Dice, Camera, Action Episode 87 - Tomb of Annihilation

April 8, 2018, 9:08 pm

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Episode 87: Necessary Evelyn

• Check out the complete DCA Episode Guide right here.
• The Dice, Camera, Action Youtube Playlist 
• Follow the show live on twitter here 
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• The Reddit Dice, Camera, Action Index 
• Read up on the backstories of the Waffle Crew

We start off with a song by Anna. Awesome! This group really goes the extra mile.

 The Party

(Anna) Evelyn - Human Paladin of Lathander
(ProJared) Diath - Human Rogue
(Holly) Strix - Tiefling Sorcerer
(Nathan) Paultin - Human Bard


Last time, a balhannoth destroyed Evelyn's construct body. Her spirit was shunted into the soulmonger. Simon was killed, too.

Evelyn's spirit flew up and into the atropal and, through the power of her faith, she unleashed rays of sunshine into the heart of the creature and, apparently, destroyed it.

Back in the Shaowfell, Diath, Strix and Paultin sensed that the death curse was gone.

In the dark tunnel, smoke lingers from the fireball. They can hear the crashing of the waves from outside.

There's a bright amber light out in the Shadowfell that illuminates the beach.

Diath notes that this is twice now that Evelyn has saved them. The heroes take a short rest. Diath now has up to 45 HP.

Strix prays for the Morninglord. Holly wrote up a prayer and everything. Waffles makes sad noises.

There's a creature in these tunnels. It's... death.

Meanwhile... Evelyn is being tossed into the air. It is a bright, sunny morning. She begins to fall. Someone catches her. She looks into the eyes of her father. This is a memory.

Now, her dad is gone. Evelyn looks around and realizes that she's in her human form. Evelyn sees Zaress, the priestess she met in the Soulmonger. She's 40 years younger than she appeared to be in the soulmonger.

Zaress is watching a boy, who is on a swingset. The kid's name is Dortimer Ankathra. Is this an anagram or something?

Evelyn sees that they weren't annihilated. Lathander saved them?

Zaress says that is was Evelyn who saved thousands of souls. She's heard murmurings of sainthood in association with Evelyn's name..

Zaress tell Evelyn that since she did not die a natural death, there's a path back to the natural world.

Evelyn wants to say hello to Lathander.

Zaress and Evelyn talk some more. Zaress points out that the greatest gift is not a soul.. it's love.

"What is a soul without a soul mate?"

Zaress urges Evelyn not to rely entirely on Lathander. "Don't lean too far into your belief in him, as it is more important to believe in yourself."

Back in the Shadowfell, the group starts following "Death". He seems to be leading them in a square path.

Paultin casts Mislead, which allows him to become invisible.

Death says "I'm free" It starts to cast a spell. Paultin casts counterspell and shuts it down.

"Are you Acererak?", the group asks.

"No."

"Are you death?"

"I am Death."

Death was a prisoner of the balhannoth. It explains that this Death is one of many Deaths.

The group wants him to bring back Evelyn. He says he can't do that.

Death has a couple of scrolls. It's his naughty and nice list.

Death tells them how to get out of the tunnels. They've got two choices: Go through the wall or walk around the whole path.

After some searching, Strix falls into a pit full of corpses. From the ceiling, a fresh corpse falls and lands with a splat.

Diath uses the horn of blasting to blow a hole through the wall.

Morning Glory has wings! She's now a pegasus.

Overall

I like the Lathander stuff. I don't get the Death stuff. Death couldn't just kill the balhannoth?

We talked about all this stuff on Waffle Talk:

---

Dice, Camera, Action Episode 88 - Tomb of Annihilation

April 8, 2018, 9:30 pm

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Episode 88 - The Awful Crew

• Check out the complete DCA Episode Guide right here.
• The Dice, Camera, Action Youtube Playlist 
• Follow the show live on twitter here 
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Chris actually becomes a player for this episode!

 The Party

(Anna) Evelyn - Human Paladin of Lathander
(ProJared) Diath - Human Rogue
(Holly) Strix - Tiefling Sorcerer
(Nathan) Paultin - Human Bard
(Chris) Umpox - Imp

Last time, the group tricked death and learned how to use a shadow crossing

Strix has polymorphed her friends into mice. They're hiding in her hat as three hags confront her. The hags:

• One hag has two coins over her eyes and ants crawling over her skin.
• One wears a string of children's teeth around her neck. Has a peg leg.
• The third one has a sack on her head. Peeking out of a hole in the bag is a dog and a viper.

The hags want some hair from the heroes. The group decides to do it. Yhey think that maybe the hags can bring Evelyn back.


Meanwhile.. in Port Nyanzaru.. there's another Strix, Paultin an Diath walking around. They're third level.

Chris gives the DM chair over to Anna!

The group describes the Awful Crew:

• Diath: Less scars, looks 29 years old, wears clothes from Port Nyzanzru. He lets a hair dangle in his face.
• Strix: Shorter horns, hair is matted, disgusting, and slicked-back. Her tail is out, long black claws, parts of her are rotten.
• Paultin: Looks like Strahd.
• Umpox: Chris is playing the hag's assistant imp. He's thin, has bat wings, and a scorpion tail. He holds an eyeball.

Diath has a bodybag - a sack of evil. When you put bodies in it, the bodies are transported to the hags. It only works on evil people.

Umpox is usually invisible. When not, he assumes the form of a rat, a raven, or a spider.

Strix snatches a rat off the street and bites its head off as she scans the area for evil creatures.

They don't spot any evil creatures. Paultin decides to cast crown of madness on a fishmonger and have him start beating people with fish.

They spots a young girl creep up, steal a fish, and flee.

They grab her. Diath asks her, "Hasn't anyone ever told you that stealing is wrong?" He sticks her in the bag. He makes a performance check to make it like a magic trick to throw off bystanders. Rolls a 19!

They're good for the day. They want to go get a drink. Strix wants to burn something.

Three dinosaur riders take offense to this and chase the group.

Diath tries to jump onto a rooftop and do some assassin's creed maneuvers. Doesn't go well.

Paultin checks his pocketwatch and sits down in an alleyway that has a hipster alley bar. He grabs a table.

One of the dinosaur riders is a huge, muscled dude. His name is Shmon Shmeena. He's wearing jorts. He punches the imp.

Evil Strix cuts off Sh'Mina's hand.

Paultin abandons the group and heads over to a back alley bar. Paultin's snapping his fingers, trying to get service.

A remaining bad guy on a dinosaur. Diath gives him an intense eyebrow raise. A dinosaur bites Diath for quite a bit of damage. Not good! Allosaurus is still trying to kill Diath.

Paultin's being a rude customer. Here comes the chef.. It's Shmulk Shmogan! He's holding a plate of spaghetti. "Whatcha gonna do when Shmulkamania runs wild on you?"

A waitress spits in Paultin's glass. Evil? Might have a candidate for a bag.

Umpox  lands on the shoulder of Marsha, the waitress. He tries to pluck her eye out. He does! Then he drops the eye in Paultin's moonshine. Paultin drinks it anyway.

Strix is on a dinosaur. She's hit with three arrows. She's down, making death saves.

Diath chases off the enemies and drags Strix to safety.

Shmulk Shmogan is giving Paultin the dreaded airplane spin. Paultin barfs spaghetti and moonshine.

Paultin unleashes a thunderwave that causes Shmogan to back off. Wait.. no... Shmogan is HULKING UP.

The restaurant's name is Pastamania.

Diath is going to jump off a table and bodybag this dude.

Paultin tries to hit the Shmulkster with moonshine, but rolls bad.

Umpox tries to revive Strix. Rolls a 1.

Overall

I have no idea what that was all about! Amusing. I love the idea of evil duplicates of the adventurers.

We talked all about this show on Waffle Talk:

Dice, Camera, Action Episode 89 - Tomb of Annihilation

April 10, 2018, 8:29 pm

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Episode 89: Double, Double, Toil and Trouble

• Check out the complete DCA Episode Guide right here.
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I really liked this one! A little awful crew, Sewn Sisters, crazy deals....

 The Party

(Anna) Evelyn - Human Paladin of Lathander
(ProJared) Diath - Human Rogue
(Holly) Strix - Tiefling Sorcerer
(Nathan) Paultin - Human Bard
(Chris) Umpox - Imp
Episode 89: Double, Double, Toil and Trouble
Evil Evelyn: Paladin of Shar

Last time, the awful crew (evil clones of the waffle crew) got into a fight with dinosaur trainers. Strix rode an allosaurus and started lighting things on fire. She got knocked out and is bleeding to death. Two successes, one failure.

Like last week, Anna is the DM!


We get descriptions of the evil characters. My favorites:

• Evil Paultin: Strahd poseur.
• Evil Strix: Feral trash pile.

Strix rolls a death save. She rolls an 11. She's stable. Umpox is invisible, flying near Paultin.

Someone claps and steps out of the shadows. She's made of wood and metal, colored black and gold.

She looks the group up and down. She touches Diath's face and goes, "Aren't you just a tall drink of something strong?"

She likes their style. She asks them if they're going to finish the waitress off. Diath stabs Martha

She tells the group they can be her followers. Evelyn wants to be the leader. A fight breaks out.

In the chat, glados comes up with a great name for her axe: Nightfall.

Evil Paultin's name might be Nit Luap.

Umpox disengages, flies 80 feet into the air. Diath throws some daggers at him, and he dies. He was holding an eye (a hag eye), which gets squashed.

Evelyn tells Paultin to swear fealty to Shar. He does, obviously lying. So does Paultin.

Evelyn heals Strix. She says, "Let's douse the flame of hope and rule with an iron fist." The awful crew has been assembled.

That's where the Awful Crew stops.

The Sewn Sisters

Chris takes over in the DM seat.

The group had made a deal with the hags.The heroes will give them hair (so they can make more clones). In exchange, the hags will give them:

• Fox's spectacles
• Resurrection scroll
• X the Mystic book that was allegedly stolen from Shemeshka

The hags are about to speak, when something appears in the cauldron. It's the evil little girl that the awful crew put in the bag last session.

The hags want to eat her. The group stops them. The hags put the little girl to sleep a place her in a cage.

There's discussion of further trades.

Strix tries to polymorph Baggy Nana into a chicken. She makes her save.

The adventurers are quietly talking amongst themselves. The hags overhear the group mention Shemeshka. Later, they hear Strix mention Gutter. The hags are very interested. Two of the hags leave to obtain the items. This will take 1 day. The group will have to wait here. The hags split up their tasks:

• Peggy: Goes to get the spectacles and the book.
• Baggy Nana: Goes to fetch the scroll.
• Widow Groat: Stays with the group to keep an eye on them.

She asks Strix asks what her coven is called. Stix blurts out that it is the chicken foot coven from the Feywild.

Groat says, "We are the Sewn Sisters." She pulls out some red thread. "Snip snip.""Stitch stitch."

Something else appears in the cauldron. It's John Cena! The dinosaur trainer from last session. His corpse, anyway.

Widow Groat says to the group, "You've stepped into an arcanaloth rivalry. Mr. Fox vs. Shemeshka. All arcanaloths want is magic and knowledge."

She tells them about the plane of Gehennea. Then she tells them about the Books of Keeping, tomes that contain the truename of every yugoloth in existence. The group has an awesome idea. They want to find the book that has Shemeshka's truename! With it, they can have power over her.

Strix asks Groat if she knows any truenames. The hag offers some for another trade. What can the group offer? They go through their stuff. Some of their ideas:

• Lightfall's parts
• Strix's arm
• Paultin's 4 candles

Groat comes up with a crazy idea. She wants Strix to carry a child for her. Diath hates this idea. Strix seems open to it. Diath begs Strix not to do it.

Strix asks Groat if she could stop Shemeshka. Groat says that she could.

Widow Groat shares a secret. Widow Groat whispers to Diath that when Shemeshkia mediated the deal between the Skizzixes and the Lorcathas, Shemeshka kept a piece of his valuable, ancient soul. It's locked in a box in her house.

"Would you like me to bring you the box?", she asks.."The Box for your womb."

Strix thinks about it for and says yes.

Widow Groat gives them time to discuss it.

Paultin goes over and watches Groat chop up the corpse of John Cena.

Suddenly, the hag reels. When Umpox was slain, the hag eye was destroyed. It is linked to her, and thus she is temporarily blinded. 

Evelyn's Dad

Meanwhile, in "heaven"...

Evelyn's in the domain of Lathander. She asks around, hoping that Simon's soul is here.  His soul must have went somewhere else.

Evelyn says all she ever wanted was to be wanted. She thinks Simon felt the same way, so she's hoping Simon to give Simon that feeling.

Evelyn realizes she can talk to her dad, who passed a way long ago.Evelyn flies to a glittering temple on top of a hill.

There's people cradling spectral babies. A 12 foot tall green angel. A planetar.

The babies transform into young adults. One of them is Evelyn's dad. Evelyn can cry now. She hugs him. She learns that her mother is in one of the great temples of the Morninglord.

Her father tells her, "It doesn't look like you may be here very long. ...you're just here for a short visit."

She flies around with her dad. She asked him why he never came back. She never knew what happened.

He explains that he went into Undermountain, the giant dungeon underneath Waterdeep.There's a family that has fallen into the dark service of Shar. They infiltrated cities.

While in Undermountain trying to bring light to the darkness, Evelyn's father was killed by a vampire named Karesta Delvingstone. It sounds like his body is still down there.

Evelyn's dad wants to go tobogganing (sledding). Evelyn is up for it.

The Deal

Back in the Material Plane, Groat's eyesight is returning.

The group notices a strange, giant door. I'm pretty sure they're in the bottom of the Tomb of Annihilation.

After day, Baggy walks through the wall. She has a blackened scroll tube. "One resurrection scroll, she says.

While the group is in the Waffle Hut, they hear the two hags having an argument about the destruction of the soul bag. They are angry at the awful crew.

The group overhears the hags scheming. They get the sense that all three hags are plotting against one another.

The third hag returns. Widow Groat starts talking about the baby again. Diath takes Strix's hand and tells her not to do this. He says they'll make it through this, like they always do.

Paultin, Diath and Strix hand over their hair. In return, the hags give the group the items. Each hero takes one:

• Diath: Spectacles. 
• Paultin: Resurrection scroll. It is very warm. It was stolen from a cleric in the bowels of the Nine Hells.
• X the Mystic's Spellbook: Strix.

Diath slyly starts talking and pointing out that the hags have been talking about ousting each other. They start fighting.

Taking advantage of the chaos, Diath frees the kid and looks for a secret door. Strength check to open it. Paultin: 17. He makes it.

They appear in the outskirts of Port Nyanzaru, emerging from a ruined ziggurat in the old city section of Port Nyanzaru.

Strix wants to use the bomb to collapse the tunnel and block the exit. She realizes that the blast radius is too big, and backs off the idea.

Strix unpolymorphs Waffles from her hat.

The little girl that they freed thinks the group is the awful crew. She steals the spectacles from Diath and runs into the city!

Overall

I really liked this episode! Tons of stuff happening.

Evil Evelyn: I was hoping to see an evil Evelyn and we got it! She's awesome. I figured she would be a paladin of Dendar, but Shar makes more sense in the big picture.

Diath's Soul: Shemeshka has a piece of Diath's ancient soul in a box?! In her house? That is really crazy. What exactly would happen if Diath's soul became whole again?

The Deal: I was surprised that Strix was up for having a hag baby. How would that work, exactly? What a crazy idea.

Undermountain: I was a little thrown by the mention of Undermountain. Is the group going there? Evelyn's dad mentioned families infiltrating cities. This sort of keys up with what Mike Mearls said on a show a while back - a storyline about the devils infiltrating cities and causing the blood war to spill into Faerun.

Nate has a new D&D show!

It's fun to see the players develop more stuff.

Dungeons & Dragons - What is a Good Dungeon Master in 2018?

April 13, 2018, 3:02 pm

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I have been busy working on a couple projects, one of which is a secret thing that I am very excited about.

This blog has opened up many opportunities for me in the D&D realm. Thank you for reading my stuff and buying my DMs Guild products!

Running the Tomb: I've been running games online and it has been going tremendously well. We have played through almost all of the Tomb of Annihilation. I'm starting to look at the final encounter and really study the bad guys. I want make sure I don't mess anything up!

So far, the tomb has not been as deadly as I thought it would be. I think part of that is due to me being a bit of a softie.

My other group, the Dungeon Academy, has started playing through the Chris Perkins/Jon Leiheusser Temple of Elemental Evil prequel, the Battle of Emridy Meadows. That group is fantastic! The last episode was really awesome, total chaos.

The Greyhawk Channel: I am playing in a campaign on the Greyhawk Channel. It's called Mordenkainen's Path of the Planes.

I made a githzerai, basically so I could use all the lore I dug up in my guide to the githzerai.

Being a part of this game has taught me quite a bit about where D&D is at in 2018, and it made me think about whether or not I need to adjust my style.

I run my games in a goofy sort of manner. I keep it moving, I joke around, there's not many in-depth scenes. I keep dialogue short.

As I played this session, it dawned on me that many players on this show and on others are expecting something different. Players are watching Critical Role and Dice, Camera, Action, and it seems like a lot of them are expecting and looking forward to the emotional, dramatic side of the game.

People want to invest in the game in ways that, frankly, I have never been comfortable with. I'm not saying that I can't or won't do it, I'm just saying I've never fully committed to it and that it's new territory for me.

The session we just did in Mordenkainen's Path of the Planes was really awesome. The production on this show is great. Shane, the DM, has background music, he uses roll20, he's got maps and tokens for everything, and we use zoom and discord.

On top of that, he's got all of these twitch gadget things running that keeps the chat engaged. It's amazing to watch the channel grow so quickly and it is very clear to me that the greyhawk channel is going to be huge very soon. All three of the other players he got for this game are awesome.

So as I'm playing, I'm sitting there thinking about which of these things that he's doing might fit into my online games. I'm not a technical guy, but I understand that production values matter. What should I use? What can my computer handle? How simple is too simple when it comes to running an online game?

As the session cam to an end, we had a scene where we'd survived a cataclysmic occurrence and were in the ruins of Mordenkainen's tower. My character is a drunken master monk, and so he went looking for booze.

Since I'm a githzerai, I hate slavers. One of the characters was a reformed slaver, or something to that effect. My character hated her. The other heroes encouraged me to let it go. She made an impassioned plea. So, my character paused for a moment, and then slid her a drink. My character hasn't accepted this person, but he's open enough to see what she does next.

When the session was over, I turned the whole thing over in my head. Should I be making space for these kinds of scenes in my games? We only have two hours per session. They eat up a lot of time.

I'm coming to the conclusion that many.. most.. of my players are looking for this kind of thing, and I probably have not been accommodating them.

Spotlighting Backstory: I've never been good at blending backstories with published adventures. Going over the Dice, Camera, Action summaries, I noticed how the show pretty much revolves around the group's backstories.

• Strix: The Izek, Lady Wachter, and Skizzies.
• Diath: The hanging, Gutter and Lorcatha.
• Evelyn: The Lathander stuff with the constructs and the saints.
• Paultin: The Strahd/Dark lord run and the ring of winter.

Chris jumps around, focusing on one or two characters each session. It seems to be working both for the players and the viewers. People like it.

One thing I don't like on DCA is how Chris splits the group up a lot. There are plenty of times where a player will sit there for 30 minutes, doing nothing while two other characters are off adventuring.

I don't like that, I don't want players to come to the table and just sit there and watch. If I was going to split them up, I'd try to cut between them every 5 minutes or so.

But, again, nobody seems to mind.

Going Forward: I think what I am going to do is just take little baby steps and see what happens. I'll make some space here and there - probably during rests - and throw in story-type stuff that feeds the feels, so to speak.

I think the point of all entertainment is to make you feel something, right? I've probably not put enough effort into that in my games. In think that gives my games a somewhat shallow quality, sort of like rocks skipping on the surface of a lake.

We'll see. I'll mess around with it and let you know how it goes.

I should be able to talk about my secret project soon. Maybe a few weeks? I hope people like it, I'm really breaking my back over this thing.

I'll be running:
Tomb of Annihilation tomorrow at 6:30 PM EST
Dungeons Academy 7 on Sunday at 6:30 PM EST

Dice, Camera, Action: Episode 90 - Tomb of Annihilation

April 17, 2018, 8:36 pm

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Episode 90 - Vicious Mockeries

• Check out the complete DCA Episode Guide right here.
• The Dice, Camera, Action Youtube Playlist 
• Follow the show live on twitter here 
• Dice, Camera, Action on Reddit 
• The Reddit Dice, Camera, Action Index 
• Read up on the backstories of the Waffle Crew

Final episode of the season! Special Guest: Jerry from Acquisitions, Inc.!

Chris is using his phone, He's in Burbank, California.

 The Party

(Anna) Evelyn - Human Paladin of Lathander
(ProJared) Diath - Human Rogue
(Holly) Strix - Tiefling Sorcerer
(Nathan) Paultin - Human Bard
(Jerry) Omin Dran - Half-Elf Cleric

Chris recaps the last episode, which includes the whole "womb for the box" thing.Jerry wonders aloud what they're doing on this show. The group points out that Jerry's group gets treated nicely by Chris. The waffle crew are the "whipping boys".

The group is in Port Nyanzaru, where their evil clones are wandering around.

Evelyn is in heaven.

A little girl had purloined the magical spectacles and took off, running. Diath chases after her. He catches up and grabs her.

She starts making a scene in the street, and a crowd is forming. He tries to grab the glasses: Sleight of Hand check: 32. A big tortle tells Diath that what he's doing isn't very nice.

The girl is demanding payment. The group catches up to them, and Paultin casts suggestion on her. It works. The group has the spectacles again.

Now that the group once again has all of the things they need, Diath asks Strix to read X the Mystic's Arcane Grimoire. Once she has, then they'll hand it over to Shemeshka.

It begins to rain. People dart for awnings. Raincatchers start collecting water. The group ducks into "Sebata's Snake Pies", a little establishment that sells meat pits.

Strix finds a paper with the Acquisitions Inc. letterhead on it. It appeared in her hat. It's correspondence from Omin Dran. She wants Omin to come and raise Evelyn and Simon from the dead.

She receives a magical sending from Omin: "Strix, where are you? I don't want to teleport into a hole."

Her response: "I'm at Sebata's Snake Pies."

Omin appears in neatly polished armor. He sees Strix, standing in the rain.

He is with a 30ish something woman named Vajra. She is black, slight and has a noble bearing. In her hand is an obsidian black staff.

Diath drops his pie and steps between Omin and Strix, fuming with rage. Omin has used the infernal contract to summon Strix away from the group before, and he doesn't like it.

Paultin draws his sword, confused. Vajra uses her staff to magically make the sword rusty and useless.

Diath goes off on him. Omin says, "You're acting like this is your girlfriend or something. What?" The other heroes stifle laughter.

Omin: "Listen, Dorth. I owe her. Let me do my work."

Omin says the price has already been paid.

The group rolls out the remains of Evelyn and Simon right on the street .Omin kneels down and examines them.

Port Nyanzaru guards are approaching the group. Paultin casts invisibility on himself.

An armored guard calls out, "Stop! Put your weapons down on the ground."

The guards think the group are the evil doubles. Citizens begin to gather. Some of them recognize the group.

The guards try to forcibly arrest everyone, including Omin. They hold Waffles at spear point. Strix casts gaseous form on her.

Paultin tells a guard he slept with his wife last night. Paultin rolls a 24, but it doesn't work out. The guard is gay. "I don't have a wife. Stop lying."

Omin demands to be allowed to collect the bodies before being taken away. The guards agree to it. The guards then march the group through the city.

They pass under a bridge. The heroes spot the evil clones looking down at them from atop the bridge.

Diath curses when he spots them and points them out to the guards.

Time to roll initiative!

The players actually play both their regular characters and their evil counterparts.

Anna is playing Evil Evelyn (her name is pronounced "Eh-velyn"). Evil Evelyn spots Omin's symbol of Tymora and dry heaves.

Evil Diath touches evil Evelyn on the small of her back and says, "This one's for you." He kisses her and swings on a rope down toward the group.

Paultin is thrilled with this new Diath. He says aloud, "One's my friend but one's... hotter."

Omin casts hold person on Evil Strix. She is held.

Evil Paultin casts crown of madness on Strix. Holly rolls her saving throw.. 15. She made it. That would have been bad!

The underside of the bridge has stone carvings of monkeys hanging from it. Strix casts animate object on a pair of them. Two stone monkeys break away and claw their way up to the top.

Paultin attacks evil Diath and drops him with the sunsword. This enrages Evil Evelyn, who shouts "Cower before Evelyn of Shar!"

Evil casts phantasmal force.. everyone but Omin fails. They drop their weapons and run! It appears that Evil Evelyn is higher level than the clones, who are 3rd level.

Phantasmal force manifests their deepest fears. What's their fear?

• Strix: Everyone's dead.
• Diath: His mirrored self. He hates the idea that everyone sees him as that guy. Also, Strix collared, shackled, enslaved and near death.
• Paultin:Wearing the ring of winter and being alone in a frozen realm.

Strix casts magic weapon on her hands. She has claws. She kills Evil Strix.

Omin wants to casts stone shape on the bridge. Evil Evelyn fails her save. The ground under her feet softens and she falls through the bridge and lands on the ground below. Evil Paultin remains on the bridge, battling a stone monkey.

Evil Evelyn lays on hands with evil Diath by making out with him. He regains 20 hit points. Gutter is right near him. Evil Evelyn grabs the sunsword. Evil Diath grabs Gutter. This is bad!

Diath finally snaps out of it. He sprints back and throws a dagger at Evil Diath. He hits and is most pleased.

Evil Paultin thunderwaves the other monkey and destroys it.

Strix doesn't like Evil Evelyn and drops a 5th level fireball on both her and Evil Diath. 40 damage. Evil Diath is burned to a crisp.

Evil Evelyn lets out a shriek of rage.

Paultin casts dissonant whispers on Evil Evelyn, which causes her to malfunction and collapse. She's dropped to exactly 0 hit points.

Evil Paultin sees his whole team is fallen and flees.

The total live viewer count hits 2,432 at 8:58.

Omin says, "This was way harder than I expected. What if I need more than you, next time?"

Strix offers that the waffle crew could help the AI group if they need it. The group is brought to a guard quarter.

Evil Paultin makes a stealth check. He evades and escapes the guards. End of session.

It sounds like Jerry will be back in two weeks on the season premiere. Chris shows us a dicebag Anna made for Chris out of DCA costume pieces.

Overall

I love the idea of the evil clones, and I liked this. I expected some kind of twist, cliffhanger, or clue as to what season 4 will hold, but nothing stuck out to me.

While I was mortified at the idea of Evil Diath wielding Gutter, I really like Evil Diath and Evil Evelyn and I hope we see them again somehow.

I am enjoying the show, and I'm hoping they go all the way to 20th level.

Dragon+ Issue 19

April 23, 2018, 4:25 pm

≫ Next: Dice, Camera, Action: Episode 91

≪ Previous: Dice, Camera, Action: Episode 90 - Tomb of Annihilation

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You can read this issue right here.

It's that time again! Dragon+ time! Someone needs to get the word out about this thing. It's free! Everyone should read it. There is a TON of good stuff in here, things you can actually use in your game.

It's also got... me! They announced the secret project I've been working on for quite awhile now: The Official Dice, Camera, Action wiki!

We start off with some talk about the 30th anniversary of The Crystal Shard. When that came out... it was Drizzt everywhere. Everybody I knew made a drow who fought with two swords. It was an epidemic.

There's a tribute to William O'Connor. He was a really awesome artist.

Interview with R.A. Salvatore: The interview with R.A. Salvatore has a giant list of the Drizzt books in chronological order. There's so many. All the way at the bottom is the short story collection, which has an audio version that is read by "All Stars"? Who are the all stars, you ask? The list includes: David Duchovny, Wil Wheaton, Sean Astin and Ice T. Apparently, Ice T insists on pronounced the "w" in "sword".

R.A. Salvatore talks about actually playing Drizzt in D&D with Ed Greenwood as a DM. How awesome is that? I'd like to see more of that. R.A. Salvatore should run Drizzt as a guest star on Critical Role or something.

5e Moloch

Mordenkainen's Path of the Planes: We get previews of some stuff from the upcoming book. The sibriex are in it! As are the sorrowsworn. And... Moloch! They actually give us a pdf of Moloch's entry from the book.

This one is especially interesting to me, because I put Moloch in my Emirikol's Guide to Devils. What's cool is that their version's story matches up with mine pretty well, and they included an awesome new idea: Moloch turns into an imp whenever he actually enters the Nine Hells.

Comparing stat blocks, mine is fairly similar to theirs. My biggest mistake was using the wrong die for hit points. Large monsters use a d10 for hit points. I used a d12.

Another cool thing: Moloch can be found in Sigil where he bargains with yugoloths to build an army to raid Malbolge and take back his throne. Moloch is in Sigil! Awesome.

Qawasha & Kupalo: This is the third part of a pretty gigantic short story by Adam Lee. This one involves the city of Mezro and is pretty cool. There's some flavor text I'm going to steal for my campaign: "....a cursed neotent of some forgotten god that burbled and clutched the air as it groped with its claws for living flesh."

Interview with Myke Cole: The author of The Armored Saint. A D&D-loving author who was in the military. He was playing Morrowind while his base got bombed.

Cooperative World Building: This article gives your group a way to create a campaign world together. I don't know why, but this kind of thing gives me the shivers. Any time a player encroaches on the DM's territory, I feel weird about it.

At the very least, I know that some players don't want to create the world, and they would just sit there while others did all of the creating.

Hey, I'm sure it works for other people. I think I might enjoy it if we were all drunk.

Best of the DM's Guild: Ruins of Matolo

Dragon Archives: They made pdfs out of githyanki articles from previous editions! This is of special interest to me, as I thoroughly enjoyed making my guide to the githyanki.

They present a pdf of the 1st edition githyanki adventure, Fedifensor... and then they give us 5e stats for the titular sword!

Hounds of Space and Darkness: Gith dogs!! I missed this!

5e stats for Vlaakith!! 3e stats for Vlaakith!

Unearthed Arcana: The Order domain, clerics devoted to law. They can give allies a reaction attack. This is right up my alley. I love "Law" in D&D, and I enjoy running warlord-type classes.

Maps: Tons of maps from Tomb of Annihilation and Out of the Abyss. They even include one map from Expedition to the Demonweb Pits!

Video & Audio Highlights: There it is... the announcement of the Dice, Camera, Action Wiki! The author of this article shot me an email and I sent him a giant, rambling missive which he organized quite nicely!

This blog has given me many really cool opportunities. Thanks so much for reading it!

Also, seriously, get this issue! It's free! There's useful stuff in it.

Dice, Camera, Action: Episode 91

May 1, 2018, 9:13 pm

≫ Next: Dice, Camera, Action: Episode 92

≪ Previous: Dragon+ Issue 19

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Episode 91 Rise and Shine 

• The Official Dice, Camera, Action Wiki
• Dice, Camera, Action on Reddit  
• Check out the complete DCA Episode Guide right here.
• The Dice, Camera, Action Youtube Playlist 
• Follow the show live on twitter here 
• The Reddit Dice, Camera, Action Index 

This is the first episode of Season 4! Jerry Holkins is back.

 The Party

(Anna) Evelyn - Human Paladin of Lathander
(ProJared) Diath - Human Rogue
(Holly) Strix - Tiefling Sorcerer
(Nathan) Paultin - Human Bard
(Jerry) Omin Dran - Half-Elf Cleric

Last time, Strix found a loophole in her contract that she used to summon Omin. She asked him to bring Evelyn and Simon back from the dead. The group fought their evil clones, and now it is time to raise the dead.

The group is in a palazzo overlooking Port Nyanzaru. It's a big white house with a fantastic view of the evening sun. The heroes can watch ships being pulled to the dock by dinosaurs.

The group needs some components for the ritual. It looks like they want to save the scroll they obtained from the Sewn Sisters. They need two 500 gp diamonds.

Strix tries to read the spellbook that the group acquired from the hags, but she is unable to make heads or tails of it.

Diath and Paultin go shopping. Diath notices some people acting strangely - guards keeping an eye out for thieves.

Paultin tries to schmooze a jeweler who has the diamonds that they need.

Diath does some haggling. He obtains two diamonds in exchange for the horn of blasting. If you look in the DMG, the horn is a rare magic item and is worth anywhere from 501 gp to 5,000 gp.

Walking home, they spot a strange coin bearing the image of a triceratops on the steps to their temporary abode. The heroes don't know what it is.

They rejoin the rest of the group and try to figure out what the coin is all about. No luck.

Before the ritual can begin, the adventurers hear noises nearby - screaming. Strix casts haste on Diath and he goes to investigate.

It turns out that the commotion is just their owlbear, Waffles, who is eating salami. A servant is trying to stop her. Waffles lunges at a cake.

Strix and Diath calm Waffles down. Guards show up, and the group tells them to bill Acquisitions, Inc. for any damages. Diath does this with great glee.

The group hands Omin the rings of protection with pieces of Evelyn's soul trapped inside of them. They had been sharing two rings. He uses them as part of the spell casting.

Zhentarim Agent

Omin begins casting the spells. He's going to try to raise Evelyn first.

He completes the spell. The group watches as the pieces of Evelyn's body come together - a golden thread weaves them into a cohesive whole. They coalesce into a new form. Evelyn is flesh and blood once again!

Omin assumes he made a mistake and apologizes: "I assure you, I performed the spell properly."

She has just one hit point. It was a raise dead spell. It feels like she's been in a long sleep. She has no memories of her time in the afterlife.

The group is thrilled to see Evelyn back to life. Paultin doesn't believe it. He slaps himself in the face repeatedly and leaves the room. Evelyn sees the remains of Simon and freaks out. The group tells her what happened.

Paultin thinks this is a dream. He reaches out and starts patting her face. She's real. He gets choked up.. tears well in his eyes.. He puts a hand on her shoulder and says, "It's good to have you back." He gets up and says, "There's still more work."

He walks away. She wonders aloud why nobody ever explains anything to her. He helps her up and hugs her. "You're back now, and that's all that matters."

"Your chest is so soft." She won't let go. He walks away, dragging her along with him.

Simon is brought back. He is still a construct. His eyes flick open.

He opens his mouth and shoots Omin with a dart right in the throat. Omin makes his saving throw.

The group chides Simon and Paultin thanks Omin. They shake hands.

Omin turns to Diath and says, "We didn't always see eye to eye, Dorth, but we were getting to a place where we would 100% revile each other... that's not nothing, you know?"

Diath says, "I can't deny what I owe you. And that sickens me."

Omin leaves.

The group rests for the night. The next day, Strix makes breakfast for everyone. Strix gives Juniper back to Evelyn. Juniper is covered in soot.

Diath gives the spectacles to Strix. She makes an arcana check and realizes that the spectacles are  a gate key. Where do they open a portal to? She's not sure.

They get Evelyn up to speed on what she's missed. Evelyn is not pleased to hear about the evil version of herself that works for Shar.

Strix gives Evelyn some food... she chokes it down. She needs to make a save. Anna rolls a die that Holly gave her... natural 20!

Diath inspects the kitchen and finds poison. This building is owned by the merchant princes of Port Nyanzaru. Waffles ate the food. The group is worried she is poisoned, but she doesn't seem to be affected.

The Zhentarim provide mercenaries for the merchant princes. The group realizes it was probably them. The zhents had tried to take the ring of winter from the group a while back.

The heroes decide that they need to leave this place. They go looking for Laric Dashland, who had asked the group to make some maps for him long ago. In exchange, he said that he would give them a boat.

Paultin spots him in the Grand Souk.

Laric is talking to a tortle. Laric is pleased to see the heroes and asks them if they have maps to all of the locales. Orolunga? Omu? Nangalore? The heroes realize that they never went to Nangalore. That's where we stop.

Overall

Fun show! I still have no idea where the new season will take place. I guess we'll see!

Dice, Camera, Action: Episode 92

May 8, 2018, 8:30 pm

≫ Next: The RPGN - The Weekly RPG Highlight Show

≪ Previous: Dice, Camera, Action: Episode 91

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Episode 92 - Bomb Voyage

• The Official Dice, Camera, Action Wiki
• Dice, Camera, Action on Reddit  
• Check out the complete DCA Episode Guide right here.
• The Dice, Camera, Action Youtube Playlist 
• Follow the show live on twitter here 
• The Reddit Dice, Camera, Action Index 

This one was really fun!

 The Party

(Anna) Evelyn - Human Paladin of Lathander
(ProJared) Diath - Human Rogue
(Holly) Strix - Tiefling Sorcerer
(Nathan) Paultin - Human Bard

Last time, Laric Dashland had asked the group to make maps of Omu, Orolunga and Nangalore. They never went to Nangalore.

The group has an explosive device in the shape of an egg. One of Diath's keys is stuck in the egg, preventing the timer from going all the way down and causing it to explode. They found an iron token on their doorstep and someone tried to poison the group.

Laric says that the two maps that the group has are enough for the group to gain passage on the Brazen Pegasus, which will take them to Waterdeep. Captain Ortimay is the captain (this is right out of the tomb adventure). Laric makes a somewhat ominous comment to the captain""They paid for a smooth, fast ride."

Strix goes to buy food for Waffles for the trip. After that, the group learns that they will need to pay tribute to the Dragon Turtle in order to exit the bay. Evelyn goes through her stuff, and remembers that she has a bunch of items taken from the yakfolk village: 4 blocks of incense, a censer, a mask, and bead jewelry.

Evelyn then realizes that perhaps all the dragon turtle will need is a song by Paultin. "We should bank everything on Paultin playing a song!"

Paultin shows the captain the token that was left on the steps of the home the group was staying in last session. Captain Ortimay is alarmed and rethinks letting the group ride with her. Paultin quickly casts suggestion to convince her it's a fake.

The captain explains that the coin is linked to the Ytepka Society, a secret organization that deals with troublemakers. The coin is a warning. Paultin distracts her and tosses the coin into the water.

Diath suggests that they don't run away from their problems for once. He wants to stay and deal with the Ytepka Society. Evelyn is up for this, because she really doesn't want to go to Waterdeep.

The captain wants Strix to take a bath. The group debates going to the bath house.

Evelyn almost convinces the group to go, but ultimately she goes to the bath house alone. She talks to the people who work there, and learns that the Ytepka Society are good guys. Chris asks her to make a perception check. She rolls a 6. She's got a cucumber over one eye, and that may have factored in to the failure.

Evelyn writes a letter to her pen pal, Omin. 

Zindar

Out on the streets of Port Nyanzaru, Diath learns all of that, plus he finds out that the Ytepka are trying to keep the Zhentarim from taking over, and that they oppose the pirates. There are less than 50 members. They have a secret hand symbol: a Triceratops horn hand gesture (hold up three fingers).

Diath spots someone on a rooftop watching them. The person has a staff and is wearing fine robes. Paultin dimension doors up to the roof. It's a humanoid - Zindar, the half-dragon man. He's got a staff with a green orb at the top. Zindar is the harbormaster of Port Nyanzaru.

Suddenly, someone comes up out of the water and garrotes Evelyn. Evelyn gets stabbed.. she takes a pile of damage and 23 poison damage. She fails her save and falls unconscious.

Zindar wants to attack Paultin. Diath does the ytepka hand symbol, which calms down the half-dragon. Zindar explains that the token was not for the group. The ytepkas have realized that the token is meant for the Awful Crew, the clones of the heroes.

Strix had met Zindar back when she was adventuring with Omin. She tells Zindar what has been going on, and that there might be more clones on the way.

The group returns to the bath house and sees a crowd gathering. They hear people talking, saying that assassins were in there trying to kill someone. The group uses invisibility and gaseous form to get past the guards.

To their relief, they learn that Evelyn was saved by two wet cat-people, who chased off the assassins. Evelyn thanks them, and is annoyed that her new body has been marred.

The tabaxi are Rivermist and Flask of Wine. Paultin gets a look at Evelyn, and for once, she is not wearing her boots. He sees that Evelyn is missing the lower part of one leg. She's apparently been hiding it with a prosthetic.

Reunited, the heroes get on the boat and argue about whether or not to "give" the bomb to the turtle. Strix and Diath want to do it. Paultin and Evelyn are shocked to find themselves as the voice of reason.

They go back and forth as the ship sets sail. The dragon turtle rises up from the depths and demands tribute.

Paultin wants to give it his mandolin. Evelyn decides to fly over and talk to the creature. The dragon turtle's name is Aremag. The water around it becames a churning cauldron. One of its eyes is clouded over with cataracts

It bellows, "Dump it."

She throws some treasure to Aremag and asks, "Do you like music?"

"No."

Paultin throws the mandolin at the dragon turtle. Evelyn tries to catch it. Rolls a natural 1. Anna rolls at least four natural 1's tonight. She is able to get the mandolin before Aremag does.

Diath is holding the egg bomb, which still has the key jammed into it. Suddenly, the key comes out. Evil Paultin is invisible! He throws the key overboard! He wants the mandolin.

Diath kicks Evil Paultin overboard. Evil Paultin falls into the water.

Evelyn hasn't ever seen Evil Paultin, so she makes a perception check to see if she can tell the difference. Natural 1. She dives in and saves him.

Once she realizes he's the fake, she throws him into the turtle's mouth. He grabs the mandolin from her as he plummets into the turtle's mouth.

Strix dives into the ocean and searches for Diath's key. She eventually finds it, but the dragon turtle attacks her! It does 52 damage to her. She's still up.

Strix dimension doors up to the ship. She's got 2 hit points left. The dragon turtle surfaces and clamps down on the ship.

Diath wants to blow up the dragon turtle.  He throws it into the dragon turtle's mouth. It dives down.. and then there is a flash of blue energy. A white explosion shoots up into the air.

The ship is blown forward on a great swell of water. Only the back end of the vessel is touching the sea.

The crew of the Brazen Pegasus is able to keep the shift upright, surfing a wave for about half a mile before the water calms.

Cut to Port Nyanzaru. Windows are blown out. The explosion tears through masts, sails and brick. The statue in the harbor is toppled.

Assassins ask the tabaxi where the heroes have gone. They say, "Waterdeep."

Overall

Really fun show! This is one of those ones where everyone is in a good mood. Very easy to watch!

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The RPGN - The Weekly RPG Highlight Show

May 15, 2018, 3:13 pm

≫ Next: Dice, Camera, Action: Episode 93

≪ Previous: Dice, Camera, Action: Episode 92

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Check out episode 1 here.

I have been working on a couple of big projects over the last few months. The first is the Dice, Camera, Action wiki, which is now fully up and running! I actually got to work with some Wizards of the Coast people on it, which was really awesome.

I got to talk to Bart Carroll on the phone about Dragon+ for like half an hour. The poor guy probably wanted to fake his own death to get out of the conversation, but I couldn't stop myself.

The other secret project just came out the other day. It's a show! It's sort of like the ESPN of tabletop gaming: The RPGN.

There are a lot of people putting their RPG games online, but it's really hard to know what's out there, and what the shows are like. Most people are aware of Critical Role, but other than that, there's not really a ton of awareness.

The Point: The idea here is to make a way for people to see what's out there and keep up to speed with everything that is going on in the world of D&D and RPG streaming. We want to cover as much as we can, whether it gets thousands of views a week, or zero views a week.

I am hoping that we can help increase the audience of people who are busting their butts on their campaigns. I absolutely love the idea of using this as a way to identify who good players and DMs are, and then figuring out what it is that makes them good.

DMs of the Future: I think that, over time, people will become much, much better at DMing. We can all watch others do it. We can learn from their mistakes and improve our own games. When somebody does something that works, we all benefit.

WebDM: I am working with WebDM on this project. WebDM is an extremely popular D&D youtube channel. I first met them as a guest on their podcast and it turns out we have a lot in common. Pruitt and I both had the idea of a D&D clip show rattling around in our heads for a long time, and once we started talking about it, we got really excited.

My job on this thing is to get footage. I organize it, put it in files, and provide context. Then the producers sort through it and make the show.

SEND ME YOUR CLIPS: So! I need footage! Every single week! If you have an online show, for the love of God, send me clips! Links to twitch clips is best - I'm having a hard time pulling footage off of youtube videos.

Try to keep them under a minute or two. We get a lot of funny ones, and that's good, but I'd love dramatic moments - a battle with a major NPC (like Strahd), a critical hit in a crucial moment, or the death of a character.

Send them to: powerscorerpg@gmail.com

Blog Stuff

Here's my schedule right now:

• Tuesday: Waffle Talk
• Wednesday: Mordenkainen's Path of the Planes (I'm a player)
• Thursday: Air the Waffle Talk replay on the D&D channel
• Saturday: Stream at 6:30 PM EST (was Tomb of Annihilation, we'll be starting HELL'S REBELS soon)
• Sunday: Dungeon Academy

In addition to that, I'm working on this RPGN show, maintaining the DCA wiki, and I'm trying to finish Emirikol's Tome of Foes, a DMs Guild product.

Once that's done, I will finish up and release Emirikol's Guide to Demons. I have a lot of that one done, and have tons of art for it. The art for this one is much better than the stuff in the guide to devils!

This blog, unfortunately, has suffered from me taking on too much at once. I fully intend on posting more here once I get things under control. I really love making guides to D&D stuff for this blog, and I am hoping to get back to it relatively soon. Once I get back to the guide to demons, I can make some guides for the blog as I do research - I still need to write up Pazuzu, Zuggtmoy, and LOLTH!

The guide to Lolth is probably going to be gigantic, should be awesome! She's in so many products, I bet there's all sorts of weird tidbits to unearth.

The Stream of Many Eyes

From June 1st-3rd, they'll be doing the Stream of Many Eyes, a big streaming event on the D&D channel. I'll be writing recaps of the whole thing, just like I did with the Stream of Annihilation last year. I think I'm going to do a wrap up show each night on my twitch channel, so keep your eyes peeled for that!

Thanks to everyone who buys my DMs Guild products! Because of you, I actually make a living doing this goofy stuff.

Dice, Camera, Action: Episode 93

May 16, 2018, 3:47 pm

≫ Next: Dark and Dicey: Episode 1

≪ Previous: The RPGN - The Weekly RPG Highlight Show

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Episode 93 - The Storm Before the Calm

• The Official Dice, Camera, Action Wiki
• Dice, Camera, Action on Reddit  
• Check out the complete DCA Episode Guide right here.
• The Dice, Camera, Action Youtube Playlist 
• Follow the show live on twitter here 
• The Reddit Dice, Camera, Action Index 

The heroes begin the journey to Waterdeep!

 The Party

(Anna) Evelyn - Human Paladin of Lathander
(ProJared) Diath - Human Rogue
(Holly) Strix - Tiefling Sorcerer
(Nathan) Paultin - Human Bard
Last episode, the heroes used the egg bomb on the dragon turtle. The ship they are on survived, but it appears that Port Nyanzaru was hit hard by the explosion.

Diath panics, hoping everyone is OK. Strix throws up over the side of the ship. Evelyn is clutching Paultin.

Diath looks for signs that Evil Paultin is actually dead. He sees part of a large flipper fall into the sea. Other bits might be birds or fish... meat is falling from the sky.

Evelyn asks Paultin why he gave up his mandolin. Paultin is quite angry.

Evelyn looks through a spyglass and sees people and dinosaurs washing into the bay of Port Nyanzaru. She can't tell if they are alive or dead. A lot of the buildings are damaged - pulled off their foundations. Evelyn wants to go back and help. The rest of the group does not. 

Diath is freaking out, thinking he might have killed a bunch of people.

There's a storm coming. The captain wants to tie the group down, but they're too busy arguing.

Evelyn says that the group demolished the city because they couldn't make a decision. Strix asks the captain to tell the group why they can't go back. The captain says there's probably nowhere to dock the ship.

Diath begs Evelyn to tell him what to do. She says that they need to help those in need. The captain asks Evelyn if she can bring back the dead. Strix suggests sending a letter to Omin. He can help them.

Evelyn gets ready to abandon the group and fly to Port Nyanzaru. Paultin says she's being self-righteous. Her says they had a solution. What good is the mandolin if he's dead? "None of you are survivors. It's getting to be way too much. Do what you want."

Evelyn asks him why he's even here any more. Paultin says he doesn't even know. She ultimately decides to write a letter to Omin.

Holly points out that Strix has two hit points.

The ship sails onward and the group gets tied down. The storm comes. The mast of the ship is hit by lightning. It's fine. Diath is wondering what the ship is made of.

The ship nears jagged peaks of rock. On one rock is an immense, 20-30 foot tall being who is casting a spell.

Strix wants to counterspell it, but she can't because she's tied up. She misty steps out of the ropes. Paultin slips out of his bonds as well.

She tries to counterspell - so does Paultin. The spell is higher than level 3, so they have to make checks. They both succeed! The spell is shut down, but the storm rages on.

Strix falls into the water. She uses alter self to give herself gills. Evelyn frees herself and summons Mourning Glory as the ship is rocked by the storm. Strix, Evelyn and Paultin fail Dex saves and they are swept off the ship. They take 43 points of damage. Only Diath is still tied up.

Strix is deep underwater. Evelyn casts locate object on Strix's staff so she can find her. Paultin is able to summon the waffle hut, which keeps him safe from the storm.

Strix casts greenflame blade on her staff to make it easier to find her.

Diath sees the captain's wheel spinning. A crewmember is trying to make his way to the wheel. Diath looks at the huge creature on the rock and is pretty certain that she is a storm giant.

Strix is underwater. She doesn't know which way is up. There's a storm giant down there. Strix waves at him. He grabs her and begins swimming upward.

Evelyn's in the water. The female storm giant dives in and is coming for her. Evelyn sees Strix coming closer. She doesn't see the boat at all.

Paultin is in the hut. He begins drinking. A hand grabs the hut, but the hut won't budge.

Diath takes the wheel and tries to steer the ship, but he doesn't know what he's doing.

Evelyn sees a crewmember in the water, holding on to flotsam. He's in danger. Evelyn goes to help him.

Strix realizes that the storm giants are friendly and were likely trying to shut down the storm. She uses a spell to write in the sky, "They're nice!"

Realizing that they are nice, Strix says aloud that they messed up again and that maybe the group should retire.

The giants put the heroes back on the ship.

Evelyn is still in the water, injured badly. She is kissed on the lips by a mermaid, and is healed for 10 points. The mermaid's hair is black and she wears coral jewelry. She's accompanied by a giant, pink and violet seahorse. She swims alongside it. They swim through the waves and seem to enjoy it. They bring the heroes toward the ship.

There are also mermen nearby. They rescue the crewmember.

The captain is nowhere to be found. 1st mate Brigg Ruddell barks commands tells the crew to secure the lines.

Safe on the ship, Evelyn giggles to herself and touches her lips. She sees that Paultin hasn't said a single word. She sits next to him and says, "I'm really sorry about your mandolin."

Paultin tells her that the mandolin was "...one of the last things tying me from where I came from." He felt like getting rid of it would get rid of his painful past, and maybe that would let him embrace his new friends. He thinks maybe he should have held onto it and sold it.

Paultin wonders every day why he is with these lunatics. He can't bring himself to leave and that makes him angry.

Diath hears a strange humming noise. It's from his key ring. One of his keys is missing. One he hasn't had before is there - a silvery key emblazoned with the symbol of a crescent moon. It is the symbol of the famous wizard, Elminster.


This is linked to the weird meta-story going on right now involving the "Immortal Fortress". People in real life are receiving key-shaped USB drives. There is a wiki tracking the whole thing right here.


Overall


They're sort of going into some Storm King stuff, which is interesting. I'm also interested to see what this Elminster thing is all about. Jared was especially funny today. Looking forward to next week!

Dark and Dicey: Episode 1

May 17, 2018, 9:45 pm

≫ Next: Dungeons & Dragons - Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes Review

≪ Previous: Dice, Camera, Action: Episode 93

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Dark and Dicey is a new show on the D&D channel, and it features Nate from Dice, Camera, Action.

• Watch this episode here.
• Check out the Dark and Dicey subreddit right here. 
• Follow the show on twitter here.

For the first time ever, someone other than me (Sean) will be writing an article on this blog! The recapper here is Rina, whoyou might recognize from my show, Dungeon Academy.

Cast

Nathan Sharp as Pluck the Kenku Swamp Druid
Cristina Vee as Anya the Yuan-Ti Pureblood Warlock
Anna Brisbin as Trixa Teardu the Lightfoot Halfling Barbarian
Hunter Hughes as Kovacs the Half-Elf Oathbreaker Paladin
Zach Callison as Werblund the Deep Gnome Ranger

Kaiji Tang as the Dungeon Master

Previous Sessions

Sessions 1 and 2 were not streamed. At the beginning of the session, we got a recap:
   
“Thisbinar, the jewel of faith and justice on the southern reaches, coastal area of Barovia, is suffering a time of great upheaval.”

The Paladins of Virtue - followers of Thisbinar’s patron god Reganos - attempted to usurp power from Sir Lucian, a magister. Though the coup failed and the magister gained enough support to get rid of the paladins, the city itself began failing. Lucian was given emergency power to regain the city’s former glory, essentially making him a king.

The party themselves were on a prison ship heading towards Steelwall Garrison, where they would be left and forgotten.

With a stroke of luck, they met Topbutton the goblin and Dinkle, his adopted ogre son. This duo is planning a heist within the Blacksteel Isles, a nearby island nation rich with adamantite. The king of this nation, Algard, was said to have conquered the dungeon tower of Endspire, developing the city of Allhaven around it.

The object of the heist is a magical red gem which is supposedly at the top of Endspire, and supposedly grants a wish to those who touch it. Topbutton lets the party out of their cells in exchange for their help in getting the duo to the Blacksteel Isles and helping them on their heist.

As they made their way through the ship, killing quite a few people along the way, they came across a room filled with circus equipment and 20 pounds worth of narcotics. Which is to say, the prison ship is also a smuggling vessel.

Pluck and Anya immediately partook of the drugs.

As the party exited to the deck, the ship was nearing the Blacksteel Isles. A protective magic mist was laying over the sea so that the islands couldn’t be attacked. The guards on deck however, would be able to attack the group.

Pluck panicked and dropped a darkness spell immediately. Some of the guards ended up walking off the ship and into the ocean.

Topbutton was able to control the ship just enough to have it crash onto a beach. The vessel was destroyed.

After being attacked by various monsters, the group met a Guard Captian by the name of Vigil, who they were able to convince that they were on a mission for “Winkerbean’s Wondrous Emporium,” the smuggling circus. Vigil then leads them to the poor town of Fairheim. As they are traveling, they save a young girl named Sass, who was being attacked by skeletons. Vigil was concerned about this, as magic is heavily regulated. The general populous isn’t allowed to cast, and all citizens and visitors are required to wear adamantite bracelets which suppress all magic.

Of course, Pluck cast some spells, which immediately summoned an adamantite golem to the location and which stood above Pluck menacingly. He didn’t cast again after that.

When they reached Fairheim, a Dwarven cleric by the name of Kaytri, healed them (especially Pluck and Anya). With the help of their new friends they were able to be sheltered from the law for the time being. They are currently staying at a tavern called “The Pretty Cook,” the owner of which is an Ogrillon by the same name.

This is where this session begins.

Episode 1

At the tavern, the group was given complimentary rags to wear. +1 to stealth, because no one wants to look at you if you wear them. Perfect!

Anya is skilled with scissors and thread, and makes a stylish two-piece out of them.

Side note: Anya saved a big ol’ pile of snakes from the tavern’s cellar when she learned that snakes were a part of the menu. She is best friends with an albino snake. His name is SnekSnek.

Kids had stolen Trixa’s Lion costume, but has returned it. Trixa goes into the bathroom and sees a note that wasn’t there before. Scratched into the wood are the words “Brush your teeth.” There was nothing to brush her teeth with, so she scratched “No can do” into the wood below the first note.
   
There’s complimentary breakfast! It’s leftover stewed cabbage and giant centipede sausages! Only Werblund and Pluck seem to enjoy it.
   
Anya forms a cult. It’s a bunch of little kids yelling anything she may say repetitively.

A snobby knight who has obviously seen no action shows up. His name is Guard Captain Fizzlepot. He wants the package he was promised and threatens to tell the king about the thieves that must have stolen it, looking pointedly at the party.

Kaytri is having none of it, though, and thoroughly intimidates him. Dissuaded from this due to the illegal aspect of his package (see: smuggled drugs), he then leaves. Two of the soldiers that had accompanied him go into the Pretty Cook.

Kaytri starts talking to the party and gives them a mission. The bracelets that the Guard Captains use allow them to cast spells without wands and without golems tracking them down. Since Fizzlepot is a guard captain, they could probably steal a bracelet from him. She gives them one she had stolen prior, and tells them to talk to the two soldiers that walked in to the tavern, as they are her friends.

The soldiers that walked into the tavern are also friends with the Ogrillon. Their names are Shady Jeff and Walter Killmaster.

The first natural 20 of the game is Pluck’s insight check.

Walter is very enthusiastic, which grates on Pluck’s nerves. Jeff is very smarmy. This is who they are, and are trustworthy...in their own way.
   
Guard Captain Bracelet: +1 AC, can cast magic without summoning adamantite golems to come for you, can magically attach 4 wands and recharge these wands at dawn

The plan is to go to Lord Fizzlepot’s residence during the festival that night to steal his Guard Captain Bracelet and anything else that isn’t nailed down.

Topbutton and Dinkle are setting up the circus for the group. Trixa immediately dons a crocodile costume she found among the supplies. She and Werblund both take 20 throwing knives. They are props, but can still deal 1d4 damage.

Kovacs makes a friend of the minotaur blacksmith named Ironhoof, who promises him a greatsword if he can get his hands on any raw materials.

Anya tries to become better friends with her party. With SnekSnek’s advice, she goes to apologize to Pluck. It doesn’t work very well. She then follows more SnekSnek advice: to give them gifts by turning their complementary rags into nice clothes like she did with hers.

Kovacs gets his first ever drink. It’s a very rich, high quality brand of beer called Bulbous Beer. Werblund knows what it is, and is excited about it. Werblund, Kovacs, and Pluck all partake.
The first natural 1 of the game is Pluck’s history check to learn about the beer.

The second was his constitution check.

Pluck is smashed, head first in the toilet. Kovacs is less so, but hits the floor. Werblund is fine and helps his friends.

Shady Jeff is back to help them into Allhaven. He brought a wagon for everyone to hide in. Before they proceed to their mission, everyone tries to problem solve the drunk problem. Pluck turns into horse. Trixa fetches Kaytri, who soberizes horse-Pluck, but she doesn’t have another lesser restoration spell to use on Kovacs. They get into the wagon.

Once they get to the entrance to Allhaven, they have to bluff their way in. Inside the city, they see a statue of the king. The plaque at the base of the statue reads:

 “May my people never starve again”  Algard, king of Allhaven

The festival’s games have marvelous prizes, including wands, pieces of raw adamantite, various toys, and crates of food.

They split the party. Pluck and Anya attempt a strength game and both fail. They try to persuade the person in charge to let Trixa try, but fail. Kovacs and Werblund go to the house they plan to ransack to scope things out. They find 3 or 4 guards are inside.

Trixa attempts to remember the map and lead them to the house, but ended up at another game. Trixa persuaded the person running the booth to give her a free shot by pretending to be a little girl. She succeeds and wins! But the prize was a doll instead of a wand or adamantite, as she was pretending to be a child.

Trixa rolls a natural 20 on her next attempt to find her way to the house. The party is back together again.

To distract the guards, drunken Kovacs pretended that he thought the house was his own. Trixa tag teamed, pretending she was his daughter.

Passing the magic bracelet between each other, Anya cast Invisibility on Werblund. Pluck cast Pass Without Trace on the party to help attempt the investigation inside the house.

The distraction force started failing their deception rolls, and one of the guards shouted “Boss!”

The +10 to the rolls helped Werblund, Anya, and Pluck to get in, but on their way up the stairs they heard a big man start to come toward the staircase to go down. In a panic, Pluck cast darkness. ((at this point pass without trace should have been cancelled but it’s w/e))

When it becomes dark and the guards are bewildered, Trixa pretends to have a big choking fit. The big guy on the stairs, the Boss, ends up rushing her to the temple to get a cleric.

Pluck drops the concentration on darkness as he, Anya, and Werblund finish climbing the stairs to begin their search. They find the an ornamental suit of armor, 130 gp, a Wand of Mage Hand with 10 charges, and key to a chest that contained a whopping 2000 gp, assorted gems and baubles, and the right of ownership to the fizzy water company that Fizzlepot owns.

Kovacs finally gives up the act. When he leaves the door the guards go back inside.

At the temple, the moment the Boss leaves Trixa by herself she runs for it. Back at the house, she and Kovacs go around to the back door to see if they could make their way in.

To continue their search for the bracelet, the trio has to go downstairs again. Werblund has to roll stealth to see if the guards hear him, though he doesn’t have to worry about them seeing him. Pluck, however, rolls a nat 1 on his stealth roll. With the added 10 to make 11, he got down the stairs fine, but once he got to the stairwell he knocked over a precious porcelain vase with a huge crash. The guards stare right at him. He pretends to just be a very clumsy janitor, but we will find out if it spurs an initiative roll next session!

Dungeons & Dragons - Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes Review

May 19, 2018, 7:24 am

≫ Next: Dark and Dicey: Episode 2

≪ Previous: Dark and Dicey: Episode 1

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You can buy Mordenkainen’s Tome of Foes here.

I’m very interested in this one, because it deals with devils and gith, two of my favorite things in D&D.

I’ll be comparing the stuff I learned making my guides, especially my guide to devils. I think I can learn a lot from seeing the company's official take on something that I attempted to assemble.

This review is loaded with spoilers! Before I start, let me just talk about whether or not this book is worth getting, so you can bail out pre-spoilers if you like.

The Good

What's good about this book? The vast majority of it! The blood war details are fun. We get a rundown of the nine major archdevils. Each of them has a clearly defined role, something I think was sorely needed. They gave full details on Zariel, who has long been a mysterious entity in D&D lore despite ruling the most accessible layer of the Nine Hells.

The elf chapter is probably my favorite section of the whole book. They cooked up a heck of a lot of fun ideas that will actually help you flesh out your character, especially when it comes to trancing during a long rest.

The gith section is great, particularly the information on the ruler of the githzerai. They did a great job of making him as interesting as the lich queen who rules the githyanki.

There are tons and tons of monsters, and a lot of them are really cool. Many of them are planar monsters, but most can fit into your game even if your group sticks to the Material Plane. There are monsters from many old products and settings, a really nice variety.

The art continues to get better. There's a high level of quality across the board. In previous releases, there were some issues with images coming out too dark or being covered partly by graphics - that's been almost entirely fixed. I don't know if it's the type of paper they chose or what, but the art looks really clear and vibrant. They even had a couple of two-page spreads in here.

The Bad

If you're a player, I'm not sure how much you will want this thing. It's got a bunch of really cool races for you to use like gith, tiefling variants, and shadar kai, but after that, it depends on if you're interested in lore.

I think the elf section is phenomenal, and the githzerai section is great, too. The halfling section and the dwarf section weren't especially thrilling. I did like the discussion of gnomes using clockwork devices in their day-to-day lives.

The blood war section is good, but, for whatever reason, there's never all that much discussion about details of the blood war in D&D books. You'll get a broad overview, but for the most part you don't get a lot of nitty gritty stuff (aside from the 2e Hellbound boxed set, obviously!).

I don't think there's too many duds in this book. I didn't like the new take on the sorrowsworn, and I've never liked monsters like the steel predator, kruthiks, or the gray render, but those are few and far between.

As far as the art goes, my main complaint would be that they re-used some images from previous releases. Not a big deal, right? The problem is that they used old art for two-page spreads! Seriously! One piece of art is from Out of the Abyss, and the other is from Tomb of Annihilation. What is the deal with that?

We could have gotten a massive spread featuring Lolth and Corellon, or the city of Tu'Narath, or a massive Blood War scene! Why did they do this? Boggles the mind.

Overall: I think this is my favorite book so far. There's some little things here and there to quietly complain to yourself about, but really this is a great supplement. It's absolutely loaded with ideas and monsters!

Details

Alright, now let's go over some of the interesting stuff in this book in excruciating detail! Spoilers from here on out! I'm blowing the spoiler whistle right now.

The preface page alone is loaded with info.

Shemeshka says that Mordenkainen magically forced Bigby to write most of this book, and questions why Mordenkainen wants to preserve the balance between good and evil.

Then “Qort”, an apprentice of Mordenkainen’s, explains that he convinced Shemeshka to steal the book so that it could be seen by others. Qort says the book shows Mordenkainen’s initial thoughts on preserving the Balance.

The Blood War

I'm not a big fan of what the 5e bearded devil looks like, but that is a pretty cool picture.

We learn that almost all of the battles in the Blood War take place in the Abyss and the Nine Hells. I love this. In 2e, most Blood War battles happened in other planes, which felt kind of lame to me.

Fighting occurs all along the Styx, but mainly on Avernus, the first layer of the Nine Hells. That's pretty cool. In older editions, there was a ton of focus on the Plain of 1,000 Portals in the Abyss, so it's nice to see the spotlight over on the devil side of things.

The demons invade Avernus because it is easily accessible from the Abyss

Lords of the Nine: I wrote a big old book on this topic so I am really keen on seeing what the 5e devils are actually like!!

Asmodeus: They added some stuff to his origin. In ancient times, the angels of law and good accused Asmodeus of terrible crimes. Thus came the Trial of asmodeus. The judge was Primus.

At one point in the trial, the angel Zariel started a brawl. Primus did not make an official judgment. He ordered Asmodeus to forever carry the ruby rod, which grants his underlings the right to enter into contracts with mortals but unleashes an inescapable punishment on any devil who breaches such a contract.

“His most recent recruit is Zariel, a former angel.” That’s different. In older books, Zariel had been in hell for thousands of years. She had been overthrown by the pit fiend, Bel, and thrown in prison.

There's also this note about Asmodeus: “His supposed daughter, Glasya, is thought by some to be a godlike entity of unknown origin.” Really? Huh.

Zariel: She had been an angel tasked with monitoring the blood war. She led a band of mortals in an attack on the devils, and was found unconscious under a pile of dead bodies. Asmodeus turned her into an archdevil. Later in the book, we get art of her. She's pretty cool-looking.

• Tiamat: So, why is she confined to hell? The book posits a theory: She killed a mighty, forgotten giant god who cursed her with their dying breath. The curse brought an end to the war. If Tiamat returned to the world, the war between dragons and giants would renew.

Dispater: He's an arms dealer. He made an impenetrable suit of adamantine armor that foils spells and keeps him safe. He wants to solve every mystery of the cosmos. His imps scout material plane for secrets… does this put him in opposition with Vecna?

In this book, there are A LOT of creatures who are looking for secrets. It's a little weird.

Mammon: They came up with a strong, unique concept.. Lawful evil souls not bound to any devil are brought to Minaurous, where they are recorded and distributed.

It looks like in 5e, there are no "soul shells". When you appear in the Nine Hells, you appear as either a lemure or a nupperibo.

Fierna and Belial: Belial runs Hell’s judicial system and Fierna handles filling the soul quota.Fierna stole the secret of how to travel freely between the Nine Hells and the material plane from the archlich, Vecna. How did she do that? Through Kas?

Levistus: He's still frozen in a glacier! Geryon is there in Stygia, too. His devils fight Levistus’s devils. It is believed that Stygia was once a mortal world drawn into hell. Their inhabitants, facing annihilation, pledged their souls to Asmodeus to escape annihilation. “The archmage Tzunk has researched the topic extensively but has yet to find any evidence that truly confirms the account.”

Hey.. last I heard, Tzunk's severed head was sitting in the River Styx.

Glasya: Malbolge is the prison of the Nine Hells. There's a story about how she had been buying souls with counterfeit currency via a technicality, offending Mammon. Asmodeus punished her by making her an archdevil.

Baalzebul: Poor Baalzebul has been getting bullied by Asmodeus for many editions. Guess what? It's over now! Well, sort of. He's his old handsome self again, but if he speaks a single lie, he's going to be a big slug for one full year.

Mephistopheles: He harvests the souls of wizards and sages. Of all the archdevils, Mephistopheles has been the one with the least development. I really like the idea that he’s all about magic, and that he specializes in acquiring the souls of spellcasters, who he puts to work doing mundane research.

4e Tiefling

Tieflings: A quick note about tiefling art. You may or may not remember the outcry over the depiction of tieflings in 4th edition. In 2nd edition, they had weird little traits, like they didn’t cast a shadow, or they had black eyes. In 4e, they got thick horns, tan-pink skin, and huge, thick tails. 5e toned it down a bit, but the look remains.

2e tiefling

If you look around on the internet, people love making tiefling characters and they love drawing them - and almost nobody draws them the way they look on page 22 of this book. To me that means that they people don’t want tieflings to look the way they do, and their official appearance should be altered to reflect that. I mean… Strix doesn’t look like that, right?

Princes of the Abyss: When demons go to the Material Plane, the land becomes warped by their abyssal energy. If the land is sufficiently affected, a portal opens. If the abyssal infestation gains hold, the portal becomes permanent. Then… a demon lord can come through! It leads an army to strip the world of life and lays siege to it. If not stopped, the world becomes another layer of the Abyss.

I think that's a great idea! Entire worlds getting sucked into the Abyss.

Elves

This section is really great. We learn that when an elf goes into a trance, they can see visions of their life or even of their past life.

Elves have immortal souls.They die, go to Arvandor, and are reborn. As kids, they remember their past lives, revisiting moments in their trance, over and over

The Mysteries of Arvandor: When Corellon mentally calls out a number of chosen elves (up to 1,000) and brings them into his body. Those who return from this experience are ever transformed. They were able to assume a new form, shapeless, for a time and share a telepathic connection with the others.

I think that might be my favorite thing in the whole book? Why does Corellon do this? How strong is the telepathic connection?

Raven Queen: She takes on many forms, including a shadow that claws at innermost thoughts, a pale and regal elf, or "a shambling tangle of slick roots and sticks."

She was an elf queen. When Corellon and Lolth were in conflict, she tried to use the souls and magic of her people to become a deity. The followers who aided her became the shadar-kai. During the ritual, some of them tried to siphon power into themselves. It ruined the ritual and the Raven Queen was sucked into the Shadowfell. The traitors became nagpas.

Sometimes she will ask a soul to perform a task for her - acquire an item.. “...pawns in an inscrutable game, the rules of which are known to only her and the Lady of Pain.”

So... they changed the Raven Queen a bit. For me, this is an "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" type of situation. People loved her the way she was. I don't really see the benefit of tying her to the elves like this. But, in the end, it doesn't matter all that much. They always leave space for you to run her how you like.

It's a bit odd to me, though, because she was so popular. Depicting her as a walking nest just doesn't feel right to me. I think the "walking nest" should be an entirely different entity altogether. It's not a bad idea, but to me it doesn't fit the Raven Queen that so many know and love.

Gith

Good stuff here, especially the githzerai section. They went out of their way to get art depicting both Vlaakith and Menyar-Ag. Menyar is very cool, and I don't remember reading much about him prior to this. He's semi-dead yet immensely powerful.

Also, githyanki hatch from eggs!

Monsters

Astral Dreadnoughts: Awesome! I have hardly ever heard of anyone fighting one of these in any edition, but they are really cool. They were created by Tharizdun! Did not know that.

Boneclaw: A wizard who tries and fails to become a lich might become a boneclaw. Their soul bonds to some other evildoer nearby and it serves them. This thing can actually attack creatures who enter its reach.

Old Cadaver Collector art

Cadaver Collector: This is one of those monsters that had art that was so awesome in a previous edition that they should just re-use it. These creatures wander Acheron and collect dead bodies. Where do they bring them, though?

Demons: A lot of the demons they decided to include are weird ones from 2e - the dybbuk, the maurezhi, and others. I thought the molydeus was relegated to the dustbin of history, but it’s right here in ye olde Tome of Foes.

Sibriex: I love the sibriex! It feels like there’s a lot of cool things you can do with them. There’s an awesome flesh-warping chart, in case you want to let a sibriex “improve” your character. My favorite: your eyes become beacons, emitting a 15-foot cone of dim light

Demon Lords: They reprinted the demon lords from Out of the Abyss with the same artwork! I wish they would have included some more demon lords like Lolth, Malcanthet and Pazuzu.

Hellfire Engine: I LOVED the hellfire engine from 3e. It was a clockwork/hellfire giant that rampaged across the battlefield. The 5e version is more of a steamroller, which might sound crappy, but the art is so badass that i accept it 100%!

Abishai: Tiamat’s devils! I really like the way they look in this edition. The artist incorporated the unique appearance of each type of chromatic dragon.

Merregon: Legion devils! They took away their 4e pool of hit points deal, which is a bummer, but very hard to implement in 5e. The description says that they have metal masks bolted to their heads. The mask bears nothing except for the name of their commander and the layer of the Nine Hells it serves, but the art shows the mask has the face of… a baby. Very weird!

Narzugon: Hell knights! I love hell knights. The art for these is very good! It has a power I didn’t expect: It can heal one creature up to 100 hit points. I guess it's their lay on hands dealie. Also, they use a magic item called “infernal tack” to summon and control their steeds. Very cool!

Then we get stats of a few archdevils...

Bael: There’s a million cool dukes and duchesses out there. How did they decide which of them to feature for this book? Bael is pretty dull, as far as villains go, but he makes for a good brutish heavy to fight your group. Plus, his art is very cool.

Geryon: Maybe my favorite “rogue” archdevil, Geryon is now back in Hell and fighting to regain control of Stygia. There’s even a mention that he’s back in (citadel) Coldsteel, from A Paladin in Hell!

Hurijin: This is another one where I wonder why they picked him. To me, Baalphegor is a much more interesting choice, if you’re going to pick someone from the court of Mephistopheles. Again, though, the art for him is really awesome and that goes a long way.

Moloch: Another of my favorite dukes!! He’s been through a lot. Currently, he is transformed into an imp whenever he enters the Nine Hells. “Rumors suggest that he can be found in Sigil…”

Titivilus: I’m pretty sure 3 of these 5 dukes all came from those two “Infernal Aristocracy” articles from Dragon Magazine right before 4e started. I like all these, but I wish they would have shined the spotlight on some more under-developed archdevils in this book.

Giff: I really love the art of the giff. A lot of times, the head is too big and it looks like somebody wearing a hippo mask. This one looks really great! Checking out the statblock, we see that the giff have a… uhhhh. Fragmentation grenade.

Gith: In the githzerai section, you get a glimpse of how mutability is handled in 5e. It’s a regional effect for the anarch. It takes 10 minutes to stabilize a 5-mile radius!

Marut: If I remember right, these guys had elephant heads in 2e. Now they are clockwork eyeball things. They are “inevitables”. It says that they “enforce contracts forged in the Hall of Concordance in the city of Sigil.”

Nagpa: Nagpas are basically the skekzis from the Dark Crystal. In this edition, they dwell in the Shadowfell, enemies of the Raven Queen.

Ogre: There are some really fun ogre types, including the ogre battering ram and the ogre howdah.

4e Sorrowsworn

Sorrowsworn: I don’t like what they did here. In 4e, sorrowsworn were super-shadar-kai, freaky gothic agents of the Raven Queen. In 5e, they are “emotion given form”. Naked monster-people with spike-arms. One type of sorrowsworn, “the wretched”, is a two-legged football with teeth. I think that the 4e sorrowsworn had a bit of a weird look, but this is way out there. Ready? Here's the 5e sorrowsworn:

What the hell, man. 

Star Spawn: There is a sidebar on Elder Evils. There’s a big list of them. They include: Dendar (from Tomb of Annihilation), Kyuss (from Age of Worms), Tharizdun (from Greyhawk), and the Queen of Chaos (from the Rod of Seven Parts!).

Merrenoloth: These are the creatures that have boats on the River Styx. The art on this is easily the best art of a merrenoloth ever. They kept the “grim reaper” flavor but gave it its own look. They handled all of the things the boat can do through lair actions (the boat is its lair) and regional effects.

That's it! This book is right now about $30 on amazon. Definitely worth it!

Dark and Dicey: Episode 2

May 25, 2018, 12:55 pm

≫ Next: The Stream of Many Eyes: Day 1

≪ Previous: Dungeons & Dragons - Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes Review

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• Watch this episode here.
• Check out the Dark and Dicey subreddit right here. 
• Follow the show on twitter here.

Follow Rina, the author of this recap, on twitter right here!

Cast

Nathan Sharp as Pluck the Kenku Swamp Druid
Cristina Vee as Anya the Yuan-Ti Pureblood Warlock
Anna Brisbin as Trixa Teardu the Lightfoot Halfling Barbarian
Hunter Hughes as Kovacs the Half-Elf Oathbreaker Paladin
Zach Callison as Werblund the Deep Gnome Ranger

Kaiji Tang as the Dungeon Master

Where we left off:

Kovacs and Trixa are outside, having caused enough of a distraction to grant the other three entrance to Lord Fizzlepot’s home. Trixa went around back to see if there was another way in.
Werblund, Anya, and Pluck are rummaging through the house. They found a great amount of treasure, but not the Guard Captain Bracelet they are trying to find. Werblund is invisible, the other two are not. On their way back downstairs, Pluck was discovered as he knocked over a precious vase.

This is where the session begins.

Fizzlepot is on his way home. He, however, is not so much riding the horse as he is passed out drunk on the horse. As such, he doesn’t notice when Kovacs marches up to the horse to throw him to the ground. The horse, however, does notice him, and takes off running towards the house.

Anya, Pluck, Werblund, and Trixa all hear the galloping horse come near the home and come to a screeching halt. The halt itself throws the rider. A flying Fizzlepot then crashed through the door, landing between the two guards.

Anya jumps from the stairwell to try to assassinate the drunken lord.

Trixa successfully opens up the cellar door with her crowbar. Kovacs goes to tie off the horse. It took two animal handling rolls, the second of which was a natural 20. He starts guiding the horse to the back and ties him off there after a quick conversation with Trixa.

Pluck attempts to dissuade Anya, but she wants to claim the house for her own and continues her attack. Werblund ignores them and continues searching for the bracelet. Roll for initiative! The guards went first, setting up a quick barricade. Pluck went second, bailing through the window.

Despite knowing the danger, Anya jumps through the doorway getting within range of the guards. They immediately attack her one misses and the other hits, where she takes 7 points of damage. She leaps over the table and hits Fizzlepot, dealing 7 damage. He is now screaming in agony.

Werblund attempts to investigate but too much is happening for him to concentrate on what he was doing.

Assuming Fizzlepot is wearing the bracelet, Kovacs and Trixa go inside. Trixa goes through a window landing near Werblund, who is still invisible.

Werblund tells her to not be an idiot, and Trixa takes a moment to confirm that it was Werblund, not the voice in her head. Since she wasn’t seen, she decides to take a look around for the bracelet. Unfortunately, she rolls a natural 1 on her investigation check. She steps on a nail. She then had to make an ominous Wisdom saving throw, which she rolled a 4 for.

The guards hit Anya for 5 damage. She tries to persuade the guards to not kill her and nearly succeeds, but that’s when Fizzlepot decides to speak up and yells at them to kill her because she stabbed him. They continue to be hostile to her, as Fizzlepot is their employer.

Pluck casts Healing Word, healing Anya for 5 hit points. The guards notice the healing and realize there’s a caster somewhere. Werblund ends up jumping into the combat, but hasn’t attacked yet. Kovacs enters the house, and notices that Fizzlepot does have a Guard Captain’s Bracelet on. He jumps into combat in an attempt to get into Fizzlepot.

Both Werblund and Kovacs are now in the initiative.

One guard notices Kovacs coming, tries to stab him, and fails. The other guard attempts to stab Anya and also fails.

Werblund attempts to take the bracelet away from Fizzlepot. He barely misses and accidentally brushes the captain’s hand. Werblund’s invisibility breaks and they share an awkward stare.

Kovacs attacks the nearest guard for 5 points of damage. Anya tries to attack Fizzlepot again, but misses. Fizzlepot then tries to cast some sort of spell on Anya, but a ring on his hand glows and a bunch of paperwork and a quill appear instead. Then, annoyed, he begins to fill out paperwork in the middle of combat. The arcana checks weren’t great, but were just enough to know that this Ring of Bureaucratic Wizardry would make Fizzlepot have to fill out what spell he is casting, for what purpose, and what he hopes to achieve with it.

It starts to get strangely cold. Lights in the chandelier start to snuff out. The only thing everyone sees is a small figure in the doorway holding a meat cleaver, it’s eyes milky white, the veins around which are turning black. The mouth begins to widen unnaturally, the teeth inside thousands of barblike needles.

Fizzlepot wants to surrender.

The guards are scared and wildly swinging their weapons, only one hits Kovacs, dealing 10 points of damage. Werblund successfully takes the bracelet from Fizzlepot and puts it on. Kovacs tries to push the small figure - Trixa - out of the room, but is instead lifted to a shadowy face which shakes its head and licks Kovacs’s face.

Anya attacks Fizzlepot again, dealing 7 damage. At this point, Fizzlepot is done with the paperwork which he throws into the air where it disappears. His rapier then starts to glow, as he had cast Magic Weapon on it.

Pluck uses Magic Stone on a nearby rock and throws it at the shadowy demon. He misses. Trixa is in a haze, dreaming. Everyone is now in initiative.

Kovacs is able to get out of the grasp of the demonic shadow just before being impaled by a shadowy blade.

The guards attempt to attack Werblund but miss completely. Werblund attacks one of the guards, dealing 7 points of damage. Kovacs tries to grapple the possessed Trixa once again. Possessed Trixa shoots a shadowy dart at Kovacs, dealing him 7 points of damage through the leg and embedding in the floor, negating his movement with Trixa’s enraged Sentinel feat. Anya casts Charm Person on Trixa, but nothing seems to happen.

Fizzlepot attempts to attack Werblund but misses. Pluck heals Kovacs for 7 points with Healing Word.

Trixa wakes up. She is back in control but doesn’t remember anything. She attempts to jump over the barricade but only succeeds in knocking it over. A guard hits Werblund for 10 points of damage. The other guard rolled a natural 20 to hit Anya.

Luckily for her, the guard rolled ones for damage, so she was only damaged by 2 points. Werblund kills one of the guards. Kovacs has a hole in his leg but no longer has a shadow through it. He goes to attack the other guard and deals 4 damage. Anya casts Eldritch Blast at the last guard, killing him as well.

Fizzlepot tries to surrender again.

The furniture and chandelier starts to shake. Pluck bolts.

Topbutton, Shady Jeff, and Walter on a carriage race towards the house. Topbutton, panicked, says that he smelled magic, and now the group had best begin running. Trixa tries to attack Fizzlepot, but Walter parries it, saying in his chipper way, that they should bring him back alive.

An adamantite golem is racing towards the house. Everyone is jumping onto the wagon. Before leaving, Kovacs borrows the bracelet from Werblund to cast Command on Fizzlepot. The word used is “Comply.” He does. Kovacs then gives the bracelet back to Werblund.

The golem tears through the house. Werblund’s natural 20 intelligence check tells us that the golems go to the location where magic happened, not the user of the magic.

They now interrogate Fizzlepot. Anya takes the Ring of Bureaucratic Wizardry from Fizzlepot, and Pluck is chewing on a gold piece. At Werblund’s non magical command, he empties his pockets.
Their contents were contain candy wrappers, an ounce of drugs, and a single gold piece. Pluck tried to take it all but was only able to take the candy wrappers. Anya took some of his blood and stored it in a vial (ew).

Fizzlepot is both very intimidated and very drunk. Outbursts occur, most of which are directed at Trixa, calling her a literal monster, and worries that she’ll freak out again. Her response is “Don’t make me freak out. My friends don’t freak me out.” 

They do get information out of him. He doesn’t know where another bracelet is, but he does know that other guard captains would have them. The king is still alive, but no one has seen him recently. He lives in the spire that is the center of the city. The only ones who visit him include diplomats and guard captains of high repute.

Back in Fairheim, Kaytri is waiting for them. They intimidate Fizzlepot to 90% fear.
Walter takes Fizzlepot to Kaytri. Werblund and Kovacs also go to Kaytri. Shady Jeff wants to go to the Pretty Cook for drinks, and takes Trixa, Anya and Pluck with him.

At the Pretty Cook, they talk investment. The cook offers to fix up his tavern and give a cut to proceeds to the group for 150 gold. He also offers to help improve Ironhoof’s smithy for another 500 gold. Shady Jeff offers to get some talent for circus acts, offering for 250 gold.

Trixa talks him down to 100, but the persuasion check  was 9 and the subsequential insight checks were also not high, so while the players themselves don’t trust him, the characters definitely do. When one of the kids that was a part of Anya’s cult asks for money to fix their house - the orphanage - Pluck gives them 200 gold from his personal stash to give to Kaytri to get it up and running again.

 Werblund and Kovacs attempt to sneak behind Kaytri and Fizzlepot. Fizzlepot is tied up with a long rope, the end of which Kaytri holds. Werblund succeeded on his stealth check, while Kovacs didn’t. Kaytri notices him and calls for him to join her. Werblund is keeping pace behind them, hidden. Kovacs shares his distrust of unseen powers and her being a cleric.

She calls attention to the paladin’s emblem of faith and claims to share faith with the same power, and proceeds to tells the tale of the Eagle and the Fox to Kovacs. After telling the story, she asks him what his definition of justice is, just as they come to a cliffside. At the bottom of the cliff looks to be soft sand.As she puts a wooden stake into the ground near the cliff, Kaytri says that she believes that justice is about balance. She ties her end of the rope to the stake and pushes Fizzlepot off the cliff. The soft sand is actually quicksand.

As Fizzlepot struggles and screams as he tries to climb out of the quicksand by the rope tied to him, Kaytri tells the things Fizzlepot has done in the past, and leaves Kovacs to decide whether to save the man or let him die in the quicksand.

Werblund, having seen and heard the whole exchange, goes to Kovacs. Werblund wants to off Fizzlepot. After a short discussion, Kovacs agrees. They slash the rope together.

They then make their way back to Fairheim.

The next Dark and Dicey game will be played at the Stream of Many Eyes!
#LeaveNoStoneUnturned.

The Stream of Many Eyes: Day 1

June 1, 2018, 3:40 pm

≫ Next: The Stream of Many Eyes: Day 2

≪ Previous: Dark and Dicey: Episode 2

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You can watch this stream on Twitch here.

Lots of rumors running around about what the new story is! There's the whole #NoStoneUnturned story going on social media... one major clue is "Plane Shift". Waterdeep seems to be a major locale, and obviously there's one or more beholders involved.

We start off with Nathan Stewart and Anna Prosser Robinson. They are sitting in a set of the Yawning Portal. Hey! Liisa Lee is there.

Matt Mercer was a creative consultant on the new adventure.

In a little bit, four members of the D&D team will spill the beans on the new products:

• Mike Mearls
• Kate Welch
• Chris Perkins
• Jeremy Crawford

The Force Grey Cast:

• Joe Mangiello
• Ashley Johnson
• Matthew Lillard
• Deborah Ann Woll
• Kate Welch

Tomorrow - Mash-up game. It will be a continuing narrative, the story continues from one group to the next.

Tomorrow, a new group will debut. Rivals of Waterdeep. It's a group from Chicago. This will be their first time playing together.

Sunday will have more games, including Jox Machina - bodybuilders playing D&D.
Players include:

• Joe Managiello:  Arkhan still has the Hand of Vecna, apparently.
• Travis Willingham
• The BIG SHOW from the WWE. 
• Mike Mearls is DMing. Holy crap.

We walk to another set, where we meet the Neverwinter MMO crew. The new module: Barovia! The tarokka deck is in the game. You have to find the cards and assemble the deck. Madame Eva will do readings for you.

Promotion for the Art & Arcana: History of the Art of D&D. Then we go into a room that has what looks like original paintings by Jeff Easley! The 1e DMG cover, Unearthed Arcana.. There's a dude in a hood. It's Sam Witwer! Murdy Gurdy!

There's a map of the Forgotten Realms drawn by Ed Greenwood when he was a kid!

This book will be out on October 23rd.

We talk with the Girls, Guts, Glory players for a moment, and then we jump over to meet the Roll20 people.

Spoilers are rolling out on other sites. I don't want to read them, but if you're interested, here's what is about to be announced for D&D!

We talk with a company that is making props for sale on the mass market - coins, maps, and more. The company is called Beadle and Grymm's. This box of stuff is $450!

Then we talk with Minsc, who discusses a new Neverwinter Nights game.

There will be a new dice set. This one includes two d20's and a lifetracker - it's a dial, similar to the tracker from Magic: The Gathering.

Then there's a band. We get a graphic: Up Next, Waterdeep: Dragon Heist. So.. that's the new adventure! It's popping up all over the internet. I'm trying to avoid reading about
 it.

OK. Anna sits down with the D&D team.

• Mike Mearls - Right now he's trying to figure out 5e psionics
• Kate Welch - She's co-hosting the Spoiler Swag how once per month
• Chris Perkins - the STORY ARCHITECT
• Jeremy Crawford - The Editor-in-Chief

The new adventure: Waterdeep: Dragon Heist.

It's going to be out in game stores on September 6th, everywhere else on September 18th.

What levels is it for? Chris Perkins says that will be revealed over the course of the weekend.

Chris says that this is different from the past adventures. This adventure takes the game back to civilization, in an environment that encourages a lot of roleplaying.

It's a toolbox - you get toys as a DM for an urban romp. It's meant to be like Ocean's Eleven - steal treasure and keep it out of the hands of villains so they can't use it for nefarious purposes.

There's no ticking clock - the DM can make it last as long as they want. Chris likes this one because it is not a world-shattering event. It is grounded. You can lose yourself in the city. Waterdeep is a character, it has a personality all its own.

The people of Waterdeep aren't phased by adventuring types. They are used to it. The city is welcoming. If your party is smart, you'll get on the city's good side. If you do bad things, the city will turn on you.

Seasons: Jeremy says that this is meant to be a re- playable adventure. The original Ravenloft adventure changed every time you played it. At the outset of this adventure, the DM picks the villain!

There are 4 villains. The choice of villain determines what season it takes place in.
You can complete an intro quest for a prominent NPC. If you succeed, you are given a "home base".

They built downtime into the adventure!

The Xanathar has a role in this story. The adventure uses some of the mechanics from Xanathar's Guide to Everything. If you start a tavern, you get a rival, that kind of thing.

They are using a lot of NPCs from old products. Laeral Silverhand is the ruler, and was an adventurer herself. Jarlaxle is in it - what's his interest in Waterdeep? Anyone who's read the Drizzt novels - he can be your best friend or your worst enemy.

In addition to downtime being incorporated, they also make use of the chase rules. They expand them to add urban components. There are going to be chases in the city.

There are new magic items in the book. The blackstaff itself is in the book. There are stats for some famous NPCs. Stats for the giant, animated statues.

Volo gives a "walking tour" in the book - the chapter is separated from the rest of the book.

This is not an adventure where you can fight through everything. You will be arrested!

They wanted this adventure to be one that you can play through in just a couple of months if that's what the group wants.

Mike looks forward to seeing what the DMs Guild does with it. To him, success means that the book inspires lots of cool DMs Guild products. Kate wants to see a Cheers-style game, which is the drama between people in a bar (who never leave the bar).

Chris says there were things they couldn't fit. One was a character that they wanted to put in, but couldn't fit. He is now the central focus of the other campaign that is going to run parallel to Dragon Heist (???).

Jeremy wants to see Waterdeep fan art - art of the city itself. What each group's tavern looks like.

There's a Lantanese submarine in this one.

Mike talks about a campaign he was in. The group was struggling against a noble family that nobody knew was evil.

Sidequests for factions - you can get special favors. There are long lists of all the major guilds in the city, how a character can be linked to them, and gain renown with them.

Waterdeep is big - random encounters feel organic.

The book rewards creative problem-solving.

Chris talks about the talent involved: Ed Greenwood, James Haeck, James Introcaso, Charlie Sanders, and Matt Mercer.

Force Grey

(Joe Mangiello) Torogar Steelfist
(Deborah Ann Woll) Jamilah
(Matthew Lillard) Beetle
(Ashley Johnson) Dagney
(Kate Welch) Rosie Beestinger

6 months have passed since Acererak was thwarted. The Open Lord resurrected who they could. The weeks passed in Waterdeep. Jamilah has had a hard time adapting to the environment.

Someone slips each of them a message in their hand. Green Mask Lodge, card's room, within the hour. It has the symbol of Blackstaff's tower.

The group assembles there. Torogar needs some baby oil - he's a bit ashy. Beetle, a dwarf, does a spectacular leap onto a stool.

The group is told by Vajra that someone named Adinus has arrived in town and wants business with the Order of Mages. She asks the group to go there in her stead, to serve as her proxies. She does not trust this man, and his ulterior motives must be uncovered.

Scour the location without raising suspicion and gain proof in his dealings. Reward: gold, influence, and access to the more dubious elements of Waterdeep.

The group isn't so sure if they're right for a stealth mission.

Ut oh... stream died. It's down for about 5 minutes.  Technical difficulties.... no sound.

The group sits down with the dude in question. Toro says he has no friends and that he's a wealthy landowner. Can you recommend a new realtor? Deception check: 10. The guy politely humors him.

Jamilah tries to tell the guy that she's from Cormyr,, but clearly she grew up in the jungle of Chult.

Dagney wants to go to the bathroom (to snoop). Beetle loudly shouts that he has to go too.

They're drinking Lathander's Red, a very valuable wine.

A golem serves their food. Rosie is attracted to constructs. She starts criticizing the meal and Adinus politely accepts it. He asks Rosie what her background is. She says she's just a grandma with hundreds of grandkids. Adinus smiles and seems genuinely charmed. He says he hopes to have kids one day. Rosie says, "They're over rated".

Meanwhile, Dagney and Beetle are snooping around. Dagney really needs to her wash her hands. After some snooping, Beetle finds a chest. It's trapped.




Dice, Camera, Action

Episode 95 - Specter of the Zhentarim

This page will be updated throughout the day.

The Stream of Many Eyes: Day 2

June 2, 2018, 10:31 am

≫ Next: The Stream of Many Eyes: Day 3

≪ Previous: The Stream of Many Eyes: Day 1

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OK, day two! A bunch of shows will all link to each other somehow.

Sirens of the Realms

I believe every character in the group is a bard. 

(Cynthia Marie) Girasol
(Krystina Arielle) Orisha
(Ladee Danger) Pearl
(Vivid Vivka) Ghost Half-elf/half-sprite
(Jason Charles Miller) Brig

The heroes are waiting in traffic. Half the payment up front. They tell each other what they've been doing.

They arrive at a manor - they have a gig.

There's a room for the group - their band is known as the Siren Sisters. Their instruments are there, along with water and healing potions. Brig quickly snatches up all 5 potions.

Ghost ends up with food all over her. Pearl casts prestidigitation on her. Ghost has the spell, but can never cast it. Pearl decides to help and pours a drink on her. Ghost struggles... she can't pronounce prestidigitation in real life, which is very amusing.. but eventually, she gets it!

A man approaches the group. He has a platter. His free hand is made of silver. Ghost snatches some wine flutes.

Someone important is here. The Open Lord of Waterdeep - Laeral Silverhand.

The NPC asks Ghost to steal a handkerchief from her. She sings an amusing little ditty and casts suggestion on Laeral. Laeral rolls a one! Handkerchief obtained.

The group looks around and notices some vents behind plants.

Ghost decides to try to fly up in a vent. She's never been able to fly using warding wind, but this time she rolls a 20! She goes in the vent.The group climbs up, too, and together they crawl deeper into the building.

There's a room with robed people wearing masks. One mask is of a blue snake. There's a plague doctor mask and a mirrored silver mask. They are talking about a dragon's hoard - treasure hidden in Waterdeep.

These individuals discuss their chosen agents:

• Malakon Demodun. A scoundrel with extra-planar help. Not a noble, but has plenty of influence, especially with less well-to-do circles.
• Tuko Pomoja a loyal and dedicated servant. An aasimar who traded his sword for the path of the fist.
• Rosie Beestinger! is one.
• A weaver of fates, elvish bard... Vlanya Umvarra.

The group whispers among each other and it snowballs into two of the group actually fall into the room. Grig quickly casts invisibility on himself. Ghost casts infestation, summoning black spiders.





This page will be updated throughout the day.

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The Stream of Many Eyes: Day 3

June 3, 2018, 10:43 am

≫ Next: Hell's Belles Episode 1

≪ Previous: The Stream of Many Eyes: Day 2

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Last night, the day 2 stream ended with the announcement of a second book! We start off day 3 with a discussion of this product.

Dungeon of the Mad Mage
Things that are discussed:

• It comes out on November 11th.
• It is a continuation of Dragon Heist. It goes from levels 6-20. It is a deep dive into Undermountain, which sits under Waterdeep.
• Every floor is a different setting.
• Halaster Blackcloak is a crazy wizard that has put some really weird things in the dungeon.
• Every level of the dungeon has a map. Every level of the dungeon is a character in and of itself. Halaster will be watching the entire time. Statues and portraits of Halaster interact with the group. Is he imprisoned in Undermountain? What is he up to?
• There are portals in each level of the dungeon that pulls creatures from other realms and planes. These creatures try to claim part of the dungeons as their own.
• Weird experiments by Halaster and his apprentices are scattered about.
• They left space for the DM to add rooms and areas. 
• Chris says that there is a lot of fun stuff at the lower levels that are "worth the wait."

Adventure Impractical

Mark Hulmes is the DM.

(Matthew Lillard) Bobo Silvertongue Human Bard
(Taliesin Jaffe) Archie Tiefling

(Sam Riegel) Obby the Rat Dwarf

(Ashley Johnson) Rabbit Yuan-ti Monk
(Clint McElroy)  Merle Highchurch Dwarf Cleric

Archie Vanderflute opens a book, which summons a hooded figure. A secret auction will be taking place and the Magpie's Court. One item up for auction is Dagult Neverember's journals. The group must find the court and obtain the ledgers by any means possible.

We jump right into it with the group chasing a half-orc in a tuxedo. Obby shoots at him and rolls a natural 20. Bobo tries to chase him down but crashes into some barrels. Merle drops and insect swarm and Rabbit sicks her snakes on him. The guy gives up.

Archie sweet talks the guy and asks where Magpie's Court is. It is in a dwarven bank called K'zaar Knox. The banks has only one entrance. The items are stored in the vault, which is a chamber with an 80-foot cylinder drop. If you touch the walls or floor, a magic alarm goes off.

He gives the group his invitation so they an get in. Now he wants to flee the city.

We skip ahead to the heist. Mark gives each player a flashback token. They can use it to declare something they did earlier in the day.

The group wears ridiculous elegant clothes and enters the vault, using the invitation to get in. The guy at the front is a snooty noble named Wiegalious. The group calls him "Wiggle".

Hell's Belles Episode 1

June 26, 2018, 12:55 pm

≫ Next: Dark and Dicey Episode 4

≪ Previous: The Stream of Many Eyes: Day 3

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You can watch this show on Twitch right here

This is a new show on the D&D Twitch channel that airs on Sunday nights. They are playing through a classic Planescape adventure, The Great Modron March, converted to 5th edition.

Obviously this is of great interest to me, because I ran the exact same thing a few years back and really enjoy seeing how other people play through it.

On top of that, this show features a bewildering collection of players that I either know, have played with, or admire! Shauna plays in my online games and is the co-host of Waffle Talk with me. Lysa is a frequent guest star on my shows. I've had Kayla, Mazz, and Holly on as guests on Waffle Talk.

This group has 7 players! That's a lot. I was wondering if it would hurt the pacing, but it didn't at all.

The Party

DM Mazz

(Shauna) Levity - Tiefling Monk linked to Glasya
(Chloe Christine)Lyra - Tiefling Paladin
(Hadeel) Miga - Tiefling Rogue an urchin who lives by the sea
(Holly Conrad) Durge - Tiefling Bard college of whispers, member of the Dustmen
(Lysa Chen) Mercy - Tiefling Shadow sorcerer from Ravenloft
(TK Johnson)Gille - Tiefling Paladin
(Kayla)  Pentar - Tiefling linked to Zuggtmoy

The heroes are in the grand bazaar of Sigil.  Shopkeepers are touting their wares, a number of dabus are clipping razorvine.

The group spots Chastity, an ally who has been helping the group get acclimated to the city. Levity buys some cranium rat skewers. Miga eats an entire rat skewer in one bite.

Pentar is picking mushrooms off of her body. She holds one up to Mercy, who swats it away.

Gille taps his foot, looks around, wondering when Levity will bring him his food.

Lyra picks through a food stall and buys apples for everyone. She hands them out to the group.

Durge thinks the cranium rat skewer is under-cooked. She's pretty sure Miga will experience the True Death soon.

The group suddenly begins to feel excruciating pain. For some reason, it is relieved slightly when they walk in a particular direction. Mercy thinks Pentar implanted spores in everyone's brain.

The trail of less pain leads to a shop once owned by Durge's uncle, Jysson. He was a clerk.

Mercy opens the door and asks, "Uncle J"? There's dust everywhere. Papers and notebooks everywhere. Mercy is a bit of a neat freak. She screams and shuts the door.

Miga pulls out the rat skewer, ready for battle. Gille thinks that this is a chance for heroics. The heroes cautiously enter the building.

Levity hears a voice that says, "Oh dear, I had no idea that this would happen."

A cat jumps on a table. It's grey. It talks! The cat cocks its head, and asks, "Durge?"

Miga hides and hisses at the cat. Durge shakes its paw. It's Uncle Jysson, in cat form. He explains that he died and became a petitioner for one of the lords in the beastlands.

Then, a book begins to speak. It's the source of the pain they'd been experiencing. It has drawn the group here to speak to them about Automata, the gate town to Mechanus.

There's a face in the book. It explains that its master, Heiron Lifegiver, has a debt that must be repaid. The Book wants the group to travel to the gate town of Automata.

The portal to Automata is in the clerk's ward. The key to the portal is a piece of paper torn perfectly in half with the letter "e" on each half.

Miga and Pentar can't read, so this "e" thing is more difficult than expected.

As the group leaves and hits the streets of Sigil, Miga does some pickpocketing and nabs a cool 13 silver pieces.

Mercy notices in an alleyway that there is someone organizing pens. It's a round ball - a monodrone. Mercy reorganizes the pens. The monodrone has got red paint on him. S3-4N. Heyyyyyy..... wait a minute.

Mercy watches him put things in order. S3-4N has one normal robot arm and the other has a fork hand.

Mercy has one white clawed arm. Her other arm is like stained glass due to a curse. S3-AN smiles. The tieflings like him.

Miga wants the monodrone. It says "Designation modron from Mechanus." Miga sees that his hand is made of treasure.

Pentar licks him and sticks two mushrooms to him. It asks Miga if she's a modron. Miga says yes, she's "Miga 2". Miga shows the group the monodrone and says that it's shaped like a friend.

A door pops open in its side. It has a little... flavor packet... it spices the mushroom and starts chewing on it. Wut. It hands Mercy the rest. It's shiftspice. In a flavor packet. Mercy puts the flavor packet in there.

OK. Wow! Let me explain this. A few weeks back, I ran an adventure called Rrakkma online. I put shiftspice in it, which is a cool item from Planescape: Torment. Basically, you put it on your food, imagine the flavor - and that's the flavor of the spice.

I went on and on about the shiftspice, and the group dared to suggest that it comes in little flavor packets, like mustard at a fast food place. I dramatically informed them that shiftspice only comes in containers like salt shakers - it's too cool and magical to be found in a flimsy little flavor packet.

Since that time, my players have been attempting to do all sorts of stuff with their flavor packets, and every time I have to correct them.

During a recent dinosaur race, the group tried to entice their triceratops mount by dangling food  in front of it - trying to put shiftspice from a flavor packet on the food to core sweet advantage on the check! I was outraged.

So, on this show, apparently there is a modron whose name is suspiciously similar to mine that is dispensing shiftspice flavor packets.

Clearly, I will have to retaliate in some manner on one of my shows, at the very least to clear the air about why the githzerai would never put shiftspice in a flavor packet. I mean, it's just not feasible.

She picks up S3-4N and holds it over Miga. It uses its fork hand to comb Miga's hair. Miga tells it to rest and it shuts down.

The group steps through the portal and appears in Automata, sometimes referred to as "Old Tomato" by the adventurers. All the buildings are the same size. The people walk in neat lines and rows. Most of them are wearing identical grey robes. The group hears a voice declare that "newcomers must register."

Jysson is with the group. He recommends that the group ditch the guards or they'll be in lines for hours. They take his advice.

Miga pickpockets.. rolls a d100. Gets a 69. She yoinks a dog-eared pamphlet containing... modron porn. Oh no.. S3-4N sees it. Its eye goes wide. Can not unsee.

Gille snatches it away. Levity wants it. Lyra advises that Gille hides it in his haversack. The chat has many a title for this pron booklet:

• "Love Knows No HD Limits."
• "How to Oil Your Gears."
• "Two Modrons - One Coupler"

The group nears Fandal's smoked meats. The book says that this is definitely where its makers used to live. The master's name was Heiron Lifegiver.

Miga goes in with some money. She asks, "Is there a wizard? Can I have meat?" The shop was once owned by Heron, but it has been sold. She is told that Heron has been seen at a halfling tavern not too far from here. The Book knows where the tavern is.

The heroes head to the halfling bar, which is sized for small creatures. Levity spots someone she knows - Chastity. Durge performs for the patrons and hands out pamphlets on the True Death.

Chastity quietly advises the group that Heiron is in hiding. The Council of Anarchy is after him. This council tries to keep Automata from getting too lawful so that it doesn't slide into Mechanus.

Chastity tells the group that Heiron is in a closet in a building nearby. It's guarded at night.

The group buys forged papers and heads to the Council of Order building. They make their way inside and find the closet. Heiron opens the door - he's a half-elf.

Suddenly, the door vanishes and he tumbles to the floor. A high elf woman and 8 hired goons are here. The high elf wants to put the heroes in the dead book. Durge says she is so ready to go in the dead book.

Durge casts crown of madness on the high elf and forces her to attack one of her allies.

Miga rushes a guy and and stabs him with the skewer. The guy's eyeball comes out. Good gawd.

The adventurers pummel the guards. Then.. chaos ensues. The people of the city are running around. someone shouts out that the modrons are marching.

S3-AN asks, "What is happening?"

The portal in Automata is open and modrons are pouring through. Hundreds of them. One of the goons snatches the book from the heroes and escapes into the crowd.

Jysson tells Durge that the clerk building in Sigil belongs to her now.

Overall

Great show!! Mazz got 7 players through an entire chapter in a single session. That's not easy! Great group, really fun to watch.

Dark and Dicey Episode 4

June 28, 2018, 7:28 am

≫ Next: Rivals of Waterdeep Episode 1

≪ Previous: Hell's Belles Episode 1

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• Watch this episode here.
• Check out the Dark and Dicey subreddit right here. 
• Follow the show on twitter here.

Follow Rina, the author of this recap, on twitter right here.

Cast

Nathan Sharp as Pluck the Kenku Swamp Druid
Cristina Vee as Anya the Yuan-Ti Pureblood Warlock
Anna Brisbin as Trixa Teardu the Lightfoot Halfling Barbarian
Hunter Hughes as Kovacs the Half-Elf Oathbreaker Paladin
Zach Callison as Werblund the Deep Gnome Ranger

Kaiji Tang as the Dungeon Master
Where we left off

    At the Stream of Many Eyes, the group  found themselves in a carriage chase as a mob of agents from another party target a magical artifact the Shenanigang currently possesses.
   
After various shenanigans, they were able to shake off their pursuers. Soon after, their carriage started falling apart, and the dire boar ran into a cart filled with cabbages. The boar trips, flipping onto its back and flinging the carriage and all its occupants straight towards an outer wall of the Yawning Portal.

Thus ended the Stream of Many Eyes session.

Episode 4

The Shenanigang got arrested for property damage. The bag of gold they had found in the carriage was enough for the bail money.

The trip to and from Waterdeep took about a month. Anya had stayed in Fairheim during that time. The rest of them are now approximately 20 minutes out from home. As the magical mist signalling their approach began washing over the ship, everyone made a perception check. Pluck rolled a nat 1! What a wonderful start to the session.

Everyone else notices a small green thing with three eyes and wearing a cap. It is Google McGuffin!  Pluck is the only one unaware of it being there, and yet it sits in his lap. The group does point it out to him, at which point he squawks in surprise and throws it.

Trixa catches Google, and asks where it got it’s hat. Here we learn that Google knits in its spare time, and it makes Trixa, Pluck and Werblund some tiny hats. The group asks it questions, including if it needs to recharge. Google says that it needs to rest like anyone else, but is fresh the next day. After Kovacs confusedly and accusitorily asks it if is suggesting that it is a person, it answers:
“Oh no. I am an ancient and powerful artifact. Here. Have a tiny hat.”

It then asks them to take it with the group as they travel the Blacksteel Isles so that it could expand its knowledge on the area. As the rest of the group talks it over, Pluck attempts to sneak it away to toss out a window. He doesn’t make it very far before the rest of the group notices and Werblund stops him.

Google offers its help in any endeavors the party would need in exchange for taking it with them. Werblund immediately takes Google up on this offer, asking it to find his daughter. It immediately begins glowing green. When it stops it turns towards the Fairheim dock as it confirms finding the girl’s location.

Fairheim looks different. The investments that were discussed at the end of session 2 have been implemented. The Pretty Cook looks like a valid business. The dock is seeing more use for ships coming and going. The orphanage is in operating order, though is still in need of additional furnishings on top of its low-end kitchen and beds. And Anya has constructed a big statue of herself in the middle of town.
   
Kovacs and Pluck both feel like they should just leave.

The kids playing around the base of Anya’s statue are wearing dark cloaks with little snake emblems on them. It looks like Anya’s cult might have a larger budget now.

As they get off the boat, the cargo door nearly explodes and here appears Sir Piggleton, the dire boar friend! Philbert the tortle store manager also came along with some of the fizzy water supplies, as most of the profits and property of the company had to be sold in order to cover the bail. It looks like the company will have to be remade from the ground up.

Anya quickly comes to welcome the party back, bragging about her successes in Fairheim. A perception check from her shows her a little hat in Pluck’s pocket. She takes it thinking it’s valuable and tries to convince the group to give her a bracelet in return for it. Google says that it could make one.

Pluck tries to deceive Anya into thinking that Google isn’t there and that it was him instead, but Google near immediately ended the ruse. Google has a hard time lying.

Google promises to help get a bracelet for Anya. It also says that it would keep its magic usage to a bare minimum when on the island. This worried Kovacs and Pluck, who tried to put a bracelet on it, but the rock is a bit too small. They’ll need a bit of rope.

Werblund, annoyed, asks about his request from earlier. His daughter is in Thisbinar, with Winkerbean. They will be in Allhaven within six days.

Shady Jeff comes over to ask about the group’s excursion to Waterdeep, but Werblund wheels the conversation back to his daughter. Jeff promises to do some digging for Werblund and figure out information about the Winkerbean circus tent that is to be set up in Allhaven. But in the meantime, leads the group to the now completed circus tent to introduce their new entertainers. They are also now members of Anya’s cult, which is now very popular.

While Trixa tries to figure out different acts they might be able to create and Anya bursts into song, Werblund, Kovacs, and Pluck just leave. Werblund and Kovacs go off to have a of secretive conversation. The two both have qualms against Sir Lucian of Thisbinar, and though Werblund doesn’t like everyone very much, he is willing to work with them in their endeavors if they help him get his daughter back. They plan to go to the smithy to suit up. Pluck eavesdrops on the whole conversation, having rolled a nat 20 on his perception check. His main concern is having Werblund rank everyone in how much he likes Pluck.

Google asks if it could be of assistance for rescuing the daughter, and is quite excited about the prospect. It also mentions however, that Thisbinar is currently closed off from the world, slowing trade and travel down to a trickle. The guard is completely militarized. And to top it all of, Kovacs disclosed that blood magic had been running rampant in the city; demons summoned, humanoids sacrificed, and Lucian himself being imbued with demonic power.

As Kovacs raises his voice angrily as he discloses this information, Trixa and Anya follows them out of the tent as well, leaving the cultists to mill about. Pluck quickly tells one to go learn to juggle and another two to make out or something.

Google mentions Kovacs being responsible for aspects of the political upheaval, which Trixa connected to some peoples’ anger towards him when he introduces himself, and for the secret kept there. Kovacs snaps at Trixa, saying that both the man he wishes to destroy and Trixa have demonic strength, so why should he trust her. This is when Google pipes up defending her, stating that Trixa doesn’t have control over that.

And that Google knows everything about them.

Trixa tries to secretly ask Google how to get rid of the demon. It involves forgiving her mother, which she does not want to do. We also learn that the demon comes out with negative emotions and survival instincts. Pluck and Werblund overhear the conversation, and Pluck tries to convince Werblund to not tell Kovacs for fear of him killing Trixa. Kovacs does overhear that though. Pluck tries to cover his tracks.

Anya also wants to talk to the pet rock. When Trixa finishes the conversation and hands Google over, there was a flash of green in her eyes, which faded immediately.

Kovacs gives up and goes to Ironhoof’s smithy with Werblund. Ironhoof excitedly welcomes them back and gives Kovacs a greatsword made from the silver and adamantite they took from Fizzlepot’s armor. It doesn’t have a name, but here are its stats:

2d6 Greatsword. Heavy, two-handed. Silvered. Adamantite Reinforced: Automatically crits against inanimate objects.

When Kovacs sheathed the weapon on his back, he felt movement behind him. Pluck had appeared, trying to chew on the sword because it is very shiny.

Werblund sells off his meat cleaver, dagger, and chain mail and buys two longswords and a breastplate. Pluck buys a necklace with mazes on it, that could be enchanted if he so chose. Kovacs also sells his chain mail in favor of a breastplate.

Google also wants to get equipment. A tiny sword and shield, specifically. Pluck covers for it, mimicking its voice. They end up taking a letter opener shaped like a sword and the decorative shield it came with. Ironhoof just gives it to him.

As they leave the smithy the kids who are a part of a cult ambush the group asking for presents. Kovacs gives one a shortsword and Trixa gives another a throwing knife.
They’re about to start their “slaves and drugs” chant, but Shady Jeff stops them and they start to chant “peace and love,” though they are exasperated as they do.

The Pretty Cook makes a big meal for them when they return. The menu has expanded into what is considered more normal cuisine, but the Underdark menu is still available. Anya and SnekSnek are eating mice. SnekSnek has a little hat now, which Google had made for him. SnekSnek likes Google.

Pluck goes off to a table by himself to ask Google to enchant the newly acquired necklace to be like the bracelet. He has to make an ominous wisdom saving throw, which was a 12. The rock says that it can’t enchant the necklace by itself, but if Pluck touches it then they could get some help.

When he does, they vanish from the room.

Pluck is writhing around in a chaotic and dark place, unable to make a sound. Google is off in the distance, holding a seemingly friendly conversation with a formless entity that is both everywhere and nowhere at the same time. It goes like this for what feels like hours or years.

And he returns back to the room.

Immediately, Pluck lets out a scream and throws Google in a panic. Everyone else goes to alert. Werblund pulls out his swords. Trixa catches Google. Pluck’s necklace is now a +1 necklace of protection.

After a chaotic conversation filled with yelling, Pluck storms away, traumatized. Everyone else stays trying to hash out what happened.

Google’s friend is an antisocial djinn which lives on its own plane of existence. The artifact doesn’t think the rest of the group would like it there based off of Pluck’s reaction.

Google has, however, started formulating the beginnings of a plan to get another bracelet. There are two potential targets: Vigil, the tiefling woman guard captain they had met previously, and Nekko Havenspear, another guard captain that patrols the area and is something of a celebrity in Allhaven. It looks like the plan right now is to have Anya seduce Havenspear.

Werblund reluctantly tells Anya that if she helps in getting his daughter back, he would help her get a bracelet, and may consider her a friend at that point. Anya excitedly tells SnekSnek of this development.

Later, Anya and Trixa go to Ironhoof’s before he closes up shop. Trixa sells a kitchen knife she got from the prison ship’s kitchen. Anya sells the Ring of Bureaucratic Wizardry, and attempts to sell the vial of blood she collected off of Fizzlepot as well. The first was a very successful transaction, but the second went less swimmingly and grossed Ironhoof out, opting to help Trixa instead. She got a battleaxe. Anya tries to get something better than her shortsword, and winds up with a giant mace that functions more as a warhammer. Anya also gets some studded leather armor. Trixa asks for a cloak, which Ironhoof says he doesn’t have any of right now, but if she comes back tomorrow she can pick up a cloak. It’s being made of some of the drapes on the window. Anya also buys a little puzzle ring and bracelet to try to cheer up Pluck. The bracelet is engraved with a personalized message from Anya.

The night is from there uneventful, but they all get a wake up call from Google floating from room to room, excited for adventure with its little letter opener sword and shield.

The plan is for Anya to go seduce Nekko Havenspear. Google magically applies her makeup. As they make their way through the woods towards the waterfall, they come across a cart being ransacked by three lizardlike creatures, and Philbert the tortle up a tree calling for help. They turn angrily. Kovacs tries to intimdate them into leaving, with the help of Werblund. Unfornutately, a 1 was rolled, and Kovacs burps instead. Pluck just hides with a natural 20.

The lizardfolk speak to them in Draconic, and the only one who understands them is Anya. At first she tries to persuade them to leave, but failing that she tries to intimidate them by describing what her friends can do. Upon hearing that Kovacs had been a part of a political upheaval, they became interested. Apparently, their people have been driven from their homes, the lizardfolk people now starving on the streets and outskirts of Allhaven. The reason they are ransacking the cart is due to hunger. Anya wants to help her reptilian brethren, and ends up promising to kill of the Allhavians.

    When the lizardfolk leave, she relays this to her party, and Google confirms. Everyone is annoyed at her in different respects, but Kovacs says that the best way to help them while maintaining the deal is to get rid of those in power in Allhaven.

    A bit later they make it to a clearing that has a river leading to a nice pond with a small waterfall nearby. Nekko is bathing in the pond and waterfall. He’s a classically beautiful man. Textbook, in fact.

 Kovacs spots the bracelet they’re after, and Anya spots a very ornate, nice looking spear. When the items are pointed out, Werblund notes that the spear is well constructed. Pluck just sees the shiny point, casts Pass Without Trace, and goes to take it.

    Werblund gave the bracelet he was wearing to Anya in hopes that she would cast invisibility on someone to make it easy to just steal the items and leave, but instead she went up to a distance close enough to Nekko to cast Charm Person. Exasperated, Werblund goes to take the bracelet.
   
Both thefts succeed. Whether or not Charm Person succeeded is unclear, but Anya goes to greet the man anyway. A persuasion check and a charisma saving throw later, the man seems to see Anya in a positive light. He gets out of the pond and his bottom half appears to actually be a horse.

Which is where the episode ends! Join us next time to find out whether or not Anya can seduce a centaur, and if the others can get away without him noticing his stuff missing!

Rivals of Waterdeep Episode 1

June 28, 2018, 7:32 am

≫ Next: Rivals of Waterdeep Episode 2

≪ Previous: Dark and Dicey Episode 4

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Rivals of Waterdeep - Episode 1: “Deal with the Devil”

This is a prequel to their show at the Stream of Many Eyes (which can be seen here). The party is in Nightstone. They are all level 4.


Aram Vartian - Dungeon Master

(Surena Marie) Ashborne - Half-Elf Ranger
(Carlos Luna) Nocnoc - Half-Orc Fighter
(Cicero Holmes) Perrin - Halfling Bard
(Tanya DePass) Selise - Human Paladin of Tyr
(Shareef Jackson) Shaka - Tiefling Warlock
(Brandon Stennis) Rinn - High Elf Sorcerer
We start with Selise, who’s been having visions of Nightstone crumbling under a great darkness. She arrives at the Hall of Justice to meet with an old friend, Vera, to try and convince the church of Tyr to pay heed to her warnings. Vera can only offer a horse and a good word sent ahead to Waterdeep.

Rinn has been hired as the liaison between the human hunters of Nightstone and the elves of the Ardeep Woods. He meets Nocnoc while out on patrol. Rinn asks the half-orc how he got his name, but Nocnoc doesn’t trust him enough to tell that story. They suddenly hear bells ringing from the direction of Nightstone.

Sharavka (’Shaka’ for short) sits on a hill overlooking Nightstone. His warlock patron wants to know more about the mysterious obsidian obelisk for which the village is named. As he is planning a route to sneak into town later that night, Shaka realizes that there is no one on the streets below.

Ashborne stumbles upon Shaka. Her right hand is a claw, but she has been having dreams of herself with her old hand, standing in front of the obelisk in Nightstone. Ashborne is intrigued by Shaka’s map, but he doesn’t trust her. A fox kit named Chips pops out of her bag. Shaka starts crying because Chips is so adorable. They decide to team-up to study the obelisk together. They hear the bells as they descend the hill.

Perrin arrived as part of a traveling show run by Guthren Derthmore, an old dwarf strongman. He is admiring himself in a mirror, pumping himself up for the show in Nightstone, which he calls “suburban Waterdeep”. When he comes out to perform though, there’s no townsfolk. Guthren runs off towards the inn to try and drum up an audience. Perrin hears a guttural growl from behind him, and casts ‘Light’ to reveal... a hell hound!

Selise is galloping full-tilt towards the church, where the bells are coming from. Suddenly, there’s a girl in the middle of the road, and the paladin is thrown from her horse as she tries to stop. The girl raises her hand and Selise freezes in mid-air before slowly floating to the ground. The girl tells her that her “friends” are being hurt, and gives Selise a locket that surges with holy energy. The girl is an avatar of Lliira, the goddess of joy! She disappears.

Everyone converges on Perrin as he fends off the hell hound. Ashborne rolls a natural 1 and accidentally shoots an arrow into the back of Perrin’s leg, but it draws the creature’s attention. Shaka fires an ‘Eldritch Blast’ as it lopes toward them. NAT 20! Perrin casts ‘Shatter’, causing the hell hound to explode into fiery bits just as Selise, Rinn, and Nocnoc come around the corner. Selise heals Perrin. Lliira’s locket multiples on her neck--there’s one for everybody!

The bells stop.

There is a soft green glow coming from the obelisk. Two more hell hounds circle it. Ashborne tries to offer them jerky... THEY ATTACK! There’s a quick battle. Rinn hears faint music coming from the inn. Ashborne sees some kind of script etched onto the obelisk and reaches out to touch it. As she does, she sees a vision of a gargantuan form rising from the ocean--a Kraken! Slarkrethel?!

Rinn and Nocnoc rush to the inn. Every townsperson in Nightstone is inside, getting drunk! The mayor tells them that the party is for “him”--a hot dude in a loincloth who looks like Dorian Gray from Penny Dreadful. Nocnoc wishes him a happy birthday. The man laughs, and says it might as well be his birthday, because he can only be here once per year. Rinn asks him for gold, and the man produces a torrent of coins from his hands.

“You like gold? How much is enough?”

THE MAN SAYS HE IS GRAZ’ZT, “THE PRINCE OF ALL DEMONS”!!! (I screamed with glee)

Graz’zt touches Lliira’s locket, and it burns him. Graz’zt’s smile disappears. Nocnoc feels a wave of terror and runs away, telling everyone that they have to leave right now. All the doors and windows slam shut. Graz’zt glares at them. He says that they’ve ruined his party, and storms out of the inn, down towards the obelisk.

Graz’zt shoves a claw into the stone, and it bursts with green light. An oily dome rises from the obelisk to cover the town. Graz’zt disappears. His two cambion bodyguards turn and smile at the party, saying that they’ve doomed the whole town (”1000 souls exactly”) to a century imprisoned here, all because they angered Graz’zt on the one day of the year that he could have a party on the Material Plane. The cambions tell them that for every 1000 gold they bring to Nightstone, Graz’zt will allow ONE soul to go free. THEY’LL NEED ONE MILLION GOLD TO FREE EVERYONE!

They have enough money to save one person. They choose the mayor. Her memory is fuzzy, and all she can remember is that a charming stranger came to town a few days ago. If the party really want to save everyone else, the demons point them to Waterdeep, which is a town where lots of money changes hands.

The party take the wagons from Perrin’s traveling show and set out. The mayor accompanies them, as she believes she can set up a meeting with Mirt the Moneylender (as seen during the session at the Stream of Many Eyes). As they leave the dome around Nightstone, the lockets given to them by Lliira crumble into nothingness...

Rivals of Waterdeep Episode 2

June 28, 2018, 7:34 am

≫ Next: Riddle of the Raven Queen

≪ Previous: Rivals of Waterdeep Episode 1

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Rivals of Waterdeep - Episode 2: “Hell to Pay”

You can watch this episode on Youtube, or listen to a podcast version!

The party are on the High Road, two days south of Waterdeep. We pick up right where Episode 1 left off.

Aram Vartian - Dungeon Master

(Surena Marie) Ashborne - Half-Elf Ranger
(Carlos Luna) Nocnoc - Half-Orc Fighter
(Cicero Holmes) Perrin - Halfling Bard
(Tanya DePass) Selise - Human Paladin of Tyr
(Shareef Jackson) Shaka - Tiefling Warlock
(Brandon Stennis) Rinn - High Elf Sorcerer

We start off with the dreams everyone is having during their long rest...

Selise is a lawyer. The judge declares her clients witches, and they are taken outside to be executed. Selise tries to intervene as they are cut down. One of Graz’zt’s cambions, Devonia, appears (she sounds like Gretchen Wieners from Mean Girls), and gives Selise a tome with the words ‘BURN BOOK’ written on it. There’s 999 pages, each with a drawing of a person and the heinous crimes that they’ve gotten away with, as well as their location in Waterdeep.

Shaka puts the finishing touches on a map. Suddenly, the morning mists part, and a black tower rises before him. The tower is said to contain forbidden knowledge from across Faerun, including the true names of demons. Every morning at dawn, the tower moves to a new location. He runs into the mists, but loses his way. He runs into the other cambion, Corsan. Corsan tells Shaka that this is “a preview”, and offers the warlock a book that can answer any question asked IF he does him a favor--bring him a brass cube from the Dragon Hoard in Waterdeep.

Ashborne is playing hide-and-seek with her fox, Chips. She finds a bear over the body of Chips and loses her composure. She leaps onto the bear’s back and tears into it with her claw. The bear runs off, but it’s too late... Chips is gone. Devonia steps up and brings Chips back to life, and says that she can make it so that as long as Ashborne is alive, Chips will also be alive. She also offers to restore Ash’s mutated arm. All she needs to do is bring Devonia a copper box from the Dragon Hoard in Waterdeep. They pinky swear. Ash feels as Chips' heart begins to beat as one with her own.

Nocnoc finds himself at the tavern in Nightstone, and sneaks out the front door. He steps through... back into the tavern. He tries different doors, but it keeps happening, and when he tries to ask for help, nobody looks at him. Suddenly, everything goes dark. He says “Knock-knock”, and Corsan answers, “Who’s there?” Corsan shows him an army as it clear-cuts the forest where Nocnoc’s monastery is located. The soldiers attack the bubble around Nightstone, but as it pops, everything is destroyed. The cambion says it will only take two, maybe three months before human predictability leads to this outcome, but he gives Nocnoc divining rods to help the half-orc find enough gold to lift the curse before that. In return, Corsan wants a copper box from the Dragon Hoard. Uh-oh... Does anybody else smell the seeds of inter-party conflict being sown?

Rinn is an elf, so it is WEIRD seeing other people sleep. He pokes Selise and wakes her up, she grabs his hand. He just wanted to say hello. As Selise gets up, she feels the Burn Book beside her. She opens it and sees that there’s actually 1000 pages--the last one is “the person she’s been looking for”. I think that was entirely improv on Tanya’s part, and Aram said it’s 100% canon. Awesome!

Rinn begins his trance. He sees himself in a store with all sorts of cool stuff, but he has no money to buy any of it! He touches something and it turns to gold. He touches the shopkeep... BOOM, GOLD! Rinn freaks out as everyone and everything around him starts turning to gold. Devonia steps out and says she loves what he’s done with the place. If Rinn gets her the brass cube from the Dragon Hoard, she’ll let Rinn have all one million gold pieces given to free the people of Nightstone...

Perrin sleeps perfectly soundly. He’s never slept better in his life. His boss, Gundren, had a dream though, and it freaked him out. Everyone was fighting a dragon... everyone except for Perrin. The two cambions were there too. Gundren wants nothing to do with this, packs up his stuff, and leaves.

Lliira appears before Selise during her morning prayer, and says that there is a way to replace the good people of Nightstone with the bad people in the Burn Book using the map that Shaka drew last session (the map now has moving silver dots representing the townsfolk on it)! Everyone else wakes up just in time for breakfast, prepared by Perrin’s ‘Unseen Servant’. They discuss their troubled sleep, and the strange gifts offered to them by Corsan and Devonia.

Rinn lies and tells everyone that the demons offered to make it so he wouldn’t feel the compulsion to steal from other people anymore, but Perrin sees through it and gets the elf to tell him the real deal in private. Rinn offers to split the gold half-and-half with Perrin, and the halfling agrees to keep this secret between them.

On the road, they run into Waterdhavian scouts who ask them about Nightstone. They now have an escort the rest of the way to Waterdeep.

As they camp that night, hunters from Daggerford surround them, led by a lord who’s brother was sliced in half when the bubble around Nightstone appeared. They saw the party leaving the village and say that they’re arresting all of them. Perrin casts ‘Suggestion’ and convinces the lordling to leave them alone, but another archer realizes that the bard used magic on their boss and fires!

They fight off the attackers, who flee. The mayor of Nightstone is amazed at how well they work together as a team. Maybe they’ll actually be able to find this mysterious Dragon Hoard and save the people of her village from Graz’zt’s curse after all.

Aram mentioned that we’ll have one more episode before catching up with where the session at the Stream of Many Eyes (which, it turns out, is Episode 4) left off. So far, we’ve been going at a one in-game day per episode pace, and, given that the party have one day’s travel to Waterdeep still, that seems like it’ll be continuing.