after their attack.

Yeah, are you doing anything, Lady Godwin? Free action, bonus action, move. can I make an insight check with my pre-established knowledge that Dracula does have these sorts of abilities and I would have thought about this can I make an insight check so I can see if some

I don't want to go against Dracula but so I could become aware because I do have the pre-existing knowledge that this is like something he would do and even though I think right now in my head There's no way he would do it. He's a trusted friend. I do think that this is a thought that I would have in my head. Do you know what it is, Lady Godwin?

It's not your now thorough knowledge of Count Dracula and what he's able to do. It is decades of navigating the social jungle of the city of Lumano. You know when you are being bullshitted by someone who you think is a pal. for that, I will allow you to have this sort of division of your mind to investigate itself with an insight check to see if you can pick up on that. 13? On a 13. 19. That's better.

22. Okay. On a 13, you get a whiff of it. This man is so hot. And floating and powerful, your best friend, and he only wants to party with you. And you know all that, but you've also known a lot of fucking guys like that before. And so I think that you are able to kind of exert a small amount of willpower here in this situation. Okay, a small amount is, I think, all I know.

Cool. Well, I seem to have done it to myself again, didn't I? We've been down this road before. hox another toxic relationship for me and i'm putting myself on the bench and i'm putting you in and i hand the dynamite to my hand okay dracula my hand my hand can't be under my thrall dracula's thrall yeah sure the hand takes the dynamite it kind of pinches it between its pinky and thumb kind of like holding it against the palm as it stands on the middle and ring fingers, like they are little feet.

I love that. And Dracula says, Don't do that. What are you doing? That's for us. It's a party, Fiver. I, listen, it's not up to me. That's my hand.

You've got to talk to the hand. Talk to the hand, I suppose. Dracula looks kind of, kind of nervous. What does your hand? Do. Uh, I don't know, Griff, you tell me. No. Hmm.

I can't, I can't control the hand. Uh, okay. Hmm. Let me think about that. Okay. I'm trying to be very fair. I feel you. If I, as a player, have a plan for the hand, then I might as well do it myself.

That's cheating. Um, okay. Uh, the hand is going to, uh, I'm not trying to necessarily solve this problem, but I trying to make it more interesting. I get you. So whatever happens, happens, man. I love my friend Dracula, so I actually don't care. I'm just happy to be here with him.

I think the hand is very small. It doesn't, you know, have a ton of movement speed. I think it realizes it is holding a dangerous object because we have given it certain human characteristics, right? And so I think it's just going to try to get it away from you. So I'm going to say your hand takes the dynamite and it scampers over behind the lantern. Let me find a little icon for it. Surprisingly, there is not just disembodied hand.

Okay, looks like we're going to the, looks like we're doing a web search. For disembodied hand, be careful, Griffin. Turn on safe search. Time to search disembodied. Ew! Oh, great, but I tried to work. boring here. Oh, yucky.

Griven, no. Get out of there. World's gnarly as skateboard accidents. Somebody give Griffin the kick. Get him out of there. He's gone too deep. Most extreme Russian semi-ricks. Way, man.

Dash cam, whoopsies. This is no good. This car's exploding. Okay, there's a hand now. It looks pretty badass if you ask me. It runs around sort of the other side of this compartment that the lantern is housed in and kind of puts the, the itself and the dynamite between you and the lantern.

It's like not that much further away, but it is also now, you are now standing between it and Dracula. So that, that's about as far as it. Oh, gosh, I'm sorry. Let's me get it. I'll get it. Hold on. Okay. So I start walking. That's just me time.

Okay, cool. I'm just talking. Yes, it is your turn, Crawford-Mudner. Okay. Hey, Merlin. My liege! Yeah, what up? What is your order, sir?

Great question. So, first, I'm going to need you to send a boat to pick me up so I can come and sit on the throne and show. Oh, at last! Yep, yep, yeah. Hooray, our king, his reign may it last long? Well, and... Okay, so that's point number two. Do you see that dude standing over the ladder there?

Holy shit, is the Cal Dracula? One of them. He is blocking our egress, and if I don't kill him, like now, then your king's about to explode. So I need your help channeling this big ball, like all this sunlight's coming here through Scalibur, so we can like blast this fool with your magic, so we can get the fuck out. My man, I'm just a hologram. Oh, come on, man. No, it's not It's listening

I'll bring you pornography Like the good stuff Flipbooks I can make my own porn Do you realize how insulting that is? Of course Eureka Uh

Hmm He says I can't do anything About that Um But I can teleport Things So one moment

he disappears and a second passes and then in the spot where he was floating just now you see the throne of the king of England up here right next to you okay I sit down you sit down in the throne immediately your head is filled with a dazzling amount of information

you are all of a sudden like your understanding of global politics, I think, increases dramatically. Your understanding of taxes and levies and trade and all that. That shit all hits. It's like you've read every issue of Le Mans all at once. Perfect. I love that. You also look down and you see the ruby shining in the hilt of Scalibur just sort of pulsing.

And you see that the runes that are etched down the blade are similar. filled with a golden light. Okay. I hint, I, Dracula. Right? Yeah. And I say,

All right, man, get fucked. And, uh, I, I say get fucked. Do you want to take another? Okay. I say, hey, I don't like you. Me?

You're a doo-do head. Whoa. Uh, how about, hey, Dracula, you suck. No, man. Oh, no, no, no, no, no, hold up, hold up, hold up. No, man. No? You got it.

You think that's the first time I've heard that one. Okay, let me try this one. In, in the words of my, in the new, in the new, no, no, no, in the words of, of my newfound people, this is going to be bloody good. And, well, I don't know, but you just have, like, I don't know about, like, I don't know about your journey. I stab him with my, well, I'm King Anglin, and I stab him with the glowing Scalibur.

Awesome. Make an attack roll, please. Oh, surely. It's going to be super great, right? What's the fully charged up Scalibur's plus to hit? What, I mean, whatever it is. No, because right now I have, well, it doesn't matter because it's an 18 plus whatever that is. Yeah, you hit, you hit Dracula on that.

I stab him straight through his stupid heart. Cool. You stab through Count Dracula with the fully powered up. Your hearts are full. And the beam that sort of emerges from the hilt and travels down the length of the blade into Dracula's heart, it is so brilliant and so bright. and you are wielding a power that is unfamiliar to you, but at the same time, like, so choice. As the light passes down the hill towards dragon.

Like, how many four locoes would you say it feels like? It feels like four, four locoes. That's 16 locoes. Are you sure? It's 16 locoes worth of... He... I think he just looks down at the blade as the light travels down it and enters his body, and he just says, Oh, farts!

And then he... Instantly, he shrivels into a... Just a corpse of a old, old human being that immediately stops floating and just drops like a sack of bricks down the ladder that he was hovering over. And you hear him fall 60 feet. There is a nice long time. pause and then you hear as he hits the ground below.

Well, another job. Well, oh, wait, we got to go. And I push Philo and Godwin towards the hall. But I'm going. Listen. I mean, your move is good, good. You have acted already. But I'm like, you're not going to be able to move your friends, I don't think.

No, no, no, no. But I don't want them luxuriating in the moment. Yeah, sure. You are also, for me, it would have to be contested. No, he's dead now. No, so, yeah. Oh, I'm afraid. Okay, good.

I'm just mad at you killing my friend. Sure, go ahead. Lady Gobind, you do feel a moment of frustration with mutt. You hate it when your friends fight. But then as Dracula turns into this desiccated falling corpse, you immediately remember, like, wait a minute, that guy's a total dick. Oh, actually, fuck Dracula. Yes.

My mistake. All right. Mutt? Yeah, it's ladder time. Then my classic, classic catchphrase. You, with your movement, what is your movement? 30 feet, you are able to get a decent length down the ladder. Your dark souls quick moving it of just kind of like fireman sliding down the sides.

You're able to get about halfway down the ladder with your movement, 30 feet below the lantern room. Um, that is it for you. Next in the order is Philo. Okay. So, at the end of Godwin's turn, the dynamite's going to go off, right? Correct. If the next word's out of your mouth, aren't, I go down the ladder. Go down the ladder.

What the fuck are you doing, Clinton? I've got to follow my dream. I got to follow him. Oh, what? Yeah, dad had a dream. I dreamt. I dreamt dream last night, which I've never dreamed. I've never dreamed about.

Taz. I've never dreamt about Taz. And I dreamt last night something to do here. Well, I'm glad you waited until this moment. Yeah. Okay. Fylo's an artificer. He has been studying. Everything, everything he does, he's studying. He's always studying. He's always looking. He's always analyzing and always trying to figure something out. And he, he, has this internal monologue going. I mean, you can have an internal conversation, a dialogue. No, I just, I just want to tell Van Helsing

to, uh, to, uh, to brace himself, to brace himself. Uh, you think that and you see Van Helsing appear and he says, should I be worried? Uh, yes. A little. He smiles and he nods and he says, I trust you. So Philo is watching his two friends make it ahead towards the ladder, but Godwin is still inside the structure, right? I mean, no, Godwin isn't trapped.

Godwin hasn't acted yet, but Godwin, you know. Yeah, but at the end of Godwin's turn, Cablooie. Well, Godwin gets a chance to move at the end of Godwin's turn. not at the beginning. Okay. Fylo has analyzed the situation. He's going to look at his friends. He's going to look at the lantern and say,

I am of two minds about this. I puts the helmet on. Just go on the ladder. Wow. Okay. On his own head. On the puppet head. On the puppet head.

Because the rest of him is gone. But his analysis. is that the reason it destroyed Philo's body is because it didn't have a mind to try to control the energy. But he has two minds because he has Abraham in there with him. Yeah, okay. You take the helmet off of your charred, unrecognizable corpse. I can't believe we're doing this fucking trope again, man. This old gag, we're what? We're peasant. The old Pinocchio takes the helmet off the corpse and puts it on his own head

Because Abraham Van Helsing lives in his head That old thing That old thing That old truth It's played out when John Wayne did it And now we're doing it again It's played out in the searchers And it's played out there

Classics, okay? Man, do you know how many times the Simpsons has made fun of this And we're doing it You put the helmet on and instantly you are transported. You are floating high above

Lumino. The clouds you do not see. You are below the top of Lumino Tower and so when you look up you just still only see night sky. When you look down though Lumino from this vantage point is truly living up to its name.

Every streetlight every electric lantern in the whole city is shining brilliantly below. And there are these narrow sort of ribbons of amber light streaming off of each of these electric lights trailing high into the sky, joining at the top of the tower. Floating over the theater district, you see Dracula. And he is floating, his arms sort of folded over his chest. chest. He is not the kind of young, vivacious fellow you've encountered before. This is the form of an old man. His hair is up into just sort of outrageous white buns atop his head. You are taking in your surroundings, you realize you are floating weightlessly, too, and that you are not alone. Right

at your side is Abraham Thane Helsing, who is looking at Dracula with steely resolve. This is happening sort of in a liminal space. This is happening... Is this still Dad's dream? Are we in Dad's dream right now? Is this all part of my dream? Dad, you are... I'm real, right?

I'm real, though, right? You are wherever Dracula has been... You're not answering me, Griffin. Freaking out. To control this city and the people inside it. What do you do? I think I've already done mine, right? No, I think we got a result.

all this before the dynamite explodes. Okay. I hadn't really, I didn't dream this part. That's the thing about dreams, Mac. Maybe dad, this is the moment to go down the ladder. Maybe now. Let Van Helsen kill him. McGriffin figure it out.

I don't know about the liminal. Okay. It feels like you are flying, right? You're in control of your body. It feels like the flight you have. have experienced yourself, right? You don't know what form you're in right now, but you do know that it is the same form that Dracula and Van Helsing are in.

Okay, fine. Okay, fine. I am going to drink one of my alter self elixirs. The fuck? Which works like the alter self spell. Sure, man. Yeah, we're jazzing it. I'm going to

extend, my Pinocchio nose as long as I possibly can. Fuck, why? And fly right at old bunhead Dracula. You... He's gonna skeeter him to death. I'm gonna skeeter that son of a gun. You turn yourself into

God's own missile as you launch yourself like a dart, sharpened, elongated swordfish nose in front of you. Wait, you have to tell a gigantic lie. Oh, okay. Um, uh,

I do, it has to be a gigantic. Well, you're gonna live to see tomorrow. Yeah. Yeah. Um, the gigantic lie is,

um, I know what I'm doing. There we go. Perfect. Okay. As you fly towards him, He opens his dark, blood-red eyes, and he holds out a hand towards you, attempting to hold you off. This is going to be a battle of wills happening inside of the tower.

You are essentially vying for control in this moment. I think what this is going to be is a, hmm, is it contested, I will allow you an option, contested sort of wisdom or contested arcana checks. Arcana. Okay. You're giving me a choice, Arcana. Okay. This is going to be a contested arcana check. Let me roll first to let you know what you are hitting.

Okay. Go ahead and roll. All right. Arcana check 16 You see him hold you off And he Says

I am the master Of puppets You think you can defeat me here I got no strings to hold me up The nose continues to grow And grow and grow and he looks at you And With a sudden burst your nose

doubles in length and shoots through Dracula's chest and 15 feet beyond. He arches his back and bends backwards. And like a crimson sheet of fabric being fed through a shredder, he just unravels and vanishes. And... And then it's just you and Vin Helsing, floating above Lumineau. And Van Helsing says, do you have any idea how we get out of here? Um, maybe.

Um, the nose grows longer. Yeah, the nose grows a little bit longer as you say that. Um, well, I think you can get out of here because you're free. Dracula's dead. You may go to your eternal rest, my friend. Oh, I don't want to do that. No way. Oh, you don't? No, I don't believe in that sort of stuff, so I'm not ready for sort of oblivion.

Yeah, if you had mentioned that before, I would have... Yes, we're a little bit short on time, though. Yeah, okay. So I think back in my corporeal body, do I have control of that? Um, no, I mean this, this, you have, you have changed bodies, right? You are inside of this. The, the helmet is still on Brother Philo. But I don't know that we ever really established, like, how one exits from this situation. Brother Philo casts Vortex warp on himself. Oh, shit. Okay. What? You magically twist space around another creature you can see within range. target must succeed on a constitution saving throw

or the target is teleported to an unoccupied space of your choice that you can see within range. So I'm going to transport myself to the surface of Luminon. I love this. So you won't need to do your own concept, right? Like you can fail on purpose to allow this to happen to you. Right. you cast this spell and a vortex appears around you and you see Van Helsing

looking at these ribbons of Dracula that are still drifting upwards into the sky which in this liminal space it has started to change and you see beams of light from the sun above part through the clouds he looks at you as you enter this portal and he says let's cut back while you guys ponder over your liminal situation i i need to talk to mutt okay mutt is i know we have less than six seconds but i feel like with the liminal space thing happening yeah let's we can fludge it time is frozen hey mutt can i ask you what in the actual hell

going on with philot? Great question. Did he, did he eat some fucking spinach or something? I, I don't understand. He's been a well-meaning puppet. He'll do a little jig every once in a while, cure a, you know, a single, single-digit number of hit points. It's all very well and good.

And then all of a sudden, he's gone fucking super-saying. He's flying through the air, he's extending his body. It's incredible. Yeah, man, I think, can I tell you, we've been finding a lot of, And I'm not, here's, I've been fighting a lot of bad guys up to this point. And I think he's been holding back, if I'm being honest. I guess he's been saving salts. Here's the worst part, mud.

I'm not even shown for experience. Yeah, man. That's what's really wild. It's like I'm in a dreamscape, but I'm not. You know, I'm awake, but it's like a whisper of an echo of a dream. You are actually. How many layers? Do we need to give Philo the kick?

Spin a top or something. Jesus Christ. Yeah, I'm worried Philo's going to. to cast the wrong spell and dad's gonna see him behind him. Like he's just gonna like up here by fucking page master or something. He looks at you as you are, you create this vortex behind you, Philo. Abraham Van Helsing says, I suppose my work is done.

I mean, there's definitely probably a few Dracula still out there, but, uh, We got the big one, so I think I am ready. Brother, what does your Saint-Tancred say about death? What awaits me when I depart? St. Hancred and his two brothers said, Death is just a state of mind. It's a state you go to. As long as you don't mind.

Hmm. Well, St. Tancroix was not really good at spitting out the really catchy catchphrases. Not a jazz man, Saint-Tay. No, he didn't. He couldn't skewed it. He could not save his life. Then perhaps for all Dracula's follies, we have this to learn from him. Death is not.

so scary after all. And the vortex sucks you in and you reanimate inside of your puppet body. The helmet is giving off smoke. Whatever you have just done here, it was not part of the invention's original design.

You are back in this space. You see Lady Godwin standing over the ladder, descending downward, looking around in just sort of mystified, as it turns out that the liminal space was sort of kind of arcane superposition created by this incredibly powerful, magical device you all are standing in. So you definitely saw some of that crazy Goku encounter happened outside. That is, I think, it for your turn.

Next in the order. the bats. We have all forgotten about them until it was too late. Fucking, hell yeah. Okay, for the, for the listener at home, the bats would now quadrupled in size. Their saucer, their saucer now encompasses the tower. Now, this is not important to note.

These are not actual bats growing in size. It's simply the idea of bats has grown larger in the public consciousness. We're way more aware of them now. We're so much more funded into bats. Another successful Godwin awareness campaign. Here's what happens. The bats fly into the tower. They are going haywire now that they are no longer sort of being remote controlled.

They have flown into this tower and are just sort of crashing around this room. They have dispersed. That is why they have sort of like increased in size here on the map. But they are basically making it pretty. tough to see what's going on in this room right now. And last in the order is Lady Godwin. Can you pay a picture for me, Griff?

I don't have a great ability. Thanks. The bats were really... But just trust that the bats are there. I'll put them in the corner, always watching. Hey, Lars, what are you doing? You playing? You are standing at the center of the land. lantern room. At the other end of the room, you can see kind of through this cloud of bats, Brother Philo, who has just regained consciousness inside his puppet body standing next to the skeleton of Dracula. Behind you is the hole with the ladder, leading downward to relative safety from the

dynamite that is moments away from detonating, which is also inside of this little lantern housing chamber on the other side where your hand has kind of crawled away towards. Okay. I mean, you have, you, I think, have a lot of options here. If you don't do anything about the dynamite, it is going to explode at the end of your turn. So if you're not doing something about that, getting either yourself or you sense that mutt is probably okay since he is underneath this room. Yeah, you guys don't.

but you are, that is the, that is the scenario. Does my hand have the dynamite? Uh, you, you, you, you have no reason to suspect it doesn't. Like I said, it is kind of hard to see anything in here, um, because of these damned bats. How far am I from Dracula and Philo? Uh, you are about 10 feet from Dracula and Philo. Great. I am going to dash over and grab Philo.

Uh, Okay. Yes. I grabbed Philo for my second attack. I think, hey, Justin, I know that Lady Ganoa's been pretty attack-based, but everything doesn't have to be an attack. He just grabbed Philo. I don't see.

I'm sorry, that was an attack. All right. Travis, B and D you don't understand. Grab it. When all you guys are a hammer, I guess, you know. It is not an attack. You are moving through incredibly treacherous terrain. I think just to kind of navigate this cloud of bats and make it to Philo, I think like maybe a deck save just to see how easy it is for you to find him and get to him like at all.

Two and a three. Not great. You are being battered. He still got. Reddit agrees Taz is back. You, as you push forward through this cloud of bats, you are being just constantly lacerated by their wings. A couple of them cling onto your body and you feel a few of them sink their teeth into you.

You are going to take 21 points of slashing, piercing damage kind of mixed. Hell yes. Thank you. I don't think you are raging anymore. I think after being mind-controlled, I don't think you didn't attack that turn. So that would be full damage.

Yes, that's true. Full damage, got it. Perfect. That's just your move. You have made it to Philo. Just part of my move, right? I can break it up. I mean, yes, that's part of your movement.

Thank you. Okay, next up. And try an old classic. Oh, my one last shot. I want to pick up Dracula's corpse and I'm going to throw it into the lantern. The old go-to. Here we go, baby. One more.

There's been five attempts so far. None of them have worked. Five in a row I've attempted to throw somebody into something that hasn't landed. But I think, like, remember narratively, it was really, we all thought it was going to happen before, but it didn't. And I think it's just building to this exact moment. You know what they say, if at fourth you don't succeed. You grab this gap-toothed skeleton and lift it and prepare to throw it as you do. You flashback to high school track team.

You are on the javelin toss squad and it's the day of the big meet. And when it's your turn, you get up and you trip. And the javelin, it just. snaps on the ground and everyone points and laughs and mean Tommy Jefferson in the stands. He yells, good. Nice throw, Sodwin. And laughs and laughs and laughs and laughs and laughs. You remember all the times in your life.

Some of them extraordinarily recent of where you have attempted to throw something, but you just can't fucking get it right. But as you pick up these old-ass Dracula bones, you realize you have one more chance to prove this, not to anyone else, but to yourself. Make your attack roll. Is it time for the roll? The big roll. The one.

I love it. He doesn't know. That's a three plus six, a nine. The bones just kind of fall down on the ground like four inches away. The other thing, the other thing that he doesn't know. The other secret I was just testing his weight for my frenzy attack

Mut is on the ladder halfway down looking up at the whole like Here they come You know what You hear mut from 30 feet above you You hear And you know that Lady Godwin just fucked up throwing something

Not a long distance again There is improvement You can't deny it. Statistically, it is better than the last one. A four, Justin tries again, fucking Lady Gobind tries again, bro. Four plus six for a tent. Above you might, you hear it a second time and you're like, there's no fucking way!

I'm like counting seconds in my head. Like, we're on like sit, missus sit at this point. Like, what are they doing? So they did it. So, but the first, what I got Falo, that was a free action. That wasn't by attack. I do have if at six, one more, you don't succeed. No, I pressed the javelin button that time, so that was the wrong button.

It accidentally rolled up. Well, you are not raging, so you do not have your third attack. So two, you realize, you know what, Lady Godwin, you can try again. It will be the last thing you ever do. All right, me and the puppet jump off the tower, eh? All right. I need, uh, Philo, you are fine, right? you are small and light.

Godwin has no problem picking you up as she smashes through the northern windows. Give me, as the moment you smash through the windows, the dynamite behind you explodes. And you are launched outwards. I need a... Well, Philo is, but they're still in the tower.

You see Lady Godwin, and you see her scooping up the bones. how could this be she's willing to sacrifice everything to destroy the bone I need to know if how much of that is a goof or if you've also jumped out of the tower did you stay behind to try no I jumped out of the tower man it's fun to play this yeah yeah give me a dexterity saving throw to see how able to escape this explosion you are as you jump out at the very last second. 17?

Fantastic. Oh, yeah. There's your advantage. No, just 17. With a 17, it is just in the nick of time. You feel this tremendous wave of heat growing behind you that just as you get worried it's going to consume you, you are sort of launched away by the concussive force of this dynamite exploding.

you see the bones of Dracula on the floor be swallowed up by the flame. And then moments after the flame sort of shoots overhead, then just a mushroom cloud of brilliant white light emerges from the top of the tower as it explodes outwards like the fucking end of Lord of the Rings. That's cool when you don't want to describe something. you can just reference like a similar thing. You say it looks like something else. Go watch that.

You'll get it. It explodes in a sort of spherical wave of force. But I think you were a safe distance away from the explosion, but now the thing that the ladder was attached to above has exploded. So I'm going to need, I don't know, acrobatics to get down the ladder extremely quickly or a deck save to try to just avoid the debris fall. I want to get down the ladder because now that they're like going, you know what I mean? Yeah, sure, sure.

Thank you. That is an eight plus four. 22. Eight plus four? No, sorry, 18 plus four. A wildly different result. Yeah, yeah, yeah, much much different. That's not me.

You can see the number. You know it's 18. Okay. 22. That's a real 22. You lift your feet from the wrong you were standing on and just kind of like press the like inner souls of your shoes against the sides of the ladder and shoot down it. You hit the floor and roll off the ladder and you duck down in the sort of door frame leading

outward to the town square below. And you see that everyone has sort of run off from this tower as it explodes. Debris falls down. It crashes into surrounding buildings. It crashes into the fountain in the center of town square, but you are able to escape danger. What do I see? Can I see Godwin and Philo falling? I don't think we can possibly argue that you slid down a ladder faster than terminal velocity. So I think that this is kind of happening simultaneously. I don't know.

If you do see Godwin and Philo falling, it is at the end of that fall. So let's hop back to like a second or two ago. Godwin and Philo, you are both plummeting to the ground. You have moments before the street, which is about 70 feet below you, comes to meet you. Are we still in initiative? We are not. No. Okay.

Philo has, I know you're going to check this, but it's true. Philo has one flying elixir left. I believe you. No shit. He baby birds, Lady Godwin, again. Nummy, hell yes. No. Fuck, no.

It's anus flavored. Ugh. Not anus. Fuck, anus. I'd rather have anus. Hell. Fly. Is that rhubon?

Is that rhubops? Whee! Okay. Hey, Godwin, you are falling as you drink this potion. And I think that you start figuring it out as you fall to the ground. You are not flying Philo, so as she is trying to kind of like compensate for the weight of you, I think that you all are just kind of like spinning. Your descent slows somewhat, but I'm going to need a dexterity saving throw from both of you.

as you approach the ground with, you know, maybe not fatal speed as you twist around. I reach up and I reach up and, uh, he's a, I reach up and push his nose as hard as I can. Push his nose? Yeah, I'm going to use him as a propeller. It's still gigantic. It's still gigantic. So, so, you're going to spin his head around real fast so his, so he's, nose turned into a propeller. That's...

Because it's extremely... It's extremely long. So I can use that to help control. His nose was long in the liminal space, but I'm fully willing to... Yeah, sure. Give me a strength check as you attempt to violently rotate the head of this puppet man who is your friend. A strength check. Now that I can do.

17. You do see them, Mutt. You see Godwin and Philo. Um, Philo looks weird. It looks like Godwin is holding him aloft above her, but then you see that his head is spinning around at about 1,300 RPMs. As, as he forms a makeshift helicopter and lowers himself and Lady Godwin down to the ground, slow and soft. I didn't say that. I got a flight potion.

I'm going to go find his bullies. Let's go. Okay. Well, then they don't. I want to go look for some of his bullies. There's got me people who were bullying him earlier. I want to do the like the luck dragon bit where we're like flying right. He's like, go get him.

I want to harass all his bullies. No, no, we'll land. No need to harass bullies today. That's for tomorrow. That's for tomorrow. Lady Godwin and Philo execute a textbook Poppins landing on the ground next to you. and how do you stop Philo's head? I said him gingerly on the ground and step.

Just waiting for him to let it wind down. Your associates, the fellow... He's throwing up sawdust everywhere. And the problem is, how do you clean that up? Yeah. Throw vomit on it. Oh, okay. You see your fellow defenders of Lumino sort of peeking out of the, the rebel, as they begin to approach you.

The musicians and dramatists and artists and everyone kind of shake their heads and come to their senses. And at first, everyone is looking at you. and then they all look up as the vortex is dispersed from the fractured tower above. And as it disperses, sunlight begins to be down hard on the city of Lumino and on grave. you hear cheering and jubilation as people celebrate their freedom. From what exactly? I think most of them probably don't know, but they do know that the sun has returned to Ongrave.

And music from countless sources just fills the streets as Lumino is consumed by joyous celebration. a parade forms organically winding through the streets of the city for hours. And as the noon sun rises upward to its apex, this parade passes by a narrow alleyway where a skeleton lays on the cobblestones, broken and charred. The sun creeps towards this skeleton, and it glows. And the beginning traces of musculature start to reform around the skull and the bones rattle. And then a song, music, begins flooding through this alleyway as the parade passes.

There's a single violinist straggling behind the pack. And suddenly as Count Dracula reverect, and reforms and regenerates, his senses are launched six centuries into the past to the day when the world's beauty first revealed itself to him. And then the sunlight passes over his reforming body, reducing him to a cloud of ash that drifts gently upwards into the sunlit sky. Maximum Fun. A Worker Owned Network of Artist-owned Shows, supported directly by You. you.