Rest Stop

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Go check him out today. And without further ado, let's get on with the day's episode. Previously for Group C, the team said goodbye to Poe as he had felt he had done enough in the city of Onakal and decided to move on and meet up with some old friends. In their last couple of days in the city, Group C met a peculiar drow who was on the hunt for old acquaintances of Merrick. They talked to this drow and dodged some questions and in the end thought it was best to avoid her. Finally, the team was given a message to deliver to the city of Brightport, specifically the houses of Brightport.

The Aladrin of Onakal didn't want to be a part of Brightport's infrastructure any longer, refusing to pay taxes and outright seceding. Let's pick up with Group C today as they get ready to venture north and start a brand new adventure. Let's do that thing! We're going around the table to introduce ourselves. I'm Jason, I'm the Dungeon Master. Going around the table to start with Brie. Hi guys, I'm Brianna Marie and I play Klara, the half-drow fighter. And Zack. What's up, my name is Zack and I play Avowyn Bates, the human fighter. And Jane. Hi, I'm Jane, I play Efene, the throwable gnome bard.

I almost called you Merrick. And Jasper! That's fine. It's bleeding into real life anyway. I am Jasper. Hey everybody, I'm Jasper. I play Merrick, Elfa Red, human cleric who throws gnomes potentially. I don't know. And Lisa. Hey, I'm Lisa and I play Elorath B. Stinger, the halfling barbarian who prefers not to be thrown. Good to know. See, if you don't tell people your preferences, they're just going to assume. Yeah. Do not throw. [Laughter] How about we pick things up about a day and a half or so after your last session. Now, just to be clear before we get rolling, you wanted to catch a caravan out of Onakol and start heading north, right?

Correct. Okay. Now, I don't think any of you are going to object to this, but I wanted to let you know what you're in for just in case. It's slow going with a caravan through the desert, but it's slow going because it's a lot safer. They're well equipped to take care of it. There's scouts and guides that know the way. So it takes about five days, sometimes six if the weather's real bad. So it's a little slower than your path getting here. Is that going to be a problem for anyone? You can always set out on your own. Fuck you. Okay. After the way in being so shitty, there's no way.

Yeah. Five times as long. I don't care. I kind of have a problem with it because how are we going to bond without a sandstorm? Right? Dick. So let's just say that you're waiting for the caravan. So it is the third of Farayor and there's a caravan getting ready to take off today. Is there anything left for you to do and own a call? Is there anyone you want to say goodbye to? Anything you want to pick up for the ride? Is there anything you want to take north with you besides the message that you're taking to Brightport? Oh, that's a good question. Do we need to gather any provisions, take any rations, anything like that?

The caravan pretty much takes care of that. Okay. The horse that we had pulling our cart. Oh, okay. Or our cart. Do you want to take that stuff north with you? I think the cart we should probably just burn. Honestly, just because of disease. Actually, no, no, don't burn it because then it'll go in the air. That's probably bad. I feel bad for that little cart because it's like the jalopy you rode into town with. Yeah, it has a face kind of like, hmm, it's headlights. No, we should get rid of the cart. If there's anything that we brought with us, I really just feel like we kind of had it on our backs.

Okay. Right? I think the heaviest thing we were carrying in the cart was the water. Yeah. Hmm. I'm going to regret, as a player, I'm going to regret not spending more time just poking around because I really want to be able to check out the gate and all sorts of things. But as a character, it's time to go. Hey, you can always come back, man. Yeah, that's true. Absolutely always come back. If they'll let us back in. Yeah. What's your horse's name? I don't think we name it. Chowder. It's called Chowder. I feel like, yep, it's a trap. Whoa, it was a simple question.

Trap. So Chowder- His name is Trap. Yeah, Trap. Trap's good. Trap? Trap Chowder. Trap Chowder, the horse. Okay, writing that down. That is canon. Two P's. T-R-A-P-P. Oh, like the pants. Sure. Trap, Pants, Chowder. All right. Pants in quotation. Come on, Pantsy. So I picture this horse as, this horse has seen some shit. Horse things. Yeah, yeah, that's true. Heading back out in the desert is not necessarily something the horse would be crazy excited to do, but you know what? It's a loyal horse. It is a valued member of the team and you are steed. And yeah, he'll march along with the caravan and you guys.

Let's take extra good care of Trap this time. Yeah. Okay. Now, as for the trip up north, it's probably going to be fairly boring unless something catastrophic goes wrong, of course. But I mean, these people know the way. The safest route to the desert, it still comes with some danger and stuff, but they can avoid a lot of the pitfalls that would kind of harass someone going through blind, never going through the waste before. So these guys are taking the safest route through. It's a little longer. Five days. But I would like one of you to roll a flat D20 for me just to see if something catastrophic goes wrong.

All right, guys, stop asking. I got it. Easy money. Okay, that's a nine. That's fine. So I would say it's a fine nine. It's a fine nine. So it's probably just it's your typical desert fair, right? It's hot. It's just blistering during the day. A lot of these that this caravan has, like, you know, covered wagon type stuff. Like you're in the shade as much as you can be. And the horses are taking constant breaks. It's one of the reasons it's so slow going. You probably had the weather kick up once or twice, something like that. But nothing catastrophic, nothing terrible.

It's been as good as the journey could be, that type of thing. And I would even say that you probably picked up one or two things going through. Like, if you're the inquisitive type, you know, day two, day three, it's like, why did we go here instead of here? And they go, oh, that's because of this, this and this. And you go, oh, we didn't do that the first time. Like that type of thing. You're probably picking up little tips and tricks. That's OK. Great. So next time we could just come straight through. We just stride right through the desert again. Not experts, but you're definitely it's it's like, oh, why didn't we think of that?

That type of thing. Oh, more water. Duh. Like that type of thing. Is there anything you'd like to do while you're on the road for the five days in the desert? I have a question. Hit me. Are we are we making friends with anybody that's around in this caravan? Like, I don't know. Are you? How many kind of people are here? Like, is this this is like merchants and are we karauzing? Are you karauzing? Hey. Because I plan on hooking up with some of these people. Oh, sweet. Just a collection, just a random assortment. Yeah, whatever. Doesn't matter. OK, sweet. OK, well, what do you mean to hook up?

I'll explain. OK. No, no. When I'm older. Yeah. You're looking for the bandwagon. That's like third in line and that one's always rocking. But OK. Yeah, that's it's probably it's probably a slim crew because the tourism isn't it hasn't reached that fever pitch yet. The donor calls hoping it'll get to. So they have a couple of caravans that go in and out each week. So there's that pretty much goes to Whiteheadge. Sometimes they go a little bit further. They'll go up to Brightport, something like that. But this one's just going to Whiteheadge pretty much refueling coming back.

It'd probably be, I don't know, eight to 10 people. And then you guys. Probably good for the war wagons, something like that. OK. Well, I don't know about anybody else, but they want to do there's one thing that I wanted to be able to do because going through the desert is going to bring something back to Merrick's mind. And so, like, if there's like a at night, sort of like we sort of circle around and maybe have like a campfire or something like that, where we might just all sort of huddle together. I would like to be able to pull out that figurine that that Merrick found in the desert and just just sort of, you know, out of curiosity.

Just say like, hey, I found this. Does this does this bring this make you think of anything? Does this look familiar or anything like that? Just around whoever's around. Are we talking about the little statuette? Yeah, sorry. Statuette little figuriney thing. Gotcha. So, again, for those of you who might have forgotten, because that was like six months ago. This is like a little like an ebony statuette. It's, it's again, time and attention was put into this. It's very beautiful. Still pretty polished for it being lost in the sands and stuff. The weather hasn't gotten to it much.

Probably about eight, nine inches long, something like that. It's exceptionally portable. Got a little bit of weight to it. Probably a couple of pounds, something like that. Oh, OK. Well, I didn't know, like I was just I was just kind of, you know, trying to jostle some memories here. Yeah, that's the background. Yeah. I just want to see if anybody if it if anybody recognizes it or anything like that. And the reason I'm sort of justifying that it came up is, wow, that was about the only thing that was not shitty that happened on the way down here was just like I found something.

And I think that would just probably pop up in America's head again. OK, you know, I mean, you know, the dead guy is for him or her. I didn't look at the pelvic bone for long. And would any of us have any idea as to what it is or what it might be? Would we have seen anything like it before? Well, let's see. Was this did did Merrick ever bring this up to the group? Did he ever show this off or was it just something he's like, I'll put this in a pocket? We got bigger things to worry about because at the time, Holograph was sick. If I recall, Merrick just said, like, huh, this looks interesting and didn't think I'm going to keep this to myself.

You know, wasn't like that. It's more like, huh, cool. A trinket, you know, whatever. And then he put it into his pocket. So he's never shown anybody. But it was never a secret. It was just something he just kind of forgot about. But I just kind of wanted to see if anybody like, you know, sort of toss it around. Like, is anybody just look familiar or anything like that? I think Clara already saw it and rolled for it and didn't get anything out of that. If I remember correctly. I don't know. I don't recall. I don't recall 100 percent. But for the sake of roleplay, I'll say she already saw it and was like, oh, totally cool.

But maybe other people would want to roll? I think Anthony would be curious. I think she'd want to take a look at it. Let's do it. And throughout this, you know, we don't have to roleplay all of it. But Merrick's like, by the way, you know, like when we were coming down here and then he'll kind of explain the situation and and, you know, kind of give the context for it. Like, I don't know, seemed pretty interesting. Figured I'd keep it. Uh, Anthony, do me a favor. Give me a history check. Oh. Ooh. Wow. Uh, that's thorough. That's a 23 everybody at home. So. Yeah, this is this is going to ring some bells, Stephanie.

Now, would you say that Anthony is religious? Not really. Not herself. She'll have. As is her way, she'll have read a lot about religion, about the gods, but she's not particularly religious herself. OK. This particular statuette, there was a there was a time specifically in Elara where people would carve these all the time. Some of them were dedicated to gods. Some of them were almost like like police sketches of demons, stuff like that. It's like this is what I see in my dreams. And they, you know, particularly artistic people or followers of Morden would sit and carve these beautiful, articulate statuettes.

It's like that's that's the thing I'm talking about. And they'd show it off to other people just to see if their their dreams match up with other people's or their experiences. It's like, have you seen this thing? And, you know, sometimes people would go, oh, God, yes, I've seen that exact thing in my dreams. Sometimes people would just think they're crazy. Now, the interesting thing is, sometimes there are stories that crop up about these statuettes having some sort of some sort of magic component to them or some sort of power or a connection to the deity or demon that they're depicting.

This particular one is named Barak. This is supposedly, if you believe the stories, a demon that grants wishes. The problem with this is usually the very desperate go to a demon like Barak. One, because they feel like the gods have forsaken them or that the gods can't or won't fix this particular problem and they are out of options. The other problem with with with making a wish and having a demon granted is that there is always a price to be paid somewhere down the line. It could be immediate, could be 50 years from now, but there is always an equal and opposite price for the thing that you wish for.

Again, that's if you believe this type of thing. Is there any indication from the history about how one would implement something like that if it were to be done? Is there any story about how that might happen? To make a wish? Yeah, to like turn it on. Well, there are stories of rituals and stuff like that. There are tons of rituals that summon demons. And there are some people that say that if you were to be in a possession of a statuette like this, if it's carved with enough care, if it's enough articulation, that type of thing, if enough love was put into this, that you can actually summon the demon to the statuette.

A conduit. It's almost like a walkie talkie to the demon world. The other thing about Barak is that this demon was a beguiler, a charmer, real. He would promise you the moon and the stars. And there are tons of stories. Efini would be able to rattle off tons of stories, some of them good, some of them that paint bark in a pretty decent light like, oh, this person wished for their crops to grow and they had a long, full life. And then, you know, they met a grisly end, but this was after 50 years they were going to die anyway, that type of thing. And then there are some really cruel, twisted stories.

I mean, really dark, dark stuff. Pretty much hit the nail on the head, some Wishmaster shit. Like Monkey Paul type wishes, if you don't word your wish very specifically, not only will you have to pay a price for it, but your wish will be trampled upon and twisted into some cruel mockery of your wildest dreams. Damn. Yeah, I'm not worried. I'm not worried about it. Sounds reasonable. Okay. Well, Efini would tell what she knows and she probably would. She probably would throw in a story or two. She'd probably be quite animated, kind of, but it makes sure it's excitement and oh shit kind of on her face.

But she would tell everybody what she knows about it. Huh. So Merrick will basically, I think his face would be like, "Uh, okay." He's going to sort of reach out to be like, "Yeah, let me hold it." And presuming that you give it back. I'm just debating that. Okay. I think there would be a little bit of hesitation. She'd be looking at you very closely. She wouldn't give it to you straight away. She'd kind of give you a look like you're not going to do anything stupid, right? As she's kind of reaching out towards you. Yeah, I think Merrick would sense the hesitation and he would do the, his eyes would go wide open and he'd go like, "Uh-uh, uh-uh, uh-uh." Like, not give it to me back.

Like, I want it now, but more like, "No, this is not safe." So he's going to take it and he's going to delicately just put it back into his bag and then he's going to close the bag up and he's going to pat it and be like, "It will stay there." Can I ask a question? Does Merrick wear gloves? Oh no. Oh no. Say yes. Say yes. Trust me. Oh no. He... Here's the thing. Here's the thing. For real, Merrick typically wears leather gloves. That said, I'm trying to figure out whether this would be a context in which he would be wearing them. And I honestly think that he would, in order to pull something out of a bag and like look at it and I don't, I think he probably would not be wearing gloves.

And I hate that. Okay. Second question. When you pulled this out of the sand, it's a bit dirty. It's been left out in the elements. It's been buried. Did you clean it off in any way? Yeah. So what I imagined when that happened long, long ago was that, and he would have been wearing gloves during the ride because he was doing the horse stuff like he was at the front of the thing. So he definitely was wearing gloves there. That's not a justification. That's for real. No. Just asking. And I'm just letting everybody know. And then he would have picked it up and been like, "Huh?" And he would have brushed it with his glove and probably blown on it like, "Whew." Right.

But not like, not like with a toothbrush or anything. Not like clean it off. Not thorough. Just kind of wiping it down real quick. He would have wiped it down and brushed it off. Maybe like rubbed on his tunic just to like, "Huh? Look at that." Okay. "What's that? Huh? Look at my bag." Okay. Could I have everyone in the party except Merrick? Give me a little perception roll. Oh my god, Merrick. If you have some sort of fucking disease now, we have to turn this whole cart around. Ooh. Oh. I am not paying any attention. Oh, Anthony, I hope you got this. You were asleep.

I'm napping. It's in the cart just all wrapped up. Here's what's gonna happen. Mm. Mm-mm. Mm-mm. Anthony's gonna be telling these stories. And, uh, when Anthony was holding this... Oh no. I imagine there's this... It could just be getting wrapped up in the stories you're telling. Or, as the realization, it's like, "Oh, do you know what you have here?" type of thing. I would imagine there's almost a feeling of relief handing it back over to Merrick. It's like, "Get that away from me." That type of thing. Let's... Maybe even a feeling of, "We should bury that." Something.

And as you hand this back to Merrick, there is going to be a split second. Anthony's gonna notice this. The eyes of the statuette are going to have a pale green tint to them. Almost a glow. Just for a split second. And so are Merrick's eyes. And that's it. Then Merrick's gonna put it back in his bag. No, that's cool. That's no big deal. Let's, um... Let's just, um... Double curse. Triple curse! Yeah, so Bree wrote in the chat, "I wish I weren't a werewolf." Turns Merrick into a regular wolf. Can I also say, speaking of triple curse, I just want you to know that you misspelled Merrick again.

I'm kidding. It's fine. It's fine. Wait, did I really? Yeah, of course. It's right there! It's right above where I wrote it! And I thought about it! And I was like, "No, it's right." Speaking of curses, I think you should never spell Merrick right, because it would really ruin everything. You know, at this point, at least I can hide behind like, "Haha, it's a funny joke, guys!" It's like our lucky totem. It's like when I used to call Torbjorn "troubish" because I actually couldn't pronounce Torbjorn. Okay. So, Efthony, about those glowy eyes... Do you want to wake Clara up?

I imagine Efthony actually taking a step backwards, kind of in shock. And if anybody, whoever is close to her, should probably like throw her arms out to like... ...touch something, and like sort of maybe even tug on their arms, like, "Did you guys see that? Did you just... Did anybody else see that?" See what? Uh... That little statue's eyes just glowed green, and so did Merrick's. Whoa. So Merrick's gonna have a look on his face like, "Uh... I don't think so. Like, I'm fine. Trust me. I've got all kind of problems. There's no problem right now. I can't guarantee you." Clara will... ...just come over and say, "Maybe someone else should hold the statue.

Just in case. Maybe we should destroy that thing? Oh... Hey, come on. Listen. This... If this is what you say it is, number one, number one... It's... As you said... There were hundreds or thousands of these things made because people just like carved these things, right? This isn't... This doesn't mean anything. I think the stories maybe got to everybody a little bit. I don't know, and they're amazing stories, but they're also... They're just stories. They're just... They're just stories. This is... I think it just all got... Everybody got caught up in it. And no offense, but...

I mean, it's just a statuette. Nothing's going on with it. Now, if... Merrick? Yeah? A light came down from the sky, and you think you released gods. So maybe some stories are worth believing in. How about you just pass it off to someone else? I understand why you want to keep it. It's worth studying. It's worth selling if we ever need money. But if there's even the smallest chance that it's affecting you in any way... That could cross over with some other things that might affect you... And end up causing a lot of trouble. Merrick's going to... Be looking right into Clara's eyes.

It's going to be a long pause. Probably start to get a little bit uncomfortable. And then he's going to go... That's actually a really good point. And he's going to open up the bag. And he's going to hold it up. Hold the statuette up, and he's going to say... "Okay, who's game?" Does... Okay, when Efenny knew basically everything about this, was the touching thing something she knows? Well, see, that's the thing. There's tons of stories about how to activate. Some people say, "Oh, you polish it like a genie's lamp." And some people say, "Oh, you have to pray to it for so many days." Or some people say that you have to make a wish first, and then the demon comes.

There's all kinds of conflicting reports. Okay. Because here's the thing. I've gone on record a few times now. Clara does wear gloves, and now I'm like, "Clara would take it." But I don't want it to be a thing where it seems meta that Clara took it and she's wearing gloves. It's always kind of iffy when something's been brought up. You know? Yeah, no, I think it's fair. Fair enough. Yeah. Then Clara will take it. Okay. And just... I imagine she'd probably wrap it in something and then put it deep in her bag, like bottom of the bag. Gotcha. Now, Merrick's going to say, "Listen, I don't want it back, but don't get rid of it, okay?

Because two things. Number one, like you said, what if we need it for something? And I mean, we need to sell it if we want to, I don't know, get it to be studied. What if we go to Umineiro or something? They would cream in their pants for that kind of stuff. Can I say that? Can I say that on the podcast? Have you listened to this podcast? I'll wear a cinturine now? Uh-oh. Uh-oh. They would. And so please don't get rid of it. And on the other side of things, you know, if it were an actual thing, what if we got into a bad situation? You know, maybe talk to this Merrick dude.

No. Okay, fine, fine, fine, fine. But we need to get it to where it needs to go, right? We need to give it to somebody, but just don't get rid of it. It's way too important than that. But I don't want it back. Don't worry, I'm not trying to take it. Is Merrick trying to take it? Not if you say no. I'm just saying, does he have any sort of pull or anything like that? No. Okay. Wow. Of course not. Clara will look to Merrick and say, "We'll keep it." And then she'll turn to Efony and say in the exact same tone, "We'll keep it safe." And then she'll just put her bag aside and, like, end of conversation.

Yeah. And to be clear, Merrick's like, thumbs up. Like, your point was very well taken. He doesn't want to put anybody in danger. He doesn't want anything to be, even if he thinks it was probably nothing. He's like, "That's fine. No problem. Whatever." And Clara's trying to be more accommodating after, like, the whole drugs thing, where she's like, "Okay, I get it. You want to keep it." Just like, "Werewolf." So she's trying to be like, "We don't have to destroy it. Just in case." Fair, fair, fair. Right. All right. I'm glad we had this chat. That was fun. You know what's funny is if you hadn't brought that up, I bet that was still happening in the background.

Maybe. That's what you sound like, Jesus. Oh boy. Oh boy, oh boy. After five and a half days through the waste, you guys are going to arrive in Whiteheadge on the 8th of Faeriehore. So let's advance time. 8th of Faeriehore, you're going to arrive in Whiteheadge, and you're going to take your horse and just sort of break off from the caravan. I would imagine you'd thank everybody. You're like, "Oh, thanks. That was much more pleasant that time." That type of thing. And they're going to spend their time in town kind of getting supplies, resting up for a couple of days, something like that, and then they're going to head back.

What would you guys like to do? Whiteheadge, I'll give you a breakdown once again, is a smaller town, not really hopping. They got their regular, the tavern, the inn. There's a lovely weapon shop here, weapon and armor, and they are pretty tough on crime in Whiteheadge. And the reason for that is that they get a lot of runoff from places like Brightport, and they've had some problems with bandits' rest before and stuff like that, so they're pretty damn tough on crime. Also, the Fang, which is a group that's been causing some problems in the area, has been growing rapidly, and they've had to kind of put their foot down on some stuff.

What would you guys like to do? Well, I mean, we still have that message to deliver, so as far as Clara's concerned, it's kind of a situation of, "Okay, let's just go to our next stop." Maybe buy some horses, because that'll make the trip a little bit shorter. That's true. Because we got the one. We got Trap. We got Trap. Yes. I don't know who Trap technically belongs to. I mean, I guess Jordana. Are you returning Trap? Oh, sure. Yeah, we rented him out. Was that from the merchant? I think it was from the herbalist in Lockfort. She basically pulled some strings for you guys, too, bro.

That's true, right. We were supposed to bring back the cart. We have to buy our new cart. No, we're gonna buy it, because there was no way. We're not gonna give her a disease cart. That's fair. Yeah, you're right. Okay, correct. Well, there was no real time limit on it. It was kind of an honor system thing. We still need to do it. Well. One of these days, you know? Could you share the map with us? Let's see. I believe it. I don't know it off the top of my head, but I think I'm fairly certain Lockfort is the opposite direction. It sure is. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But maybe we could hire someone to go?

Like, if someone's already going to Lockfort, we could be like, "Hey, we'll give you a cart and carriage if you just-- or a horse and carriage if you just give it to Jordana." That's something you could do. Like a courier or something? Yeah. There was a guy named Charles Tully. There sure was. Was he a merchant in Whitehead? He wasn't a merchant. He actually used to do the caravan-type runs to own a call back in the day. But for the right price, I'm sure he'd run it out there for you. It's only next town over. You guys want to do that? Just split the cost and we'll send Trapp back to Jordana?

I think that's a great idea. Get a bunch of new horses to get emotionally attached to and named? Let's do the right thing. All right. Do it. Yeah. Jason, charge us. How much? Oh, yeah, we did just get a bunch of money. Okay. Just make it happen. Whatever. You know what? Okay. Is this a thing where you're trying to pay a lower amount type of thing? You're just seeing what you can get away with? It's like, "Would 20 go?" That type of thing? Or are you just like, "Here's money, go." Let's be frugal. Yes. All right. But not like dickish frugal. No. Do me a favor. Give me a little charisma check.

Give me a little persuasion. Ooh, ooh, ooh. You want to do that? I have a plus zero. [laughter] Charisma? She has a scar. Same. Zero. Plus zero. I have a plus four. Oh! Hey! Anthony, what's up? Sing him a little song. I think we found our new talker. Yeah. One. Hey. So what's your pitch? What are you telling this guy? It's like, "Hey, sir. Proposition." That type of thing. What's your elevator pitch for Charles? Um, I don't know. That's not a good start. I'm gonna... Nope. [laughter] Just imagine you walk up to him, just look him dead in the eyes, and the first thing you say is, "I don't know.

I don't know." [laughter] Great that. This is why I don't say I've got plus four things. If you want, Abilene can go with you. Oh. Sure. That'll help the charm. [laughter] Maybe tell him something like, "Hey, we're trying to repay a favor." 'Cause that's... That way they know it's for a good cause, and for a good person, kind of thing? Yeah. "Hey, do you remember us? You sent us into the desert. We didn't die." [laughter] Actually, yeah, she could play that up and about the hellish trip through the desert. She'd probably play all that up and give him the big eyes kind of thing, and yeah.

Go down that route. Cute. Okay. So that's... I'd say that'd probably tug in his heartstrings, that type of thing. A thirteen's pretty decent. So he would agree to do it. And he would charge you twenty-five gold. Because he doesn't really leave town all that much, but he would make sure it's going to get where it's supposed to go. And he would even bring his old cart along as a replacement cart. Aw. What a good guy. Wonderful. She would thank him very effusively for that. Nice. So how about we split that cost amongst the party? Five gold each? Sounds perfect. Alright.

Well, you know. Sorry everyone, shave off five gold. No. Our chart is clear. We have no red in our ledger now. You guys are doing great. That's a hell of a lot more than most groups do when they say they're going to pay somebody back. Let me tell you about this group three. Holy shit. [laughter] They owe tens of thousands of gold. Yeah, we really did. [laughter] Not Flora though, she's fine. So I heard something about buying horses. Oh yeah. Yeah. Oh, pony in my case. Yeah, little pony. I feel like we should... Can you name it S-Pony? Because it's F-N-E. [laughter] I love that so much.

That's actually pretty nice. I had to think about it for a fabulous second. It's a thinker. It's a slow burn. I like it. Let's do it. I was going to suggest that we share a horse, but I like this F-Pony a lot better. Yeah, I was going to suggest, you know, we get another wagon that we actually own. You know, it's nice to carpool with your friends. Oh, like a nice... you'd save some cash. True. Wait, we go slower with a cart. Yeah. For sure. Okay, I'll put it this way. Is it a little slower? Yes. Is the ride a little more luxurious depending on how much you spring for the cart?

Yes. And we could carry more. It's true. That is true. I don't think it would be too slow if we could afford two horses to pull the wagon. Instead of one poor horse that's just like heaving and hoeing. I've heard about this one person who does like good calligraphy on the side of carrying this cart. Oh, scruffy, yeah. Okay, Clara would agree to get the cart if we... If the money we spent on it went to making sure it's a sturdy cart that can make it through mud and stuff, rather than the calligraphy on the side. That's probably true. That's probably true. So function rather than form.

Exactly, because the roads can get bad and I believe winter is coming soon if I'm not... Boy, that phrase is never going to be usable again. Yeah, I know. The cold never bothered me anyway. I mean, who do you get a call? Also, because of all the shit they've gone through so far, you said there's a really nice weapons place. Oh yeah. Could Marek talk to them and basically get them to sort of help him put together like a really good toolbox for whatever might come on the road? I don't mean weapons, I just mean like metal and... Are you building a pickup truck?

No, I just want to make sure that we have like, not like the run of the mill sort of like, here's your rope, but like, give me something that can really help us out on the road if we needed to in terms of like fixing one of the tires and all that kind of shit. So what I'm hearing, and correct me if I'm wrong, you guys are really trying to outfit yourselves. You want the road ahead to be as smooth as possible because you have dealt with broken wagon wheels before, Marek personally. You guys have been stuck in places before. You want a nice, sturdy ride.

Yes. I also, the reason that I think this is a good idea is because we're not planning on necessarily staying in Brightport, probably not. Right. We're going to go out on the world and like, we need like our home base. And right now, let's put our money into it. That's exactly what I was thinking is I don't want a cart that'll get us to Brightport and then break. Yeah. If we're going to spring for a cart, I want to get a cart that'll like get us to Uminyero potentially. Well, okay. There is, there's a little gnome in town. Firstly, let's talk about this cart.

There is a little gnome in town named Wilfen. That's a perfect gnome name. And what he does is custom gear. Now that covers a wide array of stuff, but long story short, he can build you a cart from scratch. If you're willing to wait, he will build you a cart to all of your specifications. Do we have anything that's super time specific? I know we have to deliver the letters, but we can... No, that's just... Who's tracking us, you know? Yeah, there's no time bomb or something like that. I think that might be pretty good. I like it. We can hang around the town for a little bit.

Did... would he be able to give us a time frame? Well, it depends on what you're asking for. Now, it sounds like you guys want a really sturdy cart that'll seat at least five with room to carry gear and a toolbox. Two horse drawn wagon. So, I'm gonna ask for a couple of rolls, actually. First of all, who's doing the talking? Yeah, you should go talk to him. Right. I think it should be Effie. She's got plus four. I do too! And she's a gnome! Yeah, racism! Drow should talk to Drow, gnomes should talk to gnomes. Just talk to your own people is all I'm saying. Never but equal, you know?

Oh, man. Fuck all of you guys. We need you more than ever. It's alright, I'll go with you. You're our only hope. What am I rolling? Episuasion again? Well, let's start up a conversation first before we get to the... Let's not dive right into it. Let's heat up this saucepan first. So, Wilfum is obviously not an old guy, but he's a little older. Probably in his late 30s, early 40s type of thing. Lives alone and is pretty much obsessed with his work. And you can tell most of this right off the bat because you're gonna go to his workshop and there's just stuff littered everywhere, right?

And this guy obviously likes to tinker and loves to build and stuff like that. You're gonna see bits and bobs all around. You're also gonna see frames of half-started carts and half-finished things. If you've ever hung out with somebody who likes to tinker or invent or something like that, there's a lot of partially started projects. They're waiting for some sort of burst of inspiration to follow up on. Yeah. And Wilfum is gonna notice Efning. Is the whole group coming in? Evelyn definitely went with her and he is touching stuff on the way inside. Because it's very interesting.

Evelyn's very tactile. Yes. Yes, he is. Okay. Thank you for noticing. I... I appreciate it. I think we probably all go, but the two of them can be sort of the mouthpiece. Right. So he's wearing this dusty old hat. Kind of a floppy-brimmed situation. Usually just to keep the sun out of his eyes. He's going to gently remove it and give you guys a little half bow. How are you folks doing today? Great. Efning's going to give him a really big smile and say, "Good morning." "We are very well, sir. How are you today?" And he's going to put the hat back on, kind of give it a shake first, because he noticed it's like, "Oh, that is dusty." "Well, you know what?

I could not be better. The sun's shining, the birds are chirping, and well, I've got lovely folks like you to keep me company." And he's going to give you this big beaming smile, paying very close attention to Efning. She will beam right back at him and say, "I am very pleased to hear that. My friends and I, we are looking to purchase a car. We hear that you're the man to talk to." Oh, well, can I get a little more information? Are you planning on just using this for the regular wear and tear? Are you merchants? We're not merchants, but we will be doing a lot of traveling.

We will be looking for something very, very sturdy. Well, I may have a couple of things that will fit the bill, but you wouldn't be interested in anything custom built, because that's my specialty. I would really love to show off my skills for you folks, if you'd be so inclined. I would love to see your skills, personally. Efning will smile at him again and motion a hand around where they are and say, "Well, I'm very impressed with the work that you have going on in here, that's for sure." Custom made, though, how long would you say that would take, and what kind of prices would we be talking?

Well, normally, if you're looking for something really sturdy, something that will stand the test of time, I'll tell you right now, there's no one who'd do it better than me. At least within a hundred miles of here. And to pay for quality like that, it's probably going to run you a little more than something that just rolled out of someone else's shop, but I might be able to make an exception for... And he's going to be staring at Efning for... and then kind of bat his eyes at the rest of the party. For you lovely folks. That would be very much appreciated, and she's going to give him just a huge smile and kind of like, "Bastard eyelids, eyelashes, just a little bit." So, before I get started on anything, I would say this could take anywhere between usually three or four days to eight or nine, somewhere in there.

It depends on how much custom stuff you want put in, and what kind of equipment you're looking at. I think Efning would probably indicate to Marek at this point, because he had a little bit more idea of exactly what he wanted with the car, and just kind of indicate for him to join in. Well, listen, I've been in a couple of bad situations with a broken wheel, and the next thing you know it's a day and a half later trying to fix something, and I just don't want to have to do that again. So, I know that there's always going to have to be some effort put into it, but I just want to be equipped for whatever could happen.

We've got a broken wheel, we've got mud, we've got sand, whatever can make us be a little bit more mobile, a little bit, I don't know, just not so worried about every little bump and rock. So, I don't know, basically a toolbox, but also kind of want to be outfitted for really being pretty sturdy. He's going to be stroking his face the entire time, and the second that Efning relays this to Marek, he's going to have to crane his head up a bit to meet Marek's gaze. He's going to be kind of tapping his foot the entire time. At first you might think that he's being impatient, but eventually you're going to go, "Oh, that might be his thought process, that he might have a nervous twitch or something when he's thinking." Okay.

Well, I'm thinking, I'm thinking, how long do you folks have? Is there anything pressing to get to? Well, we do have business to see to elsewhere, but we don't want to rush your work. Yeah, Marek will nod and be like, "We'd rather get this done right than done quick." Mm-hmm. Well, I think I could do the whole thing for about 400 gold and... *Burp* Marek vomits. That would only be like 75 gold each though. It's not bad. It's less than 75 gold each, I think. Wouldn't it be 80? 80? Probably. I'm bad at math. Me too. I think you're right. Wait, I have a phone. No, it's 80.

It's 80? Okay. Are we having... Is that so? I would be happy to have fries. Oh, sorry. Would that include horses and stuff, or is that just the cart? Are you asking him this? Oh. Elrath would not think of that. Oh. Bet it would occur to Efenny though. Okay. Um... *whispering* Nipslip! I think... I think... *Laughter* I think Efenny's gonna reach down to Efenny and whisper in a ear and he's gonna say, "I think I can get us a better price." Oh god. "I think he likes me." Efenny's gonna just pat Avalon's arm like, "Yeah, okay, we'll deal with that later." She's going to look back to Wolfen and say, "If that is a fair price, but then we would have to pay for horses after that as well, I assume.

That may be a little bit pricier than we would have liked." Hmm. And she's kind of looking at him very wide-eyed, like looking... So you're turning on the charm a bit. A little bit poopy-dog eyes at him. Okay. Could you do me a favor? Let's see how effective this is. Let's roll a persuasion check. Aw. Same again. 13's the number of the day. So I don't know if this is a practiced motion for Efenny, but maybe her puppy-dog guys need just a bit of work. It's not quite as bad, but when people take pictures of me and they tell me to smile and I tell them I am smiling, it's something like that.

And Wolfen is going to sort of pick up on the... You guys are in a bit of a jam. Well, I suppose what I could do is take one of the half-finished carts and reinforce the structure and finish it up, and I could save you about 100 gold if I did that. And also cut down on the time, too. I don't want to keep you folks waiting for too long. Again, looking at Efenny. Efenny is going to step forward just slightly and she will just touch his arm. But just very briefly, she doesn't want to freak him out or anything and then let go and just say, "That would be absolutely amazing." Okay.

So, yeah, he's going to reflexively not jump when you touch him, but just kind of look away for just half a second. And he's going to tell you, "Well, if there's anything else that you good folks need, I'll be getting all the materials together today if you'd like me to get started. And you can make changes right up until the point that I'll be finishing things up if you decide you want to add things." That would be fantastic. And she's going to hold out a hand to shake. And he is going to do the same to you. Wilf and Horji. Efenny. Efenny Skelly. Nice to meet you, sir.

I think this handshake probably goes on for a little longer than it needs to. Just slightly. Just ever so slightly. And then he probably realizes, like, that's weird. And he's going to pull his hand back. And are you paying now? Or are you basically like, "Hey, get started and we'll be back." We could do half and half. Like we each give him 30 now and then 30 when he's done. Let's leave 50% up front and then 50% whenever he's done. That way we have a little bit of room in case we want to change things. And I'd say with a custom job like this, that's probably the going protocol.

Did you guys take away five from your pouches earlier? Yes. I did not. I did not. Go ahead and do that and then another 30. So... I'm putting up my little calculator here because I do not trust myself. 160 minus 35 at the end of the day. Did we determine whether or not this cart and the full price would include horses? Oh, it does not. Okay. I was drinking or something. No, that could have been more clearly stated. No. The horses and other equipment would need to be purchased elsewhere. But this cart, if he keeps his promise, it's going to stand the test of time.

Nice. I like it. Lasers. I want lasers. Now the only thing we have to worry about is someone stealing it. We got to stay on top of that. Oh, wow. That would suck. Why'd you put that idea out there? So that we'd be aware and not let it happen. This is going to have the equivalent. This is going to have included in it the ethereum equivalent of that thing you stick on your steering wheel and like nobody can take it. Right? Oh, the club. The club. Right. I think that you just have to hobble your horse or something like that. Like a boot on your wagon wheel or something.

Every time we park it, we have to kill our horses. Your horse budget is through the roof. We're going to break a leg and heal it when we're going to go again. Oh, that's right. Oh, it's terrible. Trap chowder the third. Wrapping stuff up there. Firstly, hats off to Effany. Well done. Well done. You gnomey little minx, you. Work it. I did so well, I refrained myself from sabotaging you. I'm just barely. I have land within a wink. I don't think anybody wants that. Serious praise. You never know, man. I'm sure there's a listener too who would love that. Oh, yeah. I would.

So here's what we're going to do. This is going to be great. I'm going to go up and down the party here and I'm going to ask for a couple of dice rolls. Now, I feel like we've been picking on Effany a bunch, so let's let's let's move to Eloraf and Klara. Ah. Do me a favor. Give me two D6s, please. OK. It was a six and a one. That's kind of cool. Yeah. So this is going to take seven days. Oh, man. That's not terrible. He said somewhere between four and eight. That's between four and eight. Yeah. So seven days. Maybe he ran into some complications. He, you know, that there was just a couple of, you know, a couple of retooling bits.

Like he's like, oh, that's no good. Now, I need two more dice rolls. One. What does this cart look like on a scale of one to ten? Klara, do me a favor and give me a flat D10. OK. I think this is the ten. Fairly certain it's the ten. Here we go. Eight. Yay! Yeah. So this cart, I think when you go to a custom shop, something like that, and you're like, OK, we're looking for sturdy, sturdy, sturdy. You're figuring like more along the lines of a Jeep or an SUV, that type of thing. You're thinking function like a pickup truck type of thing. Like you're thinking that this is probably going to be pretty ugly, but it's, you know, it's going to get us where we need to go.

Abilene. Yes, sir. Let's roll for how well built this cart is. How sturdy is this going to be now? Unless this is stellarly low, the party wouldn't necessarily be able to walk up to it and go, oh, this is terrible. Now, if you roll a one or a two, this thing's going to be a hunk of shit. And you'll see that it's a hunk of shit for, you know, if you really start digging under the hood, so to speak. Give me a flat D10, please. OK. That's a six. So you're basically taking them on his word, right? And maybe he put a little bit more time into the, he probably put a little bit more time into the, the, the form, the sleekness.

Maybe he's trying to impress someone. I don't know. But he wants this to be an eye drawer. Like you know, you ride into town, it's like, Ooh, wow. That's the new model. Oh shit. Like that's beautiful. This is just going to appear to be like, OK, wow. That was a little more than we expected, that type of thing. But maybe in severe weather or maybe, maybe in, when the going gets truly rough, you might encounter a problem or two. Damn. That's OK. We've got a toolbox because he's going to really hook us up with that shit, right? I mean, it might mean that we have to do a little bit more effort, but you know, we'll be able to fix it.

One more dice roll. Maric. Yeah. I want you to give me a flat d10. Now this is how he interpreted what you wanted. Oh. So he's probably going to outfit this thing in the back. So he's got the, he's got the, the, the, the, the, the form of it and the function all taken care of. Now this is just accessories, right? This is how well equipped this model of wagon is. Well, that's a three. He didn't get our oil barrels where our earth escapes. Boo. So, OK. If you show up seven days from now and you kind of, and you're, you're looking at this, you're like, yeah, OK, this is pretty cool.

Not a lot of room in the, in, in, in the trunk here. There's not a lot of, it's not a lot of space. Like there's, there's plenty of room for everybody to sit down, but the storage space just is not quite what you're after. What would you say to him? Hmm. First of all, I think it would be one of the, when you, when you rent a car and you, and you walk around it for a while and make sure there's no like scratches on it before you take it off the lot so that they don't charge you for it later. Like you're like looking and looking and looking and looking.

There's nobody talking. And I know Merrick would be like just looking at every little bit and he wouldn't be like, yeah, this is awesome. He would probably just be like pretty stoic so that if this, if, if Wilfen is watching Merrick, he might be a little bit nervous. Like, he's not really giving me a thumbs up yet. Right. He's gonna, the longer this would go on too, he would be like, he might even chime in with everything OK. For the very deliberately for the first time that he asked that Merrick would pretend not to have heard it and he's going to keep looking.

I love that. And then Merrick's gonna kind of come towards the back. He's going to have that, I'm trying to, I'm doing the faces right now. I don't know how to describe them, but it's sort of like the, yeah. Right. That sound. Yeah, I mean, this is pretty good. It looks really, really nice. I feel like we were looking for something with a little bit more comfort and by that, I mean a little bit extra space. Like we don't have a whole lot of space for our gear. That was kind of important to us. I'm not really sure. And he's going to let that trail. Is everyone there or just Merrick?

I assumed we were all there. Yeah. He's going to almost look heartbroken. Almost. Not like he's going to, I think there'd be a crack. Like he's not a shrewd negotiator. So there'd be that. It's like, oh. And then he would kind of pick his head up. Well, I will remedy this situation right away. And you could hear like the tiniest crack in his voice, just the tiniest. Cool. And he almost breaks into like a bag, just like, give me one more day. I'll fix it. There'll be no extra charge. In the meantime, maybe I could get you a discount for supplies. OK. So and this was not, Merrick didn't want him to feel like a dick.

I mean, like he just like dicked us over or something like that. Merrick's just trying to make the point so that we're in a good negotiating situation here. That's all. So knowing that this is like really hurting him, he's going to kneel down and he's going to say, hey, this is fine craftsmanship. So this isn't a complaint. This is just something I want to look out for, you know, me and my friends. We got to, we're going to be taking this on the road and we're going to be showcasing your work. I just want to make sure this is what you'd be proud of on the road.

So Merrick's going to look at everybody else and he's going to say, you said give you a day. How about we give you two more days and you, you do your work and make your magic happen. And he's right in the chat that is smooth as fuck. He'll give you this really stoic head nod like, mm hmm. And he is going to walk into his workshop really quickly and jot down a note. And he's going to take it back out to you guys. In the meantime, you take this over to Valerie at the Silver Mace and she'll take care of any equipment you need and there'll be a little discount.

I'll pick up the rest of the tab. Oh, well, you're a good gnome. That sounds really, really, really, really condescending. You're one of the good ones, Wilf. Yeah, I know what I was going to say is a good man. And right at this last second, I changed it. No, man. I'm like, wait, that sounds really, really, really, really good. You dick. Let's reset that. Let's reset that. I want this to go OK. Good guy. Let's just, yeah. You're a, you're a, you're a hell of a guy, Wilfen. You're a real stand up guy. Not tall, but like standing. You're a real sit down, stand up, whatever you are.

You're a real down to earth guy. That's gold. Yeah, he would, he would get to work right away to remedy the situation. Meanwhile, in the week that you've been in town, let's, let's hold on. Let's fast forward time a bit. So let's say. So it is the 15th affair of yore. What are you, what were you looking to stock up on? You wanted to get some, you said you wanted to get some provisions and stuff. You have a discount for that now. What were you, what were you doing in this week? Basically, there's, there's a lovely little tavern called the Succulent Pig. I would imagine you're probably staying at the inn, Ridley's Rest.

Again, smaller town White Hedge. So tons of passers through from, from east to west and vice versa. So you got people coming from as far away as like Aldmoor and Brightport and stuff coming through town, either heading, heading south or, or heading west toward Lockford and then vice versa. Um, I think at some point during this whole time, Avalon would, uh, pull Efni aside and try to talk to her about something. Okay, sure. Efni, can you go somewhere with me? There's something on my mind that I want to buy. Uh, yeah, sure thing. And basically, Avalon's going to take her to, um, the, the, um, the weapon shop.

Okay. So walking into this place, it is, uh, beautifully adorned with shining, shining armor on the walls. They have, uh, they have this lovely big open storefront window type of thing. And, uh, all the natural light comes in and hits, hits this stuff beautifully. Actually, if you're walking past the shop, it's meant to catch your eye with like glints and glimmers of, uh, uh, like weapons and armor kind of reflecting back at you. A beautiful little place. Um, there's going to be two, uh, two children, um, in the, in the shop when you walk in. Um, there's going to be a boy and a girl, uh, the boy's a little older, probably around like, um, like 15, something like that.

The girl's a bit younger, uh, about eight, maybe nine, somewhere in there. Um, and the second that, uh, the second you guys walk in, um, the little girl is going to call back, uh, to the back of the shop, um, uh, and say, "Valerie, someone's here for you." And Valerie is going to come forward, um, slightly, slightly older woman, um, probably in her early forties, something like that. A little bit of like, just a touch of, of gray on one side of her, uh, of her hair. And she is going to just beam at you guys when you walk in. Is there anything I can get you?

And Avaland's just kind of, kind of walking inside of the store and he's like, if there's any shiny, uh, armor, armory or weapons, he's kind of like, he wants to touch them, but he knows it's the shop. So he's kind of hands off for now, but he's eyeing them and he's going to say, "I'm looking for a shield. Would you happen to be selling one?" And she's going to be ever so slightly taken aback at your tone. Of course. Right. Which I imagine- She should be. Right. Avaland is used to, probably. Um, uh, because what it sounds to her, the way she's interpreted is, you are so filled with rage that you are very clearly enunciating every word.

You have one. That type of thing. Um, and she's going to be taken aback just for a second and then, uh, well, sure. Of course. What kind of shield were you looking for? Well, recently I almost died to a warforged. So maybe something that can stop that. Something sturdy. Reliable. I'm so sorry to hear that. That can be, it can be really rough out there. Yes, it can. He's just staring at her like staring daggers. He's not being, he's not angry. He's just, you know, he's being Avaland. Right. Um, and she's going to, uh, she's going to not break eye contact. Strong woman.

With, with Avaland, but she is going to, uh, reach out just, uh, just, just a little bit and touch the, touch the boy on the shoulder. Shaw, could you please go get me the shield off the back table? Again, not breaking eye contact with, with Avaland. And, uh, the boy's going to, uh, he's going to take off running, uh, to the back and then he's going to come back with this gorgeous, uh, kind of circular looking metal shield. May I touch it? Of course, please. So Avaland's going to like equip the shield and kind of like move it around. He's not, he's not the best with the shield, but you know, he's, he's a fighter, so he knows what to do with it.

Um, he's going to say, this is quite a beautiful shield. How much will it cost me? Again, that tone, that... Uh, she is going to, she's going to, she has this sheet in the back where she's looking up, she's looking up price. Well, that one would only cost you about 10 gold. 15. And he, and he's gonna, he's gonna look at Efni, like give her an eye, like, I got this. Efni's gonna kick his leg and go wide-eyed and like shake her head, not, but try to do it not that noticeably, just to Avaland like, no, no, stop. And the boy's going to look up at Valerie and she's going to, she's going to like tilt her head, excuse me?

I'm sorry, I just tried to haggle with you. She, she is going to try and stifle a giggle almost. Well, there's no need to do that, sir. Um, do you mind if I ask your name? Avaland, what is your name? She's going to reach out and, uh, and, and try to shake Avaland's hand. Valerie. Avaland raises an eyebrow. That doesn't happen often. Right. And she's being very polite, you know. Avaland will, uh, grab her hands with like both his hands, like shake hard. He's not, he's not good at this. He's going to shake hard. He's going to say, it's very nice to meet someone like you.

Um, the giggle is probably going to turn into like a bit of worry just for a second. Like, like she's almost going to lose balance, like over the counter. It's like, Whoa, okay. That's, that's a really firm handshake, that type of thing. And then she's going to take her other hand to kind of stabilize the handshake. Absolutely. It's, um, if, if there's anything else that I can get for you, please, uh, I noticed you and your group around town. I would be happy to, to, to outfit me with anything that you might need. Well, if you put it that way, do you have any armor to sell?

Oh, of course. What, what type are you looking for? Nothing too heavy and maybe nothing like a leather armor, maybe something right in the middle. Just staring at her. Right. And she, uh, could I suggest maybe a nice chain mail? That sounds perfect. And, uh, she is going to this time, uh, herself, she's going to, uh, motion around the counter. She's, she's going to like, come with me. And there's going to be this, uh, mannequin set up with like this beautiful looking chain mail armor. Again, the sun is catching it. Uh, just right. Like this is a beautiful showroom floor.

Oh, Evelyn's gonna gently run his hands down the chain links of the chain mail. He's going to say, this is glorious. How much do I have to pay you to leave with this right now? Uh, well, uh, this particular set is 75 gold. You have a deal. Really? Uh, that's fantastic. Would you like me to package it up for you or do you want to wear it out? I think I'll wear it out. She's over the moon because this is not something that usually happens. You know, like usually an adventurer on the road doesn't get their stuff from White Hedge. They buy replacements in White Hedge.

They get, you know, maybe an upgrade or a repair or something like that. You're buying fresh stuff off the rack with little to no persuasion. And that's awesome to a small shop owner. I will get this down right away for you. And she's going to take it off the mannequin and hand it over. Um, would you like me to polish the shield for you? Would it only take a few moments? That would be nice. Thank you. And she's going to go around the counter and she's going to ask you all to kind of watch things for a moment. And she's going to take the little girl's hand and head toward the back.

And she's going to polish this up. Is there anything else that you were looking for while you're in here? Uh, no, I think that's it. Okay. So after she gets all this shined up for you and she's going to bring it back to you, she is going to take the 85 gold. Unless you were really adamant about giving her 15 for the shield. He was going to if Efni wasn't here. That makes perfect sense. I don't know if she would have accepted it. But yeah, she will take the, uh, she'll take the 85 gold and you are on your way with some brand new equipment. Awesome. As we're leaving, Efni's going to like nudge Efni a little bit.

He's going to say, "You see what happens when you butter them up?" Then they're going to leave. Efni will stifle a giggle, but she'll smile at Avalon and give him a big thumbs up like, "You did good, buddy. Good job. We need to work on your haggling skills a little bit, but you did good." Avalon thinks he killed it, so he's really happy. Nailed it. He got a whole handshake. I feel so bad for Avalon sometimes. All right. Anything else from you guys? I think that might be it. I think we might be good to go. All right. Let's advance things two more days to the 17th of Farayor.

If you go back to Wilfen. Nah, we're just going to leave the cart. Okay. No, let's just get horses and go. Okay, sweet. Now, two horses would normally cost you guys 75 gold apiece. If you're doing two of them, they would probably cut you some sort of deal. Who would do the haggling for horses? I think that's Efni's job. I think it's Efni. He's our personal shopper. You got the plus four, Efni. I'll tell you what. You've been a trooper this session, so just give me a persuasion roll. Thank you. If it's a 13 again, I will shit. That's a 12. That was Jason's fault.

So your fault. You did that. He jinxed my dice. He jinxed my dice, man. In total, they would probably charge you 125 for two horses. That's good. Is that acceptable for the group? Haggle, haggle, haggle. Roll for haggle. Is there any way we can reduce the price? Well. Wait, I'm not sure I want to know the answer to that question. No, no, no. Here's the thing. If you would like to try and turn on the charm or threaten this person, I don't know what your negotiation tactics are. So let's say Aveline went with you and let's say you're like, okay, here's how you haggle.

This is how you do it. What would you say? I changed my mind. I don't want to haggle. I can do the haggling if I'm with you. Okay. Try it, Aveline. Go for it. Aveline, wink, wink, wink. No, this makes sense. This is like you've been trained. This is how you do it. Go. You got this. Now Aveline realizes you're supposed to bring the price down. Ah. This time he's going to say, we really need two horses. We have a lot of important things we need to do on the road and we're just lonely adventurers. Could you please help us out? He's going to try to wink, but it's going to look like his eyes switching and he's like, his eyes are bulging at the same time.

Oh, God. Okay. I'm going to give you a choice. You can roll persuasion or intimidation. Intimidation. He's doing his best. He's trying so hard. I think this isn't an outright, this person is scared shitless. They're more uncomfortable than anything. Understandable. You can have them for a hundred. Just please leave. Nice. Excellent. Fantastic. All right. That's 20 gold each for the two horses. Yep. All right. And now it's just paying for the rest of the cart and you guys are pretty much good, I guess. I think so. I think we need to name the horses. I think you do too.

I like that I'm the one who called it a trap earlier, but then I'm also the one who brought up the fact that they need names. It's a good trap. Yeah, it's a good trap. Guys, what do you want to name these horses? What are you guys feeling? I'm going to write it down for posterity, no matter what you picked. Wait, if one of them is black and one of them is white, can we name them salt and pepper? Yeah, what do they look like? Well, you know what? Let's roll. Okay. Roll for horses. All right. Oh wow. These are two beautiful. Clyde sales. Oh man. Two beautiful white stallions that you're going to, these like, they have been brushed.

Sexy horses. Oh man. Sexy horses. These two are like the, like the cover of sexy horse magazine, right? Like, um, the, they have been brushed out every day. Beautiful flowing mane. Um, they are well behaved and, uh, ready, ready for you guys. I see butt stallion in the chat. Midnight in Ebony. Just for funsies. Both are white. Oh, Oh, I'll remind you. No, that's why I was like, Even better. You know what? Yeah. Let's do midnight in Ebony. Okay. For these beautiful white horses. You guys let Ella Rath name them. She's like, Oh. Blackie. Blackie and Shadow. How about that?

Black? I got Midnight in Ebony. If it's Ella Rath, I feel like she'd go with Blackie and Shadow. I don't know. I just don't feel like, I just don't feel like Blackie's okay. You know what? Good point, actually. I knew a dog named Blackie, but it was named by a four year old and I was four. So like it was fine. It was fine for the time. Speaking of four year olds, Merrick's horse hopefully is super beautiful red brown. Is that true? Well, you only bought two. Oh, that's right. We're not doing, Oh, that's right. We're not doing horses each. I had this list on my, from earlier.

In my notebook and I was writing down names. Nevermind. I forgot. I'm sorry. I just got excited. Let's hear them. Like maybe they're way better. No, this will come up again later. I'll keep this for later. No, they're not better. It's not better. Trust me. We'll need horses after someone steals the cart. Exactly. Wow, guys. So distressing. So, Avalon's going to come back with this beautiful armor and new shield. That's going to probably stand out because he was wearing leather before, right? Okay. So now it's, now he's, he's, he's kind of decked out. He is ready to go.

When you get back to Wilfen, Wilfen is going to show you the cart and at first glance, it is going to look identical to the cart that you left two days ago. And if you brought this up to Wilfen, he'd go, Oh, duh. And he'd pound on the back. Now there's a seating arrangement in the back where there's kind of two benches. And then there's, there's room in the center to kind of sprawl out. If you're either carrying goods or you want to just lay down and try and take a nap, that type of thing. And it's even got, not pillows, so to speak, but like padded areas where you could lay your head down and like rest.

Like the benches aren't really hard wood. That's part of the, the, the form part of it. Like it's a nice, it's a really nice, sturdy adventuring wagon here. And he's going to pound on the floor, the back of it. And the floor is going to spring up because there's a trap door underneath of it. And now you have the entire bed in the back compartmentalized and everything to carry all the stuff that you need as adventurers. Dude. Beautiful. Dude. The first thing that's going to happen is, Merrick is going to say, "Dude." Dude. He's going to say, "Wilfen, you're a genius." Do you ever do that thing when like someone's super impressed, they just like don't say anything, they just like give you a kiss on the forehead?

It's so beautiful. Is that what Avalanche is going to do? Yeah, Avalanche should totally do that. Hell, I mean, yeah. I mean, he could. If it's that beautiful, then... Oh, he finally got the kiss. He would probably blush just at the, like the total 180. Like he's just so happy that you guys are happy. What a nice gnome. That's nice G-N-I-C. Nice. Nice. Clara will give him 35 gold. She's a little extra. A little bump. And then that also makes an even 70 that I have left, so I mean. So you guys have dropped some coin in this town. Mm-hmm. And I would say probably a week, a little over a week, but let's say a week staying at the inn would probably cost you another like, I don't know, 20 gold for the lot of you.

Just kind of staying, just you know. If you wanted to leave a tip, we could say 25 and split it five ways. Perfect. Okay. You got it. I mean, I just evened out, but you know, whatever. I know, I know. Yeah, that's why you didn't. Um, is there anything else you guys would like to do before hitting the road? Jack, don't come back no more. We only gave him half to begin with. Well, I'm assuming you're going to pay him the rest of it. Yeah, okay. Yeah, so that was 30 more each and I gave him 35 for the little tip. I spent, I think I spent 155 gold in this town. Where's my statue?

Where's my statue? Got to give him time. Next time I go to Atlanta, that's what I'm going to say. Where's my statue? Where's my statue? So yeah, man, they are, they are, you know, they're, they're sad to see you leave because obviously you guys have been dropping coin left and right in this place. But you know, at the, at the end, they would give you a nice little like, oh, thanks. Thanks so much for staying. Make sure and tell your friends that type of thing. And if Valerie, if Valerie saw you on the street, she'd probably compliment you and how well you looked in your armor, that type of thing.

Yeah, other than that, you guys ready to hit the road? Question. Yes. Would Shaw be with Valerie as we're exiting? Well, I think we have a roll for that. Okay. Let's, let's roll a saving throw. 10 or above? Yes. Anything below that? No. Give me a flat T20. Okay. Oh, it rolled off. 11. Lucky. So if Valerie were to happen upon the group, which she does, so this would be like heading to the shop in the morning or something like that. You guys are packing up the cart and getting ready to go. Valerie would have two children in tow. Elorath would immediately recognize those children as Shaw and Lucia.

Yes! And I think it would take Lucia just a couple of seconds extra, but Shaw would run over to Elorath and hug the shit out of her. She would leap off the cart and meet him halfway, if she's in the cart already, and do the same and just wrap like both of them in a big bear hug. Aww. This would be, this would be a complete shock to these kids. Just because it's like, it's been, it's been a couple of years and I don't know if Elorath has visited since then. I think you said something about, you know, checking in on them, making sure they're okay. I think so, yeah.

So it's probably been a while. Right. But since the last time, and this would be explained, but since the last time that Elorath has visited, these two were orphans. Right. Um, Valerie Ebomere adopted them both. *clears throat* So they're, I mean, she's been taking care of them ever since. Would she tell us her last name? Well, I would think it'd be, here's the thing, I think it'd be a formal introduction just because, uh, if, if, if the situation were broken down, it's like, oh, I know these two, that type of thing. And she would, she would probably be a formal introduction at that part.

She usually introduces herself as Valerie, but it would be, um, it would be like, oh, wow. Basically you saved these kids. Like, wow, that's such an honor to meet you, that type of thing. And it'd be a formal introduction after that. So it would be Valerie Ebomere. Okay. Um, well, after expressing like how happy she is to see these kids, cause it is, there's no way to describe it. Like there would just be like that, oh my god, like wordless, like just like laughing and happiness, you know? And then she, if she heard that, she'd be like, uh, did you say Ebomere?

Um, yeah. Uh, do you have like a relative named Bree? Oh boy. Um, describing the look on her face would be very difficult. Okay. Sadness, uh, would be the easiest way to, uh, to, to describe it. I, I did. Um, she, she passed away though. Yeah. Uh, she actually like saved my life a couple of times. So, um, yeah, I miss her, uh, too. I just wanted to say that, you know, like she saved my life. So it makes me real happy that, you know, like I could kind of return the favor, I guess a little bit with like your kids. And it's almost like a circle thing, but she was really great.

And I'm really sorry. During the course of you telling her this, she is going to swallow hard. And after, after a few seconds, she is going to lean in and give Elorath a hug. Oh, big old hug back. Um, and there'd be kind of some sniffling and some, you know. Mm-hmm. Um, I, uh, I really should go open the shop, but if there's anything you folks need before leaving town, please, please let me know. Okay. And she'll give the kids like another hug and just be like, you stay away from werewolves now. Like just for fun, like trying to make a joke, but probably a bad one because she's a little sad now.

Remember when everyone you loved died? Yeah, sorry. Funny joke. Yeah. I think Shaw would take that way more in stride that Lucia would not like, it's not like a haha funny. It's more like, oh yeah. Whereas Shaw has probably dealt with it a little better being a little older. But in the course of them going back to the shop, I would imagine Shaw is doing that very animated teenage thing of telling a story involving combat and acting some of it out. Aww. Oh, that's, that's so heartbreaking. Oh my God. She's just gonna like, I'm doing it right now, but she's just gonna like watch them go and like wave with one hand and her other hand just gonna be kind of like on her chest.

Just like, no, my babies are getting so big. So packing up and leaving the town of White Hedge, I'm going to ask for two rolls. And this is going to close us out for the day. Efanny. Do me a favor, roll a flat d20 to see how the first two days of your journey are going to go luck wise. Eleven. All right. Marek. Yes? Do me a favor, roll a charisma saving throw. Charisma saving throw. Yeah, awesome. That's a four. No, that's good. Yeah, the lower the first saving throws, the lower it is, the better. Right. Right? Yes. I just said that. I don't know. Four, four. Four. Ladies and gentlemen, I think that is a fine time for us to wrap things up for the evening.

What was that? What does that mean? Well, we'll find out next time on another exciting episode of Dungeons and Randomness. That's just so serious. I'm probably, it might not be, we actually might be able to slip in another game by the way, because it looks like group A won't be able to. Ta-da. There you go. But I want to know what the charisma thing was about. You want to know. Let's just record another episode right now. Jane said she was good for it. Let's do a lot of charisma roles where, where, where, where, where Ephany has to jump up front. My understanding is that Jane doesn't have a job of any sort.

So... Wait, did I read that wrong? That plain life is strange. Yeah. Oh my god, you guys did fantastic. Again, hats off to Jane for... Yeah! Well done, Jane. Thank you. You know what? What? I'm going to give Ephany, I'm going to give Ephany inspiration. Yeah! Yay! Thank you. Good job! Well done. That's the first one on this group, right? That's the first one on this group so far, but I think. Yeah, I haven't, I haven't remembered it. But just kind of... You got to write that down somewhere so that you remember, because that applies to like fucking everything, right?

That's, that's the gold star on the thing. That's, that's how you know. Yeah, that's basically you can take any role that you're given and you roll with advantage instead of not. Excellent, thank you. I can help you out in a pinch. I think on the main page there's a bit for inspiration that you can click. Yeah, there's a little button. Yeah, it's very nice for your name. Yep. Ah, you guys did great. That was super fun. That was, that was another one of those episodes where you technically didn't travel very far, but tons of stuff was done, carried on by. Yep, I love it.

Well, technically we did travel very far, it just happened very quickly. That's fair, yeah. It's true, right. We traveled quite far by map. That was good. I'm so glad that Shaw's okay. Me too, oh my gosh. That was so cool. Like it was, it was killing me when Avalon was like in there, I was like, my babies! I kind of want Merrick to have heard, heard you say, be careful, whatever with the werewolves. Yeah, I know. And it's just, and it's just all he completely understands it's just one single tear. He just kind of looks down and there's just one little tear.

He moves on. Anyway. I wasn't careful with werewolves once. She's right, you know. Be careful. Okay. Mostly be careful with their hearts. Yeah. Aw, dude, that was so much fun though. Thank you guys for playing. You guys all did great. Like I said, I might post like in the next few days being like, hey, is there any chance we can fit one more in before Theriathon? Because we need one more. I'm not sure if it'll be Group B or Group C, but whoever can schedule can take it. Sweet. Hey, something I just remembered about on Facebook, I think now you can do polls. Did you notice that?

In your... Oh, that's back? Oh, well, I guess maybe it's always been there. I don't know. But I think it just told me that you could do polls now. But I figured you could do a poll and say like, what about Wednesday or Thursday or Friday? And it could be like, you could just choose. Anyway. All right. That's all right. I like it. Yeah, might make it easy. Okay. All right. Thank you guys. Thank you guys so much. That was fun. So much fun. Bye guys. Bye. Man, we really hope you enjoyed today's episode. As always, there's a few things to discuss, so don't skip this. April 21st, starting at noon Eastern, is Theriathon.

There's some really cool stuff. We've been busting our butts the entire time trying to make that a very special event. I don't think you're going to want to miss it. We'll be talking about something, probably making an announcement within the next week or so on Facebook or Twitter. There's some really cool stuff. We want to hang out with you for 12 hours if we can. Of course, we're able to do what we do by using Patreon and you guys supporting us through Patreon. So thank you so very much. Patreon.com/dandr. We upload tons of stuff there every single month.

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