The Glass Cannon Podcast - Giantslayer Episode 206 - Don't Tell Mom Her Baby's More Than Dead

Episode Date: May 7, 2019

While Barron and Dalgreath recover from the physical and emotional wounds of the throne room battle, two strangers arrive at Skirgaard looking for the Sheriff of Trunau. For more podcasts and livestreams, visit glasscannonnetwork.com. To become an official member of the Naish, subscribe today at http://www.jointhenaish.com. Want to be a part of Glass Cannon Nation? Follow us at twitter.com/glasscannonpod instagram.com/theglasscannon facebook.com/glasscannonnetwork tiktok.com/@glasscannonnetwork Get the best apparel and gaming accessories in the biz at https://glasscannonnetwork.com/store If you enjoyed this, we have several other series featuring Call of Cthulhu - Time For Chaos Delta Green - Get in the Trunk Pathfinder 2E - Glass Cannon Live! Strange Aeons Pathfinder 1E - Legacy of the Ancients Traveller - Voyagers of the Jump and so much more! Join us every Thursday night for Campaign Two of The Glass Cannon Podcast – a playthrough of the Pathfinder 2E Gatewalkers Adventure Path! Videos premiere on YouTube Thursday nights at 8PM ET with a companion podcast available at midnight. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week on the Glass Cannon Podcast. And now we're back in Skirgard. As Baron and Dalgrith see across this now empty camp. Two figures walking towards them. A new team comes together. Name yourselves! What brings you to the mountaintop? The Rogue.

The name's Dalgrith Underfoot. They call me the Deathbringer. The Swordsman Shring! Like he pulls out Terminus Est. Oh my god That's so awesome! And he's like, yeah, I think I can do a number on him all the same though The Sorcerer is one of you

Baron Ashpeak Sheriff of True Now? And the Sheriff. That would be my name and my title, ma'am. You wouldn't happen to be related to Delanarn, would you? The adventure continues. I don't care if we sit here for 45 minutes or if we sit here for three hours and 45 minutes.

This episode will not end until book 4 is over. This is it. No. Hello, my lords and ladies. Welcome to episode 206 of the Glass Cannon Podcast. I want to go ahead and remind you to get your tickets for our upcoming live shows. We've got two upcoming shows in Indie during Gen Con, and we've got a show in Atlanta during Dragon Con, and we just announced shows in L.A. and Boston in the fall.

So excited for all of those. And this month, of course, is PaiselCon, and we can't wait for that either. We had so much fun last year, can't wait to do it again this year. The live show at Numos is sold out, but if you came last year, you know that the Glass Cannon Room was the place to be all weekend long. And this year, Glass Cannon HQ is doubling in size. They're literally taking a wall down between us and the room next door, so we'll have more space to play. We were hanging out in there all the time last year, playing games, aggressively singing Christopher Cross songs all the usual stuff

so go ahead and come by for a pickup game there'll be lots of board games there or you can sign up in advance to be GM'd through a Pathfinder scenario by one of our Glass Cannon Nation GMs just go ahead to head to our social media find the link to the Warhorn to sign up for those games and we'll be doing panels Matthew and I are doing one about character building and we'll be playing in a three-part second edition game with jason bullman running the show and eric mona sign ups for those events start this wednesday may 8th so get on that anyway i have talked to you years off let's get into this it's so exciting this is episode 206 you fabulous people. This is it, gentlemen.

This is the one you've all been waiting for. The listeners have all been waiting for. This is it. I don't care if we sit here for 45 minutes or if we sit here for three hours and 45 minutes. This episode will not end

until book four is over. Wow. This is it. What a stupid state. No, we're doing it. We could literally be doing this for four hours. Do you realize that?

I regret it immediately. Challenge accepted. Because this is my edit, and it goes up in a couple days. But you know what? It's going to be great. I think I have an Uber discount. Let me just check that on my phone. I've got to go home.

If it's too late, you're going to oob? Save your receipt. You realize we're like a really, really long distance away from completing this objective yes i do realize that but i think i think the spiritual end of this book can happen in sometime in the next five hours i really feel confident let me be clear i want it to happen right for sure and i want to record through till it happens i just i don't know if you know what you're saying i you're a madman i really i can kind of i don't normally do this but i can kind of see this episode in my head i don't know what you guys are going to do and that's where things are going to get tricky because all of a sudden

you want to start role playing with a bush and i've got to like create johnny bush and then that's half of the episode for new listeners that's an example based on a true story that's not that far actually exactly. That's actually exactly what happened. If you're just joining us in episode 206. Oh, episode 206 of an actual play podcast. I think I'll start here.

New favorite character, Johnny Bush. Hello. The secret to Skirkadla is... I am hot. That right there just lost me because you would never,

ever introduce an NPC that would be that helpful. That's true. No, never. What is it you would never, ever introduce an NPC that would be that helpful. That's true. No, never. What is it you seek? You only introduce NPCs that discourage us from discovering and talking to new NPCs. It's interesting. If I can discourage you from our role play, then I feel like I've done my job.

I would like to speak with the tree. The tree is just like, you should go do the combat. What was the tree? What was the tree? Jasmine. Jasmine. Son of Jasmine. What was your father's name? My friends call me JJ.

No, no, no. Somebody else called him JJ that he was like, I like that. I like that. Hey, Ralph. Call me JJ from now on. Jasmine. He turns to another tree. It's your own fault that we go down

that aggressive path. Oh, man. We are off and running. Almost done this up. This is it. And before. I can just say it, even if we're in the middle of something. It's your call. I've completed my quest. I'm excited about this episode. I guess I'm a little bit nervous

Not nervous in the sense of like I was Before the Scarecrow fight There's just a lot going on And there has been a lot going on Since episode 200 At the risk of extending things Can I ask you Because I didn't get a chance to ask you

Please Afterwards Did you You were scared At the risk of extending things Can I ask you Because I didn't get a chance to ask you Please Afterwards Did you You were scared Fearful Before the Scarecrow fight Like what How did it turn out

Compared to what you expected Did you expect half the party to die Did you expect maybe the full party to die Did you expect one death I expected one death I expected one death Because I knew I was bringing the house I knew that I was giving her

You know the same edge that you had as a as a as a leader i i felt like it was proper to give her a similar edge that you guys had throughout every battle in in uh in scare guard um so i thought yeah i think i can get one of them but i didn't know how it was going to play out and you didn't know which one it would no no and but did you ever guess we all guess did you ever guess i one it would be No, no And Did you have a guess? We all guessed Did you have a guess? I thought it'd be one of the casters I really did I just thought

It all came down to initiative And if I could paralyze There was so many paralyzing options Is that written in the adventure That they That whoever Whether it's Keir Cutler Or the other ones

That they target the casters Because sometimes that's written in the adventure Yeah Definitely I think it was either the Witchfires Or the Baycocks target the casters Yeah Yeah, I mean obviously The howl the baycocks do can take out everybody but it only

took out faraz to begin with um but it's also the the this world that we've created now over 200 plus episodes uh and everything that we brought in in 200 i didn't you know quite realize at the time that we'd be merging those worlds so quickly so i guess uh now that it's we've got to kind of where we need to be with that i'm interested to see where it goes uh from here do you guys have any questions about what we're doing what game we're playing today all of the above okay no i don't have any questions I'm excited I'm excited to For the At the end of last episode I loved the image

Of those two characters Yeah Coming toward Dalgrath and Baron And I'm also Honestly You know Personally

As sad as I am To see Pembroke and Faraz go I am I'm excited that The two dwarves Made it out And can Continue that story, I am excited that the two dwarves made it out and can continue that story. So I'm excited that

those two are meeting Jimmer and freaking Metra. Like, that's just awesome. So I'm very excited for this session. I have been for a while. Yeah, me too. I've been super excited about this. Yeah. Yeah. And you know, there hasn't really been proper time, as often happens

with character death, to mourn the dead characters because we were going back and forth in timelines as well as just a long, drawn-out combat. You finally got out of there, and I like the way that you guys described it. You just get in that room, you close the door, and you collapse and pass out from exhaustion. Yeah, like bar the door with detritus from around the room and then just pass out on the floor. So this should be pretty, pretty interesting. I'm not going to delay it any further. I just want to jump right in. And since it is a momentous episode, we got to start a little scene here.

Oh. So we're going to open. Where do you think we're going to open? True Now. The Shadow Plane. We're going to open on the city you think we're going to open? True Now. The shadow plane. We're going to open on the city of True Now. Matthew's always right. Nailed it.

We see True Now. It appears to be in a state of rebuilding. You see several carpenters sweating in the setting sun to repair boulder-sized holes in the city walls. Sweeping over the inner quarter, there are numerous people milling about, going about their daily business. You see some soldiers finishing up their day drinking, stumbling out of the killing ground,

while sounds of metal clanging on metal echo out of clamor. Cling, clingling, kling. We continue to sweep through this lively scene until we land on the sanctuary, where a handful of people are exiting. You can't see the rest of the group, but the last two people to leave are two dwarves,

a brother and sister, perhaps. It's Umlo and Ingrahild. And they look ready to get their drink on. Our eyes, however, are fixed on another figure who's waiting nearby for the group to get far enough away from the building. When they do, he slips from the shadows and up to the door of the sanctuary. It's Silvermane.

Yes. He enters the chapel, walks through, he sees Tiare Varvedos and Brantos Calderon speaking to each other. He nods to them and then continues further and slips into a room Where splayed out on a table Is the body Of Galabras Finn

Nearby Droja and Catresra Sit in vigil conversing Quietly with each other They see Silvermane approach And sort of like smile Sadly at him Silvermane approach and sort of like smile sadly at him. Silvermane slowly walks over to the body of Galabras and looks down at him, looks down at a face he almost doesn't

recognize anymore. A face he hasn't seen in hundreds of years. Somberly, he places his hands on Galabras' chest and then reaches for something in his tunic. After a moment, he gently removes the butterfly pendant that Galabras got from the ghost of Fabian Blix in Red Lake Fort. Silvermane then nods to Droja and Catresra, who sort of look quizzically at him but don't ask any questions. And then he walks out. The door to Silvermane's home opens, and he walks in and straight up to a humble wooden desk sitting in the corner of his shack. Sitting down at the desk, staring into space, he pulls out a piece of parchment,

grabs a quill, and pauses for a moment to look around him in this empty room with this feeling that maybe he's not alone right now. And he begins to write a letter. And now we're back in Skirgard. And now we're back in Skirgard. As Baron and Dalgrith see across this now empty camp, two figures walking towards them. One, is that Brander? Is that Della? It's a woman. It can't be. It's an older older woman And there's a man Behind them

What do the dwarves do We dart eyes at each other Yeah Dalgrith has a sword In his hand cause he heard the beating Of the wings thought it might be Brander He's got a sword in his hand he looks at Baron Looks out the window They look like friends to me

Do you know them? I don't know either of them, but in my experiences, bad days never end when you want them to, so we'd better just go out into the street and say howdy to them. Yeah, I don't think they'd have any reason to be up here

if they were fighting for the wrong side. If you know what I mean. All right, on three. All right. One, two, boom! and they burst out the door and you're just like paranoid hurt like malnourished yeah freezing cold slept on the floor for the last four hours exhausted wide awake trying to figure out how they're going to beat these wildfires and dog great that's just like name yourselves what brings you to the mountain top wide-eyed a little crazy looking metro looks at jimmy

is that them i don't know be a hell of a coincidence if it wasn't them hey uh hey sorry fellas uh uh we uh we don't mean to we don't mean to give you a fright. My name's Jimmer Hardy. This here's, her name's Metra. Metra Narn. Metra Narn. And can you tell, for Baron's sake, like, this is his first time seeing them. Like, what do they look like today?

They've been mountain traveling. Maybe they're different. Like, just give him what he sees for the first time. So, well, we've been flying, right? Is that what's going on are you our eagles landed yes the eagles probably are so i yeah the eagles have landed the eagles have landed the eagles are coming go birds uh let's go buddy thank you buddy i'm not pounding yes yes matthew's a huge supporter of the nfl he once was Jimmer is

he's wearing half plate he's got a very fine strained kind of odd looking sword like hanging at his belt he's got a shield and he looks like Walton Goggins but his hair is like kind of like sticking straight up in the wind and he's got a patch over one eye

and Metro is obviously the pale translucent skin of the fetchling no fit no pupils dark cloak that seems to be kind of shifting independently of the wind and she's got this tattoo over her neck and coming up onto her face that seems to be moving as well badass and she says metra narn yeah and baron just drops his jaw and says i'm sorry ma'am cross the wind yeah snow blowing and the light abandoned camp snow in both of their beards just like collecting in their beards and he just kind of puts a hand on dalgris chest and staggers forward kind of three more steps and you can kind of see him dragging snow behind him around his boots is one of you

Baron Ashpeak Sheriff of True Now that would be my name and my title ma'am you wouldn't happen to be related to Delanarn would you

I think we'd better go inside. I think that's best. Ah, I told you, Baron. He gives him like a slap on the back. Friends could only be friends at the top of the mountain at this time. Yes, come, come in. Come in.

We've kept it warm. I'm afraid it's not very comfortable, but at least it's inside. And as Dalgris slaps Baron on the back, a loose molar from the fight from the Skirkotler just launches out of his mouth. Wipes the blood from his chin. Metro pulls down her hood and shakes the snow. And he shakes any snow out of her hair. And do I see a resemblance to Dallin? Oh, yeah.

She looks vaguely like Isabelle Huppert. Okay. Oh, right. Huppert. Huppert is how I like to call her. Isabelle Huppert. Okay. Oh, right. Huppert. H-U-P-P-E-R-T, as I like to call her. Isabel Huppert. Huppert. Isabel Huppert.

I don't rightly know how you know my name, ma'am, but considering you might come from the same type of arcane background as your daughter, I wouldn't put it past you. I'm going to let you ask the questions because God knows I have many, but there's a lot to talk about. You're the last one I've been able to find. I talked with Sir Willem at Keswick. I talked with Droja and Catra. And Trunel. And they told me... I needed to find you and your team.

To find out what happened to my daughter. Um... Ma'am, have you, um... When's the last time you dealt with difficult news? Is she dead? Have a seat. Do you drink whiskey? No.

I'm going to have a little bit before I tell you the story, if that doesn't bother you any. Not at all. I had to drink. He finishes off like a half pint of whiskey before he gets going. And it's just like all in one fell swoop. If there's a little bit left in there, I'm sorry. We've traveled a very long way. Of course.

Here you go. Thank you. You've had that all night. You didn't mention it once. It's my special grieving whiskey. I don't mean any disrespect. You guys would have liked to know about the whiskey. Oh, yeah. Yes, sir.

Sorry, let me introduce myself. The name's Dalgoth Underfoot. They call me the Deathbringer. Puts out a hand. Shakes her hand. Goes to Jimmer. We just shook hands in real life. We just shook hands in real life.

Yeah, that was awesome. You go to Jimmer. Now they're kissing. You know, he's looking up at Jimmer and his eyes. I mean, there's just such a genuine, like, relief in seeing someone so well-armed and armored walking in the door. And so he walks up to you, looks up at you, puts out a hand and just like, you know, with a kind of a stern look on his face. It's just like, it's good to see friends here. We've been up here alone for quite some time.

I'm sorry, did you say Dalgrief Deathbringer? I did, yes. Well, shoot, yeah, I've heard of you. Ah, shit. Yeah, I know you. Oh, shit. Who is he? No, this fellow, he's famous all around the inner sea.

This guy's got a lot of stories behind him. It's a pleasure. And I'm sorry, but Baron, I've heard tell quite a bit of you as well, and it's an honor and a pleasure to meet you. Wish it could be under better circumstances. What happened to the two of you? Well, we've been on a path involving your daughter quite a bit. Now, you see, your daughter was amazing on the battlefield.

She was a kind companion and someone who I could always count on. In fact, I deputized her in the fight for the small folk against, I don't know if you know, but giants are amassing and trying to take over the whole world. I've heard some of this, yes. I've heard some a girl that young. Now, I thought that she had fallen in battle. But just a moment.

How old did you think Della was? I thought she was 18 years old. Somewhere around there. How old is she? Go on with your story. Well, you know, a girl like that, she's precocious, but she had skills, so... She joined our... She saved my life while I was still blind.

Or getting over that anyway, and went all around the world with me. Trying to stop the advance of these giants, but we finally got into a battle. We bit off a bit more than we could chew, and I saw your daughter die, ma'am. At least, I thought I saw her die. And then she was taken away by a very evil man. On the wings of a dragon.

And, matter of fact, he's kind of been chasing us all around in our efforts. And he's nearby right now. in our efforts, and he's nearby right now. And it's just getting harder and harder for Baron to say this. Like, it's impossible. He's not even making eye contact with her. Still drinking the whiskey. It's just still. And Dalgrith, in his head, is putting it together.

Right. Because he saw the half-Della face on this guy. I didn't know who Della was, but now as he's telling the story and Baron's reticence to reveal everything, Dahlgren is just going, Oh fuck. Like in his head, like this is her mother,

but he's not saying anything. He's just like completely still. I don't know if your daughter is alive or dead, or if her spirit's still on this plane, but I can tell you that parts of her have been reincorporated into this man that stole her. I'm sorry? Uh, look, there's no easy way to say this. So I'm just

gonna say, the remains of your daughter have been partially merged with this man, like a freak surgery. And I don't know how to ever pull him apart or what's left, but he seems to be feeding on some of her strength.

It's gruesome, ma'am, and I hate to be the one to have to tell you. You're saying that this man took my daughter's body and merged it with his own to become some sort of undead monstrosity. That's what you're telling me? Yes. He seems to be on a strange journey to obtain a power that I don't comprehend fully. I don't entirely understand the aims or means he has, fully I don't entirely understand the aims or means he has but he's somehow

taken your daughter and tried to become something in his perverted twisted way of thinking greater than he ever was on his own and Metra just kind of shakes her head and looks away

I thought when I came back to this plane, we could have left this kind of... left this kind of thing behind. I'm sorry, left behind? This sort of thing is common to you? I've seen a great deal in my travels. My attempts to get back here to my daughter.

Well, I'm sorry, ma'am, and Baron takes off his winter hat and kind of... Seems really inappropriate. I'm trying to have a moment here, Joe. That's the audience. Oh, he took his hat off. Oh, boom.

Fireworks. Have you thought about disabling hotkeys in the program? Has that ever been a troubleshooting idea for you, Joe? It's worse than the gunshot. So, yeah, Baron takes his hat off his head and kind of scrunches it on the other side and looks at her and says, I'm very sorry. I'm dreadfully sorry that I couldn't have kept your daughter alive.

I consider it one of my largest failings. Please forgive me. I know not what to forgive. Nor does it seem it's my place to do so. Especially since that's not the whole story, is it? I'm sorry, I'm not sure what road you're trying to lead me down. What happened before she died? Keswick.

He hinted. But he didn't tell me everything. Now, you're going to have to tell me the hint, because I traveled with your daughter for months and years. I mean, she got into a heap of trouble with some demon's blood, and Sir Will sure didn't like that. Is that what you're referring to? He seemed to suggest that in her final days, she had been tempted by an evil force and joined with it.

She did the ritual at the cathedral? Oh, yes, yes, yes. Well, yes. She did the ritual at the cathedral Oh yes yes yes Well um Yes Now that I remember Your daughter She was part of a satanic ritual right in front of my face Right before she died I was standing right there

I was on the good part of that ritual So I kind of forgot about it She was a troubled young woman on the good part of that so I kind of forgot about it she she was a troubled young woman and she seemed to be playing with the forces of evil and when she was given the opportunity to make a choice between the two

she devoted herself to a giant god I suppose in the pursuit of power which didn't really seem to fit her. Perhaps it would fit her more than you know. The forces of darkness are at hand, are they not? Yes. Yes. I'm sorry. We're so beat up because I think we took down the figurehead of this here camp,

up because I think we took down the figurehead of this here camp but there's still more forces of evil left in that tomb and once I get rested up it's my intention to head in there and take him down with Dalgrith over here. I'm sorry

we were led to believe that there were more in your party We lost a few. He steps up, giving Baron a break. We? I fought the good fat, but she got the best of us.

The queen of undeath that resided in the tomb in the mountain. She has powerful allies. Ghostly, undead, incorporeal. They overwhelmed us Undead. Incorporeal. They overwhelmed us. We were outmatched. And taken.

They took half our number. We went in with four and walked out with two. And we didn't know how we'd go back in. Now we're back up again and I think we might have a chance. If you two are as Tough as you look But it is It's a dark evil place in there But my friend here

He stood up to it And he took down the leader In the final moments So I feel like the evil is mostly behind us Perhaps the souls left inside Are merely tortured So I feel like the evil is mostly behind us. Perhaps the souls left inside are merely tortured. But it doesn't change the fact that they're not going to let us pass willingly. And we need to... And he looks at Baron.

We need to retrieve the bodies of our friends. Yes. We can't let them rest in there in that dark place. So we were... As you landed this morning, we were talking about how we might make it happen. We thought about returning to Skelton, re-arming and resting. But now that you're here, maybe we could make a go of it. I don't know, it's...

I feel like there's information in there that... Is valuable to find. And so I don't know. Don't know if it's your fault, but we intend to go back in. And I'm sorry, ma'am. I'm sure you're still processing things or have knowledge of things beyond anything I could ever think. I understand why you're here. And if you wish to accompany us to try to find out what happened to your daughter,

you're welcome to. You have skin in the game. That's a really poor choice of words. Yeah. That is an unfortunate turn of phrase. Very insensitive. Your daughter's skin. Your daughter's skin. It's in the game. It's in the game. D daughter's skin. It's in the game. Your daughter's skin.

It's in the game. It's in the game. Della's skin. It's in the game. It's like the EA logo. It's in the game. It's in the game. It's in the game.

So it's just like the logo is just Della's like melty face. Horrible graphic. You don't look like you're unaccompanied or unknowing of combat. I can see you've seen quite your share of battles, and you look pretty formidable over there. But what brings you here? Yeah, well, I have an association with what I believe is a friend of yours, Galabras Finstock. Fin. Gal Uh, Fin. Galaverus Fin.

Oh, really? Yeah. We grew up... Well, I, um... I'm employed by his father, and I've known the boy since he was a small child. He never told me about his father. I didn't know about... That's great.

And you said Finstock? Yeah. Yeah, yeah. I think he wanted to separate himself from his family to a certain extent, and so he truncated his name. Well, have you been to True Now yet? Yeah, that's what I did. I went there to seek him, hearing that he was there, and I heard that he had passed. I was pleased to find that he was there and I heard that he had passed

I was pleased to find that he had not but then we went out to try to help your friend Will believing that that would be the best way to help Galabras himself and when I returned Galabras was gone but

I've been convinced that he would have wanted me to help you and this may be the path to restoring him to storing him to life do they know how he was taken no at least at least i i was not told and baron just slams his fist down our table and just goes brander you son of a bitch i know it has to be you all right well i think you're in the right place wait brander he said brander is he the one that wears my daughter's face that's right then it's about time we seek him is he nearby you're not gonna have a problem with that if you come with us That's right. Then it's about time we seek him. Is he nearby?

You're not going to have a problem with that if you come with us. He seems dead set on following us where we go. And he has an eye for the armor of Skakotla in the tomb. Of course, we had to leave her behind in our haste to get out of the tomb. But if we get back in there and get her armor, we might have a chance to meet him face to face, for good or ill. When do we go?

I imagine if we rest a little bit, I'm ready to go in the morning. Nothing is... I'm sorry, did you say Sir Will was in... Is he okay? Yeah. Sir Will's okay. Oh, yeah, yeah. No, he's fine.

We were able to rescue him. His whole family's dead. Well, yeah. I mean, apart from that. Baron's just like over... Baron's gourd squeezing. They're just like insane, all these things are happening. They'll talk about this over the fire.

Wow. Yeah, Dalgorth, are you ready to go back in there? Yeah, it's about time we light a fire. No, no, Baron. I'm nowhere near ready to go back in there. I was going to say, you two gentlemen look... I feel awful. I didn't want to...

I don't mean to be rude, but you look like you've seen... You've spent a lot of time at the south end of a mule. You don't look well at all, I have to say. I'm a bit beat up, Baron. When we talked about returning to Skell, I thought it might be a few days of bed rest before we turn back in. Now, believe me, I want to do it as soon as you do, but we've got to be smart about it. Now, believe me, I want to do it as soon as you do, but we gotta be smart about it. Um, how do each of you propose we get back into this tomb?

Is the path clear between us and your enemies? Well, it is not. Dalgris snuck out with invisibility, and I may have slipped to another plane to get out. The way we got in the tomb before was with a powerful wizard. A man I'm afraid we're gonna miss very much. He got us in there behind their their guards around her her room, her throne room.

And this time we're gonna have to punch through as a headless giant horseman. It's a seriesless giant horseman. There's a series of morgues. If you're familiar with those and it's

going to be a long treacherous journey back into that room. That's why I think we need the rest, Baron. We can't force it. Perhaps there's another way. You said you slipped onto another plane to get out. Yeah, we ended up in another...

It's a long story, but I got this cloak here that if I say the hocus-pocus on it, I go to another plane. It's pretty cool. It's a cloak of etherealness. Yeah, that's what... Call it what it is, man. You don't have to talk to her like she's a child.

I'm actually a very powerful sorcerer. I just sort of say... I've spent most of my life traveling on different planes. Well, actually... Sort of just say abracadabra And then go into another plane See when a cloak and a magic spell Love each other very much Yes

Yeah and I take off the cloak willingly And like And Metra kind of examines it See it recognizes its power If you were to guide me I might be able to Anchor myself to a point on the material plane and teleport us there in the morning.

Could I do a dungeoneering check to see if I could, like, draw a map out for him? Yeah, absolutely. All right, let's see. 17 on the die for a 22. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Hey, go in that first room. Watch out for the frost traps

down that long hallway. There'll be a headless horseman. Don't worry about him. Don't tell him your name. Don't tell him your name. Second door on the left. Go take notes. Then there's a maze

full of morgues. Don't worry about them. But at the end of that room, there's a secret door that will lead straight into this throne room. Just get us to that secret door. And so you do.

You walk through. I imagine she's cast Fly on herself when she's in the ethereal plane. Floating through. Looking at his hand-drawn map. I solemnly swear I'm up to no good. You get there and roll a perception

to see how much of it you retain. The point I want to anchor to? Yeah. That would be a 20. 20. That's a pretty good number. Alright. You see it. Can't say you're very familiar with it.

I'm going to spend literally as much time as possible. Somewhere between studied carefully and seen casually. Closer to studied carefully. And you come back. What do you say? I just changed the wind, Troy. Come on.

Wow, that was fast. I know. Oh my goodness. She's gone for ten minutes. I'm ready. We go at your command. I've got to be honest. I didn't think you'd do it that fast.

I'm not ready. I can't. I need more rest. I need more time. I mean, I'll just tell you mechanically. I have 32 hit points out of 130. So he's... Did you come with a cleric?

He's banged up. One of you, by chance, a cleric. Or you banged up. One of you by chance a cleric? Or you, sir, a war priest? Please, please be a war priest. I wish I could say I was, but I only feel you'd be disappointed. Rapidly. Well, we got the three cure mods. Is that what we got?

Yeah, but we can only each take two per day from one single blooming. That's right. Okay. But yeah, two cure mods. That's better than nothing. Metro brought a wand. Oh. A wand of cure light wounds?

Cure light wounds. Yeah. How do you use it? UMD, baby. But Baron can cast it, right? Oh, yeah. Right. So then we won't even have to roll.

You can just... I am a loving inquisitor. Oh, yeah. So then it's have to roll. You can just... I am a loving inquisitor. Oh, yeah. So then it's not a thing. You can just... You know what? You know what my inquisition is today? How are you feeling, Dalgrith?

Oh, not so good? Wand. Wand. Wand. Wand. Wand. Wow. All right.

So... Wow. So boom, boom. He'll put Dalgrith back. All right. And then I'm good to go. Should we go right now? Well, we should talk

A few tactics first We gotta talk about these Witch fires Witch fires you say Witch fires They're called Incorporeal beasts Can I roll knowledge check on them?

Witch fires? Yeah sure What is it? Arcana? Religion Religion probably Yeah Can't do that

Tell me about them Well they're incorporeal They attack with pure fire Ranged fire And touch attacks as well Yeah, get through that. Tell me about them. Well, they're incorporeal. They attack with pure fire, ranged fire, and touch attacks as well. You can't let them close to you. You can't keep them far away. They're quite nightmarish. They're the creatures that kill our friends, ultimately.

It wasn't even the queen. Fire I can protect you from. Well, if you can protect us from fire, I feel that we'll get a long way unless they have some ability they didn't tell us about. Well, didn't tell us about. They didn't show in the first fight. I'm gonna kill you! And here's how! I can also do acid, but I won't this round. They're incorporeal.

They're incorporeal. Do you have any ability to hurt them? Just by shooting at the broad side of a barn, ma'am. Is your gun magic? Yeah, it's magic. So you can hurt them, but... Yeah, that's great.

He does half damage. Jimmer, what about you? Yeah, I don't much care for fighting the ghosts. It's not really... I don't like it, but... I mean, I think I can, like, he puts a shing, like he pulls out Terminus Est. Oh my god.

That's so awesome! And he's like, yeah, I think I can do a number on them all the same, though. He's like, shung! But they do fly as well. They could keep themselves 20, 30 feet in the air at all times. We have to have some way to close on them.

Metra mutters a few words and then starts rising in the air herself. Oh! Hits her on the ceiling. Okay, okay. Ow! We're starting to piece it together. Now, there's also a weapon in there. I've got to assume that maybe they don't know of its value.

They couldn't have grabbed it maybe so fast. But our companion, Feraza, who fell, she's got a dagger on a person that I need. If I can get to her body and the dagger's still there, I could do... I could damage them. She's got a goat's touch blade. And that's what we need to fight them. Matthew knows that it's sealed in a chamber of rock. Well, that has... It's not forever forever it's not like stone shape yeah wall of stone and yeah that it has it ends yeah i think so i think

does it i would call wall stone yeah yeah wall of stone it has to end uh duration instantaneous um it's just yeah this creates a wall of rock that merges into each other. Oh my god. And it stays forever? Yeah, it would need to be dispelled. Yeah. It's not happening. Not happening. Well, do you have Dispel Magic? I do not. Do you have Disintegrate?

Yes, I do. That'll work. I can get it, yeah. I mean, we can also break it eventually. Like any other stone wall, this one can be destroyed by a disintegrate spell, or by normal means, such as breaking and chipping. We already know that it would have taken the witch fires forever to do that. Well, then... All right, so then he would know that, so he would say,

I can't do anything in the fight. There's nothing I can do. Tell our story. There's a powerful weapon trapped within a stone tomb of death. Inside a stone tomb of death. Inside another stone. Who came up with that plan? So, I don't know what to do.

Hang back, I guess. You could give Dog... You could find a way through the stone. You could give Dogw wraith the cloak. I mean, all right, if we're going in right now, that won't work. But if we're going in tomorrow... Yeah. If we wait till tomorrow...

Now, I can activate it multiple times, right? But it's a total of ten minutes. In one-minute increments, I believe. Yeah, so I could activate it, go in there. Oh, I can activate it, go in there, get the dagger, and leave again. Come back. Yeah. And have it on me when we teleport. Yeah. Oh, that's fun. Yeah, that's pretty fun. it go in there oh i get activated go in there get the dagger and leave again come back yeah and have it on me when we tell yeah yeah oh that's fun yeah that is that's pretty i like that little heist yeah little mini heist we should teleport you activate go in get the dagger wait a minute

and then we'll all come in and then you can come out because you have to yeah what you get in a position because you have to come back onto the material plane is the problem can you can you can you deactivate even even though the minute's not up i think you can yeah yeah it has to be used in one minute yeah but you don't have to stay ethereal for a full minute okay it just means that you've used a minute up even if you just use success uh so yeah yeah let's just do that we could go in i could walk in and then we can yeah i can surprise them by appearing deactivating it unless deactivating it is an action i don't know yes it is an action i think so well then i should go in get it come all the way back here and then we should all teleport in yeah i like this i'm excited to be why don't you just wait till we teleport and then

just walk the 25 feet pick it up and then come back and then we all charge them together uh but that's fine too just in case there was something unexpected that happened in between that's all yeah it's a it's on command so yeah it's an action and the effect is dismissible and i would imagine that would also be by command yeah uh should definitely dismiss once you're inside the stone tomb well you have to do that anyway so i was like oh don't don't attic where's the door so matthew i would like you to roll a d 100 for telephone oh matthew's the worst roller on the show actually there's actually a lot of evidence that's really are going in all right so what are we calling it studied carefully um

yeah well let's see you You had probably five minutes. I'm going to say somewhere between. I'm going to give you seen casually instead of viewed once. Twelve. Twelve. You're great. You're all good. Please refer yourselves to the map where you all have new palms.

Oh. Well, not all of you. Just the new people. Just Jim and Medra. There you palms. Oh. Well, not all of you. Just the new people. Just Jim and Medra. There you are. Oh, man. So you left the bodies of our friends there. I sure did.

I sure did. Yep. They're laying there as well as the body of Skirkotla. That's really just to denote where her things are as undead just crumble. What are the... Like the Baycocks. What are the... Like, the Baycocks. What are the chances, Troy, that in my reconnaissance, I happen to notice a metamagic rod sitting at the top of the stairs?

Well, the 20 perception is what I think you rolled. I don't know. I feel like you were pretty busy at the time trying to study that room. Hell of a try, though. Love it. Just trying to keep things moving. How could you notice something in the surroundings when you're trying to study the surroundings? Yeah, I know, right?

You're so distracted. A tiny little rod. Here, I'll redraw that wall there around Feyerazza. That is the stone wall. Talk to me. Tell me what you want to do. All right, give me a moment. Stay low.

Wait, wait, not yet. What? You want protection from energy or not? Yes. He's already gone. Wait, wait, not yet. What? You want protection from energy or not? Yes. He's already gone. No, no. Faraz will cast protection from energy, fire, communal. Communal.

And that gives everybody what? All of us. I have to divide it up in a number of minutes, and I'll tell you that when I get to the correct tab, which will happen right now it's 10 minutes per level split among the recipients so that's 12 that's 100 so it's two hours two hours divided amongst the four of us all right and that's just dr 30 basically no it's 120 points ah so chips away chips away i like that those are the ones i prefer uh as the gm okay um joe feels differently far far worse yeah no it's definitely far worse for you um all right dog perfect for

baron almost certainly going to have a death in this combat what do you want to do uh dog is going to uh enact the cloak in. Walk through the stone wall. And then dispel it. Dismiss it back into the material plane over Feyroz's corpse. And there's Feyroz's body. And you just see a hole. A black hole in the middle of her chest. Where her soul was lit on fire.

We're going to get you out of here soon. And he reaches down and grabs the dagger. Steps on her face on accident. Oh, I'm sorry. Sorry. I meant no disrespect. It's a close quarters in here. I'm sorry.

Oh, I did it again. Oh, this is awful. Your poor nose. Face is completely disfigured now. We're going to have to have a closed casket. He pulls out Brynn's love. Sorry, Matthew. He pulls out Brynn's love and will say the command word again,

back into the ethereal plane, and then walk back to his friends. Wah, wah, wah, wah, wah, wah. Tell me what you want to do in Sir Catla's throne room. Dogwraith, uh, well. You go. I was just going to say, Dogwraith could say under his breath, I could go back.

I could go into the plane, wait for an opportunity, moments of strife. If you prefer. Trust me, I'll be there, but I'm just going to wait until the moments ride. Wait until they've opened themselves up to an attack. So, saying he could go into the ethereal plane now, and you wouldn't see him again

until he popped out. If you don't do that, I'll be upset at you, so do that. Okay. The only downside versus something like invisibility if you got it, I don't know if you have it, is that it would be an action to come out and then they'll have a whole round to do something about it before I can attack.

You'd prefer to be invisible? I do my best work when I'm invisible. And Metro produces a wand. Oh my God. Nice. Do you have to activate it or you can do it automatically now i can do it automatically it's on my spells beautiful so if you pull out the wand then it's like as you pull it out he's like well we gotta go quick once this one goes we gotta hurry now now now red team go so dog wraith goes invisible okay he's got brinia's love in his hand

and he'll start moving into the room assuming everybody's going to be moving in behind him unless there's any other things you guys needed to do let me cast fly on jimmer oh thank you oh wait you didn't cast fly on me you want it yes and i guess fly on invisible dog wreath god you're gonna be a spell suck aren't you that's what they call me. It's all great spell suck. I've heard the name bandied about in many a tavern around the inner sea. Many a bathroom wall.

Is that why I can never get a good cast that will come along with me? For a spell sucking good time. Oh, Dalgry. Because Baron wants to see this spell suck For a good spell suck There's a hole in the stall the size of a wand I literally can't say anything around you all, can I? Literally nothing. Well, now the word suck at it.

That's not going to end well. You set us up, man. Where were you going? What were you thinking? Obviously, I wasn't. That's on you. Honestly, you brought this on yourself. Fly on Dalgrith.

Invisibility on Dalgrith. Now, greater or regular? Regular on him. Greater on me. Greater on you. Fly on Jimgrith. Invisibility on Dalgrith. Now, greater or regular? Regular on him. Greater on me. Greater on you. Fly on Jimmer Baron. Baron is actually going to cast see invisibility on himself for a tactical advantage. Cheating. So when you

get out of, like, where we are. I like that. And then I'm going to once again cast a weapon of aww. And then we gotta go, go, go. And then I'm gonna cast silence on Metra, just so she doesn't cast any spells. Just be like, good luck, you tap her on the back. Silence.

What a great prank. Good luck in that one. What a great prank. I always haze new battle members the first time we fight. That's how you bring people in. I actually just like, as hard as you've ever seen Baron kick, just snap Jimmer's kneecap. Why did you do that? You gotta prove yourself.

And I don't like your accent. Place yourselves in the room where you would like to be. This all has to happen quickly. You do not see any witch fires in the room right now. All right, Don't Wraith is gonna fly in. Yeah, he's gonna fly in. Boom. Start flying right into the middle in the room right now. All right. Don't worry. He's going to fly in. Yeah. He's going to fly in. Boom.

Start flying right into the middle of the room. I'll stand next to the corpse of the wizard because wizards usually have cool stuff on them. That's so true. Standing next to the corpse of the wizard. The ashes. Baron. There's nothing. It's not like he had a pouch or anything.

All of his objects would just be sitting on top of his ashes. In a pile of ash, yeah. Baron, where are you going? Right in front of Feyraza's stone wall? Yes, in front of her, sadly now, stone, too. And Jimmer, are you staying back there as well, or are you going up with Dalgrith? Yeah, I'll go up with... I mean, I can't see Dalgrith, but I will.

Oh, that's right. I'll go up closer to the middle of the room. Okay. You guys stand there for a moment, looking around the room. For Baron and Dalgrith, you've been here before. You watched your friends, your companions, your comrades perish, one reduced to ash, the other Dalgrith now sees, with a gaping hole in her chest where her soul was burnt from the inside out.

As you stand in this room with this black basalt throne on a large, what did I say, 20-foot high dais, I believe. Yep, 20-foot dais. In the back of the room are two doors leading to the north. You don't know what is back there, but you do all of a sudden hear two loud screams. Oh, God. You all of a sudden hear two loud screams as the floating corpses of two beautiful women bathe in a sickly green light come screaming out of the wall. Oh, there they are. There they are.

Let's roll for initiative. Let's do it! Come on, baby! Come on, Dalton. We're going long! Yes! I'm guessing Joe did okay. Joe, would you like to tell us your initiative?

I got a 30. 30! Opened with a 30. What about Baron Ashpeak? Also got a 30. You son of a bitch! What's your bonus, bud? It's plus 12.

Mine's 14. Oh! Son of a bitch! All right, beat me again. What about Jimmer? 21. 21? Good job, Jimmer.

And all that armor? Yeah. Jimmer, nice. What's your initiative bonus? Plus five. That's great. Metra? 17.

The Metra Narn. Always a bridesmaid. Your daughter's dead. I wish you were a gnome, because you could be a Metra gnome. Oh! Get out. Take away all those bonronome. Oh! Get out. And I would laugh and laugh. Oh, we'd all laugh so hard and much.

It is round one. What's the light situation like in this room, Troy? It is dark. Cool. Yeah, it is dark. And it is Baron's turn. Baron is going to wait and hold until he sees what dalgrith does that was the plan all along even though he got a little bit of a jump on him he can see invisibility

this was tactical okay well then it is dalgrith's turn uh oh no yeah uh it's round two. Dalgrith is going to hold. Dalgrith will hold. They're so far away, he can't get to them and get off and attack, so he can't use that advantage, so he's going to hold. Okay, well, it is their turn. They come screaming in. Let's see here.

They can move. They are both going to fly up towards the center of the room. One goes right to the bottom of the steps, which is about five feet away from Dalgrith, but they can't see Dalgrith. Yikes. That's bad business. The other one fans out sort of away from everything, almost near those black doors that we now know are haunted. One is going to fire a ray. The one near Dalgrith is going to fire a

witch flame bolt at Baron. And the other one is in range of Jimmer. So let's try the first one on Baron. Remember, this is against Touch AC. Jimmer's invisible. Excuse me. Oh, Jimmer's invisible. Yep. me. Oh, Jimmer's Invisible. Yep.

Okay. No, I'm not. No, he's not. He's flying. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I don't have Invisible. That is a 17 against Touch AC.

That's a big miss. That's a big miss. Oh, that's huge. All right. Then the other one will fly. Against your Flatfooted AC? Flatfooted Touch. No, here. He didn't act.

He chose not to act. Oh, that feels like bullshit but okay if you want to play the rules like that my flat-footed AC is higher than my touch AC I don't know that's a tricky it's fine he he had the choice to act and he's choosing to be strategic he's delaying yeah he's delaying delaying yeah you're right you're right um all right and then the other one well I rolled really low uh the other one will fire a jimmer. Oh, another shitty roll. 20 against touch? That's a hit.

Okay, 20 against touch. We'll hit jimmer. Jimmer roll a will save. This is to see if you burst into flames. That is a 38. All right. 28, sorry. So you do not become sickened and burst into witch flames, which is good, because remember,

you take half again damage against all these fire attacks. I rolled okay. 23 plus 33 points of damage right off the top. Just boom. That wasn't an arrow, was it? No, that was a witch flame bolt, so just pure fire. How much damage? 33 points of damage.

Fire damage? That points of damage. So fire damage? That is an excellent question. A creature to which fire? Well, these eerie flames deal no... Yes, fire damage. Okay, so zero points of damage. So 33 points off of my resistance. Yeah, so first one just hits Jimmer,

but it is absorbed by the spell. Takes a good chunk out of that, and do the dwarves want to take a move here? Or do they want to let Jimmer go? I'll take a move, even if Dalgrith doesn't at this point. Now they're close enough. Okay. Unless Dalgrith wants to take a move. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Let me get out of your way.

Dalgrith is going to go and he's going to move. He's like oh fuck Because the one came right up in his face And he was not expecting that And now What about what level are they at Like how high up off the ground are they

Did you already say I didn't they're about 20 feet off the ground Okay so assuming Dog Wraith is relatively even with them He's going to move He's got to fly too Like when you're flying it's He's got to fly, too. Like, when you're flying, it's different. You have to fly.

It's not air walk. Mm-hmm. So he's going to fly. He'll fly 20 feet away. Okay. I'm assuming his fly speed is 20 feet. Does your fly speed change just because you're flying? Yeah, you get a speed from the spell yeah the speed the spell is 60 feet or

40 feet through a medium or heavy armor yeah uh okay so then he's got to move 60 feet well but you're also ascending so remember right well i had already ascended so basically he's going to move 60 feet he's going to fly 60 feet uh in sort of like a wide arc. Okay. Not 45 degrees, but a wide arc. Okay. And get kind of away from them, behind them. Okay. And then he's going to initiate, as quiet as he can, the command word for Brynia's love.

And turn it ghost touch. Ah, okay. It's a standard action to enact that, so he's got to enact that. All right, so you fan out, get behind, closer to where that back room is, and activate Bryniaja's love. Yeah, and so now for one minute, it's ghost touch. Nice. So for the next ten rounds.

All right, Baron, you are up good, sir. Baron is going to try to figure out what he can after fighting these guys a second time. It's been 24 hours. Let's see if he can roll a Nal Relitch. Okay. Oh, seven for a 12 total. This is not your day. This is not your day.

You are 45 feet away from the closest one and 55 feet away from the further one. I'm counting that as 35 feet, but... You put it on your square. Okay. Yes. All right. You said 45 feet? Yes.

Baron, a five-foot step up and do a full attack on that guy. Shot, shot, shot, shot, shot, shot. Do I know what type of creep? No, I don't know anything from our religion. I don't know anything about this. No, I mean, you know at this point that they're witch fires. That's all you know. Okay.

Could I use that in my mind to apply that to an appropriate Bane type against them? Absolutely. You would know Bane undead. Sure. You watched all your friends die. You know what's going on here. I just didn't want to do anything silly. You also did another knowledge check before, but we don't remember what you learned. Yeah, I mean, you know these

are undead. Alright, so swift action Bane on the weapon for undead. Let's fire at these. Power of hindsight. Alright, 20 to hit. Against touch. That is a miss. Oh, boy.

Second attack. Oh, also a miss with an 18. Oh, man. Close to a misfire. Oh, I'm feeling shaky. Okay, 20 to hit. Miss, miss, miss. And a round of Bane's down. A round of Bane down. How many rounds And a round of Bane

Down A round of Bane down How many rounds do you get of Bane? It's for a minute, right? Ten rounds It is Jimmer's turn Jimmer is He's going to

Let's see, where Yeah, he's going to fly He's going to like launch himself up off the ground and fly up to the nearest witch flame. Yep. And he is going to rear back, power attack on. What? What? Yes.

Oh, my God. I'm going to get this thing. Show him how it's done, Jimmer. 25? 25 just hit. Yes. Holy shit. Oh, okay.

This is going to suck. All right. And that is 26 points of damage. Okay. And you see that, like, I don't know, maybe half of that is getting through. Yeah. I figured. But you did hit.

Yeah. And that's all you can do because you moved, right? Yes. But now you are toe-to-toe. Toe-to-toe With this thing where Jimmer does his best work And it is now Welcome to the show, Metronarn

Thank you Welcome, Metronarn Can I do a perception check of the pile of ash next to me To see what cool magical objects are sitting there? That would be a natty 19 Natty 19, you see anything you want Metra will spend a move action to pick up the quick and metamagic rod There you go

Ah, yes, just blows a little bit of Pembroke off of it Oh, come on, man Someone online was trying to think of a new name I'm like, what about Pembroke the pile? Oh, that's not a man This is why I never go in the comments anymore All right, what do you want to do? And then she will use the Quicken Metamagic Rod

to cast Shadow Bolt on the nearest Witch Flame. Shadow Bolt? Tell me about Shadow Bolt. I will tell you to roll a reflex save. Oh! I can do that. I bet it's pretty high. I can manage my way around that.

It is a 19 reflex. Okay, you just made it. Okay. So you're going to take half damage on this. Half again. 10d6, half damage. Quarter damage. All right, so there's 37 points of damage, so you take 18, so you take 9 points of damage.

9 points of damage. That's quarter. And this is the same one that Jimmer hit. Yes. All right, hey, damage has been done to these things. And then Faraza will then move. Move, okay So move action picked up the thing

Quicken metamagic rod And then another move action As your final standard basically Also remember, I'm invisible You're invisible Greater invisibility Let's talk about the witch fires Because it's their turn, it's the top of round two

One will just reach out and try to touch Jimmer here. Oh, man. Garbage rolls here. 17 against touch. That's a hit. All right. So this is just going to kind of chip away at that resist energy. 25 points of damage.

Ooh, okay. And roll another will save for shits and giggles. That is a 30. That is a 30 That is a 30 So you are fine How many points of damage 25 You said it was a will save The other one flies right up next to Baron

And tries to Touch him as well That is going to be a 24 against touch. Oh, you reached out and touched an angel, all right. Reach out and touch someone. Oh, Rock City, Detroit Rock City over here. 10, 20, 29, 30, 31, 34 points of damage. And now it is right next to you.

And you know from fighting these things before that every time you fired your gun, it attacked every single time. Yep. With multiple A-O-O's. But the good news is, their turn is over. Dalgrith Deathbringer. Dalgrith, would you do something for God's sakes?

Do something, Dalgrith. Do something, Dalgryth. Do something, Dalgryth. Okay. For perhaps the last action of his life. Because we're dead. We're not dead. We're dead. Not yet, anyway.

I can't believe. Why did we not do resist energy? What was that decision? Process? We can have this debate another time. You want to backseat drive while the car's going down the highway with the next party i'm just killing time to try to find out my distance to this thing also if i move half my speed when i'm flying can i whatever fuck it so i'm gonna fly up next to this witchfire flanking with jimmer okay so we're on either side of it now. He's invisible

and I'll take a stab at it. Okay. So it's flat-footed AC. Flat-footed because you are still invisible for this last moment. That's a 26. 26 flat-footed. That is a hit. Alright, Joe. Good job. You're going to roll all the

dice now, right? I'm going to roll all the dice now. Don't roll any sneak attack. They're immune to precision damage. Wow. Are you sure? Yes. With a ghost touch weapon? Well, it just says immune to precision damage.

I'm not kidding. We're in trouble. Joe picked up a huge pile of dice and then he just put them all back. I thought that I read something. I guess. Wow. Ghost touch. Well, that means ghost touch means all the damage goes through, right?

Yeah. But no precision damage. Oh, that's crazy to me. Yeah, it's just their particular thing. In corporeal creatures are the worst. The worst. That's not an incorporeal thing. I thought I read something.

It said you can flank a creature if you have a ghost touch weapon. If you're flanking, just get the plus two? I think it's a specific trait to these creatures. Like, I don't think that's an incorporeal thing. I think that's specific to them. I'm not sure, but I do know that they are immune to precision damage. Okay, well, I'll be flying out of here directly. How many points of damage?

How many points of damage? Five points of damage. Five. It is a fucking dagger. It's not nothing. It all went through, bud. It all went through. It all went through.

Five points of damage. I only did nine and I rolled pretty well on 10d6. It is Baron's turn. Baron, this thing is right up in your business. Uh, Baron does not like the tactical choice of

Troy to have us split up our battles. I want to take down one of these things. Yeah. I'm gonna go five, ten, fifteen, twenty, and then that. Baron just did a little do-si-do around the battlefield so we could keep on

shooting. Do you want to try to avoid the A.O.O. by rolling out your bats? That's what I did. I don't know. Could you not see? Oh, yeah, yeah, sure. If I... You know what I mean? Like, you're still leaving a thread in the square Yes I will do that

Alright Five on the die but total We're talking 21 That is not good enough so it goes to Attack you and Hits with a 25 And will just chip away At your resist energy here

That's protection from energy, my friend. Whatever the hell it is. It does some damage. A lot of ones, but some other good stuff. 16, 17, 18, 19, 26 points of damage. Okay.

And roll will save. I forgot to do this. Oh, no. Oh, no. Oh, no. Is it a poison spell or spell like ability? Supernatural ability, your favorite. 16. You are now engulfed in sickly green flames, which means you are sickened, and you will

take twice again as much damage from these fire attacks. Half again as much. Excuse me, half again as much damage from these fire attacks. And this lasts for ten minutes. Ten minutes of just... Is there any way to put out the flames? There is not. All right, I'm going to put out a... This just got bad.

Judgment of sacred... Pee. Judgment of sacred pee pants. Sorry. Piercing. Okay. You were in the right neighborhood. That'll just give me... Joe has pushed

his microphone away. I've washed his hands of this comment. I'm done speaking in this episode. Sorry. I wanted Sacred Justice to give me a little bit more to hit. So I'm going to believe. You got it, buddy. 24 to hit. Just hits.

All right. Yes. 24 hits. Does Bane count as precision damage? I don't think it does. No, that's not. Okay, I was just double checking. All right.

33 points of damage. All right. 33 points of damage. All right. We'll call it 16. Yep. That one hits. That's all you can do because you got into the move there. Just slid that just by Jimmer there. All right.

And it is Jimmer's turn. All right. Jimmer is going to unleash his full fury. Yes. Here we go. This is where we need it to happen. Toe to toe with it. Natural 20. Yes. Natural 20.

Yeah! Natural 20. Now, here's the thing. Classic Timmer. Definite hit. Yeah, of course not. But they're immune to criticals. Of course they are.

They're immune to fucking everything. Exploding dice? Yes, absolutely exploding dice. Won't really help. Explode it. Explode away. Throw a grenade at Troy's head. That is 26 points of damage.

Okay. So 13. 13. Nice. Okay. Thing is, in worse shape than it ever was in the first fight. How about another natural 20? That'd be great.

Let's get another one. Second. Remember flanking. Am I flanking? No, because you're not ghost touch, right? Shit. Yeah. Such a weird. Oh, that's weird.

Alright, so I rolled a seven, but I'm going to use my reliable strike to one of my two for the day to re-roll that attack. Okay. And I rolled a fucking seven again.

It's very reliable. Yeah, that is super reliable. And that's definitely a miss. That's a 22. 22 is a fucking seven again. It's very reliable. Yeah, that is super reliable. Super reliable. So steady. And that's definitely a miss. That's a 22. 22 is a miss, yeah. Okay.

Third attack. Third attack. 24. 24 hits exactly. Yes. All right. I'll tell you right now, it's a 24 AC and a 24 touch. 29 points of damage. Nice.

Nice damage. All right. That thing is in rough, rough shape. And it is now Metra's turn. Metra is greater invisibility. You see Baron is just lit up by green flames. Okay, so first things first, she will point an invisible finger

at the witch flame that was attacking Baron. And please roll a fortitude save. Fortitude save. Can I ask you what this ability is? Well, you know, I'll roll it first, and please roll a fortitude save. Fortitude save. Can I ask you what this... Well, you know, I'll roll it first, and then we'll see if they're immune to it. 18. Fail.

Okay. Talk to me. That was disintegrate. Oh. It's a transmutation school. Are you immune to that, my friend? They're immune to that. Is that a death effect?

No. I don't think so. Are you just saying no? I'm looking at the spell here I don't see anything about a death effect Okay Am I wrong? It's just a lot of damage When you fail to save

It's a lot more damage Right, right, right Usually it would say somewhere in the Like the domain is destruction It's not domain death That's enough of a change to make it Subdomain is ash Like, the domain is destruction. It's not domain death. That's enough of a change to make it. Subdomain is ash. Let's see.

Immune to that, immune to that, immune to that, immune to that. That, I mean, crazy immunities. Immune to that, that, that, that, that. Now just look at undead traits real quick. That, that, that, that. Now just look at undead traits real quick. And immune to any effect that requires a fortitude save. Are you kidding me? All undead are immune to any effect of a fortitude save.

Unless the effect also works on objects or is harmless. It does. Or is harmless. No, it works on objects. It works on objects. So is that the loophole of disintegrate? I guess so. We already established it works on stone walls. Right, we know objects. So is that the loophole of disintegrate? I guess so.

We already established it works on stone walls. Right, we know that. It says when used against an object. Yeah, yeah. What a strange little... So it's basically treating the undead as an object. Otherwise, their fortitude doesn't come into play. But if an object can be disintegrated, their bones can be disintegrated. Right, exactly.

I mean, I'll go ahead and be looking this up when you roll the damage, but right now I'm ruling that as a hit. So that is 26d6. Holy shit. I rolled 81 points of damage, so it would be 40 points of damage. Okay. What did you say to get a total? I rolled 81

So 40 for you 40 for me Okay Okay That's pretty awesome Which one did you hit? The one that was Attacking Baron

The one that hadn't Been hit yet Oh my god And then I will use The quick and meta magic rod Okay To cast magic missile On the one that

Jimmer and Dog There you go There you go Nice Everybody loves a good Magic miss Magic miss And those all land true Full damage on the one that Jimmer and Dahlgrith. There you go. There you go. Nice. Everybody loves a good magic miss. Magic miss. Bottle cap.

And those all land true. Full damage. 17 points of damage. Right? Wait, wait, wait. Full, right? Full. Oh, okay.

Yeah, yeah. Force damage. Force damage. You said 17? 17. Okay. Still kicking. Still kicking.

Still kicking. All right. Well, that's the end of my turn. Hey, that's a hell of a turn. That's a great turn. I'll take a five-foot step. Yeah. All right.

All right, Metra. Now that Dahlgrith is visible, it will reach out and try to touch Dalgrith. Obviously touches Dalgrith with a 27 against Touch AC. Not terrible damage here for 8d6. 456, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 15, 19 points of damage. No, it's nothing. But Roller will save. Oh, I'll definitely fail this.

Yeah. Guaranteed fail. Yep. 7. Alright, so you are engulfed with flames and you are sickened and you will now take 50% plus damage. The other one's going to go after Baron here. It's going to take a 5 foot step, get right up in Baron's

business as is its move and I think it got you Baron 26 against touch. That will hit me. That will hit. So 86 and then another 50% on top of this. Not a great roll. I've rolled better. 10,

14, 16, 17, 18, 22, 23, plus 12. 35 points of damage. 23 plus 11. All right. 34 points of damage. Thank you.

Thank you. A gentleman's 34. We disagreed, but I didn't get testy about it. I just wanted to say. This is how it should be at the table. Let me ask you this. Are you still protected by this energy, or has it started to go into your hit points? I am.

As of this moment. Hold on. Haven't been tracking it. I haven't tracked it. I have not added it up. As of this moment. I'm still okay. You're still okay.

All right. It's not a great place to be. It's not a great place to be. I've been better places. Look at how the battlefield started very wide, and now you're all getting, like, clumped in, and they're almost closing you guys in. It is Dalgrit's turn.

I take offense to this not... I think that I get my sneak attack damage. You do. You're telling me this is just this particular creature, because incorporeal creatures are not immune to this attack. Okay, well this one says immune to precision damage. There's a specific...

I don't understand. I haven't been able to do up close and personal. It says specifically incorporeal creatures are immune to critical hits and precision based damage. It's not incorporeal creatures. It's this particular creature. This particular creature also just happens to be

immune to precision damage. It's a yes and moment. It's not an undead thing either because I'm reading undead stuff. It's just a real Joe O'Brien luck monster. I don't think so. I mean, look, why would this? No, no, no. Hold on a second.

Why would this incorporeal creature as opposed to other incorporeal creatures be immune to sneak attacks from ghost touch weapons? Why would it? It doesn't say it is. Well, but it's immune to precision damage. So are all incorporeal creatures, unless the weapon is ghost touch. See, I'm looking here at the description of incorporeal under universal monster rules,

and it doesn't say anything about precision hits. Precision damage, rather. Yeah, I know, and I think that that is a really confusing thing, because I'm talking about the incorporeal subtype. Yeah, I know, and I think that that is a really confusing thing, because I'm talking about the incorporeal subtype. Like, under the incorporeal... Not the universal monster rules. Why do we even play? No, but under the

incorporeal... This is why I got confused on this before when we fought the women in the storm, the winter storm in the tunnels. When we fought them before, I was confused about it, because I was reading the universal monster rules. This is the subtype It says they are immune to critical hits And precision based damage

Such as sneak attack unless the attacks are made Using a weapon with a ghost touch And then they also get the incorporeal Special quality and then you click on that And it tells you all the stuff in the incorporeal Universal monster yes you get precision Yes Yes A bad ruling not just a Oops we forgot in the incorporeal universal monster. Yes, you get precision damage. Yes! All right. Because you get it from last time.

Yes. Can I get it in reverse? Yeah, because that was a bad ruling, not just a, oops, we forgot. Beautiful. All right. That is 24 points of damage.

And that all goes through? Yeah. That thing is dead. Yeah! There we go. I knew it should be dead. Which means... Well, let the record reflect

that I killed it. Right, which means, Dalgrith... I killed it. I killed it. Which means, Dalgrith, you didn't take that hit because it would have died last round. Right, which means, Dalgrith... I killed it. I killed it. Which means, Dalgrith, you didn't take that hit. Because it would have died last round.

Right. And you still get your turn. And I still get my turn. One down, one to go. All right. See, Joe, you were so pessimistic about this. No, I was because I thought that I didn't get my sneak attack damage. All right, so he is going to...

Dalgrith is going to fly up, and he will... Fly around. So you don't... Oh, no, you want to go straight at him. You know what? I already took that hit. You got so much movement. Why not just fly? Because I have to fly tighter than 45 degrees. He's not a really good

flyer. You can't do tighter than 45 degrees. You need to do more than 45 degrees. Okay, I got you. Okay, yeah. Then he will do a wide turn to avoid the attack of opportunity. Wide berth. And come in where he's flanking with Metra. Alright. He wouldn't know that. She's invisible to you.

She's invisible? Yeah, she has greater invisibility. Okay. Well, that's a tricky thing, isn't it? I mean, you don't get the effects unless you know it, right? Well, unless you know. If the creature doesn't know it's being threatened, does it get sneak attacked? Well, the creature... Well, that's a good question. Well, the creature's been know it's being threatened, does it get sneak attacked? Well, the creature...

Well, that's a good question. Well, the creature's been attacked... My head just... I think you've got enough movement that you probably could get in and flank it with Baron without it incurring. That's true. That's true. So that would be easier.

Yeah, but Baron wouldn't be threatening it because he's using a gun and... Can you get the flanking bonus when your ally is invisible? Yes, you can, they say. Can I flank with an invisible ally? The first thing I read was yes. Yes, you can, they say. Can I flank with an invisible ally? The first thing I read was, yes. Okay, sold. Enough discussion. This brought me to, like, fourth edition.

It's 3.5. All right, I get one stabby stab. Ooh, that's going to be a hit. That's a 32 to hit. All right. There we go. And all of this goes through, right? All of this goes through.

So he does 14, 19, 20, 21, 24, 28 points of damage. Rania's love. Yeah, man. That's so cool. It's such a great throwback. It's such a great throwback. Back from, like, book one, the beginning of the whole fucking thing. And I love that the one character who has it is the one that has, like, no connection to the great backstory.

This whole thing. Yeah. Yeah, so that's his turn because he had to fly up in one attack. Baron, you are up. You feel Dalgrith has flown around here and given you a little bit of an edge. Wow. It's a different fire this time, brother. Baron's

going to take a five foot step away, covered in these sickly green flames just sprouting out of him. It's insane. And he is going to do a full attack action on this thing and hopefully take it down. Come on, you can do it. Let's not take a pit stop at Misfireville.

Okay? Here we go. Alright, that's going to be a hit at a 27. Nice. First attack. Don't hit me, Baron. Keep it tight. 23 points of damage. So, 11 for you. 11, that's fair. Let's see what we got. Oh, Baron. Keep it tight. Keep it tight. 23 points of damage. So 11 for you. 11.

That's fair. Let's see what we got. Oh, 21. That is not going to do it. That one rolled over. Die is over in Brooklyn. I'm so nervous. Come on.

Okay. Oh, 24. Exactly on the last one. Let's see what we get. Come on, die. Not great. Not great. Not great. Okay, so we got 25 points damage,

so that's 12. Alright, a good round for Baron, but that one miss might have been the one that keeps it alive, although it is Jimmer's turn. Alright, Jimmer swooping up. I love it. Right next to Baron, like a little bit to the side of Baron,

and unleashes one attack on this thing. One attack on this thing. That is a 15 on the die. That is a 35. That is a hit. And max damage again. 29 points of damage. 29 points of damage. 29 points of damage.

14 points. Shabba boom. This guy can fight. Hits it. Metra, you have a chance to kill it here. Finish it. What do you want to do? Metra will take a five foot step.

You don't know what you're tied up in here, but you just found out that your daughter is not only dead, but her corpse has been desecrated. It's been a day. It's been a day. And now you're standing face to face, caught up in another battle that may not be your own. What do you do here? First things first, we'll do a little quicken.

Metamagic rod. Okay. Magic missile. There we go. Okay. That's 23 points of damage. And that's enough. Yes!

Yes! Yes! Oh, man. That revenge on these goddamn witch fires. Boom! And Baron and Dalgrith get to 13th level. Yeah! Yeah, buddy!

Yeah, buddy! Wow, wow, wow, wow, wow. Wow, wow, wow, wow. Amazing. Ooh. I feel like I just went through something, Troy. Yeah. Yeah.

Are you still on fire? About a month. Month and a half. I imagine that way. I'm burning alive, Troy. Would that dispel with the creature, I imagine? Yeah, well, it lasts for 10 minutes, but it only just makes you sick, and it only hurts you if you're like, well, let me just touch this torch real quick oh god so it's

like the whiskey he always drinks anyway so it's pretty much his par for the course it's rot gut um yeah you're fine uh and eventually the fire dissipates you no longer feel sick um i don't think anybody took any actual hip foot damage did they nope because of the protection no boy what a difference a day makes can you imagine if Farazza wasn't paralyzed? Yeah. Would you imagine? It'd be a whole different story. Or if we had cast the right resist energy.

Yeah. Yeah. It's just one die roll. If you don't fail that paralyzed die roll. Yeah. Yep. It's a whole different party. You know, I was thinking about this. It's like this, one of the unique thing about this form of storytelling that we're doing is it's like sports in that, you know, when you're reading a story or like you're watching something on TV, you're kind of subconsciously aware of like all the tropes and stuff that storytellers will use to keep you involved.

And you're like, well, this guy's probably not going to get killed or like this guy's probably like maybe like suffer. killed or like this guy's probably like maybe like suffer but the way we do it it's like because of the way the dice the role the dice play there's there's this unpredictability to it that you know you you you don't have access to a lot of those tropes that like a lot of like storytellers use when they're in control of everything right but it's like you you uh you really don't know while you're experiencing the story what's going to happen like there's an unpredictability to it that is unlike any other form of storytelling and um yeah anyway the greatest heroes in the world when you think they're going to succeed can just fall flat on their face yeah you don't know in the moment when they would succeed in

any other any other story yeah yeah or you can they can die in a meaningless combat. Yeah. Yeah. Totally. It happened many times in this book. Yeah. E.G. Gormley. E.G. Gorms. I was actually thinking about that. I was like, I wonder, because like storytelling, that's how we communicate with each other.

That's how we learn. I wonder how many times in human history people have tried something like this and it hasn't really caught on until like the early 1970s you know what i mean wonder like people like a storyteller like a shaman like sitting around a fire and it's like and then the hero does this is like and what would you do if you were the hero right you know like a choose your own adventure i wonder if that's been tried and it just hasn't caught on ever until like in the last like 40 like 50 years they told the shaman what are you going to do to get fayraz's body out i kind of want to move through this part here i don't want to take too much time with uh how do you break out of that wall do you guys want to

just take some time here to chip through forate disintegrate green ray bing and see that's the thing with the sorcerer is like you didn't use your disintegrate for the day yeah yeah if you want to just cast it do it again i only get two six level oh three six level spells but one of them is that oh you only get three disintegrates a day no i oh no i get i get uh five disintegrates a day? Oh, no, I get five disintegrates a day. Oh, my God. There you go. Welcome to the party. Yeah.

Jimmer and, I mean, Dalgorth and Baron, you know what to expect when that wall goes down. But Jimmer and Metra see the body of this woman who is just like her skin is completely white and devoid of color, like everything had been torn out of her with one touch. And she's lying there. What do you guys do? We need to clear out this place, Baron. Find out everything we can about Skirkutler and then get their bodies out of here.

Is Pembroke literally dust? Or is his body there? There's chunks of him and stuff, you know. Come on, man. Obviously, by the rules of the game, he would still be laying there. But, you know, we're going with the way it was described. Because he was burned so badly. His bones are probably there.

And his stuff, his gear is there. Oh, yeah, sure, sure, sure. His everyday pants and shirt have survived because apparently that's how this works did he have anything else on him of import obviously the wand yeah what was his his uh staff the staff yeah uh and that was effectively a lightning bolt in there right uh yeah but i don't know like it was bonded to him so i'm not sure like what the rules are with that but it's more know like it was bonded to him so i'm not sure like what the rules are with that but it's more sentimental send it back yeah he definitely had like he had his

headbands he had uh like there were a bunch of other stuff that he does the floppy hat survive uh the floppy hat is gone that was the first thing oh but that was the most powerful thing he had i know but it wasn't magic so so yeah the ring of protection plus one, belt of incredible dexterity plus two, headband of vast intelligence plus two, and, yeah, that's mostly it. Yeah. And some soap. And some soap.

So we had some gear that you, maybe you'd want to sell, maybe you'd want to just keep as a memento or try and see if you had any family. With Feyraza, what kind of stuff? as a memento or try and see if you have any family. With Feyraza, what kind of stuff? Feyraza had, as I open the file, to remember. Oh.

In memoriam. And then you save over it to forget. She had a belt of giant strength plus six. I don't know if Jimmer wants that. Did she really? Yeah. We found it and she ended up taking it. Oh, that's right. I don't know if Jimmer wants that. Did she really? Yeah. We found it and she ended up taking it. Oh, that's right.

I would like that, actually. That's cool. She has an amulet of natural armor plus one. The cloak of etherealness no longer is with her. She has some druid's vestments. A headband of mental prowess plus four for wisdom and charisma. Oh, I'll take that. We can do this off air. Yeah, we can do this off air yeah we could do this

i just want to you know the general so you're just gathering well yeah i mean we're looking at everything eyes of the eagle that metro will take because i i just imagine sorry i'm just saying i just imagine you know we're talking about collecting this stuff but then dalgrith is looking back and he's sort of like elbows uh baron and just sort of nods his head up toward the huge double doors that are on the other side of this room yeah it's just like what's in there and i don't think baron was actually doing what grant was he was not listening i think he looked over for raza if her eyes were still open he closed both of them he looked at her hand to see if she actually wore like the wooden ring he gave her back then he's thinking that everyone he gave a ring to is now dead anyway oh god i didn't think about that um so uh yeah he he

kind of gets knocked out of his his reverie of thinking about feyraza's life and times and nods at dalgrith and says we have to go as i, we'll have time to mourn. Now we need to clear this place out to find out what's behind that door. Can I detect magic on the room? I know probably Skirkotla's got some magic on her, and obviously the characters, but is there anything else? Detect magic on the room

is just a lot of magic coming from where Skirkotla fell. Like her body? Well, her body's gone. Their undead just crumble when they die. Oh, right. Oh, is it her armor? Her armor, her weapon, a shield. All right.

Baron, well... Baron knows the armor's important, so before going to that other room, he's going to toss it into... He's going to do a spellcraft on it to make sure it's not cursed and going to kill him as soon as he picks it up. But he's going to take the chest armor and throw it into his bag before we go north. All right. Roll a spellcraft.

I mean, I don't know if that's going to tell you exactly what you want to know, but it'll tell you something. 17. 17. All right. What you know is that it is plus one mithril warding chain mail oh lordy and we could resize that if we kept it for ourselves we can plus one mithril warding chain mail um there's something very dark associated with the armor. Dalgrith is going to look at it and look at Metra and be like, kind of gesture toward the armor. That's your bait right there.

That's what Brenda's coming for. That's what he said he wanted anyway. Skirkatla's armor. I don't know why it doesn't look particularly special to me. There is great darkness emanating from it. Take it, Molespring, our trap.

And Molespring, take it, Baron. Considering it's your daughter, I would give you the first option with this armor if you'd like to carry it. But I will carry it for you, if need be. I'm basically a shadow. You think I'm going to carry a giant armor on me? Oh, you went invisible and then you popped out and then there's this missile and a green ray and things are dead now she might still be invisible she actually yeah she just hear a voice from the void pick up the armor lead me to my quarry anything else that's magical you said a shield yeah so there's a plus

one light fortification heavy steel shield oh cool jim. Are you not a sword and board guy, are you? I am. Oh. Yeah, but I think my armor that I have is better than that. Your shield is better than a plus one light fortification heavy steel shield? That's pretty damn good. Yeah, I have a plus three arrow deflection heavy steel shield. Oh, nice.

Cool. And these are all size large, by the way. We can resize them. She has a cloak of resistance plus two. Cool. And this one I was really excited about. It's a plus one impervious keen battle axe. Oh, that's cool.

Do you know what impervious is? What does it do? If you try to do warp wood, it doesn't work. Oh, that's awesome. You were doing that throughout the whole book. And when I saw that, I'm like, try that shit on Skip Kotlin. So I can laugh. It's crazy how the encounter was built, though.

Like, they knew there'd be an Inquisitor. You know, the warding chain just bounces those banes off. Well, it's not just an Inquisitor. It's a Paladin as well. Paladin, Inquisitor, a Cavalier. Who had that ability? Skirkotla. Skirkatla. Skirkatla.

That makes me think back, though, because the big bad in the last book was an Inquisitor, right? And that's where I got the Bane Baldrick from. It's almost like she heard that he was getting too big for his britches. It's almost like she's planning for him to come here and take over. Maybe. Maybe. That's fucking cool. What's the axe? Tell me again. A plus one impervious keen battle axe. for him to like come here and take over maybe maybe that's fucking cool what was it what's

the axe tell me again a plus one impervious keen battle axe and the armor is what uh plus one mithril warding chain mail baron doesn't like it but he's gonna reach his hand out and put it inside of his his bag of holding okay so you take you take this chain mail. Anything else in the room magical? Anything on the witch fires? Nope. What do you want to do? Dalgrith has been walking this whole time towards those doors in the back and he's standing, waiting.

Standing. Gemma will go with him. Metro will follow. She's still invisible. Baron's gonna go. He's still very visible. Go to these doors anybody open it doll graith will uh attempt to open it stealthily okay we'll stop um 39 oh by the way i can help with your stealth checks.

This gigantic chamber, not as big as the throne room, but pretty large. Everything in here is large. Yeah, seriously. It appears to be a private mausoleum. Carved in bas-reliefs on the east and west walls are depictions of a frost giant army smashing down the walls of Kellid and Ulfin settlements and leading captives away in chains. Oh, that's awesome. You see steps on either side of an enormous bier, bereft of coffin or sarcophagus.

There's just, like, a bed of stone. And the wall above the dais is engraved with runic writing. Dalgrith will walk in. Start making his way toward the altar. Can I do a perception check just to look for any dangers, any traps or anything like that? Well, 30 for jimmer uh 28 for doll grace 38 for metro yeah you don't um you don't see any traps or

anything uh dangerous per se okay uh he'll he'll approach approach up the steps toward where that writing was okay um do you speak giant it's in giant uh i believe i do i know baron does so baron you're in the room oh yeah i speak giant those of you who speak giant excuse me do you speak giant wait no i don't i don't have it on my list yes you do we all took it at one point i think i've been speaking giant for days i feel like it's all right baron. I got you, brother. Well, I'll put a point in linguistics now that I'm 13, and I'll have it. Well, it says a name. It says Skirkadla Jotun's daughter.

And it also includes a single date, 29 Kuthona, 4378 AR. And next to that is a word, Ashenmorn. What? Ashenmorn. Huh. And how many years ago was that? What year is it now? It's 4715.

350 years ago or so? Ashen Morn. Is that the date? Is that some sort of designated day? Like National Siblings Day? Could someone roll knowledge local, maybe? Knowledge history. I can do local.

Was it the day she died? Maybe a religion. Religion. All right. This seems to be something um significance let just see 70 to 20 dog race knowledge religion i'm gonna go ahead and max out my religion with all my points uh uh that is 21 it is joe hates it it is i'm gonna go ahead and max out my religion with all my points what did that sentence mean that means that he told us we were 13 so you already spent all your skill ranks in history and one in linguistics like between me telling you the rest of what i have reading

from linguistics yeah you're a real pip. Yeah. Just to get that 21. Son of a bitch! Well, what you both know now. I know, too. I just figured it out. It is the day she rose from the dead. Oh. As a grave knight.

And it was like 350 years ago. As a grave knight. 350 years ago. Is there anything in this bas-relief that relates to the story of Ungerato that I think Brander told us? Is there anything there? No. But you know that Ungerato was a grave knight as well. And Baron, as you're looking this over, you notice some unusual stonework.

Ash peak symbol. You get a free check. To the right. I've rolled the check. There's a secret door. Oh, shit. That's amazing. That's cool.

A secret door in the east wall. Do you open it? Absolutely, I do. Check for traps. Okay. Why are you yelling? Because I don't want to Check for traps. Okay. Why are you yelling? Because I don't want to get screwed. 31.

31. So Baron walks over to the east, finds a secret door with unusual stonework to reveal. A tiny chamber. There's a little chest in there. There really is. It's so little. There is a chest right in the middle of the room.

Baron, be careful. The last time I opened one of these, I was blown halfway across the room and was sick for two days. One more perception. All right. 37 for traps. Appears to be trap free. Open it. You open the chest, and you're just blown away by a fireball trap no by

i mean this is memorex uh more than half a dozen uh magical items gold and amethyst uh platinum piece ambergris ambergris yeah oh man we're gonna smell so good a bunch of shit. There's also a map that's really rolled up on top of all of this stuff. A map, you say? A map. Well, amethyst is my birthstone, so I'm flattered by this gesture, Troy. But Baron is not, and he'll reach out for the map, and we'll kind of unfurl it.

Unfurls the map. You see there's a large magical axe, a large magical drinking horn, some sort of like door knocker, a marble mastodon figurine, a staff, a headband with a winter wolf on it, an ivory cameo

of a chelish woman and just amethyst gold platinum pieces. Silver pieces. This is all on the map? You see that underneath the map and Baron, you unfold it. And it seems to indicate what appears to be

a dormant volcano in the southern Mindspin Mountains. What? Shut the front door. Along with a bunch of writing in giant and you see that it's kind of written all over the map. There's Shut the front door. Along with a bunch of writing in giant and you see that it's kind of written all over the map. There's a pair of names. Blofeld. The names are Titerian

and Quivixia. And then you see the words Elite Training Academy. Oh. Accompanying the map are two lists of giant names. One is designated to advance to elite training and includes a scrawled note that

reads, the Atox graduation is not an option. The second list is titled Competency Course Passed Needs Reassignment. Lastly, though, at the bottom of the map, directly underneath

the volcano itself, is a single word in giant that sends chills down Baron's spine. It just says, Ash Peak. Oh my god. I'm going home, baby! That's amazing. But Baron really is himself. Isn't that excited. Grant is excited for this idea.

Baron just jaw drops to the floor and is gobsmacked by it. He doesn't even know how to approach the rest of the team with this idea. And we fade out from there. We see now in all too familiar circle of standing stones. It's nighttime and eerily quiet throughout the surrounding wetlands. Suddenly, the central menhir begins to glow with a bright light as Silvermane exits the Vault of Thorns. Oh, man. We're turning to the material plane.

Up above, the moon is barely visible through the canopy of trees covering the sacred ground that he called home for so long. He looks ahead into the swamp and sees dozens of bodies lying dead on the ground, most half-covered by the bog. Some looked to be bodies of orcs, while others of the bodies of people he knew very, very well. Silvermane looks down at the ground in reverence for a moment, before walking away, holding a wooden lantern in one hand as he goes,

surrounded by dozens of lights floating above the murky swamp. We stay here in this circle of standing stones in the night as the darkness goes away and it fades into daylight. But not just daylight. Some of the stones are now gone, and those that remain are mostly broken and covered in a thick moss. The grass outside of the clearing is now high where moments ago it wasn't trees standing the distance that weren't there before. Just Just then, a young woman walks into the circle, followed by a large black panther with a young man unconscious on its back.

The young woman turns to the cat. She appears to be a half-orc, but with only very faint orcish features. It's Shael. Half orc, but with only very faint orcish features. It's Shael. She turns to the air around her and speaks. Is this the place? No one answers. Is this trap easy enough to bypass?

Okay. Good. Shiel places her hand on the men here, says an incantation to bypass the falling stone trap, motions to the cat to join her, and together, Shiel, Cat Benatar, and a feeble-minded Galabras Finn enter the Vault of Thorns.

What? Guided by Gormley. At the Pedal Gate Cheyenne looks up to see a warning of sorts That reads If you seek peace in nature, welcome If you seek anything else Beware the Vault of Thorns Again she speaks to the air around her

Which category do we fall into? Yeah I guess we will see the air around her. Which category do we fall into? Huh. Yeah. I guess we will see. The three of them walk forward over the long walkway, Galabras unconscious, still on Cat's back.

They walk over the walkway, into the throne room, and then out to the old lily pad walk. Oh my god. Shia walks up to the edge and looks down and out into the darkness. So this is where it happened. I'm very sorry.

I wonder if my father wishes he could have saved you. I wonder a lot of things about him. You say this place is special to him as well. Why? What is the connection? When she doesn't receive an answer, she looks to Cat Benatar.

Do you know? What do you know about him? Was he a good man? A coward? A fool? She rubs Cat's head. You stay here. Jumping doesn't appear to be an option. Carefully, she lifts Galabras off of Cat's back,

closes her eyes, and flies out over the pit to the other side. Before she moves forward, she turns and stands right where Lork stood when Gormley died, and just waves at Kat. Carrying Galabras downstairs, she enters the greenhouse area. Now what? There's a long pause,

as Shael just listens. Looks like she's getting angry. No. No, I... I will not. I cannot do that. You told me all would be clear when we arrived here, and now it is anything but.

I have followed you blindly when you said I would be reunited with my father, but he died and chose not to return. But now I've taken this poor young man away from safety into whatever this place is, and you want me to bury him while he still breathes? She pulls out a knife, holds it up to Galabras' throat. I would do better just to cut his throat and walk away. She listens for a long time. All right.

All right, I will do this. But only if you leave me when this is done. I've spent my whole life chasing a ghost. I can't spend the rest of my life chasing another one. This ends now.

She looks up. Doesn't receive a response and gets down on her knees and starts digging. Imagine we zoom away from this view of her digging up to the walkway and just fade out as time passes. Now, Shiel and Kat are exiting the throne room

back to the walkway on their way out of the vault. She's just talking to Kat. What do you think, Kat? Do we go back to Skelt? I don't know. Maybe I'll keep heading north, go over the crown of the world to Tien Sha and start over. If that's even possible.

Maybe I'll just then. There's a sound like an eruption. The walkway itself begins to shake and there are no handholds, remember? So Shia just hits the ground to avoid falling over as bits of dirt and shrubs scatter all over the air.

Fishing lures. Shut up. Shoot up. There it is. Shoot up. There it is. I've been looking for that for a hundred years. Deep in her mind, she hears the anguished pain of an old man crying out,

while also feeling abnormally hot, like her body is on fire. Just then, rising up from down below, floating up and above the walkway, is Galabros Finn. What? His clothes are nearly all singed off of him,

and she sees burnt into his chest the image of a butterfly. He just looks at her with these, like, fiery, otherworldly eyes. Shia's still on the ground, just looking up at her. It's like, what? What are you? And in her mind, the voice of Gormley.

Gormley Call can be heard clear as day. Matthew, I gave you a sheet of paper a couple weeks ago oh look at that what does Gormley say oh she says what what are you who is this man he is the chosen one

oh end of book four. And we'll see you next week. Oh my God. Oh my God. Jesus. Oh my God. Oh my God.

Oh my God. The Glass Cannon Podcast is a Glass Cannon Network production and is an officially licensed partner of Paizo Incorporated. Giant Slayer is copyright 2015. Giant Slayer and the Pathfinder Adventure Path are trademarks of Paizo Incorporated. Giant Slayer is copyright 2015. Giant Slayer and the Pathfinder Adventure Path are trademarks of Paizo. All Pathfinder images are property of Paizo and are used with permission.