Friends and Foes

This transcript is machine-generated and may contain errors in names, terminology, or attribution.

[clink] [clink] Pickaxe. Coming to Apple TV+ on August 9th. You're the Marine? Yeah, you're the ex-con. Yeah, I did time, but you only got to cast aspersions at me. From the director of Mr. and Mrs. Smith and The Bourne Identity comes a new film. This your first job? I know what I'm doing. I'm a little late for a crit change. Starring Matt Damon. Everybody in New England is after us. And Casey Affleck. Go, go, go, go, go! What are you doing? Taking notes. Taking notes on a criminal conspiracy. The Instigators, rated R. Streaming August 9th on Apple TV+. This summer, during the biggest sporting event of the year, Peacock turns to two broadcasting legends for the Olympics coverage you can't find anywhere else.

Um, I think they mean us. Oh, s***. Um... [clears throat] With an incredible duo sure to take home the comedy gold. Olympic Highlights with Kevin Hart and Kenan Thompson. New episodes Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Only on Peacock. Uh, you guys know the drill. We're gonna get ready to introduce ourselves. Let's go around the room starting, uh, let's start this time with Tyler. Uh, my name is Tyler. I am, I play Thoril Songsteel, a human ranger. And, Rob. Hey, Robert Wiesahan, I'm playing Malchus Grimnus, tiefling warlock. Uh, Jake. Hey, I'm Jake and I'm playing a dragonborn fire mage known as Drake Hunkus.

And Justin. Hey, my name is Justin and I play a, uh, sword mage, Jarrigan. Uh, Dan. I am Daniel Phelps and I play a human war priest named Rodswell Joybatom. And Tom. Hi, I'm Tom and I'm a minotaur fighter named Yennward Firestorm. Bang bang. Did you like Daniel? I'm going for you. I was gonna say, it's kinda funny where it's like, my name is Daniel Phelps. And then it's just like, hi, I'm Tom. I'm sophisticated now. Here's Tom and I'm here to talk to you about the good war. I'm a grown up. I do things like read books. I listen to books. They talk to me. What? What service do you listen to books on, Justin?

I listen to books through Audible, Dr. Daniel. What? That's crazy, cause, uh, Audible is our sponsor this week, guys. Love Audible. Wow, that might help me with my hustle and bustle on the game. Are we doing this seriously? Okay, well then Dan, maybe you'd like to try a free trial of Audible. This is starting to sound like that commercial they did in Major League. Hold on a second. What's the... Well, no, it's real. For real, this is legit. I totally got Audible this week. That's no joke. Totally did it. No shit. I did, yep. I jumped up on it. We used to do the Audible commercials where I'd be like, uh, you know I had a problem.

I was mowing the lawn and reading a book, right? And then Michael would interrupt me and be like, "No, no, no, no, no. You don't have to read books anymore. No one reads." Shh. Suckers read. I seriously have used Audible for a long time and I've listened to a lot of great books through it. So, you can actually go get a free trial of Audible by going to audibletrial.com/dandrpodcast. That's D-A-N-D-R podcast. Jake, what was the book you downloaded? I got the War Z. I had to do it. Everybody's talking about it. I haven't seen the movie yet. Don't watch the movie.

It's not even compared to the book though, so. No, don't watch the movie. And I hate to tell you, there's a collector's edition of War Z coming out. Collector's edition. With five extra hours of... Geez, now I hope this works out. I kind of got it to, uh, I'm going to start doing these workouts again. And I don't know how listening to a book and doing a workout goes, but I'm going to try it out. I have no idea how that's going to work. I'm sure it'll be fine. You'll get lost in there. Because you're interested in that rather than the mundane exercise and stuff.

Good. And if you guys are looking for some good fantasy to try out, I just checked to make sure it's on Audible. Try The Spirit Thief by Rachel Aaron. I started into that a little while ago. Really good. It breeds like good Dungeons & Dragons sessions go, so. Oh. How many books do they have out? Three of them are on Audible, but I think she's up to the fifth one in the series now. I know we shit on Wizards, and that's not intentional. I like Wizards of the Coast. I just bought the new Magic game on Steam. But I really hope they read better than those fucking novels.

Those 200 D&D novels they have on Audible, because... Man, they're a slog. They really are. Spirit Thief is really good. And the series that it goes into, the Eli Monparesse series, is really good. Alright. Maybe we'll start having recommendations every week. I've got plenty. Ooh. I have a couple in mind, but I think I should save. I listened to a few from Audible, like a total of five, I think. That I know nobody else here reads. Yeah, I've listened to a ton, so that's totally cool. You know what Audible's really good for? I used it a lot when I worked overnights.

And it was something that I could get my mind off work, and just let my mind drift. You know. That's cool. We should probably get into this session, because I can feel people tuning out. Like, I can totally feel, like, skepticism. I'm Dipperis of the Lactigal Emancipation. What the fuck did you just say? What was that? I was quoting Major League 2, that commercial. No, no, no. Not Major League 2. No one quotes Major League 2. Yeah, man. Talking about the fact that, like, the way that we talked about Audible sounded. One. One. The one where they're doing the... Not that they read the infinite joke.

Don't steal home without it. I always swing something. Bad. No one sees Lazy Sunday 2, Tyler. Okay, that was one. I apologize. Stop picking on Tyler. I prefer Major League 3 back to the Miners. I just want to point that out. That was actually a pretty decent movie. Actually, 3 was better than 2. I'll tell you. Okay, if extending the in-line advertising was unforgivable, this is extra unforgivable. Oh, yes. Did you know Major League 3 was actually an extended Quantum Leap episode? That's again, for good reason. Yeah. That was a good one. If that were true, where was Hal?

I'm sorry. No, there's a theory going around that me and Michael have made up that everything's got back to the same level. Everything's got back to it and it's actually Quantum Leap. We're just seeing him leap somewhere. Okay, and then we play D&D. I don't see how this D&D thing ties into Scott Bakula at all. I'm just... Quantum Leap, and that's how I get on. Major League 3. Alright, does everyone remember what happened last time, or do you need a little recap? Oh, I know everything. We remember, but... We signed it's 3D or something? The listeners can't answer you, so...

Just let's keep going. We don't have much time. We got plenty of time. It'll be fine. Okay, so last time you guys made your trek back from the north, and you found out that one way or the other, you have advanced 17 years into the future. And a lot has changed. In fact, you're not exactly sure to the extent of how much things have changed, but you found out that the city of Overdale became Overwatch. You found out that there is a legion of warforged... A warforged army that works with the city of Overwatch in some fashion. And then at the end of the last episode, you found out that Lord Padraig has died.

The city of Winterhaven has basically rebuilt. And Ian Cerberus and Talia Padraig now rule over Winterhaven as husband and wife. So, how would you guys like to proceed from here? You guys are standing in the room with these two. Would anyone like to say anything first, or... I think someone has one hand too many. Thoril. We're all staring at Thoril right now. I don't even know what to say right now. Do they have something to say to us? Everyone is kind of in a state of shock. They definitely never expected to see you again. That's the first thing you're judging just by facial expression.

I would assume by the fact that she's married, she probably never expected to see me again. You're supposed to be dead. And eventually the look of shock kind of dissipates. Ian's not wearing a look of shock, more disdain. You can see by the look of his face he wants nothing to do with you guys. Nothing at all. And the fact that you've shown up today is at the very least a major inconvenience, at least in his eyes. Talia, on the other hand, rushes across the room and throws her arms around Thoril. She then proceeds to hug each one of you individually. Good talking.

This appears to upset Ian a bit more. He's not digging it. She finally manages to form words and she says, "How? Where have you been?" There's a lot of questions that probably exist on both sides of this room. But to make a long story short, somehow time for us fast forwarded 17 years during the battle with Drak. So you made it. You found Drak's tomb. Yes. Did you say you fought Drak? And defeated Drak, yes. And killed him. He buried himself hundreds of years ago. How did you fight him? Anybody else want to take this one? Well, kind of like put our axes in his face and stuff.

Couldn't it have been that weapon he used that made time go forward? Like him go forward in time without eating you? I think the bottom line is in his tomb he was protecting his secrets for all eternity. And when we arrived he refused to let us leave. So we were given no other choice. She kind of snaps out of her stupor and she says, "Please come, sit, sit." She tells her guards to get someone to fetch something to drink. "You must be hungry, famished after your journey, please." And she motions towards a set of couches. Ian is still standing in the doorway.

Eventually Talia motions to him and says, "Come, sit next to me." And he kind of just like, "Fine." And just kind of stomps into the room, almost like a petulant child. I don't know why I'm taking so much great pleasure in being a pain in this guy's ass. Okay, can I do a lore question real quick? Absolutely. Just for timeline's sake. Just to make sure, Ironhide, Draconis, I mean not Ironhide. Draconis, Yinward, and myself don't know him, correct? Right. Yes. I have no idea who this guy is. Yeah, so we are, I mean we know... Well... We notice the looks and we notice, you know, that something's up with this guy because of how Malchus, Ironhide, and Thoril are reacting.

But we don't know the story. Yeah, so Yinward, Draconis, and Rod Sweller kind of... Yeah, they'd be in the dark about this guy. And I mean, we've heard the story. If they would just say, "Hey, this is who it is," we'd be like, "Oh!" But at this point in time, you know, no one's introduced him as Yin yet. Right, that's pretty much the next step is there... Like, there's an awkward silence as you all sit down and... Talia says, "I really don't know where to start. So much time has passed. Have you met my husband?" "No, I haven't. What's his name?" "I just fucking told you." "Get out forever." "Some of us are acquainted with him, but not all of us." "Who is that?" "He's nice.

What's going on?" "Yeah, what's the story?" "Ian locks eyes with Malchus." "That was you and we're getting excited." "I just wonder what that was." "Ian locks eyes with Malchus and just kind of narrows him." "And he says, 'Ian.'" And then another long, uncomfortable silence follows. And Talia says, "Please tell me everything about your adventure. I want to know everything." Honestly, I think the story of us journeying to Drax Tomb and coming back is far less interesting than what's been happening for the past 17 years. Could you possibly answer some questions?

"Well, we can meet them halfway though, can't we, Rod Swell?" "I mean, I just don't understand. I think you pretty much covered it, right?" "Like, we ventured to Drax Tomb where we were imprisoned, basically." "That's where 17 years end." "We're uncertain as to whether we've traveled forward in time or we simply slept or lost time down there." "We don't know the nature of what's brought us here as though it was just weeks and it's been years for you." "The only thing we know is that we haven't aged and the world has." "And of course I'm no longer a vampire." "Oh, yeah, Thor is not a vampire." "F.Y.I." "Check that out! Look at that guy!

Look at that handsome guy over there!" "And she says, 'Truly, this is a miracle.'" "As soon as she says that, Ian says, 'Well, I think that's debatable.'" "Whoa!" "Whoa, what's this guy's deal?" "Atheist." "Ah?" "He's Sir Ian, right?" "Well, it's Lord now." "It's Lord Ian?" "Yes." "What's his last name again?" "Servers." "Servers? Like the dog?" "Servers, with a 'v'." "Servers, okay." "Lord Cerberus, I think we can agree that things between us haven't entirely been cordial, but that there are bigger problems to deal with right now than our feud." "Ah, and he responds with, 'What would you know of what's been going on here?'" "I've started to grasp the gravity." "I'd be happy to hear more, though." "Where would you like me to start?" "I think the history of Overwatch would be of great interest to most of us." "Talia starts speaking after this." "And she says, 'Well, you remember the treaty signing.'" "Indeed." "I'm assuming this will explain Malchus's less than stellar reputation at this point?" "Yeah." "It seems history remembers it with a particular spin." "Well, people were looking for something to blame, and they traced it back to the treaty signing." "Depending on some of the guards' interpretations of what happened that day..." "The word kind of spread quickly that it was you who..." "Some would say pushed the group into signing the document." "And she kind of looks down at her feet." "You can tell she doesn't want to offend you, but that's kind of the way everybody just thinks of it now." "Like, that's, 'Well, this is all his fault.'" "We wouldn't be in this situation if..." Yeah, that's kind of how people think of it." "Shortly after you left, Overdare started clear-cutting forests." "No one was actually certain why until several months later..." "When most of the surrounding countryside had been evacuated." "And it became apparent that they wanted a clear view of miles of land surrounding Overdare." "Carter had become increasingly paranoid." "Certain that someone would break the treaty and venture south." "And when that didn't happen, he began to get bolder and bolder." "After several months, Overdare became a police state, essentially." "And the city was locked down." "No new travelers were allowed into the city unless they had expressed written permission from Carter himself." "And more importantly, no citizens were allowed to leave the city." "Shortly after that, people began frustrated, as you would imagine." "Some even ventured to sneak out of Overdare." "Those people were marked as traitors and suspected of collusion with the outsiders." "Outsiders being anyone who didn't belong to the city of Overdare." "And now that the countryside had been evacuated, there was absolutely no confusion." "Those people were punished in the town square with beatings or just outright killed." "It set as an example to everyone else." "A few years after you had left, people began to take up arms and fight for the freedom of Overdare's citizens." "The collection of cities on the outskirts of Overdare, humans, elves, dwarves, and even the minotaurs from the north," "began to fight for the people who wished to be free in Overdare." "These battles went on for a long time, and Overdare actually began to lose." "Being as how they were just one lone city taking on the entire region." "In an act of desperation, Carter sent for a sect of mages from the city of Uminyiro," "including a high-ranking mage named Seacall Loreweaver." "He tasked these gentlemen with creating the perfect group of soldiers." "What they came up with was a new breed of warforged that were 100% obedient and would carry out any orders without fail." "Shortly after, the tide began to turn." "It took them two more years, but the armies outside of Overdare were completely either disbanded or destroyed." "It was shortly after that that Carter declared himself king of the region." "He changed the city's name to Overwatch as a reminder that he would be very vigilant and vigilant," "and to make sure something like that would never happen again, he would be tasking himself with patrolling the lands outside of Overwatch," "making sure that he would bring his own brand of peace." "After the last armies were crushed and there was nothing left to fight for, many fled east or further north," "I imagine you went through Camp Icebreaker?" "We did, yes." "A lot of the citizens there were deserters of the armies." "And so now does he push beyond his own borders?" "He doesn't appear to be stopping anytime soon." "There was a siege of Winterhaven about three years ago." "I lost my father in the siege, along with hundreds of others from the city." "We managed to repel them, but since then we've lived in constant fear." "The only reason they haven't attacked again is, well as you can see, we've pretty much just invested everything into soldiers and weapons." "The defense of Winterhaven is the only thing we're concerned with." "I look over at Malchus and I look back and I say," "not to demean anything else that has happened since then or thus far, but I don't see the need in prolonging this." "Did anything happen to Bree and her family?" "So at this point, as soon as you mention the name Brianna," "a lot of Ian's brashness and his chest puffery and things like that diminish." "And immediately he looks at the ground, he just breaks eye contact with you guys," "and you can see him shifting around in his seat a bit." "And Talia speaks again, and she says," "we haven't seen her in a few years." "Shortly after the siege, she decided to leave Winterhaven." "She lost her father that night." "Malchus nods." "And she kind of motions towards Ian," "and says, 'you should tell them.'" "Ian takes a deep breath and specifically makes eye contact with Malchus." "And he says, 'you remember the circumstances with me leaving Overdale as Captain of the Guard.'" "I do." "And he said," "shortly after that, while healing, I was told of a witch who lived in the swamps," "who was told to have great power." "I thought perhaps she could help with my hand." "I sought her out," "and she told me that such a task would come with a price." "And what she wanted me to do was find a little girl who had recently been to her cabin." "She didn't give me any specifics beyond." "While the girl was there, the witch picked up something in her," "like she may have had some sort of power within her, arcane power." "And she wanted to test the girl to see if what she thought was true." "She gave me a scroll and some ingredients and sent me to find her," "and if the girl did possess some kind of power to report back to her." "I found the girl in her village," "and I cast the spell that was in the scroll." "And then he breaks eye contact again," "and he says, 'shortly after the entire village was swarmed with shadow beasts.'" "The village erupted in fire as braziers were knocked over, torches, and villagers fled." "Shortly after that, the little girl ran screaming from her small lean-to into the woods," "and I realized that the witch had nothing but bad intentions," "and the price for my hand was far too high." "Unfortunately, I realized that too late." "And you didn't do anything to try to save her?" "I tracked the girl into the woods, only to find you," "there rescuing her before I could get a chance to." "I decided that I shouldn't get involved." "After that, I fled east." "Wait, this is back with me and the vampire thing?" "Yes." "So what he's saying is that after..." "He's the reason for the shadows, and so he had to fight in the first place." "Well, no, he's not the reason. He was a pawn, but he's not the reason." "And Malkus actually looks at him and says, 'I don't blame you.'" "It was foolish to deal with a witch, but I don't necessarily..." "We did that." "Yeah." "If you don't mind me asking, how did you two..." "Well, after I fled to the east, I ended up in the small town of Aubrey." "I'm going to tell you about Talia here, and then he kind of wraps his arm around her." "For the first time, kind of showing, like, he's not..." "After you kind of forgave him for that, he's not as standoffish." "He's kind of, he's almost a little more relaxed about it." "You could tell, like, there's some real grief in his voice about Brianna, though." "Like, he felt genuinely bad about it." "And he wraps his arm around Talia and says, 'Well, years ago..." "She would make ambassadorship trips to the surrounding countryside, and one of those towns was Aubrey.'" "I was busy retraining myself to fight with one hand, being as how I couldn't use my good hand for my sword anymore, so..." "In the meantime, I just wanted to kind of get away from everything, and no one knew me and Aubrey, so..." "I met her shortly after I got there, and we hit it off." "I look at Talia, and I say, 'And naturally, you two fell in love?'" "She said, 'Well, we saw each other for many months before things got serious.'" "My father never really approved of anyone I dated, so it was a long time before he came to Winterhaven." "But I would make frequent trips out to see him." "And then she kind of looks at Thor in a weird way." Out of curiosity, what's Thor's facial expression right now?

"I'm just listening very intently right now. Like, no, nothing really... nothing really right now." "So..." "Stoic." "Yeah, basically." "So, into the room walks this boy in his teens." "Pretty big strapping guy." "Uh oh." "It's like to know how old said boy is." "If you had to guess, he looks to be in his late teens." "And I look at Talia, and I say, 'And I'm assuming this is Ian's son?'" "And then she kind of pauses for a moment, and then Ian speaks up, 'Yes, this is Nathaniel.'" "And the boy is the big strapping guy. You can tell he's definitely an adventure soldier something, like something in that realm." "Kind of long, dirty blonde hair, which would kind of be a cross between Ian's blonde hair and Talia's brown hair." "Has food and alcohol arrived at this point?" "Yes, yes." "Malchus grabs a decanter and just pours himself like the least classy, completely full glass of wine." "Like, not, you know, like a half glass or anything.

Like, it is just like to the brim and just starts, like, gulping away." "Um, okay, so can I... okay, is it insight that would tell if somebody's being truthful?" "Uh, yes." "Can I do a passive insight on Talia about the son?" "Well, the passive insight is for, like, if people are trying to lie to you." "Oh, okay. But I can... okay, then I'll roll an insight check." "Do we really need insight on this?" "I just, I want to for..." "Got to." "For..." "Oh, try." "For more reasons. I have a 15, I have a plus 15, so let me do that." "16, come on, okay." "Come on!" "Who is he?

You just point at him and say, 'Who is he?'" "No, I ask again. I ask, uh, so that is Ian's son?" "And Ian speaks up again and says, 'Yes, that's my son, Nathaniel.'" "And then, um, he says, 'Nathaniel, shake these men's hands. They're knights of Winterhaven.'" "And he kind of, that's the first time some of that animosity has come back, where he kind of bites on the word 'nights of Winterhaven.'" "It's like, ugh. But, yeah, fine. And Nathaniel leans over and goes down the line shaking each one of your hand and gets to the world and just kind of grabs his hand and shakes it." "Does anyone want to do anything before, like, do you want to play a little more catch-up and find out what's going on with everyone else, or..." "Why haven't they taken this town yet?

I don't understand, like, do they have their feet?" "Are they currently in war? Like, I'm curious about that. I don't think that's..." "So you're asking, you're asking them?" "Yeah. Are you guys currently... would there be a bet, is there a possibility of a battle, or are you pretty much at odds, agree to disagree type situation at this point?" "Do you need a hand?" "They've..." "Uh, they've..." "That just, that took me a minute. I'm like, 'Ah!'" "Well, the only reason they haven't taken the city is because, uh, of... we're essentially just, we've turtle-shelled." "We've, we're not concentrating on anything other than producing soldiers and weapons, and we've replaced our wooden walls after they burned down the night of the siege with stone." "Uh, which was a lengthy project, and, to be honest, we were all quite nervous until it was completed." "How do you keep maintenance up?

I imagine the resources must cost something, so how do you keep up on that?" "Well, we have our own patrols that guard the surrounding area, the immediate area of the city, but other than that, we don't have nearly the resources that Overwatch has." "Um, I saw a statue outside, but I didn't get a good look at it." "Uh, and she says, 'Oh, that's, that's actually a monument to Duncan Joypidem.'" "Ah!" "Um, one of the things, and this was perhaps a bit misguided, but one of the, one of the, uh, expeditions into the region of Overdale..." "Um, someone went into the caves where he had fallen and retrieved his remains." "Uh, they delved deep into the cavern until they found them and brought them back for a proper burial here in Winterhaven." "And, you have the remains of my son?" "Yes, they're currently in the crypt, uh, beneath Winterhaven Hall, along with Lord Pagereg and, uh, several of the more respected members of Winterhaven." "And, uh, I kinda choke up, like, big gulp, and put my head down and kinda back off a little bit at this point, just thoughts rushing through my head." "Thank you for that. It's a fitting decision, a place of honor." "Well, we figured it was the least we could do, although I, I don't agree with how or when they did it, but, uh, I am glad that it's done, now that it's done." "So, you guys have a couple of choices to make here. Uh, I, I, I, uh, you guys can continue to kinda assess the situation, or you can look around, or it's completely up to you." "I have a, I have a question, uh, how, how reviled am I?

If I walk outside unaccompanied, am I going to be pelted with rotten fruit? What is this?" "Uh, I plan to address the public, and again, this is Talia speaking, uh, Ian's kind of gone silent." "Uh, I plan on addressing the public and letting them know that you are not to be harmed in any way, and that you are all revered knights of this city, and you have helped in its defense more than once." "Uh, once they see who you actually are, I'm sure that there would be no problem." "So, she looks over to Ironhide, uh, and she says, 'Ironhide may be a different story, that may be a harder sell, uh, but again, I'll, I'll let everybody know that you are free to walk around the city, and that no harm should come to you.'" "Once you've addressed them, I would like to speak on my own behalf as well." "Uh, and she says, 'granted.'" "Uh, Ian speaks up, uh, and says, 'Don't you think it would be wise if we had guards accompany them throughout the city, wherever they go?'" "Uh, and she says, 'No, it says they're guests of ours, they're respected members of Winterhaven, they, they, they're not under guard.'" "You're not trust us?" "Uh, you asked that of Ian?" "Yeah." "Uh, he says, 'Absolutely not.'" "You have, you have a history of taking the law into your own hands." "I break my silence, uh, and I look at Talia, and I say, 'Make sure that when you address the Talan people, you stress,' and I kind of look over at Malkus in a kind of like, 'I'm sorry, I'm about to say this type of way,' um, but you stress that Ironhide is the true hero here." "I was the one who wanted to take care of this 17 years ago, and we need that acknowledged, because..." "Malkus narrows his eyes at Rod Swell, but says nothing." "Wow." "Um, Ian speaks up." "I, I, by the way, at this point, I'm admitting that we were all wrong." "This is, you know, we could have taken care of this while we were in Overdale." "But, you know, this is, this is a mistake on all of our parts." "And that is one of a number of opinions people might have about this situation." "Hey, look at it this way, we've caused these people hell for 17 years." "If nothing else, what Rod Swell just said will make Malkus' address to the people that much more poignant, so thank you for that." "And, and, on top of that, I'm, I, I think it might help go a long way in endearing Ironhide to the people, considering the current state of Warforged in this area." "They're slaves. They were made to be slaves to obey." "But they're feared and hated by this town." "Yeah, but I'm saying that I have a mind of my own." "That's what we want to put out there, sir." "We're working on your spin.

You're not so great with the 20 to 40 female demographic." "This is about PR at this point." "Mothers are afraid you're going to eat their children." "He takes all this in, yep." "And, uh, mothers are afraid that you might allow it to happen." "Damn." "Burn!" "Oh yeah, well, your momma's so fat." "Reeeetch!" "Uh, Ian speaks up." "She walked into a Drax cave in 17 years later, okay." "I was hoping you were going to tie that together, I'm like, yeah, yeah, uh." "Uh, Ian speaks up, and, uh, he says, 'I understand you've been through a bit of a traumatic event recently, but what are your intentions in our city, now that you're back?'" "Refuge." "We, uh, I, I only speak for myself, but I think that we would like to help in any way possible." "Clean up the mess we made." "I consider Winterhaven to be my home. I will help the city in any way I can." "Uh, uh, Malkus is actually still dressed in the original tabard he was given." "Uh, for Winterhaven." "Just reeking with symbolism at all times, that's what helps us here." "Uh, he says, 'If you want to help, I'll be in my study, we can talk, we can talk about it then, uh, in the meantime I have to get going.' "And, uh, with that, uh, he and his, uh, his, quotation mark, son, uh, uh, leaves the room." "It's nice meeting you, Nathaniel." "Uh, you too, sir, and he, like, he shakes your hand again. Uh, well, very well-mannered boy.

Uh, and, and they leave, and it's just, uh, you guys and Talia now." "Strap a young boy you have there, Talia." "Ship off the old block." "Lorel just smirks." "Uh, and she, she, uh, she says, 'What are you implying?'" "I am implying nothing. How old is he?" "He's about to turn seven, he's about to turn seventeen in three months." "Wait, did Thorel do that, or was that..." "I don't understand, like, like, she said that, she, like, like you said that she, that the kid has Ian's hair, right? Like, across the- "He has, he has, like, dirty blonde hair.

I mean, again, hair color doesn't really prove anything." "It does." "It doesn't. Take me for a tip, I have brown hair, I have brown hair and a red fucking beard. None of, do either of our parents have red hair at all?" "Alright, look, the kid was born with two hands, I think that makes it pretty clear he's a father." "He wasn't born a fucking vampire, I was thinking of that." "Yeah, he has stanks, okay?" "So, I mean, he wasn't born a vampire, so that's something." "It's true. Or was he?" "What color hair does Thorel have?" "Uh, Thorel has brown hair, to my knowledge." "Okay, but, like, the kid has blonde hair, so I'm just saying, like-" "It's dirty blonde hair." "He can have a kid with blonde hair." "My brother's redhead and neither of my parents have red hair, nor do either of my grandparents." "Yeah, hair color doesn't prove anything." "It's everything." "Gediology readiness." "Yeah, my sister was blonde and there's no other blonde in my family, so..." "Gediology readiness." "Okay, when we look at him, does he have Thorel's eyes, does he have Thorel's structure, like is there any, like..." "Tungens and Mari." "You are not the father." "Uh, looking at the kid, he's... it's kind of hard to tell, like he's... he kind of has, like, this really strapping form, which isn't necessarily what Thorel is." "Thorel's more lithe and thin, but this kid's almost barrel-chested in how large he is.

Big strapping kid." "It was mentioned that he didn't come to Winterhaven for months. I would assume that she didn't just go find somebody immediately." "Okay, well, I think the bottom line is we're pretty sure about what's going on here. We probably don't need to torment these people with their out-of-wedlock children and so..." "Yes, he's a bastard." "How have you been, Talia?" "Uh, she... kind of recovering from the previous question, she says it's a stressful time." "Sure that." "To be honest, we can get... we would appreciate any help we can get, and the fact that you're here today is... nothing shy of a miracle, like I've said before." "I'm sorry about my silence earlier, but I do really thank you for bringing my son's remains and giving him a proper burial.

It means a lot to me." "And she repeats again, it was the least we can do." "Now, you can stay here and chit-chat with her, or you can... it's totally up to you guys." "I imagine they're gonna want our help." "Yeah, I mean, they already said they wanted our help. Like Talia said, any help will be appreciated. I just don't think there's anything we can do this second, right?" "Like, we can't rush to Overwatch and take them down, I think that would be..." "And Malchus looks at Talia and says, 'Of course, you and yours will all know best where we could be of the most use.

I think until we have a grasp on what state 17 years has left our world in, we are best off taking our cues from you.'" "And she kind of sighs thinking about it, and she says, 'Well, the men can always use more training. We've had a couple of patrols that have gone missing in the last two weeks. I don't know if you've encountered any of them, but there are bands of Warforged that roam..." "Yeah, pull out that thing." "That's the guy!" "Oh, yeah, so you whip out the leather armor." "Yeah." "And she says, 'Where did you encounter them?'" "On the road on the way here." "Coming from the north." "And she says, 'Did you destroy them all?'" "Mm-hmm." "The ones that we encountered." "There was one that popped out of...

There was a little one that popped out of one of them's chest." "Oh, yeah, that thing, yeah." "Oh, shit." "And she buries her face in her hands at this." "Oh, good job bringing that up." "And then she says, 'You need to go speak to Ian at once and tell him this.'" "That was theirs!" "Oh, shit." "Before we go and speak to Ian, I imagine that we can stay the night here instead of venturing out into the village before you've addressed them." "She says, 'If you like, I can go address the people right now and Malchus can come with me if you'd like to go talk to Ian or I could do so right afterward.'" "Perhaps we should all go talk to Ian together." "Okay." "So, it's not too late to address the people? Like it's..." "No, no, no, it's... No, you have time." "Okay, okay.

Then I suppose we should go talk to Ian immediately like Talia told us to." "Yeah." "Right on." "So venturing into Ian's study, there's this map laid out of the surrounding countryside all the way... basically the entire east coast of this continent." "Uh... and there are several points highlighted and they're flagged. You're not exactly sure why they're flagged, but you're guessing that these are items of importance or something." "And as soon as he sees you walk into the study and he motions for you to come over to his desk, he's like, 'Come here, take a look at this map.'" "And again, he's kind of curt with you. It's just... the whole thing smacks of like, 'I'm gonna work with you, but I don't wanna.'" "And he starts motioning towards the map in different sections and he says, 'These are where we know that they have patrols set up.'" "We've told our men to avoid these areas for the most part and just make sure that they don't come too close to Winterhaven.'" "Do we see a flag set up on the road that we traveled where we would have..." "Okay, uh...

I pick that flag up and I throw it on the ground." "You dick!" "And that's the exact expression he gives you, like, 'Dick, why did you do that?'" "Um... we may have taken care of one of the patrols between you and Icebreaker." "And he says, 'That's fantastic. Hand me the carrier pigeon.'" "I look at Ynward." "How about that?" "Yeah, I look over at Ynward." "So, uh, we got most of it, except that little part." "And he buries his face in his hand." "I expected that." "He has two hands, right?" "Well, his hand. He buries his face in his hand." "I land in my other one." "That's not good." "We know about it." "Uh... he says, 'We don't have much time, then.'" "Uh... what those are, are essentially magical carrier pigeons." "That if a patrol runs into some sort of problem for any reason, it breaks free of the patrol leader." "And immediately retreats back to the Overwatch." "Uh... where more bands of warforged are alerted that that is a troublesome area." "And they basically descend upon that place." "Okay, they don't know the war here or anything, right?" "Well, they'll be able to see anybody who was battling in the area." "Oh, so it... okay." "So, the element of surprise is lost in terms of your..." "And then he kind of like... he almost, like, hipster-esque rolls his eyes, 'Your miraculous return.'" "What a dick." "I look over at Malchus because I know he eats that shit up." "I know." [Laughter] "Um... here's the situation as it stands now." "It's only a matter of time before they overwhelm us and take the city." "With each passing week, there seems to be more warforged." "We don't know how they're making them or where they're coming from exactly within the city, but..." "It's only a matter of time before they just completely overwhelm us." "Are you certain that they're manufactured in the city on site?" "We had spies in the city up until about two months ago." "We're guessing that they were either discovered or murdered in some..." "unforeseen incident, but we've lost contact with them." "We were getting reports regularly about goings-on in the city." "That's how we knew about the mages, that's how we knew about Carter's speeches, which is mostly propaganda." "Who controls the warforged?" "We're not entirely sure.

We're guessing it all falls under Carter's command, but he has to have delegates." "What about the mage that was called?" "As far as we know, he never left the city, so that's probably a good guess." "They... you mentioned before they were made special, so they're completely obedient." "Like, is there a way to know if we kill the head mage that made them if they would be normal like me?" "Or how they would obey us?" "No." "Because I want slavery." "He says we honestly don't know that much about them." "We don't have many mages in the area, we have no contacts to the city of Uminyero, and we don't really..." "We have a mage." "And he looks at Draconis for... almost acknowledging him for the first time." "And he says, 'Is that true?'" "Yeah, that's true. Fire mage." "And he says, 'I mean, if we can get one of those carrier pigeons, that would be incredibly helpful for us to find out more about the city, maybe we could use that technology against them.'" "So, what if we were to... okay, relatively speaking, how fast would they get their troops back to the spot that we destroyed the other warforged?" "Where did you encounter them?" "I don't know, where did we encounter them?" "We tell him where we encountered them." "Right, this guy on the map, exactly." "And he says, 'It would take days for them to mobilize. They're tough, but they're pretty slow.'" "Would us getting the remains of one of the warforged do us any good?" "He says, 'We've had people study them.

We really don't know much about how they're created other than we understand that they're obedient and that they can't be turned that we know of, but we don't understand where or how they came to be.'" "So you need a carrier pigeon?" "That would be our best bet in terms of spying on Overdale." "Overwatch?" "I have a thought. First of all, is Overwatch east of here or west of here? I can't remember." "South." "South. Well, okay, I'm awful at everything. Okay, so, now back in character. If Overwatch is south of here, we encounter a patrol to the north, and we go out to the west or east and slay another patrol, we can create the illusion of motion that we are traveling around Winterhaven and away from Winterhaven.

Perhaps they'll think we're moving along a particular vector if they've got dead to the north and then dead to the east or west." "And what if we take the leader alive?" "Wouldn't hurt either." "If you could manage to do that, that would be, again, incredibly helpful, but even the first sign of captivity, he would probably release the carrier pigeon." "Is there at least a device that you have, like a net or something like that, we can throw over?" "Yeah, they capture it." "Because it pops out of his chest, so if we cover him up, then it'll give us a better chance of capturing the bird or whatever it wants." "Plus, if he's in captivity, that means there's a couple of us right there to try to grab it before it can get away." "Just bust through his chest and grab it." "Or we could just make sure that the person with the best reflex is closest to..." "That is not good enough, not after like a fucking 40 minute fight. We almost died the last time." "Yeah." "So, any thoughts on how we would go about capturing one of these carrier pigeons?" "He seems to give this some thought for a while." "He said that we can give you nets, but we've never actually tried capturing one of the patrol captains." "It's pretty much just destroy on sight, and that's only if they get close enough to the city to threaten us." "I'm just saying like we can destroy it, and right when it hits the ground, we throw nets on it." "So, then when the thing pops out, it's in the net for a little bit so we can grab it then." "It gives us a better chance to grab it rather than just like jumping for it right when it pops out and starts flying away." "Yeah, he said yeah we can give you nets, that's not a problem." "You've fought them before, you know how formidable they are." "All right, well..." "If you give us some people, they would go a lot better." "A few rangers or something." "Somebody that can stay back out of the trouble." "But then at that point if we're traveling with more people, it would be harder to avoid other, you know what I mean?" "I'm just saying like three bowmen." "I'm not saying we grab a platoon with us." "He says that, he thinks about it, he's like..." "I don't feel comfortable with sending extra people out, outside of the city." "Can't spare three people?" "I think it's understandable, I think we need to prove ourselves at this point." "You kind of get the feeling that it's not just the fact that he doesn't, it's you." "He doesn't want to spare people to you." "Like I said, we need to prove ourselves, if we want his help, we can't just barge in and demand it." "Like we have to play the game a little bit, right?" "We played his game by wiping out one of the patrols, by ourselves." "But we were defending ourselves, that wasn't, we didn't know what we were doing at that point." "Basically he wants us to get a pigeon, basically is what we gotta do for this dude." "Right." "That's what I'm getting from him." "You said we have a couple days, correct?" "Yeah, it would take him at least three days to mobilize him, and get anyone here." "What's the closest..." "What's the closest unit to us that you know of?" "He points to a section on the map that's about seven hours away, that is west of the city." "And I look at Malkus, and that would fit in with your plan, correct?" "We need to look like we're moving in a particular direction that will keep them away." "Alright, what's west?" "It's a particular direction that we're going to..." "We're not saying like, what is west, is there a town out there, what's out west?" "The patrol." "No, but like, what else generates..." "See, like, we are at the coast, we're near the west..." "Not all the way, not all the way, no no no, not the coast coast, you guys are..." "I'm saying like, if we hit one that's heading east, that's out towards the rest of the land." "Then they could, well they were going anywhere." "Okay, what's the closest one to the east, yeah, what's the closest one to the east then?" "Wait wait, I'm not understanding you." "He's saying that if we go west, there's nothing but coast ahead, and to the east is everything." "Yeah, so if we go to the east, then it gives it the impression..." "Yeah, it could be going anywhere." "Okay, if we go to the west, it's still, there's only really Winter Haven." "Okay, okay, I hear what you're saying now, okay." "That sounds like we're just murdering things just because." "He points to a section on the map, then well if you're heading east, then this is the nearest patrol." "It's about five hours away." "Let's close it with the other one, dick!" "We sent the closest!" "I don't really call him a dick, that's not..." "Actually they're right outside, if you want to take care of those, I'll take it." "Okay, um, so what if we give it a night to recuperate, and to eat, and to strengthen a bit." "Um, get the, let Talia do her speech to the town, um, and maybe tomorrow head east?" "Come on man." "I like it." "We're gonna need those nets." "Yeah, we'll need those nets." "He said I'll arrange something with my men." "Thank you." "And then he just points at the door." "Oh, okay, cool, thanks." "That's the exit?" "Brune..." "At this point, Malchus says, you know, as heroes of Winterhaven who have gone and slain Drak himself..." "We are your best chance for survival." "It would behoove you to stop acting like a petulant child." "Ooh..." "Gotta hand it to Malchus, he has a point." "And he storms out of the room." "And then he capes for a storm out." "Does he seriously?" "Sure, yeah." "Uh..." "Was that him walking away?" "Oh, sick Malchus!" "Uh, and then Ian, uh, Ian, uh, speaks up to Rodswell, uh, and he says, you might want to remind your friend that the last time we placed hope in him, you disappeared for 17 years." "I'm so glad I'm not in that room to hear that." "He screamed from two rooms down the hall." "I heard that." "Mr. Server..." "He screamed it, I come bursting back through that wall like the Kool-Aid Man." "Ahh..." "Uh, Lord Serverus, I'm sure that you can tell by our appearance that we weren't out gallabanting around for 17 years." "But, I will take note of that." "Uh, he says, you do that." "Uh, oh, by the way, I'd like to introduce you, I'm sure you remember Thoril?" "And he says, the vampire, yeah, I remember him." "He doesn't look like a vampire, does he?" "He didn't know him as a vampire, did he?" "Yeah, he did." "Well, he knew, like, he knew you guys, like, spying on you guys, essentially, like he saw, like he knows about it." "And then of course he, like, he's known Talia for years and years, so..." "And the witch, and he saw us with Brie, so..." "He definitely has enough evidence." "Alright." "I'll allow it." "Is Nathaniel in the room?" "Uh, no, he's not." "Okay." "So, you guys are leaving, you're leaving Ian's study." "Do you have a choice or anything?" "Well, yeah." "Alright, we're leaving the study, alright, Draconis stops everybody in the hall, after we get out of shouting distance from the dude's, uh, little study and whatnot, and..." "He looks at everybody and..." "Basically, I wanna know this guy's story, what the hell's going on?" "I understand you guys got a history, I understand he's got a missing hand, what the hell?" "Who is this guy and what'd you guys do to him?" "Oh yeah, 'cause, yeah, 'cause Ynward and I have been informed of the story, but Draconis wasn't around for that, so..." "Yeah, I wanna know what the hell's going on." "Like, why's he treating us like shit?" "Um, okay, somebody stop me if I get any of this wrong, uh..." "We were asked by Winterhaven to assist in some matters involving standard monster killing sorts of things." "He was the captain of the guard at that time, he became competitive with us, we made him look bad." "Then later, we faced him in the Tournament of Champions, right?" "Uh, well..." "We didn't face him, he just failed out." "Yeah." "He faced a, yeah, he faced a worm similar to you guys, and that was Overdale, not Winterhaven." "Overdale, sorry, yeah, yeah.

Uh, wait." "I thought I only said, anyway, okay, um..." "Then we fought in the same competition again, and though it was not our fault at all, he lost his hand in a terrible monster-related workplace accident." "Uh..." "I mean, basically, he just hates us for being really good at what we do and making him look completely ignorant." "That's it? That's what this whole, I thought you guys, like, killed his mom or something." "It's hard being number two, he's just an asshole." "No, he's very competitive." "I mean, it probably smarts pretty bad that his, that his child is actually Thor's child and Thor was back, but other than that, we haven't done anything to it." "Yeah, we don't know that for sure." "It's a matter of pride." "So, is this guy legit, is he good, or are we gonna have to worry about this guy, basically?" "No, we don't have to worry about this guy." "We can kill him, he's asleep." "Yeah, we can kill him." "Uh, Malkus?" "Yes?" "Can I get your assurance that you're not going to storm through that door? Have you calmed down enough?" "Which door?" "Uh, the lot of it to his study." "Study, yeah." "I... was, was there cause to storm back in there?

What did he say?" "Just give me your assurance, just give me your assurance that you were." "Potswell, what did he say after I left?" "I am just supposed to tell you that we should remember that we were gone for 17 years. That's all, nobody's gone." "Hold me back." "I do it in like a joking manner, kind of like, look at this guy, like come on, you know?" "Malkus just rolls his eyes and..." "So should we go face..." "Only because you took time to ask me nicely, Watson." "Should we go face our adoring public?" "Can't wait." "Well, yeah, it's..." "So, uh, near the, near the foyer, uh, you're greeted by Talia, uh, and, uh, she says, 'I've arranged to have people gather in the town square and I'm going to explain the situation.' Uh, and then you wanted to make an address after that?" "I did." "Uh, she says okay, and then she motions to two guards who open the double doors leading out of the building." "And, uh, directly outside there's, uh, there's a, just a ton of people gathered, numbers in the hundreds." "Uh, and, uh, she, she describes the situation, uh, who you guys are and how you're, you're, you're, you're knights here and you're, you're valued members of society and you don't mean them any harm and in fact you are going to help defend the city." "Uh, and then, uh, so the crowd, like, seeing, uh, seeing Malkus there and they don't make a connection necessarily between, like, just because he's a tiefling they don't say, 'Oh, well he must be, you know, the guy who signed the..." "That tiefling?" "Yeah, that, that, that's tiefling. Uh, but then she goes on to say, 'Yes, that is that guy!' and then, like, the crowd starts turning on her and then she, yeah, and that in combination with Ironhide there." "We can still cut him down." "Is that what you like to do?

Would you like to start murdering?" "Aaaah!" "Just go all Sabre-Doo." "Sign of solidarity to Overwatch." "Just look what we did for you." "Uh, so, uh, but as she goes on to describe, you know, what, what is happening and what you've done for the city and, uh, uh, she, they, they, they calm down. Uh, and then she turns things over to Malkus." "Malkus nods and steps up to the, what, are we like, are we like on a balcony?" "It's basically the front porch of this, this, this place. Like, they've just kind of gathered just outside the Great Hall, like, it's, it's, yeah." "Okay, so Malkus steps up and, um, goes on." "I felt like the odds on that one were pretty slim." "One thing you can count on is every number comes up eventually." "We don't all have to live like that.

Most of you get to live your days with an eye toward seeing things as they progress slowly but surely." "I come back 17 years later and it is weeks ago for me. Weeks ago in the time that I remember." "I assure you, had I been here, things would have gone differently. Now, whether that means I would have died trying to stop what ultimately happened or myself and my friends did make a better future for you." "No one can know. But I tell you now that I and my friends are back, we will do everything in our power to give you the future you deserve, the future we were not here to help you gain." "And I hope that by the time we have done what we set out to do, history will, history will know me better.

Until then, I ask for your patience. Thank you." "There's this kind of small smattering of applause, but it's not, it's almost patronizing in a weird way. Justin, roll an athletics check please." "Whoa." "She just explodes in fiery glory. What is it, athletic?" "Athletics check, yeah." "Someone's totally throwing something at you." "Yup." "Wshah." "Boutta get a tomato in the face, son." "A tad." "Okay, so from the crowd, a small object is whipped towards the porch and it hits Ironhide dead in the face." "Oh fuck." "And it appears to be a potato, which kind of shatters on, like, just on his forehead on impact.

And, uh, now, the crowd seems just as shocked that this happened as you are that it happened to you. And the guy in the crowd, who, as you kind of narrow in on the guy, like you can see who did it, it's this slender, kind of bearded, surly looking human. And he says, "Get the fuck outta here!" "He just screams that at you." "Rude!" And everyone kind of, once they see, like the guy screamed, everyone kind of backs away from that guy, so there's kind of this... "Come on guys, really?" And the guy kind of looks at the crowd like, "Oh, I thought we were together on this.

That's not what we're doing?" "What's up, man?" And he starts walking towards the porch, he's like, that barely fazes him when he starts walking towards the porch, he's like, "I'm not gonna have any goddamn war forged in this city!" "You can tell he's drunk." And Malchus will step in between Ironhide and the man. Now, would Malchus have to roll a diplomacy check at this point? To step in front of him? Not at all. Oh, okay. "Go hold him back." You said he's bearded? Yes. So you're just holding him back, Malchus? Does he keep coming? He stops shy, like he's not... it's more trying to intimidate than actually trying to fight.

And he starts shouting at Talia, "You just gonna let him stay here? Huh? After all they've done to this city, you're just gonna let him stay here?" "I suggest you rethink your animosity. We are the best hope for this city." Do you want to roll any kind of check on this? "I feel like that's intimidating." Okay. Was that intimidating, guys? How'd I do? You showed up. "It was pretty intimidating. I was scared." Not as good as "Get the fuck out of here," but it's pretty intimidating. Come on, at a +15 I have to be able to intimidate a peasant. "17." Unless I roll 2.

The 17 looks to be sufficient. He just... "Hey, I'm on your tiefling!" But he's just backing up. If he gets right, he's backing up back into the crowd. Right before he backs up all the way, can I roll a check? Sure. I wanna... now, at this point, the podium is a little bit higher off the ground from where he is. It's basically the front porch. You're just kind of on... you are higher than them, but yeah, you're on a porch. Is there a way I can grab and throw Malchus right at him? Just shove Malchus on the stairs at him. For the record, whatever's going on, Malchus resists.

No! Okay, I think there's already enough resistance, and Malchus's impassioned speech only got a smattering of applause. I think any checks we should do at this point might be leaning more towards trying to win these people over and not scare them away. We don't wanna come off as monsters. We're already monsters in Overwatch. I don't wanna have the same problem here. Let me think... Roll a potato back at him. Especially with Ian and so much power, I don't know how... he already doesn't trust us, and the crowd... we're not exactly winning them over here.

I'm gonna tell you, 17 years later, he's not gonna trust us now. No matter what we do. I'm thinking... okay, if you wanted to go with that plan, I'm trying to think of how we would do that. I guess that would just basically be Justin rolling a check against Rob's Fortitude? Ooh. Yeah, some kind of... pfft. Oh, man. Is it gonna be my strength? So what you're proposing, and I'm just trying to... I really just wanna explore this, 'cause I'm just... I'm curious. You're proposing like a bar... like a drunk toss? Like you're trying to grab him up by like the waist of his pants and the scruff of his neck and throw him at the guy?

This guy grabbing... Car bombing outside the ring. Just gonna grab this whenever I can grab. So let me get... so... so... now, wait. You're... let me get this straight. [Laughter] You're... the action... you're... you're trying to do something to burn what little goodwill Malchus and Ironhide have... Why didn't I have Patonist throw it at you? He did step in front of the guy. Like he did step in front of you to like block him from you. So like right off the bat, like somebody has rage. I saw... that's almost like Dan smack adjacent to face and hold him there. [Laughter] Like... like... right off the bat, like something's thrown at you and say, "Okay, we're going to help you guys out." Bam!

Some collides with your face. Somebody jumps inside your way to prevent you from working off that anger. So... I'm just trying to stop the guy from approaching. And you're... okay, you're looking at it from the thing of like Malchus... Malchus stole a moment from you. Yeah. That's interesting. And he's right in front of me, so... I mean, he's gonna break your fall. I just don't see the plus side to this, guys. But he's not... no, no, no, no! But Justin's playing his character. Not everything is going to be for a plus side. Right. Malchus... Justin's playing his character.

That's what... if that's what Ironhide would do, you could try it. I'll help you with this. Yeah, I want to do a roll to stop... to grab onto Malchus. Stop them from stopping Malchus. No! You're gonna look so cooperative in front of these people. Okay, so... Go ahead. Try to throw me. I would help Ironhide pick up Malchus. Nope. God damn it, please. Okay, okay. Justin, you're serious about doing this? Yes. Okay. So what am I gonna have to do here? I never picked someone... Roll... I would guess... hold on a second. I've never picked a party member before. I would guess...

I would guess that you would roll your D20 plus a Strength modifier, which is zero. Three. There is a Strength modifier. Oh, so sorry, so sorry. I'm looking at the wrong character. I love this. I know at least his Attack bonus should be included in there, but... so that's gonna be plus four at least. So it's plus four... that's that? So a D20 plus four, I would imagine, would be... I kinda hope I don't crit on this one, but... Oh God, I crit almost. Oh God. Alright, so... The power of... We see him doing this. Is there anything? Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.

So let me describe the scene, 'cause it's not... Let the dice fall. Let the dice fall. You can't... you can't... you can't play... Okay, so the scene is... Guy throws a potato... Holy shit. Guy throws a potato, shatters on Ironhide's face. Ironhide's super pissed, doesn't get to do anything. The guy shrieks at him, "Get the fuck out of here." Ironhide's getting more pissed. The guy advances towards Ironhide. Malchus steps in the way, thinking he's doing a good deed. Ironhide misinterprets this as Malchus trying to control Ironhide. So Ironhide proceeds to grab Malchus by the back...

By his back and waist, and drunk toss Malchus at the guy. Spears, spears, spears. Malchus sails through the air, and falls on top of the gentleman. Wow. That shit just happened. The crowd gasps, and everyone on the porch, the guards included, the guards race down to retrieve Malchus and to apprehend the man. And Talia... If we're playing the dice as they roll, they should be trying to apprehend Ironhide at this point too. Talia... What the fuck just happened? You got insane! That's what happened. Okay, Yenners applauding. We're gonna be banished from this place now.

Okay, everything that we've worked for, everything that's been written, all this storyline... Hold on, hold on, relax. Life is messy sometimes. This guy was pissed off at us because he held a grudge for 17 years. Why did you do something like that to make him feel more like him? Spears, spears. So Talia looks mortified, like she looks at Ironhide like, "What the hell? I just told these people that you guys are cool and you do this and..." She made you out to be a hero, man! You guys, it's not about to get better, alright? Malchus springs to his feet, closes the gap between him and Ironhide, and his Blade of Annihilation springs to his hand, and he gets right up in Ironhide's face and he says, "You touch me one more time and I will reduce you to so much slag and ash." I just rolled a 20 diplomacy check, does that do anything?

Stop it, stop it, stop it. The transition's too... Uh, you can't really roll a diplomacy check against your own teammates, it's kinda... Is it? I mean, like... Well, I mean, I guess you'd be rolling against their... I mean, you're not trying to trick them or anything, so it's not an insight thing, and you're not trying to... My fantasy is that it would just talk to them, it's like... Would that be Will? Would that be diplomacy versus Will? I really don't know, I don't... Tell him it's Will and he misses it. No, but I got Ironhide if it's Will. But you didn't tell me what you were rolling against before you rolled, so...

You can't roll and then tell me. That's not really the way it works, because you could just make anything up then, "Well, I meant to do..." You know, I can't... How does Ironhide respond to my staredown? Because I am there in his face, just like burning gays into his eyes at this point. Well, if you pull out your point, I'm pulling out mine. Of course you are, why wouldn't you? Now can I roll a... What can I do? Somebody's about to get knocked unconscious. Okay, okay. I'm a duel in the middle of this! So, a crowd is gathered, basically most of Winterhaven is gathered.

You two are the returning heroes who, after 17 years, there's legends told about you guys and everything, whether it be good or bad, and the first act publicly is to get into a fistfight with your own team members. If both of your blades are drawn, you're both standing on this porch staring at each other, what would you like to do? Initiative. No. God damn it! I got a +4, I'm gonna use one. Hey, we got... We're going east tomorrow, guys. Is there anything we can do to restrain them? Yeah, we're going east tomorrow, we can't be doing that. You can totally...

Now, see, that's an easier thing, you could totally try to restrain them. Like, to separate them physically, that's much easier to do. A diplomacy check is kinda a little harder to gauge, like I would actually... I thought it was gonna be like one of those things like, diplomacy is like, okay guys, there's a time and place for everything, let's settle it. Yeah, let's... And you could do that, that's fine. Like, I would just... We'd have to take a two minute break so I could look that up. I've never actually read anything about that. I don't... Rob, the most...

What's the question? Can a teammate roll a diplomacy check on another teammate? And if so, what are you checking against? It's... So... It's probably passive insight, really. Okay. And it's not... I mean, with a teammate, all you're basically... It's not like you can control my... I mean, basically, the diplomacy check has to mean something, so I need to hear what he says. And we need to... Like... You can probably... Okay, then can I just talk? Yes. Okay. I step in the middle of Ironhide and Malchus at this point. You better get tossed. And I focus on Malchus. You better get stabbed.

At first I focus on Malchus because... Actually, yeah, at first I focus on Malchus because, you know, I seem to have a better rapport with Malchus. And I look at Malchus and I say, "Malchus, you are trying hard to get this town to accept us. We have a duty to protect this town from what we've caused. You cannot throw it all away just because of an enraged Ironhide who has done something to him." Last time I looked at him, it wasn't the one who did the throwing. Listen. He was enraged. He had just had something thrown at him. He thought you were a threat.

I can play my own battles. I don't need you jumping in front of me. Jesus Christ. He's gonna reach over to... Oh, he's saying that he's saying that Malchus? Yeah. We cannot fight. If we're going to do this, let's do this somewhere else. Say this also. Malchus dissipates his Blade of Annihilation and says, "Fine. You're on your own from now on." And just... Keep Swish, walk away. Two in one episode, Bravo. Wait, where is Malchus walking? He's just walking out in the users. He's gonna go sit with the drunk. Just off the porch and out into the town. Okay. The crowd separates as you walk through them.

They just kind of make a way. Oh, and I bristle to get them as far away as possible. And I turn to Ironhide and I say, "If you want any chance of freeing those Warforged and making things right, you will not follow him right now." "We will take care of this on a different time, sir." I don't need to follow him. Okay. What's the vagabond doing right now? I also want to scream, "He's walking like a bitch right now!" Oh, really? Now I want to swoop my cape and then run the other way. Into the night. As long as you walked or ran after that, I feel no need to add to the situation.

Can I gauge the crowd at all at this point? The crowd, yes. You absolutely can. Mostly shock. Mostly shock and disbelief for a number of reasons. One, that you guys are the same people who left 17 years ago, haven't changed. Two, because you're fighting each other in the middle of the city. Three, that guy is screaming obscenities as he's being apprehended and drug away to presumably a holding cell or something like that to sleep it off. Four, because Malchus is now charging through the city. Okay. I... Not charging. Well, I mean... It's a brisk and menacing walk.

At this point, Rodswell stands in front of the crowd and I... Is Talia still around? Is she like... Where is she? Uh, yeah, she's kinda... She's there, but a lot less proud to be there. Okay. I bring her back to the forefront with me and I address the crowd and I introduce myself as Rodswell Joy Bataan. Okay. At this point, I say that, uh... As you all know, we have been... We have lost 17 years of our time. So, yes, that would make me related to Duncan Joy Bataan. I wanna thank you for giving my kin the burial and respect and the memories that he deserves. And I will assure you that, despite the actions of my friends, we can work together and we can save this town.

And all I ask is that you put some faith in us. And give us the freedom to help you. We will prove ourselves to you. I promise. Uh, roll a diplomacy check, please. Yeah, I know. 19. Okay. You seem to have won a good portion of the crowd over with that. Like, they're like, "Oh, okay." They're very tentative about it, but... They're confident in their shaky legs. Yeah. They're willing to give us a chance. Right. Probably getting a bonus because he's a pink skin. Use whatever I can, motherfucker. Fucking red menace. Red menace. Oh, man. So, do you guys wanna... On that note, Rodswell takes off and tries to catch up to Malchus.

Okay. I'm going to let everyone else say what they're going to do before we move on. Does anyone else want to address the crowd at all? No, I want to slowly back in through the doors from where we came back into the room. Are we on, like, a podium or just, like, a porch? Like, a porch. Oh. All right, all right, all right. I'd like to give a bow before I make Maxis. Thank you. USA, USA. Uh, Yenn-Wer takes a bow which confuses the crowd quite a bit. A minotaur curtsied up in front of him. But, yeah, he's a little slow. Uh, do me a favor. Uh, Draconis. Yeah. Roll a flat D20 for me.

D20. All right. And, bam. 17. Okay. Uh, where are you walking? You said you backed... Were you backing back into the house? Yeah, back through the double doors that we came from. Okay. Immediately upon walking back through the double doors, uh, you double over in pain. Oh, yes. That's good. And you start to cough up a small amount of blood. Give me some. Okay, that's bad. Uh, and then... That's what we get for a 17? Jesus Christ. I know. I was about to say, I'm glad I didn't roll a 1. Yeah. Your dick falls right off. I'm gonna explain this as time goes on, but this is not something that's gonna go away.

I think I get the gist. So, uh... It's those Dragonborn coke withdrawal symptoms. So, who saw that, by the way? Who witnessed that? Not Malchus, not Rodswell. Not Ironhide, not... Well, Yenward maybe. I didn't charge off, all right? That was just a joke. You can't... retcon. You say... Right? Yeah. Either way, I'm inside the house now. Yeah. So, Yenward is probably the only one who saw it, because Yenward took a bow and then walked back in, so... So Thorol's just standing outside like, "Whoa!" Yeah, what does Thorol do? I'm... Thorol's most definitely leaving as well.

I don't bow or anything, I'm just sort of... You're just going to the bar, right? Like, you're just... Yeah. So, after everything that happened, I don't feel like it's necessary to do any sort of other actions other than just leave. Thorol just needs to get up there and make a speech, including the line, "You know, to some of you out there, I even feel like a father to you." Oh, I see where you're going. So, Yenward's the only one who witnesses this, and after a few moments, Draconis composes himself... ...and stands back up. Doesn't even help me out. Damn.

Come on. Yenward helps those who help themselves. Hey, now. Nice. Okay, so... Uh, do you guys want to talk about that or anything? Or are you just gonna... Well, I mean, at this point, I'm chasing... Right, but Yenward... ...they want to talk about Yenward. He's still running. Yes. I was waiting for him. Okay, you all right? Yeah. Got a little butt there. Hey, listen. Listen. This happened. This was... Hey, this was between you and me, okay? You got a lot of secrets. I'm fine. I'm fine. All right. Don't think I can fuck him up. Yeah, I'm getting kind of scared now. All right.

Um... He walks away. Uh, does... ...uh, do Malcomson-Routswell want to chat at all, or do you just want to move forward to the next day? Um, I... Well, I definitely think that we need to figure something out before we head off into the woods trying to work together here. For that big hunting trip? So, yeah, I'm following Malkus. I don't know where I'm following Malkus to. That is... Probably a bar. Malkus? Uh, probably a bar. Okay. And is Malkus, uh, allowed to be... Are they, like, willing to serve Malkus at this point? Oh, yeah, yeah. They... Everyone got the heads up.

It's fine. And again, this isn't, like, they're racist or anything. It's just Malkus as an individual. Like, it's... Right. It's... I mean, it's like... And this is my friend, John Hitler. Like, it's like, oh, like, the name just is like... Well, I mean, it was him that did it. That's true. It's like, this is my friend Adolf Hitler. Like, that's... You're right. That's even worse. Well, he wasn't as bad as you think, okay? He's misunderstood. Wait, who wasn't bad? Hitler? The stories of Hitler were greatly exaggerated. That's kind of what you're dealing with. Not that Malkus did anything, like, physically to impress, but, like, it's looked upon...

Malkus gave Overdale the keys to do what they've done. What's that paper they signed? That's what it is. But you all signed it. Like, let's not put this all on him, but... One of us can't read or write, so... He just put his print. Yeah. I was gonna say ball print. Yeah, and then he bowed and walked away. Correct. Okay. So, yes, I follow Malkus into the bar, and I belly up to the bar next to him, and... I just kind of look at him. You know what the worst part is, Rod Swell? I was extending some degree of understanding to that rusted suit of armor. He's working very hard to burn whatever little goodwill I had for him.

And... by letting him get to you, you are working very hard on burning whatever little goodwill this town is giving to you. It's hardly the same place. But you're the same person. You're the same person who, years ago, swore to protect this city. And... well, not person. I apologize. Tiefling. I said Tiefling. You used person for us. That's... Oh, okay. Tiefling's your people. Okay. And you're the same person swore that they would protect this city, and you're the same person who sat in that room with us just now and talked to Talia and understood the dire situation the city is in.

And we, as knights of Winterhaven, and as the people who, in one way or another, caused this whole mess... And we can debate and argue and fight over which one of us were the catalyst, but we, as a group, have caused this. And it's our duty to clean this up, and the only way we're going to is if we have support of those people. So... Ironhide's foolishness is completely excused and I'm called upon to be the bigger person? That's how it works? No. But I don't know how to control Ironhide. I don't know how to discuss things with Ironhide. I've never had that kind of relationship with him.

But with you, I've been able to discuss things and talk things out. And, in this case, I'm not saying that you have to be the bigger person, but I'm asking you to work with him in order to get this done. And once this is done, you two can do whatever you must do. But right now, we have a job to do. Agreed. Now, I don't know what you can do to mend things with Ironhide, but I would say right now, maybe sitting here and drinking away your problems isn't going to solve anything. It's going to solve me not melting Ironhide down for scrap? Isn't that what you asked me for?

But tomorrow, we have to be very aware, sir. We're going out to fight. Remember what it was like in that past battle that we had with the Warforged? We did it once. We can do it again. And I almost died. And I was only saved by Yin-Wer, who had a potion, which we do not have. We need you to be at 100%. Why don't we rest? You do not need to worry about my proficiency in battle. Well, I guess I've won half the battle. Because you and Ironhide aren't going to kill each other at this point, so... And then I throw some gold down and I say, "This one's on me, alright?" Malchus nods.

And I get up and I let him be. Does anyone else want to do anything before we advance? No. I'm fine. Are there shops in Warhooper? There are. There are plenty of shops. What are you guys looking for specifically? Potions. We could totally get you guys some potions. Potions. I'm just imagining Yin-Wer walking up to the group the next day and looking at Rodzul and being like, "Hey, so that potion was pretty helpful last time. I got us a six-pack." Shake, shake. It's like little rings and everything all held together. Yeah, I want exactly that to happen. I think that would be fantastic.

So Yin-Wer's going out shopping. So I'll tell you what I bought after session. Alright. And I'll set up these potions of healing real quick. They're 50 gold each. And they have like five in stock. So do you just want to buy all five? Yes, I would. All I want right now. In one glass. Alright, so potions of healing. And that's negative 250 for you. Alright. Alright, so Yin-Wer is carrying five health potions. And let me mark that on his character. Yay! Deets. I have that spring water. You do. You sure do. So exclusive 80 inside my catalog. How are those horn tips I passed on last time?

Standard? Can I buy some of those? Those are going. It's only been 17 years. I figured they'd make something like that everywhere. Yes, it's kind of a specialized item. Five health potions. Yeah. They heal you for ten hit points each. Just a flat ten. And minor action. You know all the good stuff. So you guys are heading out, right? Yes. So what do you think? What do you think? What do you think? The sharks are clearly for Overwatch. Okay, just scattering you about the battlefield here. So, on your way kind of looking for this patrol. You're walking for a few hours.

I want one of you to make a perception check. I believe that's me. Okay. Plus your prize. Yeah, it's plus ten, so... Eighteen. Okay. While you're walking through this kind of valley, where there's actually nice trees, it looks fairly untouched actually. You hear rustling. And before they can get the jump on you... It's Pikachu. Several figures jump out from behind trees and bushes. Oh my god. Fucking crazy. It looks like several drow and a half-orc. Oh. Several drow. Wait, are any of these creatures affecting the thing? Affecting what thing? My sidekick. The orb of light?

No, the orb of light doesn't react to them at all. They're definitely living too. They're not undead in any way. They're just enraged and attacking you. They kind of jump out behind the trees and bushes and just start going "Aaaah!" Like just running at you. I'm announcing myself. Which is terrifying. So, everyone roll initiative. My initiative is 17. It's nine. Awesome. I always forget where my initiative is. It's on details. Details. That's my second one so far, by the way. Oh. You're trying, man. Yeah, I know. Thirteen. Yeah, hello. Yeah, middle of the road. Sixteen.

Sixteen for Ynward. Sixteen's pretty cool, man. Yeah, man. Pretty stoked. Twenty-two for Malkus. And what did Ironhide get? Seventeen. Oh, I got that. Draconis, what'd you get? Twenty-two. That's a very storm render in some of these draw. Alright, let's go ahead and add these guys to the initiative tracker. They're our new friends. I'm guessing that one's supposed to be a lady. Yes. That's right. Sexy lady. I call her. Malkus, you're up. Nice. Wow, we really got kind of surroundified here, didn't we? Good going, Dan. Gonna go to... I'm kind of looping around this guy's threatened area to get there.

Actually, let's get there. Okay. And I will open with the usual. Soul Eater at plus fifteen. Did you add the one for being speedy? No, twenty-five in that case against Stacy. Ooh, that will hit. Oh, man. My damage went up and everything since we leveled. This is fun math. It makes me happy. Okay. D12 plus fourteen. Twenty necrotic damage. Twenty damage. Excellent. And no minor action. So that's done. The guy looks shocked that you got the drop on him. That particular drought. Draconis, your turn. Right. First of all, these other two people, we're allowed to attack them?

They're like with this group? Like are they like... The half-orc and the chick, yeah. Are they menacing us and brandishing weapons? The half-orc seems to be hanging out in the back. Everyone else seems to be like charging directly at you. He seems to be the leader. Do we see any weapons on that? Like is he brandishing a weapon or... The half-orc does have, he has a sword next to him, but again, like he's not necessarily charging at you. Alright, so I move four and I'm gonna be doing fireball. Ooh. Nice. Which is burst three within twenty squares. So that is, let me do this.

I believe right... Like here-ish to get these four. Oh, I can get that guy too, yeah, good call. Let me move that out of there. You need to get that guy four. So if I do it right here, I'll get that. One, two, three, one, two, three, yeah. So that'll be, yeah, good, nice. Good, good, good. Alright, okay, so... D20 plus twelve... So we'll run right down the line. So go with the female drow. Alright, female drow, here we go. Boom, twenty-eight. Twenty-eight will hit her and, uh, ambusher, number one, drow. Number one, roll. Twenty-five. Twenty-five will hit and the half-orc?

Half-orc, seventeen. Seventeen will miss. Damn. And the other, ambusher, number four. Alright, seventeen again. That will also miss. So you hit these two over here. Alright. You use the female drow and the, uh, yeah, so... Any half damage to missed targets or anything like that? Uh, yes, missed half damage, good call, thank you. Oh, okay. Good, good, good. Good call, good call on that. And did you add your one for being speedy? Uh, it wouldn't matter with those others. Okay, gotcha. Okay. Alright, so damage is four d6 plus seven. And, okay, and boom, twenty-three.

Twenty-three, very nice. Okay, twenty-three to these two. And they're dead. They were maintenance. And eleven? Yeah, so eleven to round it down. Bam. Alright, you wanna do anything else? Uh, should be it, should be good. Alright, uh, Ambusher 2, who is right behind Yenward, sees the fireball erupt and, uh, Malkus, uh, get the drop on his friend and stab him. Uh, and he momentarily hesitates. And then he leaps into the body of water that Yenward is in. [Laughter] And tries to stab him. So... Uh, let's see here, we're gonna go with... We're gonna go with Dazing Strike.

Okay. I don't like that. Don't sound good. Uh, that's a d20 plus twelve. Nineteen! Uh, that's against AC. Nope. Okay. Uh, he looks foolish. Uh, Ambusher number four, uh, who narrowly escaped being, uh, completely engulfed in flames, uh, runs at Draconis. Uh, and he's gonna, he's gonna use his mace. Uh, twenty-two versus your AC. Uh, hits. Okay, so that's gonna be one d8 plus four. Uh, ten. Okay. So that's ten, and he gets to shift one square after doing that. He shifts there. [whispering] Uh, Ambusher number three, uh, is gonna attack Malkus. With his Dazing Strike.

Uh, d20 plus twelve, and that's a fourteen. Shit. Uh, he stands there and looks foolish as a minor action. I, um, I Immediate Reaction, Reflexive Hell Strike, uh, he takes, uh, d-d-d-d-d-stats. He takes eleven damage. Oh, nice. Oh, wow, okay. Oh, goodness, whoa, whoa, whoa, this is a push that I've never been using. Um, push-t-t-t-shh. And I pushed a number of squares equal to my constitution. Well, that would have been helpful before. I push him four squares. Oh, wow. Damn. Uh, things I haven't been doing. So, I don't know if I have permissions to move this guy, so I don't know, let's see if, like that.

Yep. Boom. Alright. So he slammed against a rock, and that does another five damage. Yay! Ass! Uh, okay, well, that's, uh, okay. So, the half-orc, uh, is pretty pissed off, honestly, at this. Uh, and he- So now we're going to boost sides on him? Uh, he charges into combat, one, two, three, four, five, six, and he's going to flank Yenward. Oh, everyone's still beating the bull with Yenward. He's going to jump into jacuzz with the Edward-er, and, uh, he's going to do something, uh, sexual. Uh, he is going to use his great axe. Let's have his axe fight, let's fucking do this.

Crit! Yikes. Uh, so that's 20 damage right off the bat. Neat. I'm down to wherever else I'm- Uh, let's see, effect deals one. Okay, I want to create a deal as one D10 extra. Damn. Uh, so that's an extra seven, so that's 27 total. And, uh- Tank is forward. Ironhide, your turn. Alright, uh, seeing what just happened inside the pool, I'm going to come up right behind two, so I'm getting the flanking bonus. And I'm also speedy. So I'm going to come down on him really hard with a Green Flame Blade. 30. 30 will hit. And, I'm going to erase that. Wait, is this an eight?

Get out of here. Boom. Nine damage. Nine damage, alright. I'm also going to put the Aegis of Assault on. Okay. So he's marked, and it's the female drow's turn. And, let's see here, she's going to slink up. What does Bish think she's doing? Uh, she's going to use Venomous Slash. Uh, and her blades are coated with a lovely poison. Awesome. Uh, and she's- Stop, my numby doesn't. She's going to swing at Draconis. 27. That's AC? Uh, yes. Of course it is, yeah, that hits. That would hit anything that we have. Yeah, and that's 3d8 plus five. 21, and you're going to take five ongoing poison damage.

Oh, cool. Each turn it's all save ends, so. I'm like you wasn't already sick or anything. Okay, Ynward, your turn. Okay, I'm going to use Strike against Mr. Half-Work, sir, here, because he wanted to test my gangster. And, boom. 35? Jesus Christ, yes, 35. Yes. Okay, and that would be 6d10s plus- Let me just mark that as used so you never use that again. Okay, that daily's been used. One, two, three, four, five, six, plus eight. Nine, ten, eight. 37. Damn. That's excellent. Cut his head off. That's good. That's not going to kill him, but that's going to make him rethink this.

Bloodied. Hold my dick, Half-Work. Yes. So Half-Work is bloodied. Do you want to shift or anything? Can I use one of my potions as a minor action? Sure, sure can. I would like to do that. You now have four potions remaining, and you just gained plus ten hit points. So you're back up to 63. Thoril, your turn. Good turn for you, Ynward. Let's see, one, two, three, four. I'd have to probably take a swing if I went across like that, wouldn't I? Yes. Okay. Fuck it, I'll take it. So I can get in position. Okay, so the Ambusher is going to make an opportunity attack with his dagger, so that's D20 plus 14.

Better make it. 28. So he makes it. But it's only a D4 plus four. Yeah. Six. All right. My turn. Good bye, Ambusher. Melee basic attack. Let's see, D20 plus, well now I got that, so D20 plus 17. 36. Holy fuck, 36 will hit. That's one way for being a crit. 2D8 plus 12, 23. All right, 23. Let's see. Off hand attack. Off hand, back up to 17, and 36 again. Jesus Christ. It always hits harder. 2D6 plus 12. You just did 59 damage? 18. 18 damage. Oh, 18, okay. He's definitely bloodied. So you're hitting him up and down. So he's ****ed. I wanted to make him feel good about that one hit.

And it's like, "Aha!" And it's like, "Okay." Do you want to do anything else? If Thoril shifted there, would he take an opportunity to swing again? No, not if you're shifting. Hey, can you shift there so I can get combat advantage on Cowboy? Sure. Thank you. Cowboy? Ambusher number one is going to race up to Thoril. Oh, shit. Oh, great. And use Dazing Strike. That's plus 14 because he's now flanking Thoril. 18. Nope. Damn it. Yes. Clown shoe. You guys, you ****es are weak. Shit is weak. Roswell, your turn. All right. I'm going to go right there. I'm going to use Blessings of Battle.

That is a D20 plus 16 plus one because I was speedy and plus two because we're flanking. So D20 plus 19, 39. That is a crit. That's a crit. Damn. Good job. That is a crit. How much damage is that? 1D8 plus eight. But then I think I get something for a crit, right? Yeah, you get your weapon. Look up your weapon here. Power. Okay, now here's the thing. You're going to get two pluses. On a critical, your Orb of Light gives you plus 2D6. Okay. Plus 2D10 if it were an undead, but it's not. And your Shmuel Holy Light gives you a plus one. So you get plus 3D6 for it being a crit.

So whatever damage. So it's 1D8. Oh, I'm sorry. Go ahead. 1D8, you said plus eight? 1D8 plus eight. So that's 16. Now roll 3D6. Okay. Let me clear this out. Sorry. Roll. Nine, of course. Oh, well, that's okay. So you did 27 damage in total, I believe? Sure, yes. That sounds about right. Also, though, blessing of battle. You were one ally within five squares of you. Gains resistance to all damage until the end of your next turn. The resistance equals my Constitution modifier. So my Constitution modifier is plus three. Okay. And I will put that on... Let me see. Actually, I guess the n-word since he's being flanked.

That would be the... All right. The female drow you stepped in and beat the shit up. She is now at half. She's bloody, that is. And it is Malchus's turn. Okay. Malchus is gonna scoot up to ambush number four here. Plus two for flanking, plus one for being speedy, plus one for attacking a bloody target. So four on top of my regular at plus 19. Look at this pile. It looks like Connect Four on the mini's mat. It looks like a fucking logo of some sort. 23 versus AC. That'll hit. Oh, good. Okay. D12 plus 15. 24 necrotic damage. 24 necrotic damage will kill him. Yay. I gain temporary hit points because I eat his soul.

Equal to my common modifier. So four temporary hit points. Four temporary hit points. Tom, was that you that did the nom nom nom? If something funny's happening in the background, it's Tom. Finger lickin' good, and I'm done. Draconis, your turn. You are bloodied. Draconis? I believe in you, Draconis. Draconis. Is he even here? He's getting a sandwich. He's playing lol. Sorry about that, I was not playing. No, I was muted. Sorry about that, I was asking questions. Can I shift away from this chick? You sure can. One square. Alright, but then can I still attack? Sure can.

Okay, I am gonna shift right there, just back out of that. And I'm gonna do a, uh... I'm gonna do Fountain of Flame, which is each enemy in the burst. So nobody has to worry about that. Burst one within ten squares. So, that is gonna be... Who are you targeting? Like, what area? Yeah, I'm, uh... targeting that area. Okay. Alright, um... D20... So start with the female drow up top, and then we'll go down to the... The Ambusher number one. Okay. Sorry, I'm putting shit all over the map here. And... hold on, we get in there eventually. Boom, there we go. 32. 32 will hit her, that's a crit.

Boom. And... an Ambusher? Ambusher... 30. 30, that'll hit both of them. Yeah, you critted her, so what's the damage for that? Alright, that is three d8s plus seven. Shit. She's dead. She erupts in flames. And then go ahead and roll damage. And plus seven. So this gitch bits are, uh, this gitch gets her hit in the 27. I forgot to add it to my card. 27. I like how he corrected it to a three d8 and actually rolled higher than when he rolled the three d8. Yeah, that's right. Alright, and... Next up is Ambusher number two. Did he, he didn't die? No, he didn't quite die.

You killed her though. At least a bitch bird. Uh... Wow, that is... militant towards females. Um... Oh, oh, and by the way, that little thing stays there and every time they take fire damage at the start of their turn. Okay. Yep. So one can take fire damage later. Uh... Let's see here. Ambusher number two is going to use Dazing Strike against, uh, Yenward. 21. Against AC. That's totally not gonna... No. Son of a... Hold on. Ah! Ambush your... Oh, oh, oh, he didn't swing at, uh, Yenward? Nope, he didn't. He, he, he swung at Yenward, not Ironhide. So go ahead and take your...

You little bitch. But... 19. Okay. Uh, that'll miss. Ow. So... Everyone's a failure in this one. And it's... Oh, wait, I'm sorry. It's... Ambusher number three's turn. He... He sees this big fountain of flame, and he skirts around it and goes right behind Malkus here, and he's gonna use Dazing Strike. Uh, 24. Uh, versus AC? Yes. That will hit me. I react with Infernal Wrath once that's done. Okay. Uh, he's gonna do 1d8 plus four. Uh, and you are dazed until the end of, uh, his next turn. Okay, and he takes... One second, Skype is being goofy. There we go. He takes three damage.

Alright, so you're taking... Fire if it matters. Ten, uh, not particularly, no. Uh, shit. Alright, so. You're taking ten. He took three. He is bloodied. And it is Half-Work's turn. Half-Work is super pissed. Half-Work is dead. You wanna try this? Yeah, let's go. Uh... Uh, he gets to make two attacks this turn. Why? Because he's bloodied. Uh, so what he's going to use first is his Great Axe attack, which is his pretty standard, uh, big weapon, me-swing, crush. And that's a 16, so that's no good. Uh, and he's gonna follow that up with Blood Flurry attack. Blood Fury, I should say.

That'd make more sense. Uh, and... Blood Slam. 26. Against what? Oh, it doesn't matter. AC, yes. Okay, so. Uh, that's 2d12 plus two. Now he has my damage resistance. Does that do anything? Uh... Yes, it... Yes. He's back so hard. I'm confused by the wording of it because it says, um... Uh, you're... Oh, no, I guess all damage is referring to all kinds of damage. All kinds of damage, yes. Okay. And then he... So he gets three damage resistance. Okay. And damage is 18. So he takes... Yennenward's gonna take 15 damage. That's not... That's bad. Okay. And it is your turn, Jarek.

Yeah. Um... I'm gonna... If I use some, like, Deep Freeze on number two, he's in the water. Does it freeze him in the water or... Wait, what happened? Number two right there, he's in the water, right? Yes. If I use, like, a freeze ability on him, is that gonna freeze him in the water that he's in? What ability is it? It's Deep Freeze. It might. Let me see. Let me check this out. It's daily. Was it daily? I don't know. Stacking this ice. That's the thing. Your teammate... Like, let me see here. On the same, like, is it gonna hit, like, all of that ice? Okay. Well, it's not a burst.

It's one creature. So you're targeting the creature or not. Yeah. Yeah, so it'll just be him. Oh. So it's not gonna hurt the... I'm gonna do it anyway, you know? [snickering] Where is ya? Thirty-one. Thirty-one will hit. So that's forty-eight plus six. Forty-two. What's it say? Twenty-two damage. Uh, twenty-two damage. He's... Uh, he's bloody. Alright, he takes ten damage when it's his turn again. 'Cause he's standing right there. Okay, okay. I see it. Okay. Cool beans. And, Yenn-ward, your turn. Yeah, I'm gonna use Reckless Strike. And I get to add one 'cause those fast and another one 'cause he's bloody, right?

Gotcha. So it's fifteen. Boom. Twenty-eight to hit. Gotcha. And I get to roll sixty-ten. Jesus Christ. Yeah. It's pretty fun. Plus eight. Oh. Forty-five. Forty-five is just enough to kill him. Hot damn. Just leave him right now. So, uh, the half-orc is dead. Uh, do you wanna move or anything? Uh... Yeah, sure. Just one over. Get out of that water. Nope, nope. Never mind. [snickering] Uh, Doro, your turn. I'll just stay here with one, do a melee basic attack on him. Twenty-four. That'll hit. Alright. This fight's pretty well, you guys. [humming] Plus twelve, seventeen damage.

Alright, seventeen damage. And off-hand. Get that. Twenty-eight. Twenty-eight'll hit. Off-hand's always harder. Twelve, twenty-two damage. Twenty-two will kill him. You spin around and cut his head off. Dead as fuck. Uh, do you wanna move or anything? Uh, yeah. Since I still haven't taken my move action, I still move freely, can I? Sure can. Alright. One, two, three... Uh, four, five, six. There we go. Alright. That was a long ride around, but I made it. Rottswell, your turn. Okay. Uh, one, two, three, four, five. Right there. Um, so I'm flanking two. I'm gonna use Resurgent Sun, which is two...

Uh, which is, uh, D20 plus sixteen, plus two for flanking and one for being speedy, so D20 plus nineteen. Roll it. Thirty crit. Yep, that's a crit. Um, so with the crit, that is 2D8 plus eight, and then I roll 3D6. So, let me see here. Sixteen, twenty-four, uh, plus 3D6, yeah. Twelve on my 3D6. So, yeah, he's super, super fucking dead. Like, there's no... Yeah, dead. Awesome. Uh, also, uh, because of that, uh, anybody wanna use a healing surge? Uh, sure. Okay, you can use a healing surge. Uh, plus, you also get... No, it's just the healing surge. Bam, you are no longer bloodied, Draconis.

Yeah, thank you. And Malchus. Okay. Oh, nice. Thor got me flanking. Beautiful. Um, plus two for flanking, plus one for speed, plus one for bloodied again, so that plays out like the other math. Uh, there's Soul Eater. Uh, plus 19. Crit. Damn. Um... End 'em. Yep, yep, yep. Uh, so, bare minimum, I'm doing, uh, twenty-six damage. Is he still standing? Yes. Okay. Really? Uh, two D10s for my crit dice, and I can choose to reroll one of these dice with my Rod of Deadly Casting. Uh, and I will reroll the four, so it'll be eight plus seven, so fifteen damage from the crit.

Dead. Yeah! Oh, man. We did good. Good job, guys. Good job, gentlemen. Yeah. Ow. Uh, so the last one of these guys falls dead, and, uh... Search. I'd like to loot the half-orc. Take his shoes, take his shoes. Um... Thanks to everybody, actually. Uh... Thief. Uh, rifling through the half-orc's pockets... Huh. Uh, you, uh, you find, uh, thirty gold. Nice. Poor. Broke-ass bitch. Probably why he was robbing us. Probably, yeah. Uh, you also notice he's wearing an armband. Uh, it's a, uh, it's a black armband with what appears to be some sort of, uh... A white bird on the, uh...

Uh, on the side of it. Oh. Are we taking that? Okay, so you're taking that from him. White bird. Can we do some kind of history check on the armband? Oh, I can do a history check. Go for it. Do it. I'm smart. Wait a second, just give me a fucking second. Okay. I just think it's fashion. Ehh, twenty-four. Uh, you don't recognize the, uh, the insignia at all. Hmm. Hmm. Okay. Uh, but you do notice that every one of the members of this party, uh, were wearing that same armband. Is there some kind of magic benefit to it? Can I tell if there's, like, some kind of magical scent to it?

Uh, you can do an Arcana check. Alright, um... Uh, Draconis, he's better at that than I am. Fourteen? Yeah. Alright. Fourteen? I only got fifteen. Ugh! Oh, well. (Laughter) Well, the funny thing is, I had one better history too, so we're awesome. Oh! Uh, by, uh... Twenty-eight. I rolled a twenty-eight though. There's nothing magical about these armbands. Um, real quickly, I'm gonna do a religion check. How's that? Okay. Twenty-five. Uh, they, they, this bird doesn't signify any religious symbol that you're familiar with. Okay. Then I think we should move on. I don't think there's anything else.

Rob, you got anything? Should we move on? I think we're good to move. Okay. Although it's getting pretty late, so... Who is this Rob? Uh, after a few moments... Uh, you hear more movement coming from the surrounding tree, uh, treeline and bushes. Jesus. And almost triple the force that just leapt out at you. Uh, you, you, you basically notice that you're completely surrounded. Uh... And, uh, a... Uh, a female figure steps forward. *Gasp* Uh, and she's very familiar. I look at Malchus. *Laughter* You guys don't, wait, wait for it. Uh, she's wearing an eye patch.

Oh. Oh shit. The pirate. It's the vampire slayer. Oh. Oh, oh, oh. Oh shit. Oh, oh, oh. And she steps forward and says, "Well, I see this group is still getting into trouble." I was wrong. Oh fuck. I got a sword. Maybe we'll have the vampire with us now. We're in the clear. Yeah. What, what group, huh? You're a ton of boot. Uh, she says, "You just, you just killed..." Well, I'm not gonna lie to you. They were my best men. But you just killed some of my men. You're being, being attacked. Come on. You know what it is. Ambushed us. She's actually kind of flippant about it.

It was, you, he was called an ambusher. What are you looking at? *Laughter* I was on his name tag, guys. It's a, it's a game. He works at Kinko's. Um, she says, "It's, it's, it's completely understandable. Though I think you should come with me." Mmm. Do we have a choice? Are you asking her this? Yes. Not particularly. *Laughter* Yeah. Sounds good. Alright. Again, you do have a choice. You can always fight. That's completely up to you. No, that's alright. Yeah. I, I, I have a good feeling about this, first. Because we're fourth in this situation. Yes. *Laughter* What if I didn't get stabbed?

Yeah. Uh, you guys are led, uh, further into the treeline, actually. You, you, you were kind of leaving the path you were walking, and she escorts you into the forest. Feeling vulnerable. And, uh, almost as soon as you start walking with her, uh, a couple of, uh, there, there's a human and drow following in tow. But everyone that kind of leapt out at you kind of disappeared back into the treeline. Mmm. You don't notice where they went, and you didn't, like, they, they're, they're very good at, at hiding. It would be- So they got people. And, uh, you notice that Leora and the two, uh, the two people following you from behind are both wearing those same armbands.

Okay. Uh, and they lead you, uh, further into the woods, uh, to the entrance of this cave. That's kind of, uh, like, if you didn't know it was there, it would, you'd be hard-pressed to find it again. Like, it's, it's kind of hard to stumble upon. Like, there's, it's in a thicket of trees, and then just beyond that, it's kind of covered with, with brush. Uh, and, uh, she kind of parts the brushes aside, and, uh, she, she, she kind of motions, it's like, after you. We enter. In we go, I guess, yeah. Yeah, and we, we enter the cave. Uh, so, inside, it's, it's all lit with torches, but it's very much a natural cave.

Uh, there's actually a natural, a naturally occurring spring you can hear, like, trickling somewhere, like, further into the, into the cave work. So, uh, Leora grabs a torch and, uh, starts walking you through. And even though this is a cave system, there's, there's tables and chairs and things set up. So, someone's living here. Uh, and you, uh, as you're walking through, the cave starts to open up a bit more. It's not, like, so narrow as it is at the entrance. And, uh, you start to see more and more people with those armbands, and, and, this is human, drow, elf, dwarf, like, there's, there's a, there's a little bit of everything scattered.

All the outcasts from the old, from the, uh, Overwatch. It, it, it, it could be, like, you're not exactly sure. I mean, like, guessing it would be the people that were obviously thrown out. So, uh, you're, you're led further into this cave system, and Leora kind of motions towards, uh, after a while you get to this door. And she, she opens it, and it's not as well lit as the rest of the area. And, uh, she kind of calls into the room and says, "Look who I found walking around in the forest." And then there's, there's kind of a moment of silence. And then, uh, a figure starts to step out of the darkness.

Uh, but before it's fully illuminated, this blast hurdles out from the dark room. And it strikes Malkus. Ah, jeez. And Malkus falls backwards against a wall. Uh, this looks to be more concussive than anything, so it's not something that would cut him or make him bleed or anything. But it, it, there was a lot of force behind it, and he fell backwards against this wall. And out of the darkness steps a thin female figure. Uh, with, uh, raven hair. Uh, and part of it's kind of combed over half of her face. Uh, and as she kind of steps into the illuminated torchlight, uh, she says, "Hi, Malki." Dun dun dun!

Boo. I take that, that's our cliffhanger. Probably, yeah, 'cause it's about eleven. One, two punch. Bam bam. So then we ate. And then... At least it was a potato. Malki should throw iron hide at her. Do it. There we go. That was my favorite part of this episode, just because it was just like, "Wow, I didn't see that coming. Okay, we could do that." I don't think anybody saw that coming. That's awesome. I thought we were gonna have our first little, uh, PvP fight there. I, I kinda hope that expanded a little bit, we could, uh, fight into him. Just looking for an excuse, that's what you were doing.

Mm-hmm. I thought, I think it's funny the way Jake said "first PvP fight," assuming that most, uh, campaigns have PvP fights. Uh, I'm not a, I'm not a Dungeons and Dragons, uh, connoisseur by any means, but I'm pretty sure that's not a normal occurrence. Rob, can you assure... Oh, I'm sure, characters fight each other here and there, I'm sure that... You're there, but I don't think it's like, you know. Oh, that's not, it's like, "And now for the traditional, fight your teammate." Like, that's not in such a public way. Yeah, 'cause everybody's supposed to be friends most of the time.

Right, right. Find you a common goal. That was good, that was good. Well, now I've got more emotional baggage for Malkus to sort out before next session. Man, you're gonna be real Evo, you're gonna turn into... Oh, well, no, I, I, I think Jason has, has understood very well that I like it when he twists the knife on my characters. So he's just beating the, beating the emotional crap out of Malkus, uh, which I feel like makes for a good team. There's no cause, I'm not, I'm not doing it willy-nilly, there's, there's reason, there's cause. Oh yeah, no, no, I, I'm sure there's perfectly good justification, I'm sure it'll be very tormenting, just like everything else.

For some reason... That's, that's Malkus' lot, that's, that's his role in the story. For some reason I thought when I threw him out 'cause he was just gonna get up, brush himself off, and go right back on top of the boat and let nothing happen. But I love the fact that they jumped inside each other's faces, like, obviously Malkus is fucked up because he doesn't know what happened to that little girl. Because she's just gone. And Ironhide is in charge now, like, like, they had to go out and kill his own people, so, like, they're both conflicted. Oh yeah, yeah, no, we're both, we're both, uh, I can tell we're both kinda strung out on what's going on.

And, uh, and I think, I think we had a good, uh, we had a good face-to-face right there that'll really get people stirred up for the pay-per-view. Mm-hmm. I, yeah, I, I, I, I just, I'm glad I was able to calm things down, 'cause that could've turned out really bad. The Hack and Slash menu show. Just in front of everybody! Holy shit! I, I, when, next time we have an episode where somebody's character dies, there needs to be an image made with all of us that says, "By the end of this episode, one of, you know, one of these characters will be dead." You know, just like, the, the, like, classic comic book teaser splash.

I wonder who would win between you guys, that's interesting. You know, we, we can do, maybe we should do an alt-world thing, where it's just a one-on-one... Ironhide... We'll do, like, a Rocky III thing, like, after this, you owe me a favor. And then they, they have, like, a sparring thing. And I'm just on hand so I can heal whichever one loses. I can use resurrection on them when it's all done, so that it's like nothing happened. Somebody's gotta ring the bell. Ding, ding. It's, it's the alternate dimension where we're all, like, really dysfunctional villains and, like, some of us have goatees, other ones are wearing single black gloves.

Okay, here's, here's the thing. I did say we can take care of this once all this is over. And I do have a resurrection spell. We could... Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Does he? It doesn't, and I'm looking at it, and it doesn't say that it costs anything. Let me see this. I'm telling you, man. There's limits to that. It's not just a get out of jail free card. But I think, I think you have to go, like, several days with at least your attack rolls and stuff. With a negative one penalty to attack roll. Skill checks, ability checks, and saving throws. Until it has reached three milestones or taken three.

That's what it says. Now, I'm glad we have that out if it comes to that. But I just want you to think about exactly how, like, emotionally hung up whoever loses will get about this issue. Right? Because, like, whichever one of us is resurrected will have to carry the baggage of getting beat up to the point of death. Sounds scared to me, Ron. I just think it would be, it would be something that would be really fun for the listeners. Um... Tom, I just don't want Justin Bitchin to be for the rest of this. Jason, you're reading the spell. Do you see any kind of catch to it?

No, okay. I, I, it's not that there's not a catch to it, but I, I have to make certain caveats within our world. Otherwise there's no, there's no penalty. Do you know what I'm saying? Right, but why do I have the spell if I can't use it? I'm not saying, no, no, no. I'm not saying you can't use it. It's not like this. There's going to be a consequence to it, is what I'm saying. Or at some point if you are strapped for material, we could just do an alternate universe fight club and see what happens. That could also just happen, like, like, kind of like how it just happened today where it's like, oh, this is going far.

Like, where we just break out into a fight. Well, see, Jason, it says the consequence would be that they take a negative one penalty to attack roll, skill checks, ability checks, and saving throws until it has reached... Now, what does, until it has reached three milestones or taken three, what does that mean? Drawers was a milestone, this was a milestone, emphasis was a milestone, basically. Or does it mean three levels? Milestones are two, a minimum of two fights in the same day. Like, every two fights in the same day is a milestone. Okay, so that would be the consequence, right?

I, yeah, I know, but, I'm, I'm, from a storytelling perspective, that just seems... All you gotta do is just get somebody blood, like, like down in the ground or something. You don't have to stab them through the back or something. That is true, too. Like, they're not gonna murder each other, I would like to hope. Like, that, like, once someone falls unconscious, like, that would be... Don't just keep fucking swinging at them. Like, I'm looking at that, and from a storytelling perspective, I'm like, man, that is horribly OP. Like, that's, that takes all the consequence out of death.

That's, they come back just slightly, kinda weaker, tiny bit. Well, I mean, I can only use it, I can only use it once a day. That's still incredibly OP. That's, like, are you, I'm talking... Well, just DM, shut up. That's what I'm saying, like, I'm talking, like, you are resurrecting someone from the dead. Like, let's say, a pillar falls on them or some shit and they don't jump out of the way. There's no consequence to that death, because it's like, you just take a nap, use that spell, and they come back. And the negative one... The reason that's in there is in D&D Essentials, they were trying to remove all, all...

So, in, when Fourth Edition first came out, there was a subset of spells called ritual spells that always cost money and take, and took lots of time to cast. Yeah. And what happened was, people, people ignored them because they were like, well, if I spend my money on the ritual spell, I can't afford to boost my AC, my, my attack bonus, and my, and my defenses. And so, people were just not using rituals because, now granted, resurrection's an exception, because people are going for that anyway, but Essentials tried to strip out all the rituals, which is where that, that solution came from.

I, I'm just looking at this and I'm like, that takes all the cons... Like, do you know how hard it is to kill you guys to begin with? Like, not that I'm trying, not that I'm trying, but like... You guys get like nine chances. It's like nine strikes and you're out. And then like, you're taking away the, it's like, but, unless you want to resurrect them for free, whenever you want. After a nap. Okay, here's the issue. Yeah. I, it's, I can't resurrect somebody in the middle of a battle. No. I'm at the end of an extended rest. And it has to be within 24 hours. So, in a situation like Drax Tomb, if someone would have died at the beginning of that situation, there would have been no time for us to rest, and then I would not have been able to...

Correct, but that's an extremely, like, odd... How many times do you think you're going to get frozen for 17 years? At least two more times. Not just that, I mean like, you know, we had that point, I'm just talking, I'm talking specifically about the point that we rested and then we had to wake up from our rest. You don't sleep for 24 hours. I know, but we didn't, we weren't able to rest enough, you know. Basically, that wasn't an extended rest. We didn't get an extended rest in because we got interrupted, so... Almost the only way we can get a permanent death is if we either A) lose the body, or B) have three people die in the same fight.

Because you'd be able to res one immediately after the fight, you'd be able to res another one before 24 hours passed, because you could just get up the next morning, have your spell back, and get the second one. You'd actually have to kill three people in the same fight, or lose the body, which is what happened to Duncan. We lost the body with him. Yeah. But again, I'm looking at that spell, that is fucking ridiculous. It was... I see what Jason's saying though, I definitely see it. Also, I gotta say that a lot of times the answer has been, "Well, that's the game." And if that was the answer when it was used against other people, isn't that kinda how you have to do this?

Like, there's been a lot of times where it's been like, "Well, that's how the dice rolled." And, you know, that's the consequence, that's what happens. Yeah, but dice rolls are different because there's a random element in that. This is pretty definitive in that... It's a kludgy, imperfect solution to removing rituals from the game. And that's one thing that essentials tried to do. But that is when it's written. I mean, yeah, I mean it's there. It's a spell you have, I can't take it away from you, I don't want to do that, but at the same time... You know what we don't have to solve right now because nobody's characters are dead?

This is true. This is true. Although, I mean, it might be better to do it now than when it comes into play and then we sit there, "Okay, let's stop the show and argue about this." Jayce, Jayce, what you can always do is put a DM twist on, like, "Yeah, they come back." He doesn't... That's where we're having a disagreement. Like, not only does Dan want me to not do that, but it's basically... He wants me to play the ball as it was. Well, no, if you want to write something in there, I just thought you literally meant like, "Well, no, I'm going to write a reason that you can't use that." No, no, no, no, no, I don't want to do that, but I mean, I try to ground the world in something.

So, like, okay, picture someone dies in battle or something like that. Like, let's say... Right. Like, that was one of those moments where he's bleeding against the wall and it's this huge thing. Imagine if he died and you just go, "Boop!" and he's up again. It's like, "Well, that's... What the fuck are we playing this game for?" X-Com is a good example. After combat you just revive him, it's like, "Well, then why am I playing this?" There's no consequence to this anymore. And it's incredibly difficult to kill a character anyway. You have to either reduce his hit points to negative half of his health or fucking...

They get three strikes per... And that's an infinitesimal amount of time that someone can just minor action a health potion, get up to somebody, use them. Or heal check them and have them use a heal surge. Or the cleric can have any one of his burst abilities and heal stuff. There's a dozen different ways you can rez somebody. And then if someone manages to die, which should be an interesting, big moment... Like, think of Duncan, and then you can just go, "Wah!" and rez him. There's no... There's no... Yeah, it just... I get it. It's just like, I don't... Okay, if we're going to change the rules of the game, then we have to...

We've already changed the rules of the game, dude. Do you think there's a rule in the book that says you get +1 for being speedy? Eh. Catch you there, buddy. There's not? Shut the fuck up, Justin! Or, God damn, you're going to arrest the guy sitting in the background going, "Yeah, what he said!" Just shut the fuck up! How? Jesus Christ! Every time Jason gets in an argument with me, Justin's in the background saying, "Yeah, what'd he say?" I'm saying that it's fun to have consequences if it's like, and then you eat the magic cracker... And if you've ever seen...

But have you ever heard... I have never heard Justin say, you know, like when someone's arguing with Jason be like, "You know what? I think Jason's wrong." Like, it's always... Have you met Justin? No, when you two are arguing, but like if I argue with you, it's constantly him saying that. Well, I'm saying like, at least for this game right here, I will defend the DM where like, it has to be interesting or we won't play. Like, the fact that we almost got into a fistfight today, that was interesting only because it was allowed to happen. But imagine you just have a no-fight spell and everyone runs... everyone turns and shakes hands and walks away.

Well, we just looked at it like, "No, we're all on a team. We can't fight. We can't have conflicting issues. We can't have that." I just want to find a middle ground for it, that's all. I'm just saying, that should be an incredibly powerful thing. Like Tom mentioned to Dragonballs earlier, like think about that. To get someone back from the dead, like you have to scour the earth for these things and bring them together and that's your one thing. In the past, Jason, you and I have had private conversations where I've asked about when I thought the resurrection spell required a bunch of rituals and doing all that, and you still said you didn't want me having it.

Like, I don't know, like where can it happen? Well, no, no, no. You showed me a spell that you weren't a high enough level for. That's why I said you couldn't have it. It wasn't that you can never have it. It was this spell, but I was like, in the future. Like, would this be a way out for Thoril? Would this be blah blah blah blah blah? And it was still like, "Uhh, I don't know..." I thought you were trying to bring back Duncan, and what I was telling you was, you don't have a body. The ritual required like, I forget what the one you showed me. I had it marked as a... ...Duncan, and I said, "No, I'm talking about Thoril." I was literally talking about killing, like, if it was possible, like, to kill Thoril and then bring him back as a human.

Like, that was my... That was what... It was your resume. I was wondering, like, maybe you can make it like, if you just want to make it interesting, if you don't, if you just want to bring people back, just like, you're dead, but now you're not! Like, if you want to make it interesting, make it so like, it's like, in the, um, under the red hood, I think? The Batman, uh, uh, uh... Oh, the Lazarus Pit! Yeah, kind of like where he comes back, but there's a chance he could come back wrong. Crazy. Yeah, you would... It'd be two in the same day, but yeah. Yeah.

I think Rob is just trying to prevent an argument at this point. Oh no, I am fully... I honestly think this is something we should address now, so that... We are addressing it now! I know, but I'm saying I don't think it's wasted time, you know, I think... No, I'm fine. I just don't think you and I are going to come to an impasse on the spot. Like, let me spitball a couple of solutions so that we can establish a lore reason why. 'Cause clerics are kind of broken to begin with if you think about it, but we all just kind of accept it. Like, Thor... Okay, like we had Malkus go...

Go back to the example where Malkus is laying there bleeding. Yeah. And then you can just walk up to him and go "Wha?" and he's healed. So, we're already working on the assumption that people who are like, mortally wounded or something like that, you could just heal them anyway. So that kind of takes some of the... Like, it takes a lot of the aspect of like, finality out of things. But if you could just bring them back from the dead on top of mortally wounded, that's... Redonkulous. Like, we just need to figure out a middle ground so that it doesn't seem like...

Like, you are the most powerful character in the game at this point. I think I understand where he's coming from. You can spit in the face of death itself. I think he's looking at it as like, this is a unique move that nobody else has nor could ever have. And it seems like it's being... Like, this is the thing that makes me cool. This is the only... Like, yeah, healing people makes you cool. Eh, kinda. It doesn't make me Thor-al. You know what I mean? Like, I'm not gonna have that moment of like, "Bam! Bam! Ha ha!" Like, the resurrection thing is really cool, and it'd be really cool if I could do that to somebody, but if it's gonna be like, "Yeah, I think it's comeback, but they're missing their dick." And it's like...

Oh, man. Justin's not DMing this. Jason would be like... It's like, "Well, I don't wanna come back if I don't have my dick." Just, I'll say that. I'll replay that. She's got no dick. And then I had a Dan moment where, like, I thought my character would be like, "His AC is made out of stone and ore and metal and stuff, so he shouldn't have like, a 30 on AC." It's like, "No, that's not how it works. It's whatever your leather is." It's like, "Oh, I guess, okay." And Justin had a point, like, why wouldn't his AC be stronger than, say, a fleshy little human who has skin?

Whereas he has metal for skin, and like, he's judged by the leather he's wearing on top of that. That's what we did. We said, "Okay, well, that's the rules." So that's what we do. Exactly, and that makes it fun, because my character has limitations. But what you're saying right now is we go against the rules. I know, but these... Okay, we're basically cobbling together two or three different substructures of rules based on fourth edition. Like, we're either following the core set or the essentials line, and that's what we're saying. I'm trying to find a middle ground between the two.

I don't want you to have to cast this huge... It should be like a big, meaningful moment if you bring back someone from the dead. I'm picturing something more like the Green Mile, where it takes a little something out of you each time you do it. Or something... Like, there's some weight to it, so it's not just like, "Oh, yeah, I do my magic, my finger guns at him, and boom, boom, and his corpse raises." Do you want to do it as a ritual, then? Do you want to just use the ritual rules? Because those were ridiculous. I'm not even exactly familiar with the ritual rules.

Was that the one that cost like $25,000? Yeah, okay. See, that's what I'm saying. I don't want to do that either. I want to find a middle ground. It's not even about the money of it. It's about... The weight of it. There should be something that's like, "Oh, I need a rare plant that only grows in the swamps of Yemgar." Some shit like that. The cost shouldn't be from your pocket. It should be from something else. Like, deeper inside that character that you're resurrecting, or from you. There's a sacrifice that needs to be made. Everything has a price, is what I wanted.

If you had the ability to raise... That's like if Yemgar had the ability to just like, "Okay, well, I'm going to use my ability to cleave this guy in twain, no matter how many hit points he has." Well, I guess you could always use the... They could be undead at that point. Because if they're undead, then I have to attack them. So then I would have to roll something... See what I'm saying? Like in the vampire slayer thing, where they rezzed their mom, and they come back wrong? Or zombified is what you're saying? I don't know. I mean, that's an option, right?

And then the only problem with that is that no one would want to. And that's the thing. We need to find a middle ground where it's not something that's so bad that the person wouldn't want to do it. Like in the mental, where they'll come back and every now and then, there's an urge deep inside them to attack something, or to rage against what that person used to be believes what he shouldn't be doing now. You could pull a Wizard of the Coast where we have to rescue them from hell or something. Like the Pinar Kid ones, yeah. That's what I'm saying, yeah.

We could base the rez on a dice roll. Like a yes or no? Like a yes or no, but maybe how tainted they would be if they... God, they come back as a crit one. I'm straight balling. If it's above 15, then they're totally fine. If it's between 15 and 5, then they're undead. If it's below 5, then it's a failed roll. The just abomination or something comes back. They come back okay if it's 5 or below. They come back completely fine, but they have no dick. If you wanted to do something with a dice roll, you could have the dice roll be a chance that they come back permanently down one healing surge.

I think that would kind of make sense for losing some bit of their life force permanently, and I don't see us dying often enough for it to become a straight up imbalance problem. That doesn't seem serious enough. No, but a lot of times everyone has like 9 healing surges. I didn't even get hit this last time, so if I come back it's like, "Alright, well I have 8 healing surges, that's no big deal." Unless I'm just throwing 2 min tours and a trench coat at you guys all the time, like it's kind of tough to... A trench coat makes it more powerful, that's a better armor class.

Like those guys were supposed to ambush you and you just made short embarrassing work of them. And rightfully so, it's just... The idea that we were throwing out there about the Irola d20 and if it's between 5 and... The biggest chance would be that they come back undead. And then there's a slight chance that they'll come back totally fine, and then there's also a chance that they won't come back at all. But we need to define what undead is. That's an interesting... Undead can mean a lot of things. Undead can mean vampire, it could mean zombie, it could mean...

A werewolf. No, a werewolf. A werewolf. Somehow that's like... Would there be a way just to put a limit on it? So like, it can only happen once and then can't be done again or something? Is that possible? Well, that seems too fine-al. Fine-al-al. Once per level up? Fine-al. Fine-al, yeah, thank you. Tom has to keep giving me words when I've completely failed. They come back and they're like 4 levels behind or something. Oh my god. That's for the entire group. That'd be bad. Or we all lose a level, maybe? Wow, wait, why would everyone lose a level? Because we have to pool our power together like fucking the Planeteers.

Spirit bomb. Because we're forming Captain Planet? Can't wait for that new movie. So bring them back, we have to all give them a bit of our life. Captain Planet, right. Who's heart? Me. Okay. Obviously, yeah. What if Dan can't cast it again until he hits 3 milestones? That's just 3 fights. That's like 6 fights. Right, but if we have like, I mean, how many times do we have a day where we only have 1 fight in the day? Those days don't count as milestones. Yeah, but this is 4 towers that's bringing somebody back from death. Well, I mean, okay, but think about it. 6 fights the way we go is like 7 episodes.

I mean, yeah, that at least gives it some weight where it's not just like he takes a nap and he's ready to go again. The way that power is worded is fucking ridiculous. 24 hours and a nap? That's nothing. Okay, I think the ritual price that you talked about earlier was for True Resurrection or something? Yes. I think it's only 5,000 for the basic res, right? Do you want to just make it 5,000 gold pieces of Divine? It's not 5,000 gold pieces, it's 5,000 worth of crystal. If you want to be specific. Well, what do you mean basic res? Is there like an aversion where someone comes back with like chrome spinners and shit?

True res is that I don't even have to have a lot. Oh, okay, okay. Well, that's not even on the table anyway because you don't have that. I'll have that next level. Jason, if you want to look over, the ritual rules are in the Player's Handbook that you got, the new hardcover. So if you want to see what that is for point of reference. Let me, let me, Jesus Christ, you have two resurrection spells? Okay, let me take a look at that and everything and I'll post in the basement page and you and me will hash this out. Okay. Okay? Okay, that's cool. Awesome. I want to find a medium ground.

We've argued to 1115 and Tyler's got to go to work. I think Tyler's gone, isn't he? No, he's here. I'm still here. I'm sorry, Tyler, I thought you left. Oh, no. Tyler, I care enough about you to notice that you didn't leave. Well, I had my Skype. I'm kidding, dude. Well, thanks for sitting down tonight, guys. I honestly thought we were going to have fucking Justin and Rob start killing each other in the game. It doesn't have to be canon. We can just have a DNR arena. Fuck it. I'm down. If Jason wants to run it, I'm down. Fuck yeah, I'd run that. I'm with the six of us, right?

We can just have a little tournament. We can do a bracket. I'm going to come down on the whole resurrection spell debate. On the fan page, if you go to facebook.com/dungeonsandrandomness, you'll find the episode posting for this if you haven't already. In that posting, there's a question, "What do you guys think about the resurrection spell debate?" Give us your opinions there, or you can send us an email at dandrpodcast@gmail.com. That's dandrpodcast@gmail.com. Don't forget to swing by iTunes and give us a rating. It helps us out a lot. We really, really appreciate it.

We're going to be reading a bunch of those reviews in an upcoming episode. We may do another mailbag or Q&A, something like that, in the future. But until then, thank you very much for joining us, and we will see you next time.