The Agents travel into the Midnight Woods to speak with Winterra’s family about what’s been going on in town. But what truly awaits them in this seemingly gleeful family reunion?
Transcript
Into the Woods
[[Intro music plays]]
[[Adventuring music plays]]
[Jordan]: “Hello everyone, and welcome back to Agents of DAMNED! Our DnD let’s play podcast featuring myself, your sometimes benevolent, often malevolent dungeon master – Jordan Roman. And as always I am joined by my fellow players:”
[Caitie]: “Hi guys, I’m Caitie and I play Saithe!”
[Christina]: “Hey guys, I’m Christina- I play Winterra.”
[Drew]: “And I’m Drew McClain and I play the good doctor Arlo Agon.”
[Jordan]: “Guys it is time at last for a family reunion of ursine proportions. And fuck am I excited for this one!”
[Caitie]: “Let’s do it!”
[Jordan]: “Now hold on there, I’m with you on that, but I think we need a recap first. So last time, the Agents finished their meal at Big Betty’s after their intense conversation with Ash. After filling their bellies with the questionably wholesome, yet oddly empowering food, everyone set out to meet with Seebo to help with the experiment he mentioned to Winterra. Rightfully apprehensive at first, the Agents eventually agreed to help in exchange for some magical items. After nearly killing Saithe, Seebo declared the experiment a success and sent the Agents on their way. Meeting back up with Second Chance, the Agents spoke with Raiann to report their findings for the day. Raiann told the Agents and Second Chance to find out why Ash was in Silverymoon; but, to avoid direct confrontation at all costs. That night, Winterra had a dream about a time with her father where he gave her some encouragement to help cope with her feelings about a mysterious person named Oliver. The following day, Second Chance went to speak with Granaphor and Sisava to gather more information while the Agents went to The Midnight Woods to speak with Winterra’s parents. On the way over to Terra’s home, they were ambushed by a large creature that grabbed Winterra from behind and lifted her high in the air, crying out-”
[Winterra’s Father]: “MY DAUGHTER!”
[Jordan]: “And so we resume our tale.”
[[Music shifts to rawhide drum music with piano]]
[Jordan]: “Arlo and Saithe, you guys just see this large bearlike creature grabbing Winterra tightly from behind and just flailing her about wildly and honestly Arlo for you being a doctor – concerningly – you’re almost positive Winterra’s spine is now severed amongst all this but they are still laughing merrily and just seem to be y’know, doesn’t look like anything’s wrong other than – again – likely spine severage. What do you guys do?”
[Caitie]: “Saithe is just gonna turn to Arlo like-”
[Saithe]: “Are all fathers like this?”
[Arlo]: “Um…well I mean the intent…yeah…for the most part. Ehh, but – wait, wait a minute why don’t you – eh, we’ll delve into that later. But yeah, in general, yeah. Just less um, I guess WWE wrestling moves performed on each other.”
[Jordan]: “So this goes on for several minutes before this large being eventually puts Winterra down and spins her around so that they’re facing each other and says-”
[Winterra’s Father]: “My daughter, it’s been so long since I’ve seen you! What brings you back?”
[Winterra]: “Well, we…have some business in um, Silverymoon, and I- we have questions for you guys. But I don’t know if out in the regular forest is a good place to ask about them.”
[Winterra’s Father]: “Ah, of course. The woods are always listening. And you never know when someone from that town might actually be here – trying to drain the woods of its natural resources…the leeches! How ‘bout we head back to the cave?”
[Winterra]: “Sounds like a plan!”
[Winterra’s Father]: “Excellent!”
[Jordan]: “He turns over to Arlo and Saithe and kind of leers at you guys for a bit before turning back to Winterra-”
[Winterra’s Father]: “I assume they’re with you, yes?”
[Winterra]: “Oh! Yes! This is Arlo, and this is Saithe!”
[Christina]: “And she leans in and is like-”
[Winterra]: “Don’t ask about her smile if she takes off the mask.”
[Winterra’s Father]: “Is it wrong to be happy?”
[Winterra]: “…it’s not that kind of smile.”
[Winterra’s Father]: “Sounds confusing! I’ll just not ask questions, I tend to leave the thinking to your mother.”
[Winterra]: “Okay!”
[Winterra’s Father]: “Well, if you two are friends with Winterra, then you’re friends of the Darknight family. Come with me!”
[Jordan]: “And he just starts marching on down the woods.”
[Winterra]: “Come on guys!”
[Drew]: “I guess we just kind of follow after them.”
[Jordan]: “Alright, so you guys follow down for a little bit, and Winterra for you it’s a very familiar sight, you’ve walked these woods several hundreds of thousands of times, this once was your home. But for Arlo and Saithe you’ve never seen anything quite like this. You still see all the usual wildlife and forestry and plans and all that stuff around you but it all feels slightly off. There’s a sort of magical element to it that you just can’t quite explain. The flowers seem more lush and vibrant! More colorful, and even some of the animals they seem a little bit bigger than usual. Not like alarmingly so but just…just everything’s a little bit off. Some are different colors than you’re used to. And as you guys are going along, there’s actually this one particular plant that catches all of your attention. Even you Winterra- ‘cause it’s not one you’ve ever seen before. It’s this weird collection of reddish yellow bulbs that seem to be in like this bush, the bulbs are about the size of a human head.”
[Christina]: “Hm…”
[Drew]: “Jordan if you take me to the god damned feywild.”
[Caitie]: “How is Modi reacting to our surroundings?”
[Jordan]: “He’s kind of just sitting on your shoulder trying to stick as close to you- he’s more or less like glued to the side of your head. He’s not terribly crazy about all this.”
[Caitie]: “So he’s just uncomfortable.”
[Christina]: “So is it like an adult human head or like a…child’s head?”
[Jordan]: “It’s not an actual head, that was just a size comparison.”
[Christina]: “Right – I’m just…”
[Jordan]: “Uh…okay then adult.”
[Christina]: “Oh, okay. Those are very large.”
[Jordan]: “Let me just pull out my lexicon of different head sizes for comparisons since I know that stuff!”
[[Christina and Caitie laugh]]
[Drew]: “About the size of the head of a 22 year old frenchman. To be precise.”
[Jordan]: “You know Brock Lesnar’s head? It’s about size-”
[Drew]: Interrupting “That’s a big ass head!!”
[Jordan]: “One Brock Lesnar head.”
[[Christina giggles]]
[Drew]: “That’s top tier head. That’s like the upper percentiles of big ass heads.”
[[Jordan laughs]]
[Drew]: “Brock Lesnar, if for some reason you end up listening to this podcast please don’t come to my house and rip my arms off.”
[[Christina stifles a laugh]]
[Jordan]: “Also, please Andrew for the love of god never speak about Brock Lesnar and say the phrase ‘top tier head’ ever again.”
[Drew]: “You don’t know Brock Lesnar’s life! You don’t know what kind of head he could give! He might give excellent head, don’t like count that man out.”
[Christina]: “Ummmmm.”
[[At the same time as each other]]
[Jordan]: “Coming to your defense, Brock Lesnar please don’t come to Andrew’s house and kill him.”
[Drew]: “Again Brock Lesnar please don’t beat me to death with your giant strong man arms.”
[[Drew and Jordan laugh]]
[Jordan]: “Okay, so getting back on topic. Do you guys do anything?”
[Caitie]: “Nope!”
[Christina]: “Um, I mean I’m gonna say out loud like-”
[Winterra]: “Huh! Never seen this plant in the forest before.”
[Jordan]: “As you say that, your father turns around – in case I haven’t said it yet, his name is Ulric and he would’ve introduced himself as that, I just forgot to – so Ulric turns around, he sees it and is like-”
[Ulric]: “Oh!” Pauses “Shit.”
[Winterra]: “That’s not good.”
[Jordan]: “And the bush starts to rustle and then vines come out from the ground and it latches onto the trees around you and it literally pulls itself out of the ground and you see a mangle of corpses-”
[Christina/Winterra]: “Um!!”
[Jordan]: “-hidden within its roots that have now been unearthed. Everyone roll initiative.”
[[Faster paced piano battle music starts]]
[Christina/Winterra]: “What the fuck?”
[Caitie]: “What the fuck, doo doo, doo doo doo.”
[Christina]: To herself “Oh nice!”
[[Drew and Jordan laugh at Caitie]]
[Drew]: “What if that was like the final fantasy battle start music but like for us. Every time an encounter starts it’s just ‘Manamana, doodoo, doodoodoo.”
[[Jordan, Caitie and Drew laugh]]
[Jordan]: “I think the best one of that is I’m thinking of the dragon turtle at the beginning.”
[Caitie]: “Oh god!”
[Drew]: Chuckles “And then from the sea rises a great dragon turtle – manamana, doodoo, doodoodoo.”
[[Jordan and Caitie also start singing parts of the song]]
[Drew]: “And then the turtle is the one who finishes it he’s just – doodoodoodoo.”
[Jordan]: Laughs “What’s your fucking initiative?”
[Drew]: “Oh damn, I got a 17!”
[Christina]: “22.”
[Caitie]: “Mine’s only a 12.”
[Jordan]: “Wow, the person with the best initiative bonus.”
[Drew]: “Damn Saithe.”
[Caitie]: “I know.”
[Jordan]: “Okay.”
[Caite]: “That’s why it’s a 12. Because my initiative is so high.”
[Jordan]: “That’s concerning. Winterra, you’re up.”
[Christina]: “Okay. Um…yeah, so Winterra is going to say-”
[Winterra]: “What the fuck??!”
[Christina]: “Out loud, and like immediately become aggressive towards whatever the fuck this is, and I’m going to call lightning on this thing.”
[Jordan]: “How does that work?”
[Christina]: “Ye- let me pull up the language…a storm cloud will appear in the sky centered on a point that I can see – blah blah blah – when you cast the spell choose a point that I can see within range, a bolt of lightning flashes down from the cloud to that point, each creature within 5 feet of the point must make a Dex saving throw. The creature will take 3d10 lightning damage on a failed save or half as much damage on a successful. And then on each of my turns until the spell ends I can use my action to call down lightning in the same way, hitting the same point or a different one.”
[Jordan]: “Alright…so you said I need to make a Dex saving throw?”
[Christina]: “Yes.”
[Jordan]: “Oooh! Um..it hits.”
[Christina]: “It hits? Okay! 18..19, 21, 22, 23!”
[Jordan]: “23, nice!”
[Christina]: “Yeah!”
[Jordan]: “Yeah, it did not like that.
[Christina]: “Um, hopefully not! Yeah, so I’m going to call lightning down on it and then as a bonus action I’m going to shift into my longtooth form.”
[Jordan]: “Cool, alright. So that is this thing’s turn now. And the first thing it is going to do, you see one of the bodies on this thing – it has this sort of what looks like purplish green spores rain down onto it, and it starts to move.”
[Caitie murmurs excitedly/wigged out]]
[Jordan]: “And that particular body plops down and starts moving towards…we’ll say Winterra since she’s the one that made it rain down lightning.”
[Christina]: “Right.”
[Jordan]: “It is just going to try and hit you…gonna take a stab in the dark and say a 22’s gonna hit?”
[Christina]: “Yeah, unfortunately.”
[Jordan]: “Alright, that’s going to be 4 bludgeoning damage!”
[Christina]: “Okay.”
[Jordan]: “And then the creature itself…is going to lash one of its vines out at you. Does a 14 hit?”
[Christina]: “No.”
[Jordan]: “Alright, you’re good on that one. Arlo, you’re up!”
[Drew]: “So Arlo after seeing all this happening is gonna be like-”
[Arlo]: “I, no, none of your – macabre death tree corpse body bullshit, get on out of here, c’mon, git! Git!”
[Drew]: “And then he’s going to cast command.”
[Jordan]: “Okay…”
[Drew]: “I’m gonna need a wisdom saving throw. Now, the command I’m trying to use is ‘flee’ which is: ‘the target spends its turn moving away from you by the fastest available means.’ Um, but I would like to say officially that the command is ‘git’.”
[Jordan]: “Okay…”
[Drew]: “Gone, git!”
[Christina]: “…git.” Chuckles
[Jordan]: “Does 19 pass?”
[Drew]: “Um, it does but also fuck you.”
[Jordan]: Chuckles “It stays hanging in the tree, it does nothing.”
[Drew]: “Alright, that’s my turn.”
[Jordan]: “Next up is actually going to be Big Daddy Ulric.”
[Caitie]: “Get it!”
[Jordan]: “So, he’s going to charge at this zombie and he’s going to swing his great club… He kills the zombie. He just smashes it right down.”
[Ulric]: “Hands off my daughter you stupid plant!”
[[Christina snickers]]
[Ulric]: “Are you alright sweetie?”
[Winterra]: “I’m fine!”
[Ulric]: “Okay, good.”
[Jordan]: “That’s all he’s got for right now, he can’t unfortunately get over to this thing, um- Saithe you’re up.”
[Caitie]: “Nice. Alright, okay so…Saithe is gonna put up her hood and she’s gonna try to sneak and get herself in a position that her comrades are not in front of her but the creature is.”
[Jordan]: “Alright, so you want to hide behind a tree or something?”
[Caitie]: “Yeah!”
[Jordan]: “Alright, can I assume you’re using your…what’s it called, er – cunning action for that?”
[Caitie]: “Yeah.”
[Jordan]: “Okay, go ahead and roll me a stealth.”
[Caitie]: Chuckles “29.”
[Jordan]: “I’m sorry, one more time?”
[Caitie]: “Yeah, you heard me. 29. I rolled a nat20. Oh wait! You know what it would actually be, 38 because I have double proficiency right now!”
[Jordan]: “Oh my fuck that’s right.”
[[Drew and Caitie laughing in the background]]
[Christina]: “Oh my goodness. It’s a, she turns invisible kind of scenario.”
[Drew]: “Well damn. Well good god damn.”
[Jordan]: “You guys just look over to confirm that Saithe is okay and there is zero trace that she even ever fucking existed.”
[Drew]: “I think for a second we wonder if we ever really met her, or if we just hallucinated her the entire time.”
[Ulric]: “Wasn’t there another one of you?”
[Arlo]: “I’ve gotta be honest, I’m not actually sure anymore.”
[[All laugh]]
[Caitie]: “Alright, so-”
[Jordan]: “Just ceases to exist from the timeline.”
[[All are laughing still]]
[Jordan]: “Okay, what do you do with the rest of your turn?”
[Caitie]: “Alright, so now that I am hidden and am a safe distance away from my comrades, and facing the monster, I want to use burning hands.”
[Jordan]: “Well how does burning hands work, can you read that for me?”
[Caitie]: “Yeah, so it says- as you hold your hands with thumbs touching and fingers spread, a thin sheet of flames shoots forth from your outstretched fingers. Each creature in a 15-foot cone must make a Dexterity saving throw. A creature takes 3d6 fire damage on a failed save, or half as much damage on a successful one.The fire ignites any flammable objects in the area that aren’t being worn or carried. fire ignites any flammable objects in the area that aren’t being worn or carried.”
[Jordan]: Rolls “Does a 13 pass?”
[Caitie]: “So my spell save is also 14.”
[Jordan]: “Oh, well I rolled a 13 so it does not pass, light it up.”
[Caitie]: “3d6! 5, and 6, and 3!”
[Jordan]: “Alright, so that’s 14 damage. Alright yeah, what was that last line you said about its effect again?”
[Caitie]: “A creature takes 3d6 fire damage on a failed save, or half as much damage on a successful one and ignites any flammable objects in the area. So if it’s hanging on a tree the tree is also going up.”
[Christina] Realizing “Oh!! Oh no!!!”
[Jordan]: “Yeah no, it was hanging between two trees that are now in flames.”
[Drew]: “Oh no why!”
[Christina]: “Oh no!!!”
[Caitie]: “Because I like causing trouble.”
[Christina]: “Oh my-”
[Jordan]: “This’ll go over real well with the forest protectors based on ‘Smokey the Bear.’”
[Drew]: “Yup.”
[Caitie]: “Yeaaaaaah…”
[Drew]: “Everyone knows, Smokey the bear is all about causing forest fires.”
[Christina]: “Welp. There goes my initial plan now I have to change what I was about to do. Thanks Saithe, Appreciate that.”
[Caitie]: Unapologetically “Sorry”
[Jordan]: Amused “You have no time for that one now, you’re up Winterra.”
[Drew]: “Oh god.”
[Christina]: “You’re good. I actually have a spell that will work for this, let me pull it back up. It’s fine… Are both the trees on fire?”
[Jordan]: “Yes”
[Christina]: “And if so how much is on fire right now?”
[Jordan]: “As of right now, it’s like the sides of each one that it was holding onto are on fire, and it’s starting to spread up into like the brush of the tree.”
[Christina]: “Okay.”
[Jordan]: “Ulric is freaking the fuck out. He is not okay with any of this.”
[Christina]: “Okay um…can I get within 10 feet of the, like if I move in close enough can I get within 10 feet of the trees, where the fire is?”
[Jordan]: “You can, but you would also be within 10 feet of this thing.”
[Christina]: “Okay, so I’m gonna like, kind of crouch down in like my bear form and look over from where the fire came and be like-”
[Winterra]: “Watch. It.”
[Christina]: “And then like jump kind of, towards the fire, and as I do I want to cast, once I’m there, I want to cast Warding Wind. So I think if you use another concentration spell, it drops your previous concentration spell, right?”
[Jordan]: “What concentration spell – oh right!”
[Christina]: “Call Lightning”
[Jordan]: “Right, yeah no. You can only do one concentration based spell at a time.”
[Christina]: “Yeah, so it’ll drop my Call Lightning to do this, but it is a strong wind and it blows around me in a 10 foot radius, and it moves with me, remaining centered on me. The spell lasts for up to 10 minutes and it has the following effects: it is going to extinguish unprotected flames, it says that are torch sized or smaller, so if there’s like smaller portions of the fire it’ll put that out, um, it’ll deafen me and other creatures in the area, it’s difficult terrain for the other creature- I’m fine ‘cause it’s not on me it’s around me, um-”
[Jordan]: “Mhm.”
[Christina]: “And ranged weapon attacks have disadvantage in the area.”
[Jordan]: “What’s the range on this thing again?”
[Christina]: “10 feet.”
[Jordan]: “Before this happens, once you land and you’re within 10 feet of this thing, I need you to make a constitution saving throw.”
[Christina]: “Okay… Eh, that’s average…it’s a 12.”
[Jordan]: “Unfortunately that is not going to pass.”
[Christina]: “Okay.’
[Jordan]: “As you get in there, you start to cast the spell, but then you feel something enter your lungs and all of a sudden you can’t breathe.”
[Christina]: “Ooh.”
[Jordan]: “You hunch over, you can’t do anything you’re completely in a technical term-”
[Drew]: “Winterra, don’t you have advantage on saving throws from Big Betty’s?”
[Jordan]: “You do!”
[Christina]: “Oh right!”
[Jordan]: “Roll it again!”
[Christina]: “Okay. Thanks!”
[Drew]: “I gotchu homie.”
[Jordan]: “And do better this time, please.”
[Drew]: “I just called my wife homie and I feel weird about that.”
[Christina]: “Okay, that’s so much better that’s a nat20.”
[Caitie]: “Yay!”
[Jordan]: “Yeah no, okay, so everything I just said-”
[Christina]: Relieved “Oh my god.”
[Jordan]: “-didn’t happen.”
[Caitie]: “It was just a bad dream!”
[Christina]: “Phew! Okay.”
[Jordan]: “Yeah no, so you actually cast the spell, your lungs feel fine, I don’t know where that first thought came from, just weird. You cast the spell and the flames do start to, they get reduced significantly, to the point where it’s just small – it’s not going to spread anytime soon, you’ve more or less contained it quickly enough.”
[Christina]: “Mhm.”
[Jordan]: “As you did enter the 10 foot range, you smell just the worst most foul smelling thing imaginable.”
[Christina/Winterra]: “Uck.”
[Jordan]: “Alright, so that is going to be the creatures turn, once again it’s going to start shaking some spores loose and another corpse is going to drop down and-”
[Christina]: “Into difficult terrain!” Chuckles
[Jordan]: “Coincidentally, you’re right on top of this thing, so that’s not really a big deal. And it is going to, they’re both going to attempt to hit you.”
[Christina]: “Okay.”
[Jordan]: “Does a 16 hit?”
[Christina]: “No it doesn’t! My AC is 17.”
[Jordan]: “The zombie flails past you like a fucking idiot and the tentacle attempts to lash out at you but the wind from your spell just kind of causes it to veer off course and it misses entirely. That is going to be Arlo!”
[Drew]: “Alright, so um – what’s like in my general area? Like if we had to pick an arbitrary amount of space, what is within 15 feet of me in any direction?”
[Jordan]: “Within 15 feet of you is presumably your target, Winterra, Ulric, some trees and bushes and stuff. That’s kind of all the relevant stuff I can immediately think of.”
[Drew]: “Alright, I just wanted to make sure so I didn’t wiff this because I’ve been waiting to cast this for awhile and I’m excited about it.”
[Christina]: “Oh boy.”
[Jordan]: “I’m scared but go on.”
[Drew]: “So Arlo casts the spell that he gained during his level up time and that he gained from working on his cleric skills, Spirit Guardians.”
[[Christina chuckles]]
[Drew]: “So the spirit guardians appear around me, and they’re around me within 15 feet of me for the duration, enemy creatures within 15 feet gotta make a Wisdom Saving throw, so need a wisdom saving throw. On a failed save they’re going to take 3d8 radiant damage. Now the way that this appears is that the spirits all look like draconic music star, Ronnie Flash, playing one of his hit songs, Spectral Horseman Amongst the Clouds.”
[Christina]: “Oh my goodness.”
[Drew]: “A song that is different from any song on Earth. Y’know if I just picked a random song that it sounds nothing like, ‘Johnny Cash’s Ghost Riders in the Sky,’ it sounds nothing like that. But that’s playing all around you. That song, that sounds nothing like that song I mentioned.”
[Christina]: “Is the spell’s language specific to enemy or is is enemy and friends?”
[Jordan]: Done with Drew’s shit “So everything proceeds the way you want to, but Andrew you, you in real life, take 10 psychic damage.”
[Drew]: “Ah, my brains!”
[Jordan]: “Yeah, they both failed their saves spectacularly. So do what you want to do.”
[Drew]: “Neat! Let’s roll some damage.” Rolls “That’s gonna be 17 damage.”
[Jordan]: “On both of them?”
[Drew]: “I mean do you want me to roll it separately for each one?”
[Jordan]: “I mean the zombie’s dead anyway so…these things don’t have a lot of health.”
[Drew]: “Yaaaay!”
[Jordan]: “Daddy’s turn! So Ulric is going to run up to this thing – unfortunately that means he now has to make a con saving throw…”
[Christina]: In the background “And I don’t know if he’s good at those…”
[Jordan]: “Most things that roll a 19 would be considered good at those.”
[[Drew and Christina chuckle]]
[Jordan]: “He just, like his nose kind of scrunches up because he also now smells this horrid, foul, odor and he’s like-”
[Ulric]: “Ah god, what the- I hate these things!”
[Jordan]: “And he is going to take two swings at it. That…fully fucking hits, and that one barely hits but he still hits.”
[Drew]: “Man that plant must not smell ‘bear-y’ good.”
[[Pause]]
[Jordan]: “Andrew take ten more psychic damage.”
[Drew]: Sarcastically “Oh no! My mind!”
[Jordan]: “Alright, so this thing takes a pretty powerful beating from big bear dad. It is starting – not bloody but sappy? I guess- would be the right word.”
[Caitie]: “Gross.”
[Christina]: “Probably smells worse…”
[Jordan]: “Oh yeah no, this thing is – it’s smelling worse by the hit. Saithe you’re up.”
[Caitie]: “Okay, so…I want to sneak over to one of the trees that it’s hanging on and climb up it to the length of where its tendrils are hanging on.”
[Jordan]: “Just to clarify something, you did say that your stealth bonus was an 18 right now, right?”
[Caitie]: “Yes!”
[Jordan]: “Yeah no, you don’t even need to roll them right now you’re good.”
[[Caitie starts giggling]]
[Jordan]: “This thing’s passive perception is less than your bonus, you’ll pass.”
[Caitie]: “Woo.”
[Drew]: “Damn son.”
[Caitie]: “I’m gonna draw my shortsword and try to cut its tendrils so that it is only hanging from one of the trees.”
[Jordan]: “Alright, roll to hit.”
[Caitie]: “21”
[Jordan]: “Roll damage.”
[Caitie]: “5 plus 3- 8!”
[Jordan]: “So you do a pretty decent cut on this thing, it’s not quite enough to sever its grip.”
[Caitie]: “Okay.”
[Jordan]: “But it does not appreciate what you have done at all. Back up to the top of the order, Terra you’re up again!”
[Christina]: “Okay cool! Um…”
[Jordan]: “Wait, hold on a second!”
[Christina]: “Wha-?”
[Caitie]: “Hm?”
[Jordan]: “I just realized we forgot to do something. Caitie, you attacked while hidden – you finally get to do sneak attack damage!”
[Caitie]: “Awwwww yeah!”
[Drew]: “Oh my good golly gosh.”
[Jordan]: “It only took us 9 fucking episodes. But Saithe finally gets to use sneak attack, roll 2d6.”
[Drew]: “Oh.”
[Caitie]: “Sneak attack!!”
[Drew]: “Oh my.”
[Caitie]: “I feel like I’m in one of those PeeWee Herman episodes where somebody sets-”
[[Drew and Jordan laugh]]
[Jordan]: “I feel like the rest of us are in an audience watching ‘Dora the Explorer’ and we’ve been yelling at you for the last ten minutes and you’ve finally solved your own damn puzzle.”
[[Christina chuckles]]
[Caitie]: “11.”
[Jordan]: “Okay, there we go. Okay, Winterra you were saying? Sorry I didn’t mean to interrupt you. I just realized this momentous occasion that could not be ignored.”
[Caitie]: “Wait, wait! Did I still not cut through the- did I still not cut through the tendril?”
[Jordan]: “Oh actually! No yeah! With that it does fall off and kind of smacks into the other tree.”
[Caitie]: “Whoo!”
[Christina]: “Okay, so I’m gonna see-!”
[Jordan]: “Okay now Winterra.” Laughs
[Christina]: “Yeah, so I’m gonna see that happen and go-”
[Winterra]: “That’s a good idea.”
[Christina]: “And go to try to do the same thing on the other, on the other tendril…with my scimitar.”
[Jordan]: “Alright, roll to hit!”
[Christina]: “Okay, so that’s a 16 to hit.”
[Jordan]: “Roll damage.”
[Christina]: “Okay…oooh! Okay, 9 damage and then I also want to use my shifted bonus action which is an unarmed piercing bite, if that doesn’t completely cut it.”
[Jordan]: “It does not completely cut it, it’s barely hanging on so go ahead and roll that.”
[Christina]: “Okay. Um, a 15 to hit?”
[Jordan]: “Uh, it’s gonna fall off no matter what but go ahead and roll your damage.”
[Christina]: “Okay…5 damage!”
[Jordan]: “Yeah no, it does in fact plop onto the ground, it is looking real, real bad. This thing…if plants could look like they’re on death’s door, this plant looks like it was on death’s door.”
[Christina]: “And as soon as I finish biting it, I’m gonna make an extremely disgusted face and kind of spit off to the side, and be like-”
[Winterra]: “That was the most disgusting thing I’ve ever put in my mouth. I want to kill it.”
[Caitie]: “Giggity.”
[Jordan]: “This thing tastes like what Big Betty’s food should taste like.”
[Winterra]: “Uck.”
[Arlo]: “C’mon Winterra, you can ‘bear’ with it!”
[[Caitie laughs]]
[Jordan]: “10 more psychic damage you bitch.”
[Drew]: “She chose a bear shifter and I have been saving bear puns, the time is now!”
[[Jordan sighs deeply]]
[Christina]: “And that’s all I can do this turn.”
[Jordan]: “Alright, so it is now the creature’s turn-”
[Drew]: “It should make another wisdom saving throw on the start of its turn.”
[Christina]: “Nice!”
[Jordan]: “Mother fucker-”
[Drew]: “I told you I’ve been waiting on this shit.”
[Jordan]: “Do your damage.”
[Drew]: Rolls “12 damage.”
[Jordan]: “Okay, so as I was saying…this time it’s actually going to instead of shaking off spores it is going to wrap itself, like its tentacles, around one of the bodies and sort of absorb it into itself.”
[Christina]: “Mmm…”
[Jordan]: “Almost as if it’s taking in nutrients – ie, healing itself.”
[Drew]: “Ruh-roh.”
[Jordan]: “And it is going to then attempt to climb itself back up into the tree… Sathe and Winterra are you both still in the trees?”
[Caitie]: “Yeah, I have an idea but I can’t do it until it’s my turn.”
[Christina]: “Um, yeah and I still have warding wind up.”
[Jordan]: “Hm, well this thing is in a real tough pickle.”
[Drew]: “Hey, isn’t that difficult terrain right now ‘cause of all the wind?”
[Christina]: “It sure is!”
[Drew]: “Seems like you’re right fucked.”
[Jordan]: “Yeah it is. Hm… Yeah seems like this plant is having a real real bad time. I guess it’s just going to keep on doing what it’s been doing and try and hit Winterra.”
[Christina]: Mostly sarcastic “Fun, I love being this thing’s focus.”
[Jordan]: “So it does hit and you will take 9 damage and I need a con saving throw out of you.”
[Christina]: “Okay…”
[Drew]: “Remember the advantage”
[Christina]: “For maintaining my spell or for otherwise?”
[Jordan]: “Ah, well I guess I need two con saves out of you.”
[Christina]: “Well, yeah…one concentration and then constitution…”
[Jordan]: “Yeah, one’s a con save one’s a con check.”
[Christina]: “Okay…” Searching through modifiers to make sure she isn’t missing something
[Jordan]: “They’re both con saves basically.”
[Christina]: “Okay, alright. So this first save…da daa…15!”
[Jordan]: “Alright that passes. And now for the other thing with the tentacle attack.”
[Christina]: Rolls “Okay… that one is an 18.”
[Jordan]: “Oh! Um yeah, alright you’re fine. I also realized I have actually been playing this thing wrong, it’s supposed to make more attacks but whatever.”
[Drew]: “Also quick aside – ‘the other thing with the tentacle attacks’ sounds like a very poor translation of a japanese porn.”
[Jordan]: “I think I’ve seen that one.”
[Drew]: “Why??”
[Jordan]: “Moving on.”
[Drew]: “No, not moving on!”
[[Christina snorts and Drew laughs]]
[Jordan]: “Arlo, you’re up.”
[Drew]: “Alright, how’s the plant dude looking?”
[Jordan]: “Well, it has had two of its tentacles cut off, flopped into a tree, and then slapped onto the ground, it can barely move, it just ate a zombie. So…you tell me.”
[Drew]: “So it’s…it’s not looking great. I just don’t-”
[Jordan]: “It’s had better days. It’s had significantly better days.”
[Drew]: “Alright. Arlo’s gonna charge up some holy energy into his hands and say-”
[Arlo]: “By the power of Bahamut’s beautiful…balls I…I cast you to death!”
[Drew]: “And he shoots a guiding bolt at him at third level.”
[Christina]: Laughing hysterically “Wha??”
[Drew]: “I WAS TRYING TO DO ALLITERATION AND IT – I DIDN’T REALIZE.” Starts laughing “That I couldn’t think of anything other than…”
[Caitie]: “Balls?”
[Christina]: “Other than balls.”
[Jordan]: “Roll with legitimate disadvantage.”
[Christina]: “‘Could’ve said brain…brawn…”
[Drew]: Chuckling “That’s a 19.”
[Jordan]: “You don’t feel anything. Roll your damage.”
[Drew]: “That’s gonna be 18 damage.”
[Caitie]: “Jesus.”
[Jordan]: “By Bahamut’s balls, you got the exact number you needed to kill it.”
[[Christina and Drew chuckling]]
[Christina]: “Nice!”
[Arlo]: “Fear the power of my god’s mighty sack!”
[Jordan]: “Oh god no!!”
[[Drew laughs maniacally]]
[Christina]: “His god is somehow just amused enough at his antics, with that roll.”
[Jordan]: “Somewhere Bahamut weeps.”
[Drew]: “But what if Bahamut likes that? What if Bahamut is like – ‘yeah, fear my sack!’”
[Christina]: “Oh my…good golly goodness.”
[Jordan]: “The platinum dragon known for his chrome cubes.”
[Drew]: “Why would they be cubes?”
[Jordan]: “He’s a god, don’t worry about it.”
[Drew]: Giggling “That seems like a medical issue!”
[Jordan]: “No he’s fine. So yeah, as this radiant light strikes this creature, it just immediately just starts to wither up. The corpses that were still hanging in it sort of fall loose from it and it’s just a shiny withered up ball of…plant.”
[Drew]: “I had missed being a full caster. This is nice. I like this.”
[[Jordan, Christina, and Drew laugh as the battle music stops]]
[Jordan]: “So Ulric walks up to this thing and he says-”
[Ulric]: “Whichever one of you set the forest on fire…can you at least finish the job and burn this thing?”
[Caitie]: “Saithe is gonna hop down from the tree and just-”
[Saithe]: “I sincerely apologize for my lack of thou-”
[Ulric]: “JUST BURN THE CORPSE.”
[Saithe]: “Yep!”
[Caitie]: “She does as requested!”
[Jordan]: “So yeah. Everyone hops out of the tree who was in a tree, burn the withered remains of this thing, and Ulric speaks up and says-”
[Ulric]: “This is some weird invasive species. Your mother’s referred to it as a corpse flower? They’ve been showing up every once in a blue moon. We’ve just gotta be sure to kill the damn thing so they don’t start eating all the natural creatures and occasionally people. Mostly the animals though.”
[Winterra]: “Mmm. How long have they been showing up? How recently?”
[Ulric]: “Eh… a few months now.”
[Winterra]: “Hm.”
[Ulric]: “Well, let’s get back!”
[Jordan]: “And he starts walking off.”
[Christina]: “So I think this is the first time that Winterra has shifted around you guys too, so like bear in mind, she goes from being a decently tall shifter to almost 7 foot something bear…bear thing. It’s like, pure almost black eyes while that was going on so she’s gonna unshift, for now, and be like-”
[Winterra]: “Ugh, I hate bad smelling…gross things…”
[Christina]: “And then keep walking.”
[Arlo]: “Heya, Winterra – I’ve actually never seen you do your whole bear transformation there, and I gotta say it’s ‘berry cool!’”
[Drew]: “And he gives you finger guns.”
[Saithe]: “Arlo…”
[Christina]: “She frowns and she’s like-”
[Winterra]: “I thought the word was very?”
[Arlo]: “I…we’ll work on that, we’re gonna work on puns, they’re the highest form of comedy.”
[[Slow melodious piano music plays with a rawhide drum beat]]
[Jordan]: “So you guys walk along for a decent bit, and eventually you come into this clearing in front of a cave. And it’s actually got a nice little setup. There’s what almost looks like a sort of outdoor house but y’know, there’s just no house. So you have a table with chairs made of rock and wood, seems to be just all sorts of furnishings and stuff, but it’s also very simplistic. Pretty much a place for them to spend time together. And then inside the cave if you guys were to take a peek in there you would see a couple of like, what look like not bedrolls but basically just piles of a sort of bed mound would probably be the best way to describe it, four in total. So Ulric turns to you all and says-”
[Ulric]: “So your mother’s out right now, she had to go do something in the woods. She should be back soon though. Erhm, not quite sure where your brother’s at, what was it you needed to talk about?
[Winterra]: “Right. So, we’re on business in the town, and we were brought there because of an unusual um… election that’s happening.”
[Ulric]: “Hm…”
[Winterra]: “Um…”
[Christina]: “And she kind of pauses for a second and then she says-”
[Winterra]: “There’s a beholder and yuan-ti in the town, running in the election the beholder specifically, um…and I don’t remember ever seeing either of these things near here before.”
[Jordan]: “So as you say that he does appear to be a bit caught off guard- roll me perception.”
[Christina]: “Woo, that was an 18 plus 5 so 23.”
[Jordan]: “You see a bush rustle just out of the corner of your eye, and as you turn towards it you see a very familiar large bearlike creature barrelling at you.”
[[Christina laughs]]
[Jordan]: “Instinctively you reshift -this won’t count as one of your shifts for the day, it’s just for flavor- um…”
[Christina]: Amused “Okay”
[Jordan]: “As you brace yourself as your brother tackles you. You and your brother get to wrestle.”
[[Music shifts to a heavier drum beat]]
[Christina]: “Oh my god.”
[Drew]: “Fair.”
[Jordan]: Amused “Alright, so here’s how this little wrestling match of yours is going to work. It’s going to be a best two out of three, athletics roll offs.”
[Christina]: “Oh my gosh. Okay.”
[Jordan]: “Alright so, first one, go ahead.” Rolls
[Christina] Sighs “Mmm…16.”
[Jordan]: “So he gets the jump on you but because you saw him coming you were able to sort of anticipate it, so as he jumps you sort of flip him over you and land on top of him. That first one was yours.”
[Christina]: “Okay…”
[Jordan]: “Alright, one more…” Rolls
[Christina]: Rolls “Ooh, non nat20.”
[Jordan]: “Oh wow, that is-”
[Christina]: “That was a 17 on the die.”
[Jordan]: “-that is impressive, unfortunately as you go to pin him he sort of manages to roll back on top of you just growling viciously-”
[Winterra/Christina]: “What the fuck?!”
[Jordan]: “He got that one. Last one, let’s see who wins this.” Rolls
[Christina]: “Okay…uh – 17.”
[Jordan]: “So you manage to push up just a bit almost enough to get him down, but then at the last second he puts his full weight down and pins you.”
[Winterra]: Sighs heavily “Ugggggh.”
[Winterra’s brother]: “HAH! Gotcha again!”
[Winterra]: “God I hate you so much.”
[Winterra’s Brother]: “Good to see you too Winterra.”
[[Music returns to the piano/rawhide drum tune]]
[Jordan]: Amused “So he shifts and gets off of you. And in his unshifted form, he’s actually rather slender, and even regardless of whether he’s shifted or unshifted, he’s actually slightly smaller than Winterra. He’s more of a sort of lean build as opposed to more of Winterra’s muscle. You see that he has two scimitars on his back and a quiver attached to his waist. Winterra there’s also one particular thing that you notice that’s a little bit different about him, his right arm has a patch on like the top of his forearm that’s now missing hair that used to be there, and on top of it is this weird black mark that almost looks like an arrow.”
[Christina]: “Hm!”
[Jordan]: “And that was not there the last time you saw him!”
[Christina]: “She’s gonna go to grab his hand and arm and try to inspect the spot like-”
[Winterra]: “What’s this? Where did this come from?”
[Winterra’s Brother]: “Oh! Uhm, so the patch and the arrow are two entirely different things. The patch was me trying to help out someone in town, not sure if you’ve heard of him he’s this asshole named Seebo?”
[Winterra]: “Oh my gosh!”
[Winterra’s Brother]: “Yeah, he asked me to help him out with this weird experiment, blew up on my arm- fortunately I was fine but the hair would not grow back for like months…to ever honestly. But then, a couple months ago I found this weird snake guy just lying in the woods and helped him out and he gave me this – I think he called it a tattoo? To kind of cover it up.”
[Winterra]: “Wait, a weird snake guy?”
[Winterra’s Brother]: “Yeah Nnelg! He lives in town, he’s pretty cool!”
[Winterra]: “Hm…interesting. Okay?”
[Winterra’s Brother]: “It’s actually got magic powers, wanna see?”
[Winterra]: Cautiously “Sure…”
[Jordan]: “Alright, so the next thing you see him do is actually grab the swords off of his back and sort of ‘shink’ them out, and then he puts – you notice that the swords are a little bit weird. They’re scimitars but at each end one has a small hook, the other one has like a small hole. He hooks them together and then pulls and a small wire comes out of the hook end – he puts the two ends of the swords together and twists, and the wire goes taut, and he’s essentially converted his two scimitars into a large bladed longbow.”
[Winterra]: “That’s pretty cool.”
[Jordan]: “He then pulls out an arrow from his quiver and as he pulls back the arrow mark starts to turn from black to white as it lets out this mystic glow, and he shoots it, the arrow, into a tree and then immediately grabs another one and shoots again and it hits the exact same spot splitting the arrow clean down the middle.”
[Drew/Arlo]: “God dammit that’s cool.”
[Winterra]: “Wow!”
[Winterra’s Brother]: “Yeah, couldn’t do that before! This thing kind of helps me aim a lot better.”
[Winterra]: “Hm…well… I mean that is really cool, and it seems pretty helpful for what you do.”
[Winterra’s Brother]: “Oh yeah, definitely. Makes sniping out the intruders way, way easier. Speaking of, what’re you doing here?”
[Winterra]: Chuckles “Uhm, well…so you know how I left and I joined up with that group, DAMNED?”
[Winterra’s Brother]: “Oh yeah!”
[Winterra]: “Yeah, so we’re actually in town on business. We’re there because of the snake people actually, since it doesn’t seem like they used to live in the town before. Specifically, it kind of seems like there’s a beholder running in the election too. So they just want to see what’s going on there. Uhm, you said you’re friends with one of these guys right? So, what do you think about everything?”
[Jordan]: “You noted that as you said beholder Eirwin’s eyes get real, real wide. And he’s like-”
[Eirwin]: “I did not know that Nnelg knew a beholder…also what election are you talking about I have no idea what any of this is.”
[Winterra]: “Oh the town, Silveryleaf- they’re running an election for their leader.”
[Eirwin]: “Oh.”
[Winterra]: “So yeah…”
[Eirwin]: “That sounds like a mom question, not a me question.”
[Winterra]: “Well…what do you know about these people regardless? Since you said you’re friends with one.”
[Eirwin]: “Um…”
[Jordan]: “He thinks about it for a second and then he kind of realizes-”
[Eirwin]: “Wait, you mean there’s more than just Nnelg there now?”
[[Christina laughs]]
[Winterra]: “Um, maybe. How long – when was the last time you visited him?”
[Eirwin]: “Well I mean we’ll usually meet up in the forest just to chill. But I haven’t like been in town with him for like…the last few months.”
[Winterra]: “Mmmm. Okay, gotcha. Okie dokie.”
[Jordan]: “And based on y’alls information you know the yuan-ti tribe didn’t show up until about a month ago.”
[Christina]: “Hm, okay.”
[Jordan]: “And Winterra, I would also say that you know that if your brother does not know about this, there is no chance in hell your father knows because he does not go into town for any reason.”
[Christina]: “Nope.” Chuckles
[Winterra]: “Ah, yeah, alright. Definitely a mom question.”
[Jordan]: “As most questions are.”
[[Christina chuckles]]
[Drew]: “That’s some real ass shit just from life.”
[[All laugh]]
[Caitie]: “Right?”
[Jordan]: “Life is stranger than fiction my friends!”
[Caitie]: “Fair enough.”
[Drew]: “Dad can I go do this? Ask your mother.”
[Jordan]: “Dad, why are there yuan-ti in the village? Ask your mother.”
[[Christina laughs]]
[Drew]: “I’m a dad now and like…I do that. I never thought I would, I would just be like- I don’t fucking know, ask your mom.”
[Christina]: Deadpan “It’s exhausting.”
[[Jordan and Drew laugh]]
[Drew]: “I just don’t know and just- ‘ask your mother I don’t fucking know.’ They have so many questions about things.”
[Jordan]: Still laughing “Oh my god.”
[[Drew still laughing]]
[Jordan]: Composing himself “Alright, so you’ve been informed that your mom is not going to actually be back for a little bit ‘cause she’s off doing some stuff in the forest. Is there anything you would like to do with Ulric and Eirwin for the time being, like just try and gather any other information that’s not related to the immediate situation or just fucking whatever, or do you just want to chill and wait for Holly to show up?”
[Christina]: “Well I mean I’m just gonna kind of be like-”
[Winterra]: “Well how have you guys been? What’s been going on recently?”
[Jordan]: “They just kind of look at each other and shrug. Ulric’s the first one to speak up.”
[Ulric]: “Well I mean, we’ve had people come in, if they do you know, things that are harmful to the woods we kind of beat them up, sometimes we’ll eat their knees…the usual…”
[[Christina laughing gleefully]]
[Winterra]: “Oh, okay!”
[Arlo]: “Wait, is that knee thing real?”
[Ulric]: “Yeah? Why wouldn’t it be?”
[Winterra]: “Yeah!”
[Jordan]: “And he kind of wipes his mouth as he says it.”
[Arlo]: Uncomfortably “Mmmmmm.”
[Winterra]: “Did you think I was joking?”
[Arlo]: “I…I had hoped. But-”
[Winterra]: “Oh.”
[Arlo]: “-but we’ll shelf that for now. Put that in the file of things that we really should talk about but probably never will.”
[[Christina chuckles]]
[Saithe]: “I agree!”
[Jordan]: “You see Ulric speak up-”
[Ulric]: “Oh, did you want to know the best way to eat them?”
[Arlo]: “I…I’m actually on this specific diet that prohibits eating anyone’s knees. So uhm, I would, but well shucky-darn, it’s just not in the cards for me right now.”
[Jordan]: “Ulric turns to Eirwin and says-”
[Ulric]: “City people…”
[Jordan]: “And they just kind of nod at each other.”
[Saithe]: “I imagine that knees are more muscle and tendon than anything. Are they chewy?”
[Jordan]: “Their mouths start to water and they just nod aggressively.”
[[Christina chuckles]]
[Drew]: “Arlo looks at Saithe with abject horror.”
[Saithe]: “What? I was curious!”
[[Drew and Jordan laugh]]
[Saithe]: “You can’t blame a girl for being curious can ya?”
[Arlo]: “I…so many times you say things, and I don’t know what to say back to them. This is one of those very many times Saithe.”
[Saithe]: “That’s probably fair.”
[Winterra]: “Other than the topics of what we normally consume, I mean, this is my dad and this is my brother, guys! If you want to talk to them feel free, otherwise we just have to wait until my mom gets here ‘cause she knows a little bit more of the goings on of town ‘cause y’know, she goes in town more often than I think most of us did before I left the forest.”
[Drew]: “I go up to Winterra’s brother, I go-”
[Arlo]: “So, Eirwin, whatchu guys do for fun around here?”
[Eirwin]: “Oh! Um, well usually – I’m actually the ranger around here. So I tend to be the one who’s more like a scout. So I just kind of jump around in trees and make sure no one does anything unsavory to the forest. Like say…set the trees on fire, or something really stupid like that.”
[[Over each other]]
[Arlo]: “H-ha, yeah…that would be…ridiculous-”
[Saithe]: “I already apologized!”
[Arlo]: “-if anyone DID that.”
[Jordan]: “Eirwin immediately looks over Arlo’s shoulder as Saithe says that with a death glare.”
[Eirwin]: “What was that?”
[Saithe]: “Nothing!”
[Arlo]: “D-don’t mind her!”
[Jordan]: “He just glares and slowly shifts his attention back over to Arlo.”
[[Christina chuckles]]
[Eirwin]: “Yeah, if I ever saw someone do something like that or found out about it, they’d probably never wake up again because they would find an arrow between their eyes and knees off of their legs…”
[Arlo]: “So! Not to try and distract you from that train of thought, but wanna like, y’know go out and just shoot some beer cans or something cool like that? That doesn’t involve murderin’ my friend Saithe?”
[Eirwin]: “What’s a beer?”
[Arlo]: “Do…do you want to go shoot at some shit?”
[Eirwin]: “Sure!”
[Arlo]: “Hell yeah!”
[Eirwin]: “Do you know where any good forest intruders are?”
[Arlo]: “Um…we could do some practice shots?”
[Eirwin]: “Okay.”
[Jordan]: “Alright, so you and Eirwin go off to shoot…I guess he’s gonna shoot arrows, what are you going to shoot?”
[Drew]: “I think I…hold on let me check…I think I have a crossbow, just standard equipment. Yeah, I have a light crossbow.”
[Jordan]: “Alright, roll me a ranged attack real quick.”
[Drew]: “That’s not too bad, that’s a 16.”
[Jordan]: “You guys are actually pretty evenly matched when you do it. Like you’re pretty on par with each other. But he is, because of the magic tattoo that he has, he is ever so slightly accurate than you are.”
[Saithe/Caitie]: “Can I join?”
[Jordan]: “Are you sure you really want to?”
[Caitie]: “Yes!”
[Jordan]: “Alright. Roll me a wisdom save before you roll a ranged attack.”
[Caitie]: “Unnatural 20.”
[Jordan]: “As you join, Eirwin is like glaring daggers at you the entire time but you’re used to it so it doesn’t bother you at all, go ahead and roll your ranged attack.”
[Caitie]: “A 17.”
[Jordan]: “You are actually about very much on par with Eirwin like you’re able to mirror every shot he does. And he is visibly not happy about that.”
[Christina]: “Winterra walks up behind him and does like that brother-sister thing where she punches him in the shoulder she’s like-”
[Winterra]: “Lighten up big brother. Besides, if there was a hypothetical fire, it would have gotten put out anyway because I’m here.”
[Jordan]: “Roll persuasion with advantage.”
[Christina]: “Okay…first one was a 17, second one was a 12, so 17.”
[Jordan]: “You’re fine. He’s like-”
[Eirwin]: “Alright…I guess I’ll let it go this time. But next time I’m eatin’ her knees! We’ve got a standard to uphold, you know this!”
[Saithe]: “Sounds fair!”
[Christina]: “She looks back at Saithe, she’s like, she shrugs, she’s like-”
[Winterra]: “I mean…you get one.”
[[Drew laughs]]
[Jordan]: “Everybody gets one.”
[Drew]: “You get one! Everybody gets one…”
[Jordan]: “Everyone knows that ‘spiderman’ got his motto from the Darknights.”
[[Drew and Christina laugh]]
[Jordan]: “Oh god.”
[Drew]: “Again, just imagining like Christina’s[Winterra’s] father descending on a group of like little boy scouts or something, that didn’t put out their campfire and they’re just like- ‘we’re real sorry mister-’ and he’s like ‘you get one!’ and then just backs away into the trees.”
[[Jordan, Christina, and Caitie laugh]]
[Jordan]: “No he would literally jump back up the same way he jumped down.”
[Caitie]: “Oh my god.”
[Jordan]: “Oh, alright…”
[Drew]: “The entire boy scout troop disbands, just never again.”
[[Music changes to violin music]]
[Jordan]: “So a couple hours pass, I would say at about this point it’s about noon or so, and sure enough, Holly does show back up. Holly looks very similar to how Winterra does, but with a smaller, less muscular frame and also much more aged. But not in like a ‘she looks older,’ but a ‘she looks wisened,’ type of way. And as soon as she sees Winterra, she immediately has this look of shock, followed very quickly by elated joy as she runs over and gives you a big – by default- bear hug.”
[Christina]: “Winterra hugs her mom back, she’s like-”
[Winterra]: “Hi mom!”
[Holly]: “Sweetie! It’s so good to see you! I wasn’t expecting to see you again so…soon! Did everything go okay?”
[Winterra]: “Yeah! Everything’s fine! We’re actually in the town nearby on business. Um…”
[Holly]: “Ohhh, okay… What’s the mission?”
[Winterra]: “Well I mean…so what have you heard so far about any…you know, new faces in town relating to this election that’s going on?”
[Holly]: “You mean besides Granaphor?”
[Winterra]: “Yeah no…that’s…that’s the main question.”
[Holly]: “I kinda had a feeling. Granaphor’s kind of an…odd case in this one. You see, he showed up with the Yuan-ti-”
[Jordan]: “She looks over to Eirwin.”
[Holly]: “Not Nnelg.”
[Jordan]: “And then brings her attention back to you.”
[Holly]: “About a month ago or so, and at first everyone was understandably concerned about it. Even when I showed up to do my thing, it was- they were definitely not well received, very much outcasts. It wasn’t the easiest thing in the world to see but…they have a reputation. They usually stick to the valley that they’re from but the strangest thing is, after about a week – literally after a week- everyone seemed okay with them. Like, almost overnight. They went from being afraid and nervous to treating them like they’d always been there.”
[Winterra]: “Saithe, what was that, that you said the other day in the call…about the…what did you call it? Um…”
[Saithe]: “Amulet- the charm!”
[Winterra]: “Oh, the charm?”
[Saithe]: “Mhm.”
[Winterra]: “Yeah!”
[Holly]: “The charm? Who had a charm?”
[Saithe]: “I met Granaphor and his assistant. When Granaphor started to lose himself, and go into a state of…an inability to control himself, his assistant raised a charm which glew, er-which glowed and then he became calm again!”
[Holly]: “Hm, sounds like some sort of an enchantment charm… That is strange…I suppose it could be some form of hypnosis or even an emotion based one, it’s hard to tell without being able to get a good look at it.”
[Winterra]: “Well mom, that’s the thing. Y’know, it only seems like outsiders to the town are worried about anything. You said it yourself, everyone in the town after like a week has been okay… so what if whatever this is, or whatever they’re doing or however this is going on takes a week?”
[Jordan]: “I need all of you to roll me insight checks real quick.”
[Christina]: “Ooh! 17…5…23!”
[Drew]: “14.”
[Caitie]: “22!”
[Jordan]: “Winterra and Saithe, you guys as you are having this conversation sort of come to a weird epiphany. Not only is it the people who have been there for awhile, but there’s also one other notable exception to the people who seem to not be falling in line with this. And that is-”
[Drew]: “The other candidates-”
[Jordan]: “Almost.”
[Christina]: “No, the girl candidate.”
[Jordan]: “Niavara. The elf.”
[Drew]: “Oooooh.”
[Christina]: “Because they’re immune!”
[Drew]: “To what?”
[[Over each other]]
[Jordan]: “Charmed.”
[Christina]: “Charmed, being charmed! Yeah!”
[Drew]: Sharp intake of breath “Ohhhhh sneaky sneaky.”
[Jordan]: “Mhm.”
[Saithe]: “Is it possible that they could be broadcasting somehow?”
[Holly]: “I don’t know how they would do something like that but…I suppose it’s possible? Magic is…there’s endless possibilities really.”
[Winterra]: “Have you noticed anything weird on the edges of the forest?”
[Holly]: “Not necessarily. Like I said, the only thing I’ve noticed was the abrupt change and as you’ve pointed out to me how the travelers seem to be immune to it and apparently this Niavara – she was the one who was Allustrial’s apprentice, right?”
[Winterra]: “Mhm.”
[Holly]: “Ah yes, she was normally a bit of a shut in before her master’s passing. So, I didn’t really know her that well. Hm…I’m not really sure what to make of all of this.”
[Saithe]: “How often are you in town?”
[Holly]: “Once every other week usually. Just to visit, check in, make sure everything is okay. Make sure they understand to respect the forest, all that stuff. Lest we take drastic measures but we don’t need to talk about that now.”
[[Winterra/Christina giggles]]
[Arlo]: “Are the drastic measures the eating of people’s knees?”
[Holly]: “Oh no, no. That’s standard, I mean something far worse.”
[Arlo]: Pauses “I…I am concern.”
[Winterra]: Quickly “Eh don’t worry about it.”
[Holly]: Sternly “Well if you ever want to find out why don’t you go ahead and destroy a section of forest and I’ll be glad to show you.”
[Arlo]: “No thank you.”
[Holly]: Sternly “Good answer.” Back to mom voice “Is there anything else I could maybe help you with? I’m sorry I can’t give you more information than that, that’s really all I know.”
[Saithe]: “Do you know if there’s anybody else in town who might have more information?”
[Holly]: “Uhm…hm. Well if what you said is true about Niavara then she’d probably be the only one who can provide you with any sort of information without being obstructed by whatever this enchantment magic they’re doing is. Since she seems to be the only one who’s fully immune to it.”
[Christina]: “Winterra leans back, kind of stares up at the forest like she’s thinking and like she sighs really deeply like she’s very deep in thought.”
[Winterra]: Sighs “This…just worries me mom. I don’t want anything to happen to you guys.”
[Holly]: “Well, fortunately I recently made my run in town so I won’t be there until well after this election anyway is over so unless they come into the forest I think we should be safe and even if they do, we have the home field advantage.”
[Christina]: “Winterra smirks. She’s like-”
[Winterra]: “Yeah, that’s true.”
[Holly]: “You be sure to be safe out there as well alright?”
[Winterra]: “We will, we’re not supposed to be in town for…more than a week. Huh.”
[Holly]: “Well at the very least you shouldn’t be under the effect of the charm since it took a full week for that to happen so…”
[Winterra]: “Yeah.” Breathes in deeply “Okay, well definitely don’t stay for more than a week, got it!” Chuckles nervously
[Jordan]: “She goes in to give you a hug again and just whispers into your ear.”
[Holly]: “Please be safe. I can’t lose you too.”
[Winterra]: “I will mom, I promise.”
[Jordan]: “She pulls away and looks at you, you can see there’s a strong amount of pride in there, she’s, she pulls away and-”
[Holly]: “Well, don’t let me keep you from work! You do what you need to do. I have my own duties here that I still need to attend to so… But if you do need anything else please, don’t be a stranger.”
[Winterra]: “Definitely not. Thanks again!”
[Holly]: “Of course.”
[[Music transitions back to town harp music]]
[Jordan]: So, now what do you guys do?”
[Drew]: “Well right now I’m hearing the song ‘landslide’ play in the background of my mind, making me feel my own emotions.”
[[Christina giggles and Jordan chuckles]]
[Drew]: “Which I refuse to allow!”
[Jordan]: “Is anyone not dealing with an existential crisis have some input on what you’d like to do next?”
[Christina]: “I think we should just like head back to the town.”
[Jordan]: “Alright, does anyone have any objection to that one?”
[Caitie]: “Nope!”
[Drew]: “I think that’s a good course of action. I think we should regroup with team Second Chance but I’m already starting to get an idea of the plan but I want to see what info they gathered first.”
[Jordan]: “Okay! So you guys make your way back, fortunately since you guys already managed to make the trek once there’s nothing too, too crazy that you run into along the way. You do go past the site of the corpse flower battle and see in fact it is still a pile of burnt charred little husk so that was fully taken care of.”
[Christina]: “That’s good.”
[Jordan]: “Unfortunately the forest has burned down in its place – no I’m kidding.”
[[All chuckle]]
[Drew]: “Oh fuck you.”
[Jordan]: “So you guys make it back to town and as you head over to try and find Second Chance, you pass by the town square where there’s a bunch of shops and stuff and just kind of waiting around you actually do see Second Chance just kind of speaking to an albino yuan-ti that’s just sitting at a stand.”
[Drew]: “You have a lot of albinos in your campaign.”
[Jordan]: “I have two.”
[Drew]: “That’s statistically a lot.”
[Jordan]: “Don’t be racist.”
[Drew]: “That’s not a race!”
[[Jordan and Christina chuckle]]
[Jordan]: “It’s a yuan-ti.”
[Drew]: “It’s a medical condition! We should probably like wait for them to be done talking to them and then kind of like motion them over.”
[Jordan]: “Well the person they’re talking to is just a singular yuan-ti, it’s not like they’re surrounded by a bunch of ‘em.”
[Drew]: “Okay…”
[Christina]: “Well right, but they might be like getting information or something I don’t want to like, scare the person off.”
[Jordan]: “Ah alright.”
[Christina]: “If there’s suddenly six people around you, like that’s a little alarming.”
[Jordan]: “Mm, fair.”
[Drew]: “We could still like- like Arlo could go out there just like singular and go up to their group leader and be like-”
[Arlo]: “Hey there bud!”
[Rhelynn]: Alarmed “Ah!! Oh my god!! Oh…”
[Jordan]: “That was Rhelynn by the way, she just immediately jumped basically out of her skin and goes-”
[Rhelynn]: Still panicked “Oh…okay…hi…um-”
[Arlo]: “Um, you alright there Rhelynn?”
[Rhelynn]: “I’ve had a day.”
[Arlo]: “Um, alright. I was, that’s actually what I wanted to talk to you about. Wanted to touch base, see how your day went. I mean obviously your day was a bit more arduous than ours, we did fight a plant monster that was pretty fun…”
[Rhelynn]: “Yeah sounds neat awesome.”
[Arlo]: “Yeah…I’m- I want you to first, gather yourself, center yourself, find your center, breathe in deep…”
[[Rhelynn takes a deep breath]]
[Arlo]: “Okay, woosa…”
[Rhelynn]: Quickly, still panicked “Woosa, woosa, woosa…”
[Arlo]: “In through the nose, out through the mouth…”
[[Rhelynn whimpers]]
[Arlo]: “Okay, you’re alright, you’re fine…”
[Rhelynn]: “Okay, I’m fine…I’m fine…”
[Arlo]: “We’re right here with you. Stay present, in the moment. You’re all good.”
[Rhelynn]: “Okay I’m good, I’m fine, I’m good.”
[Arlo]: “Okay, you’re good. You’re good, you’re gucci. You’re alright, you’re alright.”
[Rhelynn]: Calmer “Thank you.”
[Arlo]: “So, now that we’ve gathered ourselves we’re gonna take a private moment, you know-”
[Drew]: “And he turns to the yuan-ti and he’s like-”
[Arlo]: “-I do apologize for interrupting.”
[Yuan-ti]: “Oh no no, it’s quite alright.”
[Arlo]: “I do need to borrow my friends here if that is alright.”
[Yuan-ti]: “Very well, they didn’t seem terribly interested in my services anyway. I don’t suppose you’d be interested in getting a tattoo would you?”
[Arlo]: “I think I actually met a former client of yours – Eirwin?”
[Yuan-ti]: “Ah yes, how is he?”
[Arlo]: “Oh he’s doing well. That tattoo of yours that you did for him is doing wonders for him. Wonderful archery he’s got going on.”
[Yuan-ti]: “Well I would certainly hope so otherwise that means I’m not doing my job right.”
[Arlo]: “You ah, you got yourself a business card?”
[Yuan-ti]: “Oh yes, of course!”
[Jordan]: “And he hands you a piece of paper that just says – Nnelg.”
[[All laugh]]
[Caitie]: “Thanks I love it.”
[Drew]: “I don’t know what I expected.”
[Nnelg]: “If you ever need me you can find me right here. Name’s Nnelg.”
[Christina]: “Right here. In this spot. Every single day, all the time.”
[Nnelg]: “I barely move.”
[Drew]: Still laughing “He has a storefront, the storefront doesn’t say ‘tattoo parlor or anything it just says ‘Nnelg’ on it in big ass letters. With an arrow pointing down.”
[[Jordan also laughs]]
[Christina]: “Well now it does…”
[Jordan]: “I am Nnelg, my services are Nnelg. I offer Nnelg in a wide variety of Nnelgs.”
[Christina]: Composing herself “Oh…”
[Jordan]: “Okay so yeah, you and Second Chance reconvene over back with everyone else. As soon as they get over here, Rhelynn points at Saithe and says-”
[Rhelynn]: Quickly “You did not adequately warn me for what Granaphor was like!”
[Saithe]: “Yeah, he’s pretty disconcerting.”
[Arlo]: “So remember when he was a beholder?”
[Rhelynn]: “I know but..! Have you ever talked to one of them??”
[Arlo]: “Not yes.”
[Rhelynn]: “It’s a lot. Even if you bear in mind, yeah beholder, it’ll be fine. It’s not, it’s never okay. It is really stressful. And these two did not help!”
[Saithe]: “That’s not surprising!”
[Jordan]: “Yeah, you look at Forngal and 7 and they just look super confused like they don’t understand what the problem is. To them, nothing happened.”
[Drew]: “I can already start to fit the pieces together of what went wrong.”
[[All laugh]]
[Christina]: “Winterra looks around where we’re standing like, is it crowded in the plaza right now?”
[Jordan]: “You guys have enough space that you guys can have this conversation without being overheard.”
[Christina]: “Okay good.”
[Saithe]: “So what did you go through?”
[Rhelynn]: “Well um, while talking to him he almost went berserk a couple of times, I saw what you meant about that charm, I decided to use detect magic to just see what it was – definitely enchantment magic, couldn’t quite tell what kind without getting my hands on it. And he just tried to just, it was really weird he sounded sincere and nice but also like he thought I was the dirt. I really couldn’t get a read on him and I think the fact that he almost snapped several times didn’t help anything either. But again – he seems genuine? I really…don’t…know. So the conversation didn’t last terribly long, because I couldn’t handle it anymore, and I sent 7 to just keep an eye on him for a little bit.”
[Jordan]: “And 7 just kind of nods approvingly and says-”
[7]: “I remain as quiet as the not night.”
[[Drew and Christina laugh]]
[7]: “I found my answer.”
[[Drew and Christina laugh more]]
[Rhelynn]: “He’s been like this all day.”
[Christina]: “Winterra kind of, like you know when you put your head in between your shoulders trying to make yourself as small as possible? Just like-”
[Winterra]: “Oops”
[Christina]: “And holds her hands out.”
[Jordan]: “Rhelynn just kind of waves her hand like-”
[Rhelynn]: “It’s fine…he does this kind of stuff all the time, I’m used to it at this point.”
[Winterra]: “Mm, okay.”
[Rhelynn]: “But he did manage to find out something pretty interesting.”
[Jordan]: “7 speaks up and says-”
[7]: “It turns out that Sisava is going off to the Yuan-ti temple about an hour from here in the, in between the mountains to the east of the town. He’s meeting with someone there, supposedly. He does so without Granaphor though, so he leaves some assistance behind. I don’t know the exact nature of the conversation as it has only been since morning that I found this out and I have not yet had a chance to stealthily infiltrate these secret meetings…quietly.”
[Arlo]: “Sounds like this might be related to the information that we’ve managed to unearth here.”
[7]: “Did you also do so quietly?”
[Arlo]: “Um…no.”
[Jordan]: “He shakes his head disapprovingly.”
[[Drew and Christina chuckle]]
[Arlo]: “But information all the same.”
[Rhelynn]: “Well what did you guys find out?”
[Arlo]: “From what we can discern there’s some manner of charm going on within the town that’s causing everyone to be not panicking about the clearly odd situation. But it takes about a week to set in.”
[Saithe]: “Likely the same or something very alike to the charm being used on Granaphor.”
[Rhelynn]: “Hm…”
[Arlo]: “Precisely.”
[Rhelynn]: Quietly “That does make sense…”
[Arlo]: “And with what you’ve told us here it sounds like the two may be related. So what it seems like is the key to us figuring out exactly what’s going on and how to get to the very core of it is going to be that Sisava feller.”
[Rhelynn]: “Yeah…the problem is, is that during the day he’s always right next to Granaphor and I don’t think trying to interrogate him next to-”
[Jordan]: “And she just shivers violently as she tries to say Granaphor but just cannot bring herself to do so.”
[Rhelynn]: “-I don’t think that’s happening. Um…so our best bet may actually be to follow up on 7’s lead and try and see if we can’t tail him to this meeting or just ambush him while he’s doing that. One of those two things.”
[Drew]: “I would also like to say to the group I guess as Arlo-”
[Arlo]: “And I think we should also come prepared for the idea that on the way back, that we may need to capture Sisava. If we need additional information or if something arises where we may need to have…leverage. Right now the situation is very much still up in the air but I know a lot of us are spellcasters that prepare their spells ahead of time – maybe prepare a couple of capture spells just in case.”
[Winterra]: “Mmm…but we’re not supposed to directly meddle in the affairs of any of this election. So I feel like taking-”
[Arlo]: “Well he’s not one of the candidates.”
[Jordan]: “Rhelynn speaks up and says-”
[Rhelynn]: “But he is one of the candidate’s head advisors.”
[Saithe]: “And the only thing keeping him sane.”
[Rhelynn]: “That too.”
[Arlo]: “Eh…that’s…that’s fair.”
[Jordan]: “Alright, so what are the rest of you guys doing for the day?”
[Christina]: “Well we should probably look into the lead about the elf lady.”
[Caitie]: “Niavara?”
[Jordan]: “Are all of you going over to speak with Niavara? All six of you?”
[Caitie]: “Yeah why not?”
[Drew]: “Yeah, might as well.”
[Jordan]: “Alright! So you guys make your way in and Niavara is, like she was before just kind of in the back reading, looking over some tomes. As you all approach she looks up and notices you all.”
[Niavara]: “Oh! Hello doctor! I’m guessing these are the rest of your…I thought you guys worked in smaller teams?”
[Arlo]: “We’re here, and we also had an associate team here just kind of helping us cover a bit more ground. Just to make sure that we can canvas the area properly and collect information as such. But we did need to have a little bit of a private meeting with you. We would like to, if we can meet with you up in your office as we did before.”
[Jordan]: “She nods and says-”
[Naivara]: “Alright, follow me.”
[Jordan]: “And she guides all of you into her office. All of you go in there – as was before, she closes the door and locks it and then turns and says-”
[Niavara]: “Alright, how may I be of assistance this time?”
[Jordan]: “And that is where we shall pause our tale for now.”
[[Music stops]]
[Drwe]: “Hooray!”
[Caitie]: Giggles “Indeed.”
[Jordan]: “Thank you all so so much for listening, if you like what you heard then head on over to our patreon over at patreon.com/agentsofdamned where you can check out our special aftershow ‘Peek Behind the Screen,’ where we’ll be sure to talk about all the crazy shit that happened in this episode. Quite a bit of crazy stuff happened so I’m sure we’ll have a lot to talk about.
But before any of that stuff we’ve got some plugs we’ve gotta get out of the way! If you need any assistance from a graphic artist, of amazing, truly indescribable quality. Then you need to head on over to ‘Black Feather Graphics.’ They are a freelance graphic artist who has helped us out with the show and they can help you out with whatever your needs are – logos, apparel, what have you – whatever other things they do… I’m not an artist I don’t fucking know… but get in contact with them and see their work over at blackfeathergraphics.com!
You’ve got a hankering for a sweet tooth? Then head on over to facebook and check out ‘Just Cheesecakes by Tina Rose.’ They’ve got a whole catalogue of cakes up there, each one looks more mouth wateringly delicious than the last. It’s almost not even fair. But each one is just fantastic. They’ve got all kinds just based on candy bars, they’ve just recently got a new chocolate one which is to die for! It’s got a brownie base, it’s just… It can only be described as ‘sinfully good.’ So if you want to check all that madness out then head on over to facebook and look up ‘Just Cheesecakes by Tina Rose.’
And of course, after you’ve had all that, you’re gonna have to work it all off. Only one man for that!”
[Drew]: Doing deep announcer voice “And that man is me! Drew McClain-trainer extraordinaire!” Going back to normal “Alright I should not do that voice for that…”
[Jordan]: “I swear each voice you do for this gets more and more anime every week.”
[Drew]: Mimics fighting game sounds before going to normal “Nah, that’s not even good that’s just ‘Link’ that’s not even an anime voice…”
[[All laugh]]
[Jordan]: “And now we reset to negative one!”
[[Caitie sounds the ‘Legend of Zelda’ achievement sound]]
[Jordan]: Amused “Just do your fucking plug so we can end this.”
[Drew]: “Kinetic Concepts Personal Training. Check us out on instagram at KineticConceptsCLT. If you don’t know what we offer by now, then you have not been listening to the podcast. Go to us for personal training or virtual training, or whatever health and fitness goals you may have. Don’t just go it alone like some dummy, get professional help. Get someone who’s gonna guide you the whole way through. Get someone who’s gonna take the busywork out of your hands and make sure that you’re able to really really get after it. Kinetic Concepts Personal Training. This is probably the worst plug I’ve done…but do it anyway! Please go to my website-thing.”
[Jordan]: “Please help him, he’s a starving father who needs to put food on the table. Let him work your ass.”
[Drew]: “I think I had too much podcast juice…”
[Christina]: Would be shaking her head at Drew “Podcast juice…”
[Drew]: “Yeah, I invented a drink called podcast juice today. I don’t know if you were here for that Caitie.”
[Caitie]: “Yep. Lord Almighty.”
[Drew]: “It is honey whiskey, a branded energy drink that I won’t name-”
[Jordan]: “Unless they want to give us money! Then we will happily name them.”
[Drew]: “Oh, if they want to give us- Any energy drinks out there, if you want to give us money, you can be the energy drink of podcast juice. Like I will retroactively change the cannon of podcast juice- or no I won’t change the cannon, it will have been that drink all along.”
[Jordan]: “You’ll help establish an official cannon, just please give us money.”
[[Christina snickers]]
[Drew]: “Pretty please.
[Jordan]: “But that’s gonna do it for us this week. Check us out on all of our social media: Facebook and Instagram at Agents of DAMNED, Twitter at AgentsofD. Also, I’ve been meaning to say this and I’ve just been forgetting the entire time, if you guys have any ideas for fun homebrew like spells or items, submit those to us so I can maybe use those in the campaign! If we use your item or spell I’ll be sure to give you a shoutout, so go ahead and start submitting that stuff and who knows! Maybe you’ll be able to make something to help out the Agents as they try and not piss off this fucking beholder.”
[Christina]: “Give us all of your luck!”
[Drew]: “But you do increase your chances of being picked if you do tweet about the show!”
[Jordan]: “That too! So, get them in, and until next time! Bye!”
[Caitie]: “Bye guys!!”
[Christina]: “Byyyye!!”
[Drew]: “Bye!”
[[Record scratch]]
[Christina]: “We put out all the fires right, like they’re gone now?”
[Jordan]: “Oh yeah no, of course you did he’s like papa smokey!”
[Christina]: “Well, I know that! I was just making sure that was definitely noted and taken care of!”
[Jordan]: “I’m not just going to automatically write off you guys not doing that and say – Ah you forgot to check out the fire and so you burn it down! No, you guys are forest guardians, I know you take care of this shit.”
[Christina]: laughs “Okay, I was just checking!!”
[Drew]: “I feel like Christina’s [Winterra’s] father would have the ability to intimidate fire out of existence. Like he glares at it and he’s like – NO. And the fire stops being.”
Agents of DAMNED 