With Milo out of the picture, the Agents are left with no choice but to enter the Thornhold stronghold alone. Can they secure a safe route to the underground treasure room? And what dangers await them inside?
Episode Transcription
INTO THE STRONGHOLD
[[Intro music plays followed by adventuring music]]
[Jordan]: “Hello everyone and welcome back to Agents of DAMNED! Our D&D let’s play podcast featuring myself: your sometimes benevolent, often malevolent dungeon master, Jordan Roman and my fellow players.”
[Caitie]: “Hi guys, I’m Caitie and I play Saithe.”
[Christina]: “Hey guys, I’m Christina and I play Winterra!”
[Drew]: “And I’m Drew and I play the good doctor Arlo Agon.”
[Jordan]: “So our heroes have had quite a day. A pretty busy, productive trip to Neverwinter but things have taken a pretty drastic turn as of last time. Why don’t we have a recap so we all remember what happened?
So last time, the Agents followed Elama into a dark alleyway. There they saw her speaking with an ashy blond haired man donned in black armor. The armored man questioned why Elama had allowed the Thieves’ Guild’s reserve funds to be prepared to be sent outside of the city. In doing so the mysterious man unknowingly revealed to the nearby Agents that the two were planning on luring in a dragon in the hopes of destroying Neverwinter. However, the man took note of ALL of the Agents- including the ever stealthy Saithe and made this information known to our heroes. The man sent Elama away, prompting Arlo to step out in the hopes of stopping her. Despite Arlo’s warnings, Elama did not stop and managed to escape with the help of the man in black, summoning a wall of fire to provide her with cover. The Agents attempted to subdue the man in black, but quickly realized they were severely outmatched. Winterra transformed into a riding horse and carried her allies towards the guard’s barracks to get help. After verbally abusing another guard, Saithe met with Bardon once again to enlist his aide while Winterra and Arlo went on ahead to the Thieves’ Guild to inform Milo of the bad news. Bardon reluctantly agreed to help; however, Milo took the news of Elama’s betrayal exceptionally poorly. Despite this, he understood what was at stake and pressed on with preparations, now with the aid of the Agents and the Neverwinter guard.
Saithe attempted to contact DAMNED HQ during this time, but was met with a cranky Raiann who told her to do her job, and promptly hung up. The Agents travelled with Milo to the reserve in Thornhold, meeting only minor resistance along the way. Once there, Milo prepared to enter the stronghold, warning the Agents of the various traps that lay within. At that moment, Milo himself was caught in an explosion, and now barely hangs on to life as Bardon rushes to his aid. And now, we resume our tale.
[[Adventuring music stops]]
[Jordan]: “So- as mentioned, Bardon is the first one to react to this, almost instantly as Milo hits the ground just running towards him and falling to his knees at his side.”
[Bardon]: Panicked “MILO, NO!”
[Jordan]: “He turns to all of you and his guardsmen and says-”
[Bardon]: “I need a medic here, NOW!”
[Drew]: “Arlo like fugue state, runs in and snaps into almost EMT action where he’s like,”
[Arlo]: “Alright, I’m gonna need you to come on over here. Put pressure on this wound, make sure he’s not gonna bleed out, I am gonna get him healed up. And he’s gonna be fine, alright? He’s going to be just fine.”
[Drew]: “I’m gonna cast…castcastcastcastcaaaast…cure wounds! At first level.”
[Jordan]: “Alright, go ahead and roll that one out.”
[Drew]: “That’s going to be a six plus my spellcasting modifier, which is two so 8 HP for our buddy.”
[Jordan]: “Very nice, so as you do that a green aura of healing emits from your hand and envelops him. And as it does you see some of the burn marks that had taken over start to heal away and his eyes slowly but surely open up a little bit. His breathing gets a little bit more normal, and he looks at you and goes-”
[Milo]: Weakly “Ugggggh. What…what happened?”
[Saithe]: “You almost died.”
[Arlo]: “Ehh…you uh, you stepped on some kind of a magical landmine there bud. I’m not gonna be the one to point fingers, but it does seem like something you probably should have known about and avoided.”
[Jordan]: “Uhm-Bardon shoots you a VERY nasty look when you say that.”
[Arlo]: “What? I mean, that’s his whole deal.”
[Milo]: Still weakly “There wasn’t supposed to be a trap like that. It was just the tripwire. Ugh…”
[Jordan]: “And he passes out. Erhm, I would say with just your general medical knowledge you know that he’s not like in danger, he’s just passed out.”
[Caitie]: “Poor Milo.”
[Arlo]: “Ah…he’s just gonna need him some rest.”
[Jordan]: “Bardon looks very troubled by this. He…Bardon does recognize that y’know, Milo’s no longer in danger, but that doesn’t mean he’s anymore okay with this situation.”
[Bardon]: “I suppose all we can do for now is wait for him to wake up- see what his next move would be. Without Milo, going in there is extremely dangerous.”
[Jordan]: “He turns to some of his men and says,”
[Bardon]: “Keep an eye on him! NO ONE, gets to him.”
[Jordan]: “He turns to some of his other men-”
[Bardon]: “The rest of you, set up a perimeter around here. If anyone comes within sight, identify them or kill them. Whatever it takes to keep him safe.”
[Jordan]: “And Bardon in a huff sort of walks off into the woods somewhere. So at this point, you guys are kind of at a bit of a standstill, there’s not a whole lot you can do until Milo wakes up. That being said you guys do have a little bit of time to rest yourselves. You guys did get a chance to heal your wounds a little bit back when you were helping to prep for this trip; however, you haven’t slept since you got here and it’s been a FULL day, almost going into the next day. So you guys are definitely starting to feel the effects of exhaustion. So at some point you guys are going to need to take a rest during this time. Is there anything you guys want to do before then or..?”
[Saithe]: “Well! I’m going to take the munchkin’s lead and take a nap! I feel like this day has lasted two months!”
[[Drew laughs]]
[Caitie]: “Saithe kind of goes off in a random direction to take a nap. As she leaves she says,”
[Saithe]: “Don’t wake me unless someone is dying! Or I’ll be the one to make that happen!”
[[Christina and Jordan laugh]]
[Jordan]: “Okay. So Saithe goes off to power nap, what about Arlo and Winterra, do you guys want to do anything during this downtime?”
[Drew]: “Um, I’m probably going to check up on Bardon.”
[Jordan]: “Alright, um…we’ll come back to that one in a hot sec, Winterra did you have anything you wanted to do more immediately? ‘Cause it’ll take him a little bit to track down Bardon.”
[Christina]: “Can I tell, from anything surrounding here, if there’s any like footprints or anything um, you know, that might give us an idea of how recently something that was not supposed to be there was placed?”
[Jordan]: “I would say for that you can roll either a survival or an investigation check.”
[Christina]: “That was actually a pretty decent roll, thats…oh god is that a 16 or a 19?”
[Jordan]: “It doesn’t matter, both are fine.”
[Christina]: “Okay, it was a 16 plus 2 so it’s an 18 total.”
[Jordan]: “So despite the tracks of all the soldiers, the wheels on the cart carrying all the gold, etc etc. There are two sets of tracks that seem to be foreign to all of you. One of them you note is someone of a smaller frame, through your experience someone who’s very light on their feet, probably maybe about five, five and a half feet tall, somewhere within there. You would have reason to assume this might be Elama because you know she’s around that height. And as someone associated with the Thieves’ Guild she would probably be somewhat light on her feet. There is another set of tracks much larger and seem to be like plate mail tracks almost? Much heavier…for that one I’m going to need you to roll like an insight check to try and figure out what that one might be.”
[Christina]: “10 on the dice, so 14.”
[[Mysterious music begins playing]]
[Jordan]: “You have reason to believe this might be your beloved ashy haired, black armored friend’s tracks.”
[Drew]: “Gasp! Senior fuckboy is here!”
[Caitie]: “Uh-oh”
[Christina]: Laughs “Oh no. Okay, and can I – does it look like they’re old tracks or pretty recent?”
[Jordan]: “They look newer than yours. One other thing you do note, that is a bit odd, both tracks go in, but the armored set of tracks seems to be going out. Which you don’t see the tracks you assume to be Elama’s also leaving. You only see his leaving.”
[Drew]: “Ruh-roh.”
[Christina]: “That’s weird…so Arlo already left right?”
[Jordan]: “Yeah, Arlo’s already off looking for him we’ll get to him in a hot second.”
[Christina]: “Okay, and Saithe went off to go take a power nap so, and she said ‘don’t wake me unless someone is dying’ so…”
[Jordan]: “I don’t think this counts as someone dying.”
[Caitie]: “Definitely not.”
[Christina]: “No, Terra’s just going to keep this information to herself for now, and she’s going to kind of, be on lookout, but take a nap herself. She’s going to perch up under a tree. Or something, and just going to do her thing and try to get some sleep.”
[Jordan]: “Alright then.”
[[Mysterious music stops]]
[Jordan]: “So now we cut over to Arlo who followed Bardon as best he could, Bardon did storm off pretty quickly, you weren’t quite as quick to follow just because you did still want to check in on Milo- make sure everything was completely fine before you left him, patient obligation, all that fun stuff. But you do run into him relatively quickly. He didn’t go off too, too far. And he’s just leaning against a tree and seems to be trying to collect his thoughts right now, but he has not yet noticed you.”
[Arlo]: “Uh…hey there compadre, I noticed you seem to be having a little bit of a hard time, I wanted to check in on ‘ya.”
[Bardon]: Sarcastically “Well, you’re insightful if nothing else.”
[Arlo]: “I am going to remind you that I did just save your best friend’s life there so maybe a little bit less sass.”
[Bardon]: “Agh, I know, I know…I’m sorry. You’re right, I am grateful for that.” Sighs “It’s just a lot. I’ve…Milo’s a good guy, he’s gone through a lot of things, I didn’t think something like this would happen. To know that something might actually come about of this…I was fully ready to write this whole thing off as nothing, but now I’m actually worried. Not just for him but for the town as well.”
[Arlo]: “I can understand how this could be…a little bit erhm- I don’t want to say frightening for you, but a bit off putting. What’s going on with us right now, what’s happening is far outside of the purview of what would be considered your normal everyday guard activity. And er- as prepared as you can try to be, something like this is always going to come out and it’s going to blindeside ya. What I wanted to make sure is that you’re going to keep a level head out there.”
[Bardon]: “I do appreciate that. And, I assure you, I am a bit shaken by this but that does not mean I’m about to take it easy. I assume, on that note- that you didn’t just come to check up on me and make sure that everything was hunkydory.”
[Arlo]: “Well… I’ll admit, I’m a doctor by trade, I’m always making sure that everybody’s ‘hunkydory’ but I do have a little bit of an additional purpose here.”
[[Mysterious music starts up again]]
[Arlo]: “This er- how should I call him? This character in his, in the dark armor, the…what would be a great name for him I never got his name…this fuckboy supreme we’ll call him, this fuckboy supreme is coming around trying to destroy your town. Do you have any descriptions matching him, like has there been any activity from him before? Like are we working with a ghost here or…what have you got?”
[Bardon]: “The only descriptions I have so far are the vague recollections you gave to my incredibly frightened guard. Past that, I’ve never heard of this guy.”
[Arlo]: “I just… Somebody of that magnitude is dangerous. And you don’t get that dangerous out of the blue. I’m worried there might be more going on.”
[Bardon]: “I don’t suppose you could tell me a little more about the guy, other than his ‘greasy hair’ and ‘loser-like’ disposition? As I said, that’s all I have to go off of.”
[Arlo]: “I’m no, you know, I’m not tootin my own horn, I’m not too you know on my own steedes here. But, I’m a relatively tough customer. That man almost killed me with two hits. That is no small feat. He summoned some manner of spectral glaive to his hand, wielded it one handed- he’s clearly got some powerful magic just kind of flowin’ on through him. Stuff like that you don’t just…come across. Someone gives it to you or you have connections that make it possible.”
[Bardon]: “So what, you think this guy is some sort of a sorcerer or a warlock or something?”
[Arlo]: “Something of the sort. But- I’d be remiss if I didn’t give you that information or entertain the possibility that whoever this guy is, he might not be the end all be all of this whole situation.”
[Bardon]: “Right…well I’ll definitely be sure to get a more apt physical description later. But, for now, knowing what we’re dealing with- definitely does help.”
[[Mysterious music stops]]
[Arlo]: “I do need you to do one- one big favor for me.”
[Bardon]: “This is already a big ask you guys have had, having me bring a platoon out, but-”
[Arlo]: “So I know- once we start compiling a profile on this guy, you know maybe in the public eye, maybe in the papers there’ll be some kind of a name for him. I need you, to do everything in your power, to make sure this man is known as ‘fuckboy supreme’ like that would really make me happy.”
[[Drew snickers]]
[Bardon]: “As amusing as that would be, I would like to remind you that wanted posters are typically seen by the general public, including children.”
[[Drew laughs]]
[Caitie]: “Above you, you just hear like a heavy deeply annoyed sigh.”
[Drew]: “Wait! What?!” laughs more
[Bardon]: “The fuck?”
[Caitie]: “Just a like, ‘huggggh’”
[Drew]: “Do-do you sleep in trees!?”
[Jordan]: “Are you implying to me that Saithe slept in a tree- climbed- not only slept in a tree, but walked off in the same direction that Bardon did to find your ideal nap spot!”
[Caitie]: “She walked in a random direction.”
[Drew]: “Wait, wait!” Claps his hands to enunciate each word in the following sentence “Does. Saithe. Sleep upside down. Holding. On. With. Her. Tail. Like. A. Possum!?”
[[Christina laughs]]
[Caitie]: “I mean…look up.”
[Jordan]: Sounding less amused “They look up.”
[Caitie]: “She’s hanging upside down like a possum.”
[Drew]: “Yes.”
[[Caitie laughs]]
[Drew]: “Yes!”
[[Caitie continues laughing and Christina joins in]]
[Christina]: “Oh my god.”
[Jordan]: “Bardon turns to Arlo and says-”
[Bardon]: “What’s your read on her?”
[Arlo]: “Erhm…she seems like somewhere deep, deep, deepdeepdeep, very deep, very very very deep down- that she has a good heart. Uhm, it is buried under layers of terrifying murderous intent, but it seems like she’s uh- there is more to her than that.”
[Saithe]: Clears her throat “I am awake you know, I can hear you.”
[Arlo]: “I was afraid of that- I’m going to take my leave.”
[Drew]: “And then Arlo very briskly walks away.”
[Saithe]: “That’s what I thought.”
[Jordan]: “Bardon does follow you and as he does, he pulls out his longsword and cuts off the branch that you were sleeping in.”
[Saithe]: “Ahhhhh! Bitch!”
[Bardon]: “Oops.”
[Saithe]: “Jackass!”
[Bardon]: “My bad- arm slipped.”
[Saithe]: Sarcastically “Right.”
[Jordan]: “And he heads back for the camp.”
[Saithe]: “Ugggggh”
[Caitie]: “She just kind of like dusts herself off, she’s like flipping him off and just kind of scurries away to her next sleeping spot.”
[[Harp music plays in the background]]
[Jordan]: “So you all make your way back to the camp, Saithe finds a new tree to possum her way up into to take a nap, and the rest of you semi follow suit and sleep however you are most comfortable (not upside down in a tree).”
[Caitie]: “You know what!”
[Jordan]: “And just try to wait it out until Milo wakes up. During this time, Saithe-
[Caitie]: “Mmm?”
[[Repetitive drum beats play alongside the harp]]
[Jordan]: “You, amidst your slumber, find yourself in a dark space. This space seems to go out in all directions as if you’re in some form of a void. You can’t see anything as far as the eye can see. And you yourself are slightly different. You’re smaller, much younger, maybe about 15 or so. Your face is as it always is, just normal, a bit of a solemn frown but nothing… terribly notable. Just as 15 year old Saithe always was. And you feel a hand reach out and place itself on your shoulder. You look up and see the face of a drow, or a dark elf. And you know this one. His name is Varis and he’s one of your closest friends. Your only friend actually, he’s been with you almost as long as you can remember in recent memory. And he smiles at you and says,”
[Varis]: Soft Spoken “Hey kid! Erhm, so…I think I found something you might actually like. Er – I heard there was this uh, this circus in town. I was telling you about that, remember it might come in? It actually did! Wanna go- check- I think you’d really like it.”
[Saithe]: “Uh…I dunno Var, I- okay. Let’s go.”
[Varis]: “That’s the spirit kiddo.”
[Jordan]: “And, he y’know, pats you on the shoulder and then walks away. And it doesn’t seem odd to you, but a circus tent suddenly shows up. And you two walk in, it’s pitch black you can’t see anything in there despite your darkvision, and all of a sudden a spotlight shoots down on you and around you, you see these blank faces just shadowy silhouettes with glowing eyes and no expression to be seen on any of their faces but they’re surrounding you.”
[Saithe]: Growing alarmed “Uh, Var? Varis?!”
[Jordan]: “You look around for him, you don’t necessarily see him, until you hear a thud. You turn around to where the thud is and there’s Varis, on the ground. A dagger in his heart.”
[[Harp music stops, and is replaced with the mysterious music]]
[Saithe]: Distraught “No!! Varis no please!!! Why??”
[Jordan]: “You fall to your knees hoping to be able to do something, anything, but it’s…too late. He already is…he’s gone. And then from the crowd you hear – laughter. You look up and see that the blank faces are now all there. Long, twisted, smiles. As they laugh and laugh at your suffering. Then you hear laughter from below you. And, you look down to see that Varis is also smiling. Though still very much dead.
And then, you hear someone approach you from behind. A figure dressed like a ringleader. Someone who would take charge of the circus- direct the show- and he walks to you cane in hand, other hand tipping his hat down and says-”
[Ringleader]: “I hope you like the gift he left you my dear. He died to give it to you!” Maniacal evil laughter
[Jordan]: “And as the laughter fades into the black abyss surrounding you, the man looks up and you see yourself. A reflection smiling back, the same twisted smile that surrounds you, and with that, you awaken.
[[Harp music replaces the mysterious music]]
[Jordan]: “Breathing heavily as you usually do after these dreams, you’ve had this one almost every day since that fateful night so, so long ago. And as you have every night after you awaken, you reach up and touch your cheeks. Just to see if maybe- maybe, this nightmare has finally ended. But alas, as is always the case – you’re still smiling.”
[[Harp music stops]]
[Caitie]: “Thanks, I hate it.”
[Jordan]: “So everyone else at this point wakes up of their own accord, everyone sort of reconvenes over towards Milo, in order to see how he’s doing. He’s a little groggy, but is awake at this point. And as you three approach him, he says-”
[Milo]: Still weakly “Oh, I uhm, I unfortunately got some bad news guys. You did a good job on me doc, but… my leg seems to not really be cooperating right now.”
[Saithe]: “Don’t worry about us. We have high stats when it comes to finding traps, both magic and physical. We’ll handle this without an issue!”
[Milo]: “Right… But- before you do, I uhm, I actually have a favor I need to ask you guys.”
[Jordan]: “And Saithe, you notice that as he does this, he does like a weird sort of scratching mark on his chest. Arlo and Winterra, to you guys it just seems like he’s just y’know, itching at a scratch. But Saithe, you recognize this. This is not just some random notion. The specific way he does it, is actually a hidden message that you know to be a part of thieves’ cant.”
[[Soft piano music plays and gradually builds to heroic sounding through Milo’s story]]
[Caitie]: “Ooooh.”
[Jordan]: “It’s a little hidden message that means – important, listen, remember.”
[Caitie]: “She nods in acknowledgement.”
[Milo]: “Uh – if you guys have the time, you remind me of a story I used to…to be told a lot while I was growing up and it kind of, it helped shape me into who I am. I think it might help you, even now with all this going on. It-it’s called the story of the brothers. It’s about a group of triplets, they were abandoned from a young age, they grew up to be thieves and made quite a name for themselves. The ‘legendary trio,’ they were known all across the Seven Kingdoms, and founded these lands. But they heard of an even greater treasure, beyond that of what the kingdoms could offer. A legendary ancient kingdom that was said to house the greatest treasure of all times. So the brothers talked, and decided that they would find this ultimate treasure for themselves.
So they traveled, ten days and ten nights. They travelled towards this- this lost kingdom, by some stroke of divine luck – they found it! And there were more treasure, gold, gems, than you could ever imagine. But above it all there were two special treasures and the three brothers wanted it for themselves. They saw them as the most valuable but their greed got the better of them. And in the end they all died fighting each other over these two treasures.”
[Jordan]: “And he looks at the three of you and says,”
[Milo]: “When I look at you three I see the potential in those brothers. They became legends for working together and only when they stopped trusting each other did it tear them apart. Always remember that. And if you do run into Elama down there, for me, please, spare her.”
[[Heroic music stops]]
[Jordan]: “Now, for Arlo and Winterra as far as you guys are concerned, Milo just gave you guys a rousing tale and tried to give you guys an important life lesson. And Saithe, while you got that as well, you also noted he did that scratching motion three other times during that story.”
[Caitie]: “Okay, when did he do them?”
[Jordan]: “The first time that he did it was when he said ‘seven kingdoms.’ The second time he did it was when he said, ‘ten days and nights.’ And then finally, ‘two special treasures.’ Those are the three times he did it to signal that it was important.”
[Caitie]: “Noted. Ah, she’s going to thank him in thieves’ cant.”
[Jordan]: “He does nothing but you realize that’s because- thieves’ cant.
[Caitie]: “Yep, fair enough.”
[Jordan]: “So he reaches into his satchel and he pulls out a map! And he hands it to you three, and says-”
[Milo]: “Here – this’ll help you navigate through it. It’s only going to be as helpful as actually navigating the labyrinth itself but, I think you guys should find it still pretty helpful. Be careful, and good luck down there.”
[Arlo]: “I mean, did you draw like the traps and stuff on here or it’s just like a general map?”
[Milo]: “Yeah, I’m afraid it’s just a general map. Unfortunately I can’t afford to have that information be known should it be leaked, otherwise it compromises the entirety of the fortress.”
[Saithe]: “I’ll be able to handle any traps we come across!”
[Milo]: “I had a feeling.”
[[Soft violin music plays that ramps up throughout this next scene]]
[Jordan]: “Alright, so you guys have now been given a map, that is the map that I sent you guys – just a quick little notice on that, the…each room is marked with a number on it. So like ‘R1, R2, R3…’ That is important to this, like to the navigating. The ‘ABC’ for like, entering, that’s just for me to know where you guys enter from. But basically as you enter the pen and step over the tripwire, that you are all aware of, you do see that there are two rooms on the far corners, and then one on the corner to your immediate left.
So how do you guys decide to approach this- oh! Also on the map there are some things that are like written out as the map was originally intended, like ‘storerooms, shaman’s den’ those don’t mean anything, except for the one that says ‘treasure room’ that means something.”
[Drew]: “Neat.”
[Caitie]: “Indeed”
[Jordan]: “Everything else just assume the actual written-in words are not real. There is no ‘worg’ pen.”
[Drew]: “That was the first thing I noticed and I was like, hmm interesting.”
[[Caitie and Christina laugh]]
[Caitie]: “Saithe is going to err on the side of caution and take a swift look around the entryways, just checking each one making sure that there are no surprises, no more runes, no physical traps. Um…basically-”
[Jordan]: “Uh- within just like the open area?”
[Caitie]: “Yeah, yeah exactly. I kinda wanna just-”
[Jordan]: “Yeah, so you see that the only trap in like this main open area seems to be the one at the main entrance. You also do not spot any signs of tampering that may have led to like an arcane trap, like the explosive one that detonated under Milo’s feet.”
[Caitie]: “Uh, okay, so I’m going to head towards entryway ‘C’ again I kind of want to just examine the area, make sure that the entryway to go down is safe-”
[Jordan]: Amused at our distrust of him “You open the door, explosion!”
[Caitie]: “EXACTLY! See, like I just want to be safe about it.”
[Jordan]: “Bro you got a 19, you are quite positive there is nothing else.”
[Caitie]: “Alright, fair enough, fair enough. Alright, just making sure that-”
[Jordan]: “You don’t trust me and I love that.”
[Caitie]: “No of course I don’t trust you! You call yourself the ‘malevolent dungeon master’.”
[[Christina snickers]]
[Jordan]: “Good, never let that go!”
[Caitie]: “No, I won’t. I dunno, Saithe is going to head towards entryway C, I’m, I dunno, Winterra what do you think?”
[Christina]: “Funny enough I rolled to see what Winterra would think, and C was what I landed on so that’s what Winterra was looking at.”
[Caitie]: “Great minds think alike!”
[Jordan]: “Does Arlo have an objection or is he cool with ‘C’?”
[Drew]: “I think ‘C’ is good. We’ll go with C.”
[Jordan]: “Alright, so you guys enter the room for ‘C’ and you see that there is a ladder leading downwards. Erhm, how do you descend into the room?”
[Saithe]: “Allow me to go first! As I have darkvision!”
[Jordan]: “You all have darkvision.”
[Drew]: “I think Arlo points that out.”
[Arlo]: “Well I think we all have some level of darkvision there bud.”
[Saithe]: “I didn’t exactly grow up around enough people to know which races have this ability!”
[Caitie]: “She says as she starts climbing down.”
[Drew]: “You’re like climbing down and Arlo is like-”
[Arlo]: “Wait, no, I, uh, er – alright she’s already gone.”
[Jordan]: “Alright so, Saithe is going down first, who’s going next?”
[Christina]: “I’ll go.”
[Jordan]: “Alright, Winterra follows and then Arlo is last. Okay, so Saithe, you are the first one to make your way into the room. As the other two are climbing down do you just wait by the ladder or is there something else you’d like to do as you enter this room?”
[Caitie]: “Ya girl gonna trap check. I look around the room and just do a sweep.”
[Jordan]: “Alright, that’s just going to be a perception check.”
[Caitie]: “..16?”
[Jordan]: “Okay, as you look around you do see that there are a few switches located on the ground. They’re pretty well hidden, but you’re used to this kind of thing so you do see them. So you are aware of the traps laid about in this area and can see them. Otherwise you don’t see anything of note in the den. Winterra and Arlo also make their way down the ladder, and join you.”
[Caitie]: “Okay, so I’m just going to point out the switches for them, kind of let them know what their purpose is, and what might happen if they’re triggered, just kind of use any knowledge I might have against them.”
[Jordan]: “You can’t really tell what they’re going to do. You can just tell, those are the triggers for the traps-”
[Caitie]: “Oooh, okay. Alright, fair enough.”
[Christina]: “Gotcha.”
[Arlo]: “And, considering what happened yesterday I did make sure to prepare a little something special for us to help get through what is surely going to be a little bit of an arduous ordeal here.”
[Caitie]: “Smart!”
[Drew]: “And Arlo casts ‘Detect Magic’.”
[Jordan]: “Ooooh, very nice. Okay, read me the language on that please.”
[Drew]: “For the duration you sense the presence of magic within 30 feet of you. If you sense magic in this way you can use your action to see a faint aura around any visible creature or object in the area that bears magic. Uhm…and you learn its school of magic, if any. The spell can penetrate most barriers but is blocked by one foot of stone, an inch of common metal, a thin sheet of lead or three feet of wood or dirt.”
[Caitie]: “Ooh lala.”
[Jordan]: “Hm…interesting.”
[Drew]: “I don’t like that you said that.”
[Christina]: “-that way.”
[Jordan]: “Nonono, I-”
[Drew]: “Please unsay it.” Laughs
[Jordan]: “Not everything I say is meant to be evil! Again I am sometimes benevolent.”
[Drew]: “You said that in the most evil malicious way possible. You said it like ‘Hm…InTeReStInG, all the traps are under 3 feet of dirt,’ like nah!”
[[All laugh]]
[Jordan]: “No, no, I’m not going to be that big of a dick. How long does it last?”
[Caitie]: Silently in the background “Maybe”
[Drew]: “That lasts for…up to 10 minutes!”
[Jordan]: “Alright! So from where you’re standing you see that there are two ways you could go. There is a straight path to another adjacent room and then a stairwell that leads down to a different room. From both rooms you see a faint reddish glow. Red you know to be evocation magic.”
[Arlo]: “Alright, both of these rooms got some…some magic in ‘em. Looks to be of the uh…evocation sort, which can mean a lot of things but in my experience it usually means some shit’s going to blow up or catch on fire.”
[Saithe]: “I’m fire resistant but you two would burn up in an instant!”
[Winterra]: Softly “Oh. I don’t like that.”
[Arlo]: “Yeah I’d also prefer that that not be our whole dealio there. Eh…coin flip?”
[Caitie]: “Alright let’s solve this like real D&D’ers and-!”
[Jordan]: Laughs “Under ten this way, under ten that way!”
[Caitie]: “Yeah! Alright, I rolled a 16 so we’ll go towards R5.”
[Jordan]: “Okay! So you guys make your way over to R5. In there you see that the walls are lined with these dragon statues and they’re sort of like just looking down, Arlo, some of them are glowing.”
[Drew]: “Uhm which ones?”
[Jordan]: “Just some of them? I’m not – I dunno?”
[Drew]: “A couple of them are glowing red?”
[Jordan]: “No all, but a few on either side are glowing red.”
[Arlo]: “Uh guys? A couple of these are enchanted. Er-at least magical in some kind of way.”
[Saithe]: “Hm, I wonder what the non glowy ones do?”
[[Music changes to the softer adventuring music]]
[Arlo]: “I mean, to me they are glowing, I can point ‘em out to you but ah, I would advise not to fiddlin’ wit ‘em.
[Saithe]: “Fair enough.”
[Christina]: “Other than the glowing statues is there anything weird about this room?”
[Jordan]: “Not off of just blank asking, if you want to do a roll maybe?”
[Christina]: “Yeah, I’ll roll. 17 plus 4 so 21.”
[Caitie]: “Niiiice”
[Jordan]: “Okay, that’ll do it. So Winterra, you notice something a little bit different, you don’t notice the statues however you do notice that on the opposite end of each of the statues that Arlo pointed out is another pedestal. Similar to the ones that Saithe pointed out in the previous room. You can assume that these are the triggers for the trap.”
[Christina]: “Mmmm. Okay, yeah. Terra points down to the pedestals and she’s like-”
[Winterra]: “Ah, and that must be what triggers them, so let’s not go stand on those in case you had that inkling of an idea.”
[Jordan]: “How do you proceed through, do you- like what- do you try and avoid the switches, do you try and avoid the statues? What do you do?”
[Caitie]: “Avoid alllll the switches.”
[Jordan]: “Okay, so Saithe. You work your way through specifically avoiding all of the switches…and you make it to the other side.”
[Caitie]: “Ayyyyyye.”
[Jordan]: “I assume Winterra and Arlo follow suit.”
[Drew]: “Yep.”
[Christina]: “Yes.”
[Jordan]: “Okay, Arlo you do not see any glowing coming from the next room.”
[Drew]: “Alright guys, this room seems to be generally clear of uh, of magical shenanigans.”
[Saithe]: “But are there physical shenanigans?”
[[Christina and Drew chuckle]]
[Jordan]: “Roll for physical shenanigans.”
[Caitie]: “Perception or investigation?”
[Jordan]: “It’s perception. Unless you give me a specific thing it’s always going to be perception, that’s more generic.”
[Caitie]: “Okay. Uhm… 18!”
[Jordan]: “So as you go in there you see there’s a bunch of chests, 8 in total. You don’t see any switches on the ground, you just see the chests. And each of them does have a very specific lock on them. In theory you might be able to pick the locks on them but you’re not really sure.”
[Caitie]: “No locks can stop me!”
[Jordan]: “You don’t see any immediate sign of like switches on the ground or anything like that though.”
[Saithe]: “There are no locks that can stop me. But we are here to drop treasure off, not take it sooo.”
[Arlo]: “Well if we’re being completely honest with ourselves, he did not say we couldn’t have any of the stuff we find in here.”
[Saithe]: “I mean, do you really want me to pick the lock?”
[Arlo]: “I mean…I don’t want you to do anything you’re not comfortable with.”
[Saithe]: “Okay fine. I guess I’ll open the chest.”
[Drew]: “Yaaaay!”
[Jordan]: “Alright, so you just go up and pick the lock straight up?”
[Drew]: “Wait! Waitwaitwaitwaitwait! Don’t do it!”
[Caitie]: “What do you mean don’t do it!?”
[Jordan]: Tuts in disagreement “No no, you said it. You made your choice, live with it. Saithe, roll a skill check for Thieves’ Tools.”
[Caitie]: “22?”
[Jordan]: “Cool, do you want the good news or the bad news?”
[Caitie]: “Uhhhhh…bad news?”
[Jordan]: “Bad news is you forgot my warning earlier about how perception and investigation are different because investigation is for looking at something specific not generic.”
[[Drew laughs]]
[Caitie]: “You absolute piece of shit”
[Jordan]: “I warned you openly. I was very explicit.”
[Caitie]: “You said that you weren’t always going to be a dick.”
[Jordan]: “So, as you open one of the chests, you do manage to pop it open however, a small needle comes out of the lock and pricks you for…you take a whole 1 poison damage. And now I need you to roll a con save.”
[Caitie]: “12”
[Jordan]: “Oh, well, that’s unfortunate.”
[Caitie]: “God dammit.”
[Jordan]: “Saithe, you feel a little bit woozy and you have now contracted the poisoned condition.”
[Caitie]: “Ugggggh.”
[Drew]: “Oh no, if only someone was a cleric that always keeps protection from poison stocked because they knew that this was going to be some Thieves’ Guild bullshit.”
[Caitie]: “Hell yeah!”
[Jordan]: “Are you going to act on that or are you just bragging that you have it?”
[Drew]: “Oh no, I’m fully doing that.”
[Caitie]: “Awesome.”
[Jordan]: “Okay cool. So you comment that you feel a little unwell and Arlo changes that immediately.”
[Drew]: “I want that to be in character, just like ‘Ooh, I think that thing poked me I don’t feel so good.’ ‘Nah you’re fine’ and I just like slap her on the back with a protection from poison.”
[Saithe]: “Thank you! But fuck you, don’t touch me!”
[Caitie]: “She says, like she’s wiping it off like he was some sort of bug on her.”
[[Christina giggles]]
[Arlo]: “Everyday I try to figure you out and every day I get further and further from it.”
[Saithe]: “We’ve only known each other for a day!”
[Jordan]: “It’s been like 2!”
[[Caitie laughs]]
[Drew]: “I dunno!”
[Jordan]: “Do you do anything else in this room?”
[Caitie]: “I check the chest out”
[Drew]: “Yeah, what’s in the chest dude?”
[Jordan]: “Just disappointment and a little vial of poison.”
[Caitie]: “Okay but is it-”
[Drew]: “Can we have the vial of poison?”
[Jordan]: “It’s used.”
[Drew]: “Awww. You’re used.”
[Caitie]: “Yeah what a waste, I was really hoping there would be something left in it.”
[Jordan]: “No, it’s almost as if the trap was the treasure chest itself to deter people from trying to steal from the fucking Thieves’ Guild. Or something.”
[Caitie]: “Alright man, fine. Moving on. Next room.”
[Drew]: “In hindsight I guess that is pretty obvious.”
[Jordan]: “Liiiittle bit, but you know, thank you for that. Oh, you don’t want to mess with the other chests?”
[Caitie]: “No! No I don’t! We’re moving on!”
[Jordan]: “Seven mooooore.”
[Caitie]: “No!! No.”
[Jordan]: “Okay so you guys make your way down the hallway past this room and you come to a crossroads. You can – Arlo you can kind of see another reddish glow coming from your right, and just looking in and with how much you guys have gone down, plus all that stuff – you can assume that this is the other red room that you saw earlier. To the left, you do not see any glowing immediately.”
[Arlo]: “Everyone be careful, but I’m recommending that we probably go to the left, as it doesn’t seem to be any kind of uh, magical chicanery going on there.”
[Jordan]: “So as you guys head down to the left, it doesn’t take you very long, you go down a little bit further and you find yet another crossroads, this one is a three way crossroad. To the left you do not see any glowing, forward you do not see any glowing, and to the right you do see glowing, it is…pink glowing. And you know pink is for enchantment.”
[Drew]: Mimics a British accent “Enchantment!”
[Arlo]: “Yeah, so I’m seeing what looks to be some enchantment magic over this here way. Uhm- but! Enchantment can be good or bad.”
[Caitie]: “Let’s do it.”
[Jordan]: “Okay, so you guys walk over into the room with the glowing pink, and once again, you see a room filled with chests. This one has a grand total of 6 chests, and Arlo, you see 2 of the chests have the glowing pink the other 4 do not.”
[Caitie]: “Hashtag nope. No. Mm-mm. ”
[Arlo]: “So uh…”
[Saithe]: “No!”
[Jordan]: “There’s also another-”
[Arlo]: “I know last time this didn’t go so well-”
[Saithe]: “Nooo. We’re moving on.”
[Arlo]: “But. I know 2 of these-”
[Saithe]: “No.”
[Arlo]: “-look to be enchanted in some kind of way-”
[Saithe]: “No, hell no, no! Arlo, no.”
[Arlo]: “So maybe, uh…actually no.”
[Saithe]: “Yeah, no.”
[Arlo]: “I’ll use my better judgement on this, we should not touch those.”
[Saithe]: “Right you should. NO! We’re not doing this again!”
[Arlo]: “Hey, you’re fine. You didn’t die.”
[Saithe]: “Well, you know what. I don’t want to. So we’re moving on. No. I don’t want to get poisoned again.”
[Arlo]: “I can’t tell if you’re like upset with me or not ‘cause of the whole smiling thing – I uh, it does seem like you’re unhappy.”
[Saithe]: “I die a little bit inside every time you talk to me.”
[Jordan]: “I assume you guys go past this room?”
[Saithe]: “Yes, let’s go.”
[Jordan]: “Okay, so as you head on over to the treasure room, you come across another sort of intersection, you know that to the left is the treasure room, however there is a large stone door that is covered in runes and does not appear to have any sort of handle or keyhole or anything. Arlo, you see that there is a green glow coming from the room ahead of you, and you know that green is typically for transmutation magic. And then, to the room to the right just across from the treasure room itself you do not see any glowing.”
[Saithe]: “This door isn’t going to budge. Maybe there’s some sort of clues over here in R9.”
[Arlo]: “Hm. That seems like a safe bet. Figure we can go check that out at least.”
[Jordan]: “Okay! So you guys make your way into the room across from the treasure room and inside you see what looks like a small library. There is a large bookshelf in there, past that it’s just various things, like a couple tables, chairs, things like that. Nothing terribly crazy. Otherwise you do not see much of anything.”
[Caitie]: “Okay…Saithe wants to check the bookcases for anything that might stand out.”
[Jordan]: “Okay, roll me investigation.”
[Caitie]: “Alright…that’s 13 and 4- 17”
[Jordan]: “Okay, how…like how specifically are you trying to investigate, like what are you trying to look for specifically in the bookcase so I know how to answer this.”
[Caitie]: “Okay, so I’m hoping to make a connection here going back to Milo’s story that he told us earlier, I’m hoping to find any connections to the way – er, in a way that like…she’s going to look for any titles of books that correlate with 7 kingdoms, 10 days, and 2 special treasures.”
[Jordan]: “Okay, so as you look for those things specifically, what you end up finding is there are 3 books that stand out to you. The 3 books that you find are: ‘The History of Faerun the First 7.’ And this seems to be a book documenting the history of the original 7 kingdoms of Faerun- the world that this adventure takes place in.”
[Caitie]: “Okay.”
[Jordan]: “You find another one that seems to be more of like a storybook titled: ‘Legend of the Hidden Kingdom.’ And then finally you find this big meaty textbook titled ‘The Almanac of Magical Treasures.’”
[Caitie]: “Okay.”
[Jordan]: “Everything else just seems to be, like doesn’t seem to have any immediate relation, these seem to happen to have the closest relation to them that you find.”
[Caitie]: “Okay, um…she’s gonna reach up and take the books.”
[Jordan]: “Alright, you pull out the 3 books. The books themselves appear to be just what they are – books. However, as you pull them out, you do notice that behind each of those books are keyholes.”
[Caitie]: “Okay”
[Saithe]: “Huh, interesting! Milo is one smart cookie!”
[Caitie]: “She’s going to start looking around the room for keys. Like above the door frames, behind pictures and photos, checking for like small boxes, she just kind of wants to find anything that might, that looks like it’s hiding a key.”
[Jordan]: “I will say just as like a general sweep around the room you do not find any lost keys or any place that would make sense for a key to be just stored in this room.”
[Caitie]: “Hmm…”
[Jordan]: “Roll me a personal insight check.”
[Caitie]: “14 and 1, okay 15?”
[Jordan]: “Okay, so as you look around, you get a thought and you realize it’s weird that the books relate to the topic that Milo hinted at, but not the number. Just out of instinct, and just a weird thought, you look back at the map and realize that all 3 numbers he pointed out, coincide with rooms in this dungeon.”
[Caitie]: “Ohhhhh. Oh no. NO! The keys are in the room with the enchantments! Ugggh okay fine. I guess I-I guess, we’ll take a few more for the team. At least Arlo can heal me if I get poisoned again.”
[[Christina chuckles]]
[Jordan]: “So each of the chests that you see has like, the locks on them are a little different than the first ones. This time the locks have symbols on them. You see a symbol for fire, a symbol for water, a symbol for lightning, a symbol of a skull, a symbol of a sun, and a symbol of a crescent moon. Now of the chests that Arlo pointed out, the sun chest and the moon chest are the ones that have the pink glow inside of them.”
[Caitie]: “That would be in reference to the 10 days and nights.”
[Jordan]: “Hey look at you, you figured it out.”
[Caitie]: “Ya girl got the smaaaaarts.”
[Drew]: “Ooooh, such a smartie pants.”
[Caitie]: “Alright, let’s dig into these babies.”
[Jordan]: “Alright, gonna need you to do two separate rolls on this one.”
[Caitie]: “Mmkay, 18 and 4 is 22 for the first one.
[Jordan]: “Alright! You manage to get the sun chest open. And inside you see what looks like half of a key.”
[Caitie]: “Mmkay, so we have one more after this, cool.”
[Saithe]: “Who the hell thinks this shit up!”
[Drew]: “Some manner of mad man.”
[[Caitie snickers]]
[Jordan]: “Probably some sexy benevolent god you hear whispering from some unknown corner of the fourth wall.”
[Caitie]: “Stooooop”
[[Christina laughs]]
[Jordan]: “I will do nothing but.”
[[Caitie also joins in laughing]]
[Christina]: “Oh my goodness.”
[Caitie]: “Alright, 12 and 4, 16!”
[Jordan]: “And the moon chest pops right on open and inside you see what looks like the other half of the first key.”
[Caitie]: “Hella, alright let’s put these babies together and move on to the next room.”
[Jordan]: Maybe a little too quickly “So you pick them up?”
[[Ominous music cuts into regular adventuring music]]
[Caitie]: “Uhhh…yeah?”
[Jordan]: “Roll a wisdom save.”
[Caitie]: “Nooooo! No wait, no wait!!”
[Drew]: Overexaggerated “HA HA HA HA HA”
[Jordan]: “Think about what you say, roll a wisdom save as you pick them both up and put them together..”
[[Caitie laughing at her own demise]]
[Caitie]: “Ugh, 11”
[Jordan]: “As you put the keys together, you think a little thought to yourself.
‘Why am I travelling with these guys? I have my own reasons for joining DAMNED. I don’t need to work with these guys. They’re just deadweight. I mean Arlo even touched me and I told him not to do that. Winterra’s just been minding her own damn business not even helping. I’d be better off without them.’”
[Caitie]: “Oh. No.”
[Jordan]: “And you draw your crossbow-”
[Caitie]: “Oh no.”
[Jordan]: “Saithe, who would you be more likely to shoot at of your two compatriates?”
[Caitie]: “Okay, uh do not take this the wrong way, I hate both of you equally-”
[Drew]: “Swear to god.”
[Caitie]: “Uhmmm”
[[Jordan breaks down laughing]]
[Caitie]: “But Saithe, as evil spirited as she is, is not going to go for the medic. Soooo, Winterra.”
[[Drew laughs out of relief]]
[Jordan]: “So you attack Winterra?”
[Caitie]: “Yeeeaaaah…”
[Drew]: “Woo, not me!”
[Christina]: “That’s fair.”
[Jordan]: “Roll to hit!”
[[Caitie rolls and bursts out laughing]]
[Christina]: Nervously “I hope that’s a bad roll…”
[Caitie]: “Oh no, it is a TERRIBLE roll.”
[Jordan]: “How bad?”
[Caitie]: “I rolled a 2.”
[Jordan]: “Ooooh. Yeah, no. You miss horribly; however, your intention was still very much known, as your two allies look over to you and see you load a second crossbow bolt. Everyone, roll initiative.”
[Caitie]: “Uh…18.”
[Drew]: “I rolled a natural 20.”
[Christina]: “Ooooh…”
[Jordan]: “Jeesus Christ.”
[Christina]: “I rolled a 6, so that’s a 9.”
[Caitie]: “Oh no.”
[Jordan]: “Mmmm. That is super unfortunate, um- okay. So no, Arlo you go first.”
[Drew]: “Alright”
[Jordan]: “Here’s one thing I will say, Saithe is now glowing with pink magic.”
[Arlo]: “Ah. I see what’s goin’ on here.” To Winterra “Don’t worry, she’s not actually turned evil on us or somethin’”
[Drew]: “And Arlo’s just going to try and like I guess like punch her in the head or something.”
[[Christina snorts]]
[Jordan]: “Roll to punch”
[Drew]: “16.”
[Jordan]: To Caitie “Does that hit?
[Caitie]: “It’s…mmm…16.”
[Jordan]: “So that matches. Arlo you would just deal damage equal to whatever your strength modifier is.”
[Drew]: “That’s three damage.”
[Jordan]: “Okay Saithe, you take three damage and come back to, as Arlo just clocks you square in the jaw.”
[Saithe]: “OW. Sonofabitch! What was that for?! What did I tell you about touching me!”
[Arlo]: “Um-”
[Winterra]: “You shot at me. Well, not really, but also, trying to.”
[Saithe]: “Oh!”
[Winterra]: “You’re not a very good shot when you’re trying to hit us, I guess.”
[Saithe]: “I guess that would make me doubly cursed? I admit, my apologies. Luckily it would seem my subconscious-”
[Arlo]: “Aw, look at us becoming a team.”
[Saithe]: “…Er…it would seem my subconscious might have a fondness for you dinguses.”
[Arlo]: Laughs “You know, you’re not so -”
[Saithe]: “No, no hugging, I see the look in your eyes! No hugging. No touching. No.”
[Arlo]: “One of these days I’m going to get that group hug.”
[Saithe]: “No you’re not.”
[Arlo]: “Just you wait. Mark my words!”
[Saithe]: “No. Not happening!”
[Jordan]: Bemused “Alright, so which room are you heading towards now?”
[Caitie]: “Uh…okay so it was 10 days and nights, 7 kingdoms and 2 treasures…”
[Jordan]: “You’re at 10, and your other objectives are in 2 and 7.”
[Caitie]: “Alright, let me look at the map real quick. It looks like R7 is closest.”
[Jordan]: “So as you guys head in there, Arlo you do still see the red glow in there. For this one I’m actually going to say that you can see that the red glow is coming from the ceiling above.”
[Arlo]: “Hm…that does uh, that does present a challenge there. Yeah, so there’s something going on with the whole ceiling of this room it looks like. There isn’t-”
[Drew]: “Is it the whole ceiling or just a piece of it?”
[Jordan]: “It is the whole damn ceiling.”
[Arlo]: “Yeah there’s something going on with the whole, the whole damn ceiling.”
[Caitie]: “Okay, uh-I’ll look for some triggers. Look for the switches.”
[Jordan]: “Roll it!”
[Caitie]: “Uh, okay, that’s a 15!”
[Jordan]: “You see all of the switches on the ground. So you guys manage to make your way over to R7. As you do, Arlo you manage to see a few different glows. You see purple, which you know translates into divination. You also see another glow, which would be yellow for enhancement. And then another pink glow.”
[Alro]: “Looks like this room’s got magic out the wazoo.”
[Winterra]: “Hm…wazoo…”
[Jordan]: “So as you guys head in there you notice that you actually come into a small office area. And it looks like there is just a bunch of – like another small bookshelf, there’s a lot of documentation all over the place, a couple of chests lying around, you can assume this is probably where Milo or whoever happens to be in charge of the run, handles the documentation for the specific run. Like for any interactions with this storehouse.”
[Christina]: “Hm. I was just going to say, is there anything that Winterra notices like right off the bat about the room?”
[Jordan]: “Nothing that I didn’t already say that wouldn’t involve a perception check.”
[Christina]: “Okay, yeah I mean-”
[Jordan]: “Or investigation, if you want to be more specific. If you’re going to do investigation you’re going to need to tell me what you’re investigating, I will not let you do it otherwise.”
[Christina]: “You said in the room there’s like a desk, and there’s like a couple more bookshelves and just like general office equipment?”
[Jordan]: “Mhm.”
[Christina]: “Um…I’m going to take a look inside the desk and see if there’s like anything…anything going on in there. As far as where someone might keep a key. Like hidden, you know like under the desk or like strapped to something weird.”
[Jordan]: “You do not see anything like that; however, as you do look about the desk, you do see a letter. It is wax sealed on the back, with the symbol of an evergreen tree. And on the front, you see that it is addressed to Milo.”
[Christina]: “Oh, okay… Does the wax look new, or does it look like this has been sitting there for a little bit?”
[Jordan]: “It’s had time to solidify but it does have a fresh scent to it. Like you can tell this is recent, this wax only just had time to set.”
[Winterra]: “Hey- hey Arlo! Is there anything like magical about this letter?”
[[The girls are laughing]]
[Jordan]: “There is not.”
[Drew]: “I take a look at the letter.”
[Jordan]: “There is absolutely not.”
[Christina]: “Okay.”
[Arlo]: “Um, nothin’ more magical than you know, the magic of penmanship.”
[Christina]: Giggles “Okay… I’m going to keep the letter and bring it back to Milo when we leave.”
[Caitie]: “Saithe wants to take another look at the bookshelves in this room and see if there’s anything of interest that reminds me of my hint!”
[Jordan]: “So as you look through the bookshelf, yeah you do find another copy of ‘History of Faerun the First Seven.’ One of the books that hid a keyhole in the other office.”
[Caitie]: “Okay, I go to pull the book – WAIT. Waitwaitwait! Nonono, wait, pause! Pause! Um!! Okay.”
[Jordan]: More amusement “Paused.”
[Saithe]: “Argo! Argo, is there anything about this book that’s going to cause-”
[Arlo]: “Are you going to learn my name? You’ve been calling me ‘Argo’ for awhile now. It’s Arlo. With an ‘L.’”
[Saithe]: “Arlo, is there anything about this book that is going to curse, poison, or otherwise injure me?”
[Jordan]: “Arlo, your detect magic tells you that the pink glow is coming from that book, but it looks like it’s coming from inside of the book-”
[Arlo]: “Oh, yeah definitely.”
[Saithe]: “Okay, is there any way we can remove the curse before we touch it?”
[Arlo]: “Um…well I guess I’ll take one for the team here.”
[Saithe]: “I mean, I’m just wanting to come up with an easier way so that we don’t end up shooting each other.”
[Winterra]: “Are we sure the healing one should be doing that? I mean I don’t-I don’t mind doin’ it.”
[Saithe]: “Exactly.”
[Winterra]: “I’m a bear person, I think that’s fine.”
[Saithe]: “ I don’t think anybody should be doing it. If there is an easier way to remove the curse before we touch the cursed item, I-”
[Arlo]: “I have a good idea.”
[Saithe]: “Okay?”
[Drew]: “Um, Arlo pulls the book off of the shelf.”
[Winterra]: “What the heck!?”
[Jordan]: “Okay.”
[[Drew laughs]]
[Jordan]: “Okay, you’re holding the book.”
[Drew]: “Arlo takes like the- I’d imagine he’d have like a carrying pouch or something, like for adventuring purposes.”
[Jordan]: “I assume you all do so yes.”
[Drew]: “Um, he just kind of opens up the pouch and then shakes the book into the pouch.”
[Jordan]: “Ahhh. Okay! So as you do that the book opens to reveal that it was actually a box in the shape of the book and the key falls into the bag.”
[Drew]: “Arlo does a dab.”
[Saithe]: “You’re not as dumb as you look!”
[Jordan]: “Very nice! That was clever!”
[Saithe]: “Definitely not as dumb as I thought you were.”
[Drew]: “Arlo just goes like-”
[Arlo]: “Medical school motherfuckers.”
[[Christina and Drew laugh]]
[Jordan]: “While we’re on the topic on your beautiful magic vision, you do notice that two of the three chests appear to have the aforementioned yellow and purple glows to them.”
[Arlo]: “I’m also detecting some glow from these chests here. So um, we’re probably going to want to – I guess check ‘em out? I’m guessing that this is a – everything in this room seems to be very much tied to you know, what we gotta do to get through the rest of this whole Thieves’ Guild area.”
[Saithe]: Sighs “Okay, fiiiine.”
[Jordan]: “There are three chests in total, how many of them are you going to try and open? Arlo identified the leftmost one as yellow. The middle one is purple, and there is no glow coming from the rightmost one.”
[Caitie]: “Mmkay, Saithe is just going to go for it. I mean she’s probably not going to die, right?”
[[Drew makes a sound on unsurity]]
[Caitie]: “Like, right Arlo?”
[Jordan]: “Which one do you try for first?”
[Caitie]: “Uh…enhancement?”
[Jordan]: “Alright, roll it!”
[Caitie]: “15!”
[Jordan]: “It pops open and inside you see a dagger.”
[Caitie]: “Okay, uh…it’s not going to like curse me is it?”
[Jordan]: “I dunno, is it?”
[Saithe]: “Arlo? It’s not going to curse me is it?”
[Drew]: “Do you like look to Arlo and ask that?”
[[Christina and Caitie both make a sound of like, “of course, why would you ask that”]]
[Jordan]: “Arlo I would say that given your knowledge of magic, and also because of the specific school that this one is, you know that if this thing does somehow cause harm it would have to be the cruelest joke from the most spiteful god in the- in all of the realms. There is no reason why this item should cause harm given the school of magic it is.”
[Caitie]: “Alright well, I guess I’ll just pick up the knife?”
[Jordan]: “Cool! You’ve acquired the ‘dagger of thieves.’ So whenever you roll an attack with this dagger, you can use a bonus action to also roll sleight of hand during that attack to try and steal something off of your attack target. The DC is equal to your target’s AC.”
[Caitie]: “Oh cool!”
[Jordan]: “And as a dagger it just deals 1d4 damage.”
[Caitie]: “Moving on, next chest!”
[Jordan]: “That one also pops open and inside you see a coin.”
[Caitie]: “Alright, I’m just going to pick it up. Pick up the coin.”
[Jordan]: “Alright. This is another pretty powerful magical item that you guys have come across, that I have dubbed ‘The Coin of Absolutes.’ So once per day – not long rest – day, you can use this coin to substitute any dice roll that you don’t like. If you flip a heads, it becomes a Nat 20, or a critical success. If you roll a tails however, it’s a Nat 1, or a critical failure. And, if you’re going to use this, it has to be done before I say what the outcome is.”
[Caitie]: “Okay, fair enough, that’s pretty cool. Can’t wait to use that one.”
[Drew]: “Ooooh.”
[Jordan]: “Are you going to do anything with the third chest?”
[Caitie]: “I mean…”
[Arlo]: “I mean, I dunno the other two had cool stuff in ‘em.”
[Caitie]: “I mean-”
[Arlo]: “Do it, do it, do it! Peer pressure, peer pressure, peer pressure!”
[Caitie]: “See this happened before…”
[Jordan]: “Saithe I’m going to be uncharacteristically nice on this one and I will remind you that if you are truly suspect of this chest, you can roll investigation to see if something is up with this particular chest..”
[Caitie]: “Okay, I’ll roll for investigation. Does 15 work on it?”
[Jordan]: “This chest does not appear to be booby trapped in any way, it is a normal chest.”
[Caitie]: “Ugh, okay fine. Saithe opens the chest.”
[Jordan]: “You open it and inside you find a nice little satchel of goodies! Inside you find three basic healing potions, two vials of antitoxin, and a bag containing 10 goodberries.”
[Saithe]: “You know what, that shrimp owes us for all this bullshit!”
[Caitie]: “And Saithe takes everything in the box.”
[[The other three laugh]]
[Christina]: “Winterra just cocks an eyebrow at Saithe but says nothing.”
[Drew]: “Arlo kind of leans over and he’s like,”
[Arlo]: “Hey, um, you gonna share with the class there?”
[Saithe]: “We’ll divvy it up later!”
[Jordan]: “Okay, real quick question just for me to clarify. You guys are keeping all of your potions and stuff inside a singular bag or are you guys trying to keep track of your own stuff?”
[Caitie]: “I mean I just have my own bag.”
[Christina]: “Right, I have my stuff in my own bag.”
[Drew]: “Yeah same.”
[Jordan]: “So by my count if I am correct, Winterra has three potions, Saithe has six, and Arlo has spells.”
[Drew]: “Yup.”
[Jordan]: “Just making sure I got that right. Okay, you guys moving on to R2?”
[Drew]: “R2D2”
[Jordan]: “Alright, so you guys make your way over to R2. You get through R3 with no problem, and as you work your way in there…once again, can you guess what color you see?”
[Drew]: “Is it red?”
[Jordan]: “Uh, similar, more pinkish! This appears to be just like another sort of a mini storeroom, it’s got like crates and barrels and stuff. There’s a table with some chairs with stuff on it and a chest off to the side. And the chest is what contains the pink glow.”
[Arlo]: “Hm, well there’s definitely something magical in that chest there.”
[Saithe]: Sighs louder “Alright, fine! I’ll open it! But this is the last time!”
[[Saithe and Arlo simultaneously]]
[Saithe]: “You two really need to brush up on your lockpicking skills.”
[Arlo]: “No Saithe don’t do it, don’t be a hero…”
[Drew and Christina laugh]]
[Caitie]: “17!”
[Jordan]: “The chest opens to reveal a key inside and you guessed it, the key is what’s glowing pink.”
[Saithe]: “Alright, how do you want to go about this? I don’t want to touch this thing. I don’t plan on it.”
[Arlo]: “Anyone have a piece of cloth or something or some tongs?”
[Saithe]: “I have a cloak, could we use that?”
[Christina]: “Um, how big is this chest? Like does it look like I could lift it?”
[Jordan]: “Not without a strength check.”
[Drew]: “Oh my god.”
[Christina]: “I’m just going to try lifting the chest and tipping it over, like knocking the key out of it.”
[Caitie]: “But it’s the key that’s cursed, not the chest.”
[Christina]: “Right, I was just saying I was going to get the key out of it without having to touch it, like tip the thing over into a bag or something else like that.”
[Caitie]: “Oh, oh, ohohoh, okay.”
[Jordan]: “Um, alright, roll a strength check.”
[Christina]: “Okay. Oooh! That was a 19 on the die and that’s plus 3 so 22.”
[Jordan]: “Um, you-yeah no you lift it like a halfling, just straight up.”
[Caitie]: “Noice.”
[Christina]: Giggles “Like a half bear!”
[Jordan]: “I was referring to the race, but sure we can go with that too.”
[Christina]: Giggles more “It was just un-bear-able to watch!”
[Drew and Jordan simultaneously]
[Drew]: “Booooo. Nooooooo. Booooooooooo”
[Jordan]: “Oh my Christ I will do so many bad things to you if you do not just empty the key into someone’s fucking bag.”
[Caitie]: “Oh. My. Gooooood.”
[[Christina still giggling]]
[Jordan]: “You dump it into Saithe’s bag and with that you have all three keys! Which route do you take to go back?”
[Caitie]: “It looks like the simplest way would be to go through R8? To go past it? Looks like-”
[Jordan]: “You’d have to go through it. I know it’s confusing on the map, you’d have to go through R8.”
[Christina]: “Mm.”
[Caitie]: “Okay yeah-”
[Jordan]: “And you do not yet know what’s in there.”
[Caitie]: “Well let’s, let’s-”
[Jordan]: “Actually you do know there’s transmutation magic in there, Arlo did see that earlier.”
[Caitie]: “Oh yeah, fair enough.”
[Drew]: “Truth.”
[Caitie]: “Is that something we need to worry about?”
[Arlo]: “Uhm, transmutation magic can get pretty fucky. I’d avoid it if we don’t need to go through there but if we’ve got to then we’ve got to.”
[Winterra]: “It is the most direct way down to the storeroom from here.”
[Saithe]: “The only other way would be to go all the way back around. I agree.”
[Jordan]: “So, you guys make your way through R8- as you do, kind of similar to one of the earlier rooms you went into, this one is filled with armor displays that are facing towards the hallway that you guys are walking through. And as you may have guessed, each of them is glowing green.”
[Caitie]: “Mmmm. Let’s roll for some investigation for switches!”
[Drew]: “So Arlo just kind of relays to everyone that like the suits of armor that are the things irradiating the magic.”
[Jordan]: “Roll it!”
[Caitie]: “15!”
[Jordan]: “You might be shocked to find this, but you do in fact see all of the switches.”
[Caitie]: “Alright, let’s get across that room baby!”
[Jordan]: “Cool, you guys make your way through R8, undeterred by the random glowing green armor.”
[Drew]: “Yaaay!”
[Jordan]: “At this point, Arlo I would say your 10 minutes of magic detection is up.”
[Drew]: “That’s fair.”
[Jordan]: “I think it’s more than fair, I could have called that one way earlier if I had wanted to but I kind of enjoyed this too.”
[Drew]: “Probably yeah.”
[Jordan]: “Alright! So you guys make your way back to R9!”
[Caitie]: “Okay! So we need to get these keys in the holes but I don’t want to touch them directly.”
[Jordan]: “Yeah I was wondering how you guys were planning on doing this part.”
[Christina]: “You said you had a cloak, right?”
[Caitie]: “Oooh, you’re right! Okay, Saithe is going to take off her cloak and wrap it around her hands and I guess hesitantly reach for a key.”
[Jordan]: “Which one’s the first key?”
[Caitie]: “Um, I guess I should probably go in order of the hints, like 7. 10, 2?”
[Jordan]: “Yeah, you’re able to pick up the key and insert it into the 7 kingdoms keyhole, and you hear a click.”
[[Drew and Caitie Simultaneously]]
[Caitie]: “Yaaay!”
[Drew]: “Yay!”
[Caitie]: “Alright, on to the next one?”
[Jordan]: “Alright, you pick that one up, turn it into the appropriate hole and click”
[Caitie]: “Hey hey hey! Alright. And last but not least, number 2!”
[Jordan]: “You insert it there, you hear a click, and then you start to hear a rumbling from outside of the room towards the direction of the treasure room.”
[Caitie]: Musically “We did it! We did it, we did it, hey! Orisimos, we did it!”
[Drew]: Also Musically “We made it through the dungeon, and nobody died! Yaaaay, we did it!””
[Catitie]: “We did it, we did it, we did it, okay!”
[[The adventuring music stops as Drew and Caitie laugh]]
[Drew]: “Is this what you expected, you expected ‘Dora the Explorer’ musicality from us?”
[[Drew and Caitie keep laughing]]
[Jordan]: “I have learned not to expect anything from you guys.”
[Caitie]: “I would hope for nothing less.”
[Jordan]: “And I think is, is as good a spot as any for us to pause our tale for now, you absolute assholes.”
[Caitie]: “Oh you love us.”
[Jordan]: “Thank you guys so much for listening, if you enjoyed what you heard then head on over to our patreon over at patreon.com/agentsofdamned to not only support the show but get week early access to out next episode which will most likely be the climatic finale of the Thieves’ Guild arc. And, if you want to hear some more of our thoughts on it, then you can also check out our aftershow, ‘Peek Behind the Screen.’ A fun note on that one, due to some weird audio issues that we encountered while recording the last couple sessions, there will not be individual episodes of ‘Peek Behind the Screen’ for episodes 3 or 4 and instead it will be a big grab bag of things for episodes 3, 4 and 5 which will be coming out on – for all Patreon subscribers – will be coming out on May 15th. So check that out if you like what you saw, don’t forget to leave us a review on iTunes, that’s something that we probably should have been asking y’all to do just help us out – we’re still relatively new, only episode 4, share with a friend, everything like that. Real quick we’ve got some plugs!
If you guys need any assistance with something along the lines of creating a logo, or anything that would require a graphic artist, I’m not well versed in everything that they do, apparel designs, things of that nature, then you should check out ‘Black Feather Graphics.’ They are an independent – burps – sorry I’m pretty gassy right now – they’re an independent freelance graphic artist, all their work is on their website – truly truly exceptional work, it speaks for itself. Just look out their portfolio and give them a call.
If you are looking to celebrate some sort of an event, a birthday, happy quarantine, whatever! Then check out the local Charlotte bakery, ‘Just Cheesecakes by Tina Rose’ find them on Facebook at ‘Just Cheesecakes by Tina Rose,’ as the name suggests they do cheesecakes! All kinds of cheesecakes – big cheesecakes, little cheesecakes, fruity cheesecakes, candy cheesecake, whatever you can think of, they got it! So find them on Facebook at ‘Just Cheesecakes by Tina Rose.’
Drew my man, you up!”
[Drew]: Doing a weird alien voice “Mmmm- Kinetic Concepts Personal Training”
[Jordan]: “I’m going to cut you off right there-”
[Drew]: Laughs and uses a normal voice “Kinetic Concepts Personal Training, based out of Charlotte, NC – look us up on Instagram. We’ve got scientifically proven, tried and true workouts for you that are personalized to you. We’ve also do group exercise and things of that nature, and especially during the current times where a lot of people are like ‘Oooh I’m gonna use this time at home constructively to get a workout in and I know as well as anyone it can be hard to actually get in to it or it can even be hard to figure out what you need to do to get the results that you’re looking for. Contact your boy Drew over at ‘Kinetic Concepts Personal Training’ and we can get you all set! Virtual sessions are you know still rolling.”
[Jordan]: “Hey that’s going to do it for us. Again, don’t forget to check us out on patreon, as well as our other social medias. Check us out on facebook, twitter, and instagram, all at ‘Agents of DAMNED.’ Next episode comes out to you guys- again if you’re a patreon on May 15th, otherwise comes out on May 22nd! Uh- until then, bye!”
[Caitie]: “Bye guys!”
[Christina]: “Byyyyee!”
[Drew]: “Byyye, tweet about the show!”
Agents of DAMNED 