Sangfielle 39: Just Returns Pt. 3
Transcriber: robotchangeling
Austin: You see in the distance, coming up from the ground in an inversion of the way it normally looks, a bolt of—or, you know, many intertwined bolts—of red lightning. And it's just holding there, the way it was when you were in the Hymn of the Mother-Beast. And it's coming from, I would say, your like west-southwest, Blackwick way.
[Music begins: “Sangfielle” by Jack de Quidt]
Austin (as Kerr): I didn't want to believe it. I thought maybe it was a coincidence. You're part of the Blackwick Group. Did you kill that Magistrate?
Austin: And like steps back from you a step.
Jack: [laughing softly] Shit.
Austin (as Kerr): You killed that Magistrate. They're here for the killer who killed…the Patriarch? You don't know anything about this. And they’re here for you.
Ali (as Marn): Okay.
Austin (as Kerr): You're not gonna like— oh, you shouldn't come back to Blackwick.
Ali (as Marn): We can't like talk to them? We can't just, you know, go with our hands up with a white flag or whatever?
Janine (as Es): No. [laughs]
Jack (as Pickman): They are—
Art (as Duvall): I think we should go with our fists up. [Ali laughs]
Janine (as Es): And a black flag, down.
Jack (as Pickman): They worship the goddess of immediate justice.
Janine (as Es): Yeah.
Ali (as Marn): Well, that's what we were doing!
Jack (as Pickman): Yes. [Janine laughs] I'm not…I am not…listen, I'm not going back on the decisions we made in killing the Magistrate. That was something we decided to do as a group. It had to be done.
Austin (as Teresa): That is you, Meyer! Meyer, I'm up here.
Art: Up?
Austin: And you look up, and it's Roseroot Hall.
Art (as Duvall): [confused] Hi. How are you? What are you…what are you doing here?
Austin (as Teresa): Would you come up here? Bring your friends up here.
Art (as Duvall): [quiet] Okay.
Austin (as Teresa): And be quiet about it. You're making too much noise.
Austin: She yells.
Austin (as Dayward): [sighs] Well— so, I met with the Magistrates when they first came to town, of course.
Jack (as Pickman): [deadpan but disdainful] Of course you did.
Austin (as Dayward): Well, they are…they have authority, and I’m someone who wants to make sure that we follow the rules, and et cetera. There was a Kay'van, I believe, I believe they said.
Jack (as Pickman): Oh, shit.
Austin (as Dayward): Yes?
Jack (as Pickman): Keep talking.
Austin (as Dayward): Do you know the agent that they speak of?
Jack (as Pickman): [forcefully] Keep talking.
Austin (as Dayward): Well, he killed someone important in the north and fled here. And they sent someone to find him, and that person never came back, and so they were inquiring about his presence. Some information got out, and when they investigated it, things went sour.
[song ends]
Austin: Welcome to Friends at the Table, an actual play podcast focused on critical world building, smart characterization, and fun interaction between good friends. I'm your host, Austin Walker. Joining me today, Ali Acampora.
Ali: Hi! You can find me over at @ali_west on Twitter, you can find the show over at @friends_table, and happy New Year. I haven't mentioned this for a bit, but me and Austin have a Star Wars podcast—
Austin: That’s true.
Ali: —over at @more_civilized.
Jack: Oh.
Austin: It’s true.
Jack: It’s very good.
Austin: It’s true.
Ali: We watch Clone Wars. It's good.
Austin: Yeah.
Art: Is it New Years in a galaxy far far away?
Ali: Do they celebrate New Years? I don't know the galactic…
Austin: They have some sort of galactic calendar that…
Ali: Time, yeah.
Austin: Well, we don't either, right? Like, this is the thing.
Ali: Oh, isn’t…
Austin: Go ahead.
Ali: No, I think that’s birthdays.
Janine: Is that what Death Day is?
Ali: [typing] Star Wars New Years…
Austin: I don't know if Life Day is it.
Art: A galactic calendar would instantly be a terrible idea. There's no way it works, right?
Austin: Well, I mean, you—
Janine: I mean, we know for a fact there’s Wookie Christmas.
Austin: PARTIZAN has that. [Ali laughs] We know that the PARTIZAN is explicitly about the calendar not working in space and an empire insisting it does. But there is a calendar, I just don't think we know it off the top of our heads, because in Star Wars fandom we use the Battle of Yavin as our year marker—
Ali: Mm.
Jack: Oh.
Austin: And no one in the world of that does that, [Ali laughs] because it hasn't happened yet where we are in the timeline. No one is like, “Oh yeah, in 20 years, Luke's gonna blow up the Death Star.” [laughs softly]
Art: But like…okay, so—
Austin: But they have a calendar.
Art: But when I say it's five years before the Battle of Yavin, do I mean it's five 365 days before the Battle of Yavin?
Austin: You do mean that. That is— it’s 368 days, but yes.
Art: It's 368 days?
Austin: Yeah, it’s the Coruscant cycle, and so that's the cycle that everybody uses.
Janine: God.
Austin: Yeah.
Art: That's ridiculous.
Ali: Well, that's where the money is.
Art: Why…why?
Austin: Because that's where power exists, Art.
Janine: Yeah, that’s…
Ali: Yeah.
Austin: Go listen to PARTIZAN.
Art: No, but it's not real. [Ali laughs]
Austin: Yes.
Art: So you don't have to say it’s 368 days.
Austin: Guns are real.
Art: But Coruscant isn’t.
Austin: And they use the guns to make it real. That's what imperial power is about. [Jack laughs] The— time zones aren't real either.
Jack: PARTIZAN 2.
Austin: But we do it here.
Art: Disney’s guns? Are you talking about the guns of the Disney corporation right now?
Austin: Yes. [laughs] Yes, uh huh. Yes. [Ali laughs] Ah, anyway. As we all know, the church invented the clock to better keep people on their prayer cycles and also to maximize, you know, crop output. So. Very important, very important history. Anyway. Um, who was— was that Janine just went? Jack is up, I think, right?
Ali: No, it was only me.
Austin: Or was that Ali?
Art: It was Ali.
Janine: No, that was…
Austin: We were still on Ali. [Ali laughs]
Austin: Why would— hi, why would I launch into Star Wars?
Austin: I didn't— listen, I didn't know how we got to clocks. [Janine and Ali laugh] I'd gotten away from Star Wars in my mind. I was 10 steps down. I was on some other shit. I was thinking about Foucault. Uh, Janine’s here. Janine Hawkins.
Janine: Uh, hi. I'm @bleatingheart on Twitter. You won't find any Star Wars or Foucault there. Sorry.
Austin: Uh huh. [laughs softly] Jack de Quidt.
Jack: Hi, I’m Jack. You can find me on Twitter at @notquitereal and buy any of the music featured on the show at notquitereal.bandcamp.com.
Austin: And Art Martinez-Tebbel.
Art: Hey, you can find me on Twitter at @atebbel, where maybe I'm just gonna be rude about clocks next year. I don't know. [Austin laughs softly]
Ali: Mm.
Art: Maybe that'll be my my New Years thing.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Art: Just more insufferable on Twitter.
Austin: [laughs softly] Uh huh.
Art: That's my New Year's resolution.
Austin: Uh, what are we…what are we doing? We're playing Heart: The City Beneath by Grant Howitt and Christopher Taylor. Our goals are to ask questions instead of planning; to evoke an atmosphere of wonder, horror, and humanity; to build break tension— build and break tension; to pay attention to what everyone at the table wants, both long term and short term; and to play to find out what happens. I should note, as always, if you would like to support the show you can go to friendsatthetable.cash to do that. And before we jump back in, I'd love to hear what everyone's Beats are. Let's start with Duvall, since he's at the top of my list.
Art: Uh, yeah. “Meet someone from your old life who’s trying to get you to give up on your quest.”
Austin: You got that one. That one happened.
Art: Oh, you think…you think that's done?
Austin: Meet someone from your old life who's trying to? Yeah.
Art: All right.
Austin: You don't have to—
Art: We didn’t get rid of— she's not gone.
Austin: It doesn't say she has to go away.
Art: Okay. Well, then, I’ll pick a new one.
Austin: It doesn't say get rid of her. Yeah, you should pick a new one before we're done this wraparound.
Art: Uh huh. “Destroy a Haunt to learn more about your task,” and I think I'm closer to that than ever.
Austin: Uh huh? It’s possible, certainly.
Art: I guess I haven't figured out what it has to do with my task, but I mean…
Austin: Yeah.
Art: Finding a destroyable Haunt is really the harder part, I think, of the…
Ali: Mm.
Austin: True, true. And there's a bunch of Haunts here in Blackwick, and I don't know.
Art: Yeah.
Austin: Things seem bad right now.
Jack: Woowee.
Art: Things could get destroyed.
Austin: Things could get destroyed. All right. Uh, Es.
Art: What a world. [Austin takes amused breath]
Janine: Yeah, um… [clears throat] Sorry. My Beats right now are…I have a major Beat. I just refreshed like both of my Beats. These are both brand new.
Austin: Mm.
Janine: My major is: Acquire a rare or powerful D12 value item, preferably magic.
Ali: Mm.
Jack: Ooh.
Art: Mm.
Janine: And I also have the minor Beat, which is a very precision, precision choice, “Rush into danger before anyone else.”
Austin: Mm. Okay, sure.
Art: Mm.
Austin: Marn?
Ali: Hi. I also have two new Beats. They're pretty linked, I think. [laughs softly]
Austin: Okay.
Ali: It is “Release your shocking findings in a journal published in Sangfielle,” [Jack laughs] and “Kill someone who is trying to stop you from claiming knowledge.”
Austin: Oh, okay. Again, one of those at least, easy. Very easy to imagine [Ali laughs] how that works out.
Ali: You know, we'll see what happens.
Austin: We will. We will see what happens. And Pickman.
Jack: Uh, I have “Find a Heart-touched sapling on a Delve and bring it back to a Haven for planting,” so this is a bit like—
Austin: Had that for a minute. Yeah, uh huh?
Jack: If they were trying to kill you while you were playing Stardew Valley.
Austin: Right.
Jack: ‘Cause I just want to get it into town, plant it, and then I'm good to go.
Austin: Uh huh.
Jack: And then, “Show the truth of the structure’s majesty to an outsider.”
Austin: Mm, and that's major.
Jack: We got some outsiders in town.
Austin: We sure do.
Jack: But, again, they want to kill me while I'm doing my gardening, so. [Ali laughs softly]
Austin: Mm. Yeah, I guess that's true. That's true. That's a shame. Unfortunate. Okay, let me…I just wanted to get some more information down here in the same place. Um… [typing]
Jack: Oh, do we want to go over Fallouts real quick or…?
Austin: Sure. For some reason, I thought most people didn't have any especially bad ones.
Jack: I don’t—
Austin: But I guess you got shot at the end of the last session, didn’t you?
Jack: Yeah.
Austin: You did. So yeah, let's go over those, too.
Jack: I'm Vulnerable. I feel small, shaken, and scared. I can't use Mind Protection.
Austin: Mm. Mm-hmm.
Jack: And I'm Limping: “Foes target you. You get places last. Speed and stealth are Risky.” And then I have some ones about how they hate me at Bell Metal and Alekest is coming for me.
Austin: Uh huh. Right. [laughs softly] Make sure we're clear that that's a capital R. I fixed it on— or not fixed it, but on Limping, like, you roll Risky on moving quick or moving quiet. So.
[0:10:03]
Jack: Yes.
Austin: Important to truly understand how rough that might be. Um…sorry, I'm trying to find my— there it is. Okay. And I guess, Marn, you also have something, right?
Ali: I do. I have a bunch, actually, which is weird. I have In Trouble which is—
Austin: Mm.
Ali: “You upset an important figure in this or a nearby Haven.” It’s a nearby Haven. It's Alaway from…Yellowfield?
Austin: It’s Alaway. That's, yeah, uh huh.
Ali: Who’s in a vat, presumably, but we haven’t…we don't know what's going on there.
Austin: Yeah. Who knows?
Ali: [laughs] I still have Forboding.
Austin: Uh huh.
Ali: “Something bad is about to happen.” I think I heard some murder music in the distance as I was leaving Sapodilla.
Austin: Right, sure.
Ali: I have Follower. I'm being followed by a stick lizard.
Jack: Oh, yes!
Austin: Yes. [Janine laughs]
Ali: That was on a big stick that I have.
Austin: Uh huh.
Ali: I don't know how I’m carrying this around,, ‘cause presumably it's like taller than Marn is.
Austin: Oh, you're not— you're not— it's following you.
Ali: No, no, no. I'm saying I have the big stick that's like a staff apparently.
Austin: Oh, right. Yeah, it’s a staff. [Ali laughs] I think it’s taller than Marn. I think for anybody else it would be like a half staff, you know?
Ali: Oh, sure, sure. Okay, okay.
Austin: Yeah.
Ali: Well, so, just, it’s like… [laughs] Marn has their backpack, and then the staff is coming like three inches above their head.
Austin: Yeah.
Ali: Yeah, so I have this lizard.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Ali: I’m in a rich guy’s house, and I have a lizard on me. And because I got shot last session—
Jack: Fucking wild.
Austin: Yes.
Ali: I don't know that this is like a Fallout Fallout—
Austin: It’s—
Ali: —but Austin can now roll Mastery against me.
Austin: What I’ll say is the next time that that person— that you want to do something against that person, if they're able to shoot at you while it's happening, they will be able to…that will be a Risky roll, because you've been hit by them once and you’ve been debilitated, right?
Ali: Sure.
Austin: That’s how I’ll interpret that tag that's normally only for PC weapons and needs a little bit of, uh, you know, needs a little bit of adjustment for you getting shot with it instead of being the shooter. Anybody else have Fallout that they want to mention here? Duvall or Es?
Janine: Oh. Uh, I was gonna say mine got cleared up from room service.
Austin: Right. And Duvall, you still have Fascination, is what you were saying.
Art: Fascination: luck, and I would like to announce my new…
Austin: Ah, yes.
Art: But I'm just finishing up some formatting here. Got it. New minor Beat: “Succeed at a task someone else has recently failed to achieve.” Like I said, I'm going to roll like a golden god today.
Austin: Uh huh. [quiet laughter]
Art: So it’s not gonna be hard.
Austin: Yeah, this’ll be easy. Okay.
Art: Yeah. I took a Hunter of the Damned for that last one. I now have the Hunt skill.
Austin: Ooh, useful.
Jack: Oh.
Austin: That's…is that all it does?
Jack: Great.
Austin: No, it has to do something else too, right?
Art: “Once per session, when you eliminate a heartsblooded creature, remove D6 Stress from any of your resistances.”
Austin: Mm. That's fun. A fun— that's a— any sort of self heal is good. You don't necessarily…I’ve not seen you hunt a lot of creatures yet, but you know, you didn't have the Hunt skill before. So, you do now.
Art: Didn’t have the Hunt skill. What was I gonna do?
Austin: Yeah, totally. Um, okay. Does anyone want to recap, high level, what's going on in your current situation? And here, I'll help. I'll move you over to this map of Blackwick County. This very, very loose map of Blackwick County.
Art: Okay. Yeah, no, this is good. What did— don't sell yourself short, here.
Austin: I appreciate it. Thank you. Y'all are up top here. Roseroot Hall, right?
Art: Uh huh.
Austin: North. You got a telescope. That's where you got shot. That's where Marn and Pickman got shot? Is that right?
Ali: Mm-hmm.
Art: Yeah.
Austin: Okay.
Jack: Yeah.
Austin: Um, who— Ali, you edited this episode.
Ali: Hey.
Austin: What did y'all see down there? [laughs softly]
Ali: Um, so we saw, um…there was a guy leaning on an ax.
Austin: Yeah.
Ali: People were talking to him.
Austin: Do you remember where he was?
Ali: Sure don’t. [laughs]
Austin: Okay. I think he was at the miner camp. I think he was with the miners for some reason.
Ali: Okay. Okay.
Austin: Maybe he wasn't, though. I guess it doesn't matter, because by the time you check out— by the time you go down there next time, maybe they'll all have moved around, but, but I also want to justify— I also want to like, you know, give you true info, so, so.
Ali: Right. Yeah.
Austin: You keep talking to me what you…so, you got ax guy.
Ali: We've got ax guy. We've got the sis—
Austin: Ax plus armor guy. That was the other thing, right? He was wearing, like, real-ass—
Ali: Oh, I think so.
Austin: —like, medieval armor, which is…
Jack: Plate armor, right?
Austin: Like plated armor, yeah, yeah, yeah. He's a Dark Souls, for sure.
Jack: Oh, great.
Ali: We saw the sister of the person we killed. [Jack chuckles]
Austin: Yes. Yep. Uh huh.
Ali: Seems pretty bad that she's here.
Austin: Rebek. Rebek Semm, yep.
Ali: Don’t love it.
Austin: She has like a shotgun. Yeah, uh huh.
Ali: Uh huh.
Austin: She was definitely, I want to say she was up near the trade hall or the ruined abbey. Maybe she was at the trade hall. Hmm. Anyway. Maybe she was at the town council. I’ll decide where these people are in a second.
Ali: We saw Kerr Kern, who is the other Telluricist that I spoke to—
Austin: Yes.
Ali: —last episode, doing some sort of like community service, but is [Austin scoffs] clearly like working with the Magistrates. I think I was lied to, by the way—
Austin: Oh yeah.
Ali: ‘Cause I thought she was like on the way back to the Telluricists Union, and she is like holding very valuable stuff.
Austin: Oh yeah.
Ali: But that’s fine.
Austin: You were absolutely lied to.
Ali: [laughs] Okay.
Austin: A hundred percent. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Ali: But…I think you lied to me, not her, but it's okay. [laughs]
Austin: Wait, what did I do?
Ali: Well, ‘cau— no, it's fine. I’m just being…
Austin: You didn't— you— uh, here's the specific— I'll tell you exactly what happened, is you didn't roll to convince her of anything. You rolled to see if she was shifty, and I told you she was shifty, and you didn't pursue.
Ali: Sure. Sure.
Austin: So.
Ali: Sure.
Austin: You gotta…you gotta convince someone to not lie to you. [Ali laughs] You cannot just know that they're lying to you.
Ali: Okay.
Austin: So.
Ali: I only gave her that stuff ‘cause I thought she was like on the way there.
Austin: Yeah, and she wanted you to beli—
Ali: I should’ve just mailed it.
Austin: Well, she's going— in her mind, she's gonna go back there after this.
Ali: Okay. Sure.
Austin: You know?
Ali: Please don't kill her today, everybody.
Austin: Mm…
Jack: Okay.
Ali: [laughs] That is between me and the party, so, hey.
Austin: Uh huh.
Ali: Is that it? I think that's it.
Austin: No, there's more, ‘cause there's the sniper.
Ali: There was a sniper who shot us.
Austin: Who presumably is up here somewhere, right? Like northish, you know, doing a little lookout. Um, and then there should be…I think there's one— oh, and there's the priest. There's the actual person who's doing the ritual that’s summoning this giant red lightning bolt down to the ruined abbey.
Ali: Ah.
Austin: Who…who you don't know who that is. You don't know— you don't know any of these names, but, you know.
Jack: Four plus a Telluricist.
Austin: That's correct.
Jack: And that priest is a Magistratum priest or a Triadic Pyre priest?
Austin: Magistratum priest.
Jack: Oh, like came along with them.
Austin: There is overlap between the two. Fulmina, who is the Magistrate kind of goddess, the deity of choice, is part of the Triadic Pyre. Those are different faiths, but they share her as part of the pantheon, and so—
Jack: Okay, cool.
Austin: Part of what happened here, as a reminder, was that they did pull in some members of the Triadic Pyre. There has seemed to be a split because some people wanted to side with, uh, what's-his-face instead. The Ojantani.
Jack: Oh, Proctor Wolff.
Austin: Proctor W— yeah, yeah. Ekashi Wolff, who tried to lead a sort of like little revolt. Did not go well. Those folks are now unfortunately dead. So, so yeah.
Jack: Don't they also call Fulmina the goddess of immediate justice?
Austin: Of immediate justice, yes. Or of immediate…immediate and something justice?
Jack: Good.
Austin: Uh huh. [laughs softly] Classic, safe.
Ali: I think it's for…
Austin: They take action pretty quick. Go ahead.
Ali: ‘Cause we know the Magistrates are like using the lightning to try to get back into the Hymn.
Jack: Oh, yeah! They're like safecracking it, right?
Ali: Oh, the…yeah.
Austin: They are safecracking it, yes. You got it. You got it. I'm gonna make tokens for these people real quick.
Ali: Okay.
Austin: So you know where they are, because it seems fair that you should know where they are, you know?
Jack: Oh, and no trains have approached Blackwick in like, days, right?
Austin: Correct. Yes. Which like, is that…what's up with that? You know?
Jack: You need Shape Knights to know, and…
Austin: Yeah. Uh huh. All right. With the icons on the map, now you can see that Kerr Kern, who is the Telluricist, is down near the Boundless Conclave. The person in the big ax, or the big plate mail with the giant ax, is near the Triadic Pyre church. Ezek Semm’s sister, Rebek Semm, is at the town council, or kind of, I think, probably like, you know, moving around this kind of main thoroughfare up near the top of the kind of lower section of town, somewhere in here. I’m gonna put her right there again. There is the priest at the ruined abbey and then the sniper kind of also up on that second tier of stuff. Actually, you know what would be a sick place for her, would be on top of the Open Hand Trade Hall. Just like on top of the Trade Hall, [laughs softly] scanning in every direction from there. I feel like that's…that's fun. Um, so yeah, there you go. That's where those five people are. And again, there are other deputies who are, a lot of them are people who are part of the Triadic Pyre. Some of them are miners who have no loyalty to the town and who just like want to be able to keep doing their work and keep being paid. And in general, the mood was bad. That was kind of what you saw, was just like dark, dreary…Kerr, the Telluricist, was…you said like doing community service, but like, sort of like being the person who is like not actually part of this, but also, you know, they kind of crossed all their T's and dotted all their I’s in terms of, like, what they're doing here. When you lay it out on paper, it would be a pretty big political faux pas to like oppose it openly, because they're going after someone who like killed someone important to them. They seem to be on the up and up as far as their goals are concerned. It's very clear that their methods are really bad. And so Kerr is kind of doing…doing the best job possible to make sure regular people are still getting like medical care and like food and shit like that, you know? Other stuff that happened: Dayward YVE, piece of shit. Es, you kind of did a little verbal sparring with Dayward YVE. A boat turned into a bunch of bugs and flew away.
[0:20:03]
Ali: Mm-hmm.
Austin: Um, I think that’s—
Art: Doesn't even rate anymore, honestly. That’s… [Ali laughs]
Austin: Yeah, fair.
Ali: We spent so long being concerned about what was gonna happen to that boat.
Austin: I know, yeah.
Ali: And it just turned into a bunch of bugs.
Austin: It was just gonna turn into some bugs, you know. No big deal.
Jack: Duvall’s cousin is here.
Ali: Mm-hmm.
Austin: Oh, right, Duvall’s cousin is here. I forgot about her. I mean, she's in my list of characters who are here, but, you know.
Jack: What’s her name?
Austin: Uh, her name is…
Ali: Teresa…
Austin: We had a really fun nickname. Reese, right?
Ali: Reese, yeah.
Austin: Yeah, Teresa.
Jack: Oh, Reese.
Austin: We call her Reese.
Ali: Teresa Reese…
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Art: Famous for reading a lot of books.
Ali: Duvall? What's her last name? Did she have a last name?
Austin: Leopold, probably.
Ali: Oh, sure, sure, sure.
Austin: Right? Teresa Leopold?
Art: No, Leopold is a middle name.
Austin: No— is it? No, it isn’t.
Art: Yeah.
Ali: Yeah, I thought…I thought Duvall’s whole thing was he's a character that’s a last name character.
Austin: Oh, Leopold. Right, right, right. Right, sorry, yes. [Ali laughs] I wrote this backwards on my sheet. I wrote Duvall Leopold. I don't know why I did that. Yeah, M. Leopold Duvall. So yes, Duvall, Teresa Duvall. There we go.
Art: That’s much easier than it being like a mother's relative or however name succession works.
Austin: Yeah, needing to come up with another…yeah, uh huh.
Art: Yeah.
Austin: I mean, that might be more interesting.
Art: Sure.
Austin: But I don't have that work in front of me.
Art: Send in your French aristocracy last names. [Ali and Jack laugh]
Austin: It’s mostly Spanish aristocracy in Aldomina, but sure.
Art: Well, Duvall’s French.
Austin: I mean, it's also not. It's also not Spanish. It's Spanish, like, architecture in my mind, but it's a fucking mes— it’s Europe, right? Because it is Duvall. It is yon Vanzton-Estonberg, definitely not Spanish. But if you look at a lot of—
Art: That’s my favorite part of Spain.
Austin: [laughs] If you go through and look at a lot of the devils, there is stuff that is lots of Spain throughout the season here and there.
Janine: I will say, aesthetically, there is like…there are very few things more Aldomina to me than a Spanish hair comb.
Austin: Yeah, totally. Yes.
Janine: Those are the ones that are like super tall.
Austin: Uh huh.
Janine: Fan-shaped. Like, that feels very…that offsets your horns beautifully.
Austin: Totally. Totally. Yes. Um, so what are you…what are you doing? Getting a good night's sleep, it sounded like, or trying to. [laughs softly] Trying to, as the red light of a lightning bolt digging into a hymn, you know, comes through the windows.
Ali: Oh, yeah. We're all very relaxed. [Austin and Jack laugh] Sleep is our priority.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Ali: We love being at this weird house.
Austin: Yeah. Hell yeah. [Ali laughs] Congrats.
Ali: Just gonna be another boat arc for us.
Austin: Uh huh.
Ali: Let’s just hang out in this mansion.
Austin: Just gonna get some room service.
Ali: Do we want to…do we want to…do we want to say a couple of us, like, went to do some sneaking? We just had this whole opening of like, here's where everybody is.
Austin: You know what I would love? Actually, here's my frame, or my thing, or my question, is do you want to do an actual in character version of the conversation Jack set up in the chat of laying out what you know and what you have?
Art: It's gonna be really hard for me to do the same punch line.
Austin: Well, just don't. [Ali laughs] You don’t have to. It’s okay.
Art: Wow.
Ali: Well, Duvall could just be in character and be like, I feel really good about this. [Austin and Jack laugh] I’m gonna have a…I'm really competent in the task that I'm gonna do.
Austin: Uh huh.
Ali: Today's my lucky day.
Jack: Yeah. Is this something that the Telluricists are…the Telluricists are kind of tacticians on some level, right, Ali?
Ali: Um…no. [laughs]
Austin: Yeah, I think we cut that.
Art: No?
Austin: We didn’t…that's not the...I mean—
Ali: Tactician is not that thing.
Austin: Marn is, because of moves that— Marn has those moves, is the thing.
Jack: Oh, right, yeah.
Austin: Like, Marn, you could do Forewarned and Forearmed to give you bonuses, for instance, right? And like…
Ali: Oh, sure, sure, sure.
Austin: And I feel like you have some other like, “When you first arrive at blah blah blah, you can da da da da da,” or whatever. But, but canonically lore-wise, we kind of cut the military out of the Hound to make the Keen.
Ali: Right.
Austin: Right?
Jack: Right.
Ali: Yeah, I think it's more about knowing environments than it is being able to be like, “Oh, well, we should come in from the back, and [mumbles]” which is what tactical sounds like to me.
Austin: Yeah.
Jack: Yeah, yeah. Okay.
Ali: [laughs] Sorry to say no to that—
Jack: No, no, no.
Ali: —which would have been great to say yes to, but…
Austin: Mm-hmm. [Ali laughs]
Jack: Yeah, I mean, it might be worth just like getting some of it on tape. I think Pickman says:
Jack (as Pickman): Dayward, do you have a map of Blackwick?
Austin: Is this the…is this the next morning, presumably? Is this like…what—
Jack: Or do Pickman and Marn just come back in, having been shot at—
Austin: Yeah, is this that night?
Jack: And go, “let's go.”
Austin: Yeah. This is what I’m trying to figure out.
Jack: Like, let’s start planning.
Austin: Because I think it's…Dayward would be like:
Austin (as Dayward): Dear god.
Austin: Like, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Austin (as Dayward): Mr. Kenson, can you— can you see to these, uh, these wounds? Or Ana, whoever's around.
Austin: And asking for the map. He says:
Austin (as Dayward): Of course I have a map. How would I expand into the town without the… [stammers] Come right this way. We'll clear up some space.
Austin: And leads you into the…god, I don’t remember how this house is set up, but probably that small sitting room where you were having conversation before. And at this point, you know, the kind of tea service has been cleared away. And so he goes into the little side library and produces…it's probably like a number of different maps of Blackwick throughout, you know, a couple of different time periods. And then there's like his expansion map of like, where he sees the [Jack laughs] Open Hand Trade Hall and then like four other, you know, things, four other businesses he wants to open in the next six months, down on the kind of residential tier of town. Stuff like that. And so yeah, lays that all out, and, you know, you get a much more businesslike version of what you see in front of you now.
Jack (as Pickman): Well, sniper’s set up shop on top of your big venture, so that might be a bust.
Austin (as Dayward): Well, I did place it for the best view possible.
Jack (as Pickman): Mm.
Austin (as Dayward): I really wanted to be able to let, you know, visitors, you know, wash in the beauty of Blackwick County as they browsed.
Art (as Duvall): Does that work?
Austin (as Dayward): It's been a very successful venture.
Art (as Duvall): Hmm. I would just think if people are looking at the view they're not looking at the goods.
Austin (as Dayward): Well, it’s about sight lines.
Ali (as Marn): Is this a priority right now?
Austin (as Dayward): Uh…
Jack (as Pickman): No.
Art (as Duvall): I'm just interested.
Austin (as Dayward): We can talk later, Duvall. [Ali laughs]
Art (as Duvall): Okay.
Jack (as Pickman): One of Marn’s—
Austin: And so, yeah, lays it out. Go ahead, sorry. [Ali laughs]
Jack: Yeah.
Jack (as Pickman): One of Marn's colleagues is down tending to the wounded, some sort of community effort. Um…the station looks quiet. As it stands, I think we have a great benefit in the Margrave’s presence with us. They don't know that we were with him.
Jack: Sorry, wait. [laughs softly]
Jack (as Pickman): They don't know that he's with us.
Austin: I think, you know, Alekest probably nods and says, you know:
Austin (as Alekest): A surprise is a winning factor.
Jack (as Pickman): And you have the torch of the Zephyr, Duvall.
Art (as Duvall): Yes. But if the trains haven’t been coming, maybe there's a problem.
Jack: Uh, like, Pickman glances at Bucho.
Austin (as Bucho): [deep breath] Ooh. If they have a priest who can do the lightning, maybe they enchanted it so that the trains would stay away. Or maybe the trains are afraid, hmm?
Ali (as Marn): But what do we—
Jack (as Pickman): Marn and I—
Art (as Duvall): Horrifying thought. [Ali and Jack laugh softly]
Ali (as Marn): What do we want to do if we go down there?
Jack (as Pickman): Can we kill them? I don't know that we can kill them.
Austin: I think Bucho says:
Austin (as Bucho): Ah, it should not be your first thought to kill them. Eh—
Ali (as Marn): We’re in this mess…
Austin (as Bucho): Negotiation, intimidation. There are many things that we can do.
Jack (as Pickman): How do we know they won't just shoot us in the head?
Janine (as Es): I was going to say that it feels like whatever you want to do in town is gatekept a little bit by the sniper who shot people simply for looking.
Jack (as Pickman): Mm-hmm.
Austin (as Bucho): Fair enough.
Janine (as Es): We may still need to kill them.
Austin (as Bucho): [reluctant sound]
Jack (as Pickman): [thoughtful exhale]
Ali (as Marn): I mean, we're in this mess because we killed one of them.
Jack (as Pickman): And it was a fucking trial.
Janine (as Es): Well, they can't get any madder, then.
Jack (as Pickman): Oh, no, they can get madder. [Austin laughs softly]
Janine (as Es): Well, you've already killed some— I mean...
Jack (as Pickman): We kill these five, they’ll send—
Janine (as Es): How do they escalate from here?
Jack (as Pickman): They send ten.
Art (as Duvall): Well, once we kill five, we should have enough experience to know what killing ten would look like.
Ali (as Marn): We're not killing five of them.
Jack (as Pickman): We’re not killing five of them.
Austin (as Alekest): Eh, there's only four.
Austin: Says Alekest.
Austin (as Alekest): And then there's one that's Marn friend. That's another surprise on our side.
Janine (as Es): We could mangle them. I mean… [Austin laughs softly] Is killing the…
Jack: Heavy sigh. Heavy, heavy sigh. [Ali laughs softly]
Jack (as Pickman): Mangle them?
Austin: I think we just get…we just get an eyebrow go up on the Margrave, on Alekest, and he's like:
Austin (as Alekest): Mangling is preferable to killing.
Janine (as Es): See.
Austin (as Bucho): [begrudging] Hmm.
Janine (as Es): It wasn't a bad suggestion.
Ali (as Marn): We just want them to leave, right?
Jack (as Pickman): And ideally not tell the Magistratum that we're here.
Ali (as Marn): Mm…
Janine (as Es): You can't unring a bell.
Austin (as Bucho): And that's how we get back to killing.
Janine (as Es): If you've killed someone and they're mad, they're not going to get unmad if you tie them to chairs and scold them.
Austin (as Bucho): [stammers]
Austin: Bucho looks, like, maybe uncomfortable about raising this and says:
[0:30:03]
Austin (as Bucho): [awkwardly] Once again, can you remind me your proximity to the man they're looking for? Polyte, his name? Are you friends? Is there a loyalty, comradery?
Ali (as Marn): [sighs] No, we got hired to find him, and then we did, and he was—
Austin (as Bucho): By them?
Ali (as Marn): No. By…
Austin (as Bucho): Oh.
Ali (as Marn): By…by Ekashi, Ekashi Wolff.
Austin (as Bucho): Ah. Why not just give them the man?
Jack (as Pickman): I don’t want to give the Magistratum shit.
Ali (as Marn): Look at what they've done just to find him. We could at least, you know, make them think they gotta go somewhere else.
Austin: Dayward YVE pipes up and says, uh:
Austin (as Dayward): Do we even know where that little, uh, Kay'van fellow is?
Ali: [quietly] Jesus.
Jack (as Pickman): No.
Austin (as Dayward): Hmm. Well, it could be a good first place to start. And if we find him, that's leverage.
Ali (as Marn): I…the reason we got into this is ‘cause we were getting him out of custody of the Magistrates in the first place. I'm not just gonna put him back into…
Austin (as Dayward): I mean, you completed the contract.
Ali (as Marn): [sighs]
Jack (as Pickman): It doesn't work like that. Maybe it does for you.
Austin (as Dayward): [scoffs] I helped— I signed that contract, and…I will tell you is, uh, I have no problem with you, uh, at this point, uh, dishonoring some spirit of a piece of paper you signed months ago. You returned him to the town, as the town council, including me, agreed with and wanted. But now, if he's causing a threat, I…you don't know where he is anyway, so it's no matter.
Ali (as Marn): A reminder, this town council gave their lives to not hand him in either.
Austin (as Dayward): Well, that Ekashi, you know.
Ali (as Marn): [indignant] I know what?
Jack (as Pickman): Yeah, what?
Austin (as Dayward): Uh, he was just a fan of the dramatic.
Ali (as Marn): [scoffs] [quietly, sarcastic] Yeah, okay.
Jack: Hey, why is it— is the reason that— well, I mean, I assume there are several reasons. But like, is one of the reasons that Dayward YVE isn't down there with the Magistrates right now is that he's just a coward? Like, he seems like he's with those people.
Austin: Uh huh. It seems dangerous down there, doesn't it? [Ali laughs]
Jack: Yeah, but he's like, [mocking] “Ideologically, uh…”
Janine: He's not even going in there to get his apples, like…
Austin: Yeah.
Jack: [laughs] Yeah, he’s gotta send in Ana Berylia.
Austin: It's…I mean, his real…I mean, he is a coward. And it does not matter if you are…you know, in a moment of crisis, what if he was there when Ekashi Wolff had tried to do the revolt? Maybe he would have gotten, you know, taken hostage by Ekashi Wolff. Or gotten caught up in a crossfire. He's just, yes, he is a coward.
Jack: He’s like, [mocking] “I've got my little mansion up on the hill.”
Austin: And he…also, his ideology is not “I should help these people.” His ideology is “I want to keep being paid.”
Jack: [laughs] Yes!
Austin: I want to continue to control Blackwick.
Jack: My trade hall is in a good position.
Austin: And to do that I need to be alive. Yeah, yeah.
Jack: I mean, should we just kick him out? I'm worried about material consequences of this. Can we just send him to bed? [Ali laughs]
Janine: Ah…
Janine: Does anyone here know how to make some sort of like, uh, like a haunted doll or…? [Austin laughs]
Jack: Oh, fuck.
Art: Ha!
Jack: I had a haunted doll.
Janine: I mean…
Art: Everything can't be haunted dolls. [Austin laughs]
Janine: But I'm just— I'm just saying, couldn't we… [laughs] You know, if we had someone skilled enough, maybe make like a, like a puppet version of this person they're looking for and then give them the puppet?
Jack: [laughs] Um, there is that…okay. I don't think Pickman knows about this, but I think she could for one reason or another. There is that Weather Room up on the…up in the mountains above town, that I think you said, Ali, was like designed for spying?
Ali: I believe so, yeah.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Jack: Um, that's an angle, potentially, to help us get to the where is Polyte, you know, route.
Ali: Oh, I don't think Polyte's even in the area. If, I’m…
Jack: Mm…
Ali: [laughs softly] If he was in Blackwick before this happened, he is not anymore.
Jack: He’s like long gone, yeah.
Ali: No, he is like down the river.
Jack: Or—
Ali: He might not even be in Sangfielle anymore, like. [laughs softly]
Jack: Yeah. Or he was terrified, and he was like, he's gone into a bolt hole. Like a, you know. He's like wedged under the floor somewhere [Ali laughs softly] and hasn't been able to get out. I'm serious! You know, maybe when the chips went down, he didn't…he didn't know where to go.
Austin: Yeah, the thing you know about him is he was waiting for extraction. He was waiting for Mirlande, who is a now dead Kay'van agent, to come pick him up. She died on a train on the way here. You found that train on Bell Metal Stat— or you didn't find that train, Lyke found that train, went through that train stuff at Bell Metal Station and found a letter from her to Polyte that never got here about how she was checking in on, uh…what do you call it? Uh, the Wrights of the Seventh Sun and Zevunzolia stuff, before swinging by to pick him up. And presumably she was gonna, like, send that letter on and then do some further investigation before coming to check it out. But, you know, that’s how it goes. [Jack sighs] Red Zephyr hit that train, and things went bad.
Ali: Is that worth something doing like an official roll for? Like narratively…
Austin: I think you just have that information.
Ali: Oh, sure. But like, doing the thing of spending the next morning of like, looking through trash, or like somebody sneaks into the town to be like, let's get an idea of where he could have been, or…I mean, but the Magistrates are doing that, right? So there's no way we could do that.
Austin: They're also doing that.
Ali: Yeah.
Austin: Yeah. I mean, you could also do it, but it would be…and you know this town in a way that they don't. I mean, you know where he used to live, for instance.
Ali: Right.
Austin: Right? So like. And the question is: did anybody flip and say where he used to live? Did anybody who did know where he was give them that? And…
Ali: Right.
Austin: You know.
Ali: But is there someone in the town who would give us that information that wouldn't have given it to the Magistrates, for instance? Or like, you know what I mean?
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Jack: Hmm. Hmm.
Ali: And that's something the dice will tell us. [laughs]
Austin: Right, right. Yeah, I would say that like anything that you want to go to town for is going to be like Risky because of trying to get past the—
Ali: Oh, sure, sure, sure.
Austin: —the sniper, but like, if you can sneak past, then yeah, you can start doing investigations. It's also, the second you're near them, we are in a mode of like, you know, the Hitman stage has begun a little bit.
Ali: Sure. Sure.
Jack: Yeah.
Austin: You know, the clockwork will come into being, and like, you have to be careful. Versus like—
Jack: Would that be—
Austin: And also, you’re— you are like a half day away, in terms of walk. It's a far walk down that way, so it's like a…in my mind, it's more of a we should commit to moving from here maybe to the Weather Room or to, you know, a little cave nearby or something that you can be close enough to, to where you would—
Jack: Yeah.
Austin: —be able to use that as a staging ground, versus Roseroot where Roseroot is like a half day away.
Ali: Oh, sure, sure. Okay.
Jack: Then I would be prepared to have an extremely uneasy night and then make for the Weather Room in the morning.
Ali: Yeah.
Austin: Okay.
Jack: I don't think we tell Dayward YVE where we're going.
Austin: Sure.
Ali: Oh, no, no. It is… [laughs]
Austin: Absolutely not.
Ali: We said it last session. It is still Shut The Fuck Up Friday.
Jack: [laughing] It’s Shut The Fuck Up Friday.
Austin: Uh huh.
Ali: It’s Friday all week.
Austin: Before he leaves you that night, I think he says, like:
Austin (as Dayward): I just hope this all comes to a…to a close as quickly as possible. The sooner we can get back to business, the sooner things will be better for everybody.
Austin: Es, I'm curious, because things have gotten, like…there had been a moment of like relaxation on that boat. But then getting here and and immediately getting to this intense place after what was already a really intense thing in the Citadel beneath Sapodilla. I'm curious how things are going with your host and like, what…we don't do this sort of like zoom in on that conversation. In my mind, it’s always happening in the background a little bit anyway.
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: Do you know what I mean?
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: But I'm curious what that…what the vibe is.
Janine: Um…so, I think you're right that it happens pretty often, but right now feels like it would be a lot more intense.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Janine: I think the vibe is very much like…you know, when you're kind of… [sighs] It's a mix, right? Like it's a mix of like, I'm a little…I'm a little anxious about dying—
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Janine: —while you're doing this stuff, from Syntyche’s point of view.
Austin: Yeah.
Janine: But also—
Austin: Syntyche is the name of the host.
Janine: Yes.
Austin: We don't hear that that often.
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: So just as a reminder for people.
Janine: We only heard it in the interviews.
Austin: Right, yes, yes.
Janine: When Es kind of assumed that role.
Austin: Right.
Janine: So yeah, I think there's that mix of like, “I'm a little worried about getting killed, ‘cause this all seems very, very dangerous.” But also a degree of like, “Hey, that stuff that happened was really messed up, and you've been acting like a little bit weird, is…”
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Janine: “Are you okay?” Like, just kind of that complicated mix of like, things are weird and scary, and I need…you know, especially ‘cause like, their relationship is very much one of like, Es is confident and knows what to do—
Austin: Right.
Janine: —and is powerful, and like, that's the whole…that was the whole pitch for Syntyche.
Austin: Yeah.
Janine: Was that she could do things with Es that she didn't feel like she could do on her own. So to feel a little bit, like, vulnerable is something that like… [sighs] Yeah.
[0:40:02]
Austin: Yeah, in my mind, Syntyche…again, it's weird, because I don't…it's hard for me to know where to draw the line between an NPC and a PC with…
Janine: Mm-hmm.
Austin: With Es and Syntyche. I don't want to take Syntyche’s, like, position.
Janine: This is harder even than like, than Signet and Belgard.
Austin: Much harder for me.
Janine: [laughs] Yeah.
Austin: Yeah, absolutely.
Janine: Yes.
Austin: Mostly because there's a constant conver— not a constant, but there's a, you know, a regular conversation happening that I'm not…that, as the GM, like, in my mind, that's constantly happening inside of Es and with Syntyche.
Janine: Mm-hmm.
Austin: And that's not something I have like access to, so it’s hard— I don't have like a voice for Syntyche in my mind, right? But in my mind, there would be this really interesting blend of like, not…not worry in the dismissive, “maybe we shouldn't do this,” sense. But in the almost, like, “Hey, like, we've been through really weird stuff before, really hard things before.” Like, almost a…almost a degree of like, not a pep talk necessarily, but like, a recommitment to this idea that like, hey, this is what we both signed up for. Like…
Janine: Mm-hmm.
Austin: Not in an aggressive way, not in a like, “And now you get down that fucking mountain and be a hero,” way. [Janine laughs] But in the like, “Hey, I'm also scared, but I'm in this for this. This is what we're— this is what, you know, I knew what I was getting into. Please don't worry about my part of this. I trust you.”
Janine: Mm-hmm.
Austin: “I trust that you're able to, like, get us through this. And I, you know, I'm here with you. And if I can help in any way, you know, help us get through this, then we can do it.” And— but also, you're not out of your mind because you're scared. Like, yes, this is a scary thing. You are right to be scared.
Janine: Mm-hmm.
Austin: “You're not disappointing me because you're scared. You're not, you know, I knew when I signed up for this, I wasn't getting an invincible goddess, that I was getting a companion and getting a guide, and you've been those things to me.” And you know, that's the sort of vibe in my mind of what that conversation is like, you know?
Janine: Yeah, yeah. And I think that's like…I think it being like that is really important, ‘cause I imagine a lot of the conversations are the opposite. Like, it's…
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Janine: I tend to…the way that I've, throughout the season, kind of pictured this relationship has been a lot more of like, an interior kind of dialogue where Es is reassuring Syntyche and—
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Janine: —and being like, you know, “Here's our way out if things go bad.”
Austin: Right.
Janine: And, you know, “Here's what we're capable of. And here's what we've done before. And like, you know, we can…we can get through this, and we'll be fine.” And that generally proves true. So I really like the idea of Syntyche kind of like turning that around and being like—
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Janine: “Hey, you know, we've gotten through…we've gotten through bad stuff, and…”
Austin: [laughs] Yeah.
Janine: “You're really good at these things, and…you know, we can handle this.”
Austin: Yeah. All right. Any other things before y'all head out in the early morning?
Jack: Um, are Marn's like prep rolls worth pulling the trigger on now or once we're in the cave? Uh, the Weather Room.
Ali: Um, it's once per session, so it feels like it could be something that like we could do now and then have carry on.
Austin: Yeah, I don't…it's not like…I’m gonna say—
Ali: It's not once per situation.
Austin: Yeah, it's once— it's until you enter a— until you enter the next landmark, and at this point, I'm gonna say you're basically in this landmark. So, effectively, like, I'm not gonna…I'm not gonna make you roll to delve back across this land at this point. The major threats have been centered there, you know? And at this point, I feel like Dayward has also invested, in the time since you've been here, in like a pathway between his house and kind of the upper hills where…this is a fun detail. I bet there are other houses being built up here, right, around him? Part of the…you know, part of the scam for him is not just invest in the town. It is like send letters back to Aldomina and say “Ah! This community is really about to blow up. Like, now is the time for you to come to Blackwick. There's gonna be huge— you know, between the mining and the shopping and the access to the lake, you know, this could be everything from the next industrial town to the next resort town. It's up to us to decide what it is.” And so like, he is like building houses for other rich people to show up, you know? And buy from him at a markup, obviously. So that's a fun detail, as you begin to move back through the houses, or back down through the hills and stuff. And I think because of that, it's almost as if this part of the north end of Blackwick County is part of the the landmark now, in a way that it was not at the beginning of the season. You know what I mean?
Ali: Mm.
Austin: At the beginning of season…you know, Es broke a boot on the way here. Y'all got jumped by the toll keepers, or the Toll Collectors. There's all sorts of like, this…this pathway was dangerous in a way that now it has been paved. And it's, you know, it's dangerous in this other way. It's dangerous in the way that, like, settling places is dangerous to the people and, you know, life nearby. [laughs softly] Versus dangerous in the “you might get attacked by a wolf” way, you know? Dayward YVE has hired hunters to, you know, to thin out animal, you know, numbers near here and shit, so. Anyway.
Janine: [quietly] I have a question.
Austin: It's very funny. I started the season being like, Dayward YVE definitely is, you know, I wanted him to be a little more complicated than most of our like capitalist villains, and now I'm just like, you know, nah, he's a piece of shit too. [Ali laughs]
Janine: I think he—
Austin: Like, he might not be as explicitly a colonialist, uh, or like a, trad— like a classic colonialist, but he's definitely a neocolonialist.
Janine: Yeah. I think he is still complicated, but like, push come to shove, you know?
Austin: Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
Janine: Like, true colors.
Austin: That’s exactly it. What was your question?
Janine: He can be— he can afford to be complicated when things are easy, you know?
Austin: Yes, that's exactly it. Yeah, uh huh.
Janine: My question was: so, are we not going to be rolling Delve at all?
Austin: Um, you can— you can always roll Delve for things. You— this is not a Delve, but you can use Delve in any instance where delving is the thing you're doing. Do you know what I mean?
Janine: That’s— mm.
Austin: So like, if you want to climb some rocks, that's Delve still. Do you know what I mean?
Janine: Okay, well, I guess I need the wording clarified on this new skill I have, because it says—
Austin: Uh huh?
Janine: “Roll Discern plus Occult to cast a spell before you embark on a Delve.”
Austin: I would say that we should talk about the entire— whatever your plan is, when it's time to do the plan, you can consider that a Delve for that move. Do you know what I mean? Like, beginning it.
Janine: Okay.
Austin: But this isn't a Delve in the sense that like…you know, when you did the Delve into the Citadel, that was like—
Janine: Yeah, yeah.
Austin: Okay, we're doing like a thing. This clearly isn't that, but I would—
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: —consider, for the use of that ability. What’s the name of that ability?
Janine: I’m just wondering, like, should I have been doing it before we left the house or something? Crimson Mirror.
Austin: No, 'cause this still isn't a Delve. Do you know what I mean? This like…
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: We just…you're not on a Delve in that traditional sense right now, because that's not…you know, a Delve for us historically has been the walk up to Roseroot for you, the journey down to Yellowfield.
Janine: Right.
Austin: The stuff underneath the…
Janine: Okay.
Austin: You know, stuff like that. But yeah, I would say that that ability is a thing you could do before. Do you just want to read this move?
Janine: Yeah. Crimson Mirror: “You bleed into an upturned mirror, and elements swim within the crimson. Roll Discern plus Occult to cast this spell before you embark on a Delve. On a success, you see three omens. Describe them. You don't have to be too specific. In fact, the more vague you are, the better. These are fated to come up on the Delve. The first time you interact with whatever you find that relates to each omen, you—” or an ally, because I have the upgrade Shared Visions as well—
Austin: Mm.
Janine: “—roll with Mastery.”
Austin: Yeah, sure. So yeah, you tell me when you would like to do that, right? Because really what you're—
Jack: That is good.
Austin: What you'd be deciding is: are you looking to do that now, before you begin the journey down to the Weather Room, or wherever you're— whatever you're going to as your like intermediary spot? Or do you want it to be…in other words, it’s like, you're gonna give me the window of when those can be true. You know what I mean?
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: If you do it now, there…you know, I said there isn't a Delve, but there's still a roll to get down there, because it's covered by this sniper, right? It's just not a Delve in the sense that it doesn't have HP the way a Delve has HP, you know, has Stress that you have to…
Janine: Yeah. It feels like it should be Blackwick-centric.
Austin: So, not— right.
Janine: Like, not…
Austin: So yeah, so do you want to wait until you get to the next—
Janine: Not path to Blackwick.
Austin: Right. Yeah.
Jack: Yeah.
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: Yeah. So then I’d say wait until you get to this, whatever your next spot is—
Janine: Okay.
Austin: —and do it there. That makes sense to me.
Ali: Oh, but for where we started on that. Yeah, I…
Austin: You're move, Marn, yes.
Ali: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I actually took a recent update on this move that I can do two of these benefits.
Austin: Ooh, nice. So, what are you doing?
Ali: Our options are Whetstone and whipple— oh, brrt, whipple. [laughs]
Jack: No.
Ali: Whetstone and, uh, Weapon Drill, which will give a piece of Kill Equipment the Brutal tag; Check and Triple Checked: one piece of Delve Equipment gains the Trusty tag; Toughen Up: gain plus one Blood Protection; One for the Road: gain plus one Mind Protection; or Creative Acquisitions: gain plus one Supplies Protection.
Austin: Mm. And you get two of those now.
Ali: Yeah.
Austin: As a reminder, the Brutal tag is the one where your weapon— you roll two dice and pick the highest instead of just one. Trusty is the same thing but for Delve Equipment on a Delve where you would be doing damage to the Delve, so less useful here, because we're not doing damage to Delves. But, but yeah. Unless you had some sort of really interesting abstract way of, you know, if you could think up a way in which you could do a plan that needed to advance the way a clock advances, that would be a way we could use Delve here. [Ali laughs] But I don't…I don't think that we…I don’t think that’s where we’re at.
Ali: I don't know that we’re in—
Austin: Yeah, uh huh.
Ali: —that much of the game tonight to figure… [laughs]
[0:50:00]
Austin: Yeah, uh huh. Fair enough.
Ali: Maybe we'll get there. I don't know. Who knows?
Austin: Yeah, I don't know.
Ali: I guess…I don't have any Kill Equipment. I have a— wait, I have a Kill knife.
Austin: Yeah, you definitely have a Kill— some Kill Equipment, right?
Ali: Um…
Austin: Yeah, yeah.
Ali: But the plus one seems good. The plus one Mind seems good.
Austin: The Protections? Yeah.
Ali: The Blood and the Mind or the Supplies seem worth it.
Jack: I can't use Mind Protection.
Austin: [quietly, amused] Right.
Jack: But I can always use more Blood Protection, and everybody would be getting it, so, you know.
Ali: You can't use Mind Protection?
Jack: No, I'm, overwhelmed.
Art: Oh, I also can't use Mind Protection.
Ali: Oh.
Jack: [laughs] Oh no.
Ali: Wait, why?
Austin: Damn.
Ali: Are those Fallouts?
Art: I can never benefit from Mind Protection—
Austin: Mm.
Art: —or remove Stress from Mind, but I clear all Mind Stress after every situation.
Janine: Geez.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Ali: Those bugs are really working, you know? [laughs]
Austin: They’re working overtime.
Art: I've only gotten Mind Stress one time this season.
Ali: Sure.
Art: But I sure shrugged that off.
Austin: Lots of Echo Stress for you, I think, instead.
Art: Yeah, I've had a lot of Echo experiences.
Austin: Yeah.
Ali: Ah, okay. So, let's all take plus one Blood.
Jack: Nice.
Ali: Yeah, we eat a bunch of eggs or something in the morning, or we're feeling good, or I don't know. [laughs]
Austin: Yeah, uh huh.
Jack: Like, anxiously eating the eggs.
Janine: Eggs protect my blood, thanks! [Austin and Ali laugh]
Art: A big bowl of hard boiled eggs in the middle of a table.
Austin: Uh huh.
Ali: Yeah.
Art: All of us just picking.
Austin: I think as y'all are— wait, what's the second one, then?
Ali: Um…
Austin: Are you sticking with One for the Road or are you going to…?
Ali: Should we take the the Supplies Protection or should we make a Kill Equipment have the Brutal tag?
Janine: I love that.
Jack: [chuckles] What, to mangle them?
Janine: But I guess that doesn't do much good for us if we're not gonna kill?
Ali: [laughs] Well…
Art: My only Kill weapon is already Brutal.
Austin: Mm.
Ali: Oh, wow. Sure.
Austin: [laughs softly] Marn looking around.
Art: I looked up what it was at the beginning of the season.
Austin: Mm. Yeah, it's good. It's a good one, isn't it? [Ali laughs]
Art: It's…yeah, it was…it was a lot.
Austin: Yeah.
Art: A lot to think of hurting someone with.
Austin: Yeah. Oh, but Brutal tags stack, Art, it's worth saying.
Jack: What?
Art: Oh, okay.
Austin: Yeah.
Ali: Wait a minute. [laughs]
Austin: Yeah. Uh huh. Multiple instances of this tag stack.
Art: That makes sense.
Austin: If you managed to get it three times, you'd roll four dice and pick the highest when calculating Stress. So.
Jack: Holy shit.
Ali: Wow.
Jack: ‘Cause my, um, when my espignol is in melee range, it has— it does Brutal damage.
Austin: Mm. So, there you go. I love this image of Marn looking around and realizing she's surrounded by killers, by absolute… [Ali and Janine laugh] murderers. I think—
Art: I've lived in Los Angeles for over a decade, and my Español is also brutal. [Austin and Jack laugh]
Austin: Art, speaking of…speaking of people looking around and being like, “You're all a bunch of killers.” Reese, I think, comes into whatever room you're all getting ready in and is like a little put back by seeing all of this. And she comes over and she's like, you know, um…god, what…did she call you Leo, or did she call you…?
Art: She called me Meyer.
Austin: Meyer, right. She's like:
Austin (as Teresa): Meyer. [uncertain sound] You all look like you're getting ready for a hunt. But my understanding was you were the ones being hunted.
Art (as Duvall): Well, that's how you…that's how you defend against that. The hunter becomes the hunted, it’s…it's a common saying.
Austin (as Teresa): You said the hunter becomes the hunted. You just— you're still the hunted in that scenario.
Art (as Duvall): No, no, we are…they're the hunters who are gonna become the hunted—
Austin (as Teresa): I see.
Art (as Duvall): —because we will hunt, it’s…
Austin (as Teresa): I see.
Art (as Duvall): Always two, a hunter and a hunted.
Austin (as Teresa): [frustrated sound] Meyer, you can't go get yourself killed.
Art (as Duvall): No.
Austin (as Teresa): Your parents sent me here to bring you home, and now what you're doing is sharpening a knife. [nervous quiet laugh] And you can understand where I'm a little bit worried.
Art (as Duvall): I— this isn't really a knife.
Austin: I'm looking at your, uh, what is this called? A hive tool. I guess I don't know what it is.
Art: Oh, you don't remember? You don't remember this?
Austin: What is it?
Art: Um…it's like a…it's sort of like a crowbar? [Austin laughs]
Ali: Hmm. [Jack chuckles]
Austin (as Teresa): And now you're sharpening a crowbar.
Art: Oh, like a mini crowbar.
Austin: Right. I do remember this. This is a specific— this is like a real thing. Hive tools are—
Art: It’s a real thing, and it’s…
Austin: Yes, yes. I remember this.
Art: I would hate to be attacked by one of these.
Austin: Yeah, it’s—
Art: If someone wielding one of these was trying to hit me with it—
Austin: Uh huh.
Art: I'd be going the other way.
Austin: It reminds me a little bit of like an all metal ice scraper for like a car window.
Jack: Oh, yeah.
Austin: You know?
Art: Yeah, that's pretty close.
Austin: Yeah.
Art: I don't even know which end you would hit someone with, looking at some of these pictures.
Austin: Any.
Art: Any, yeah. They're all unpleasant.
Austin: Uh huh.
Art: And I don't like being hit with any metal object, really.
Austin: Yeah, you’d have to go pretty—
Ali: Mm.
Austin: —pretty far down the list of metal objects before I’d be like, “that's the one.”
Art: Yeah, like, I guess you could hit me with a paperclip.
Austin: Yeah, you could.
Ali: Ow.
Art: Yeah, it's not my favorite. It wouldn't be my favorite part of the day, but… [Austin and Ali laugh]
Jack: Okay. I will, again, stress that the reason we are in this situation is that we killed one Magistrate.
Art (as Duvall): No one's trying to kill anyone.
Ali: I do want to say out loud that I'm saying, “I'm not gonna kill anybody,” but I…the fates of the Beat system are…
Austin: Ah, right. [Ali laughs] Yes.
Ali: Who knows if that’s tonight!
Austin: Marn says, “I'm not going to kill anybody.”
Ali: But.
Austin: But Marn’s Beats say, “Kill someone who is trying to stop you from claiming knowledge.” [Jack and Ali laugh] Yeah, you're right.
Ali: [sing-songy] I’m just saying.
Austin: You're right.
Art: But wait, how does this…how does this move work? It has to be— it has to be an object? It can't be my, uh…
Austin: Yeah, it has to be a—
Art: My Annihilating Touch?
Austin: It’s a weapon. It's a weapon.
Art: Okay.
Ali: Oh, yeah, it’s equipment.
Austin: Unless you— unless the thing says “gives you a weapon that blah blah blah,” but, you know.
Art: No, it functions as a weapon.
Austin: Yeah.
Art: Which is…
Austin: Yeah, sorry.
Art: Absolutely not the same.
Austin: Yeah.
Jack: Austin.
Austin: Hi.
Jack: Can I choose whether to add it to the Melee or the Ranged thing?
Austin: Yeah, I would say so.
Jack: If I add it to the Melee, I get double Brutal.
Austin: Yeah. Yeah.
Jack: What's tachnically— tachnically? tactically better here? Uh, probably getting Brutal both ways.
Austin: I think that makes sense. Yeah.
Jack: Rather than stacking it all, ‘cause then—
Austin: Yeah.
Jack: I'd have to be in melee range to do it. Yeah, okay.
Austin: Yeah.
Janine: Could I put it on my capture hook instead of my hand fan?
Austin: Totally. You’d be— you tell me, yeah. This is literally, Marn is like handing out whetstones and teaching y'all how to like get a little extra, you know, oomf out of them and, you know, maybe updating the rope on your capture hook.
Ali: Yeah.
Austin: You know what I mean? Like, making sure everything's…
Ali: Oh, that knot isn’t good enough. Let me do that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. [laughs]
Austin: Exactly. That's exactly that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Making sure stuff is well oiled and well, you know, cleaned and all that, so.
Ali: Just making a mess of—
Austin: I know.
Ali: —Dayward YVE’s fucking guest napkins.
Austin: God. [Ali and Jack laugh]
Jack: Monogrammed D-Y-E napkins.
Austin: Uh huh. [Austin and Ali laugh] Oh, it's so good. Um, yeah, okay.
Ali: The Weather Room.
Austin: The Weather Room. This is a Delve roll. Or it’s some other roll, you tell me. How are you getting to the Weather Room? Who's rolling, who's leading on this? I guess, in my mind, it could be Delve, but I guess it could also be, you know, Sneak.
Art: Uh, I'm a good delver.
Ali: Yeah, same.
Austin: Uh, and then the— we know that this is Wild out here.
Art: Well, I'm not a good Wild…
Austin: [laughs softly] Um, and I guess I could say it's Haven too, because we talked about it being slowly expanded upon, right? I think that that's a mechanical reflection of the bit I said before about building out road— or not roads, but a pathway and the first bits of houses and stuff like that, is that that's Haven starting to seep into these hills.
Ali: I have both—
Art: That's not me.
Ali: —Delve and Haven, so I would be up for leading on this and then taking an assist, if anybody wants to…
Art: Happy to assist.
Ali: Wahoo. Okay.
Jack: This makes sense as well. Marn being like, alright. [Ali laughs]
Austin: Yeah.
Jack: Having ruined this man’s parlor—
Austin: Yeah.
Jack: —off we go. [Ali laughs]
Austin: I’ll also let two assists happen here. I feel like that…you know, this is a big group of people, because it is the four of you plus Bucho plus Alekest. That's six people, and I feel like having, you know, your scout, your point person, and then your rear guard all makes sense, you know?
Ali: Mm.
Austin: So, I can imagine there being like a third person here, if someone else wants to help with something. But actually, I don't know if anybody does. I don't know if Pickman or Es can actually help here.
Jack: I mean, I think I…I can help, ‘cause I have the Haven from powering up my armor last time.
Austin: Right, right. Which we said would roll forward, right, explicitly?
Jack: I'm just wondering whether I want to expose myself to the risk, because I have this “Foes target you; you get places last; speed and stealth are Risky.”
Austin: Uh huh. [Ali laughs]
Jack: Although…
Austin: It's already Risky. Yeah.
Jack: It's already Risky, and it couldn't get riskier.
Austin: It could. It could become Dangerous.
Jack: Fuck.
Austin: I don't know if that stacks that way or not.
Jack: Um… [laughs]
Austin: Oh, you're not doing the roll.
Janine: Well, I don’t have any of the shit that’s applicable here, so.
Austin: Yeah, you don't have…you don't have Delve or…
Janine: Haven or Wild or nothing.
Austin: Yeah. You have Sneak, but.
Janine: I guess.
Austin: You could like sneak ahead and be scouty. But yeah, also—
Jack: I mean, since it’s—
Austin: —do you even want to open yourself up?
Jack: Since it's Risky…since it's Risky already—
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Jack: If you won't upgrade it to Dangerous, I'll pitch in and help. [Ali laughs] But if you are planning—
Austin: Uh huh.
Jack: —on upgrading it to Dangerous, I will not.
Austin: Um…I think we should honor the thing and say it would get upgraded to Dangerous. Because if we think about this specifically, it's you putting yourself in a bad situation.
Ali: It's bad team building. Yeah.
Austin: Yeah, exactly. You're already hurt here, right?
Ali: It’s putting Garrus through the tunnel or whatever the fuck you're not supposed to do.
Austin: Yes, exactly.
Ali: ‘Cause he can’t do that shit.
Austin: Yes, yes.
Ali: Yeah, I feel like I…no, I mean…I guess maybe. I feel like Bucho should be the person in the back, but I don't want to put Bucho up at risk, and I don't think that like narratively—
Austin: Uh huh.
Ali: —would get me this plus one, but I feel like Bucho is the…
Austin: It won’t get you a plus one. Yeah. You could put— you could always put more Stress on Bucho [Ali laughs] using the Bond mechanics, but. Yeah, Bucho in the back or Alekest in the back.
Ali: Yeah.
Austin: They're both big, you know?
Ali: Okay. I’m gonna roll this plus one.
Austin: Alright, do it.
Ali: Risky.
[1:00:00]
Austin: Uh, make sure you mark it for Risky, yeah. Look at that, that's an eight.
Jack: Oh, beautiful!
Austin: That's success, no Stress.
Ali: Wahoo. Yes.
Austin: You don't get to keep that ten, unfortunately, but an eight is an eight.
Ali: Oh, yeah.
Austin: So yeah, there are a number of moments here where you do spot the, like, the glint of the scope, just in time to like stop and everybody kneels down to like hide behind bushes and low trees and stuff. And you notice that the…that the sniper is moving from place to place. Like, after the first, you know, hour of this trip, the second time that you see that glint is not from the top of that same, uh, the trade hall. It's, you know, from, you know, a tree branch, or it's from a hill or something, right? So she is moving around. But yeah, you eventually make it. It's a— it does take you most of the…I guess if you started really early, you probably still have some sunlight left. The suns haven't fully set yet. But, but you do make it up to the Weather Room, where, you know, you see the common signs of carousing. You see that someone had a fire here last night. There are some, you know, broken bottles. I think some of you met those three, those three…you know, sometimes they're layabouts. Sometimes they're con artists. [laughs softly] Sometimes they are bandits, the Toll Collectors, Agdeline, Ettel, and Larch. And it seems like the sign— there’s signs that they're— that they have been here in the last day. But they're not here right now, and you are, so, you know, it’s your spot now.
Janine: Can I leave another note?
Austin: Sure. What's your note say?
Jack: Nope! Shut The Fuck Up Friday! [Ali and Austin laugh]
Ali: “I, Polyte, am heading south.” [Jack and Austin laugh] That’s the note I leave.
Jack: Just really throwing them off. [Janine laughs]
Austin: Ah, god.
Jack: Gonna upend [mysteriously] “Or am I?” on the bottom of that. [Ali laughs]
Austin: Yeah. So yeah, so from up here, you get a good, you know, look down on the town. You can do it safely. It’s a good perspective. You have the angle such that, like, the sniper—whose name, again, is Ennib. Is that right? Yeah, Ennib. Ennib Lee. She can't quite see all the way up here, because of the kind of like angles of the way that the cliffs are. It's easy for you to like back up the second that you see her even beginning to face here. And you get a good, you know, a good lay out of the place, as this map shows you. You know where people are. You can see that there are people going about their day at this point, but it's a lot of like everyone looking over their shoulder, everyone waiting for things to blow up in a bad way, the lightning continuing to crackle. Es, do you now want to do this ritual?
Janine: I believe so.
Austin: What's this look like?
Janine: So, I realized I have been carrying a mirror this whole fucking time. ‘Cause a long time— for a while, I was like—
Austin: Oh, yeah, sure.
Janine: “Where do I get the mirror for this?” I have a mirror. I have a metal makeup clutch.
Austin: Mm.
Janine: Of the style that was popular in the 1920s. It has expensive kohl eyeliner and a pocket mirror, [Austin laughs softly] and it is a Niche…
Austin: Sure.
Janine: [laughs softly] It is a Niche resource that I have held onto desperately, ‘cause it's cute.
Austin: Uh huh.
Jack: Mirror ready to go.
Austin: Yeah.
Janine: Ready to go.
Austin: Well.
Janine: So it's like this little metal like purse type thing that Es has probably had, like, just with her, this, you know.
Austin: Yeah.
Janine: Just with her, it’s just her thing. And often probably pops it open to like touch up her lip liner or whatever. [Austin laughs softly] But this time she sort of, I think… [sighs] I was gonna say kneels or sits on the floor, but I think I actually like it more if she's like crouching?
Austin: Mm.
Janine: With like her sort of knees to her chest and like the mirror on her knees, kind of balanced.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Janine: Now, technically…well, I'm a little torn, ‘cause we've decided some different things about what Es can do with blood.
Austin: Uh huh.
Janine: In terms of like other people's blood versus, like, you know, she doesn't bleed unless she wants to.
Austin: Right, yes.
Janine: So I've been a little bit torn about like, should this be a blood thing?
Austin: Mm.
Janine: Or should this be a consciousness thing?
Austin: Right. I can go either way.
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: I feel like we've opened doors on blood here, deeper into the season, than we then at the top of the season. I think partially because I think we’ve found our like horror tone and we’ve built a degree of trust with the material that we feel safer talking about some of that stuff.
Janine: Oh.
Austin: Go ahead.
Janine: I have my answer. My answer’s both.
Austin: Okay.
Janine: So, I think—
Austin: [laughs softly] Which fucked up thing? Both.
Janine: Both of the fucked up things. So, yeah, I have…I forget what the thing is, but the thing— it’s Red Dominion: You don't bleed unless you want to.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Janine: So, Es puts…takes her left index finger and puts that on the mirror. And sort of the cuticle, like the area around the nail, blood wells up around it, so it’s like an outline of the nail almost, and sort of goes, like drips down the end of the nail onto the mirror.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Janine: And starts to spread on the mirror. And she does the same with her right finger, but on the right finger is the consciousness kind of viscera that she extracts from people.
Austin: Uh huh.
Janine: Just sort of like a opalescent clear thing that sort of behaves the same way as the blood on the other finger.
Austin: Right.
Janine: And the two mingle on the mirror and sort of, once they do, seem to get way, way, way more liquidy and just like spread out across the glass.
Austin: Mm.
Janine: Kind of like, um…like, kind of, I want like the rapidity of like when you…when you put like soap on your finger and then touch the surface of water, and it like breaks the surface tension immediately. So if there's like ink or whatever on top of the water, it all just like shoots out to the edges.
Austin: Yeah, totally, totally. In this case, can it be that the reflection does that? And it's just like black.
Janine: Yes.
Austin: You're just like looking into a black mirror at this point? Yeah. Let's get this roll. Let's see what you see. Discern plus Occult. Before we get further into how sick this is, let's— I imagine you'll make this roll, but…but we'll see.
Janine: Just typing that description in, ‘cause I feel like I'll forget it at some point.
Austin: Uh huh.
Janine: [sighs] Okay. Roll Discern plus Occult. Um, de de de, Discern, Occult. Do I still have my Mastery from dancing with Marn, or is that expired? I never used it.
Austin: Did you— if you never used it, then sure. Yeah, go ahead and spend it.
Janine: Hell yeah. Uh, what's our…it was Risky, Standard?
Austin: Standard. Standard. Yeah.
Janine: Okay.
Austin: Yeah.
Janine: All right.
Austin: You're in a safe place. There you go. Phew. [Janine makes relieved sound] Close roll. Three, four, five, nine. All right. So, give me your three omens.
Janine: Uh, I think…Es sees these. I don't think anyone else sees them.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Janine: But it's okay, 'cause she announces them.
Austin: [amused] Okay.
Janine (as Es): A gold tooth.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Janine (as Es): A calf crying. A violet cord, its ends reddened and wet.
Austin: Okay.
Janine: So, to be clear, all— it's not just me, anyone— the first time we encounter anything that fits these?
Austin: Yep.
Janine: Any of us can roll with Mastery. For each one, not just the first one period, and then it's done.
Austin: Yeah.
Janine: It’s the first time we encounter each one, anyone who encounters it can roll with Mastery.
Austin: Perfect.
Art: Can we get it—
Janine: When they interact. Hmm?
Art: Can we get a record? Can we have it written down?
Austin: Oh, I’ll paste it, yeah. I wrote it for me privately, but…
Janine: Oh, I also have it. Yeah.
Austin: There we go. All right. Love that. Love a gold tooth, a calf crying, and a violet cord, its ends reddened and wet. What's everybody else— how does everyone respond to this whole fucking thing that just happened? [Jack laughs]
Ali (as Marn): Uh, thanks, Es. [Janine and Ali laugh]
Art: Yeah, utterly no-selling it.
Jack: Yeah.
Art: I think is…
Jack: You know, big nod.
Jack (as Pickman): Thank you.
Janine (as Es): Mm-hmm.
Art (as Duvall): Mm.
Austin: Alekest and Bucho make eyes at each other in the sort of like, “Oh boy, here we go.” [Janine laughs] This is all dang— this is all very dangerous stuff that we're fucking with, but okay. [Jack laughs]
Janine: This is the safest thing I do. What are you talking about?
Austin: [laughing] Uh huh. Yeah, it’s ‘cause you succeeded. [Ali laughs softly] Uh, all right. Can we take five minutes before we do whatever the next big step is?
Ali: Sure.
Jack: Yeah, okay.
Austin: ‘Cause I bet it’s gonna be a big step. All right, BRB. [brief pause] All right. So, now that you have your three omens, what is the next play for the Blackwick group?
Art: Well, we're gonna go get a bunch of cows and bring ‘em with us.
Austin: [laughs softly] You only get the Mastery the first time.
Art: Well, but I don't want to…I don't want to hurt any animals, so I'm just gonna bring a bunch.
Austin: Uh huh.
Art: So that when one happens to happen…
Austin: Happens to cry, I see.
Art: Yeah.
Austin: Yeah, I gotcha.
Janine: Just keep one on hand. And then like, just prepare some sort of like sad…like a sad, quick, a quick sad story.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Janine: Like “baby shoes, never worn” kind of thing.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Art: Yeah, but in cow. [ominously] Moo. [Austin laughs]
Jack: This place has a reputation for like being spying, right, Austin?
Austin: Yeah.
Jack: And we've heard this from people in the town.
Austin: I mean, it has a lot of reputations. It has…
Jack: Sure. It’s the…
Austin: If you go back to that original…the way it was conceived of, it was conceived of as a place people go to hang out.
Jack: Yeah.
Austin: But also a place that has a good, you know, a good high perspective on the town, where you could look down and see a bunch of stuff, and like, you know, be like, “Oh, look, there so-and-so, and they're doing whatever.” You know, spying in a small town is not…it has a different connotation than spying maybe in this particular scenario. But yes, you could use it for that.
[1:10:07]
Jack: The only reason I was asking was I didn't know if I could roll Discern or something—
Austin: Yeah.
Jack: —to see if this place had a particular property about it that…
Austin: No, it's high up.
Jack: Okay, it’s high up. Okay. Okay.
Austin: Yeah.
Jack: But we’re in Sangfielle.
Austin: This is not a magic place. I mean, it's magic in the sense that it's attached to this big magic cave system that spits out things from the past—
Jack: Yes.
Austin: —and the future and alternative presents, right? But it is not a, uh…yeah, it's just a tall up place.
Jack: Okay. I think what I'm looking for specifically, what I'm trying to Discern, is a path to get somebody down to the— to a position where they could intercept the sniper.
Austin: Sure. Yeah. At that point, what I would do is, on a success, give them Mastery to what that roll is. Or maybe I'd reduce it from…let's say I'd reduce it from Risky to Standard, you know?
Jack: Yep. Sounds good.
Austin: So yeah, go ahead and give me your roll here. I think, again, this is, uh…
Jack: I'm rolling Discern.
Austin: This is…what’d you say before? You said Discern? Yeah. I think this is Discern.
Jack: Discern, Haven, Standard?
Austin: Yep, you got it. Anyone helping?
Ali: Sure.
Austin: Okay. What's that look like? Marn with like binoculars out there too?
Ali: Um, yeah, I guess it depends on what Pickman is doing.
Austin: I guess, what’s it look like for Pickman? Yeah.
Ali: But just like a lot of, you know. Pickman is presumably like checking the angles of this.
Austin: Yeah.
Jack: Yeah, I—
Austin: I love it’s the same duo who just got shot the last time they tried doing this from a different perspective. [Ali laughs]
Jack: You know.
Austin: God.
Jack: If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
Austin: Yeah.
Jack: I think what Pickman’s doing is that there's dust on like a window lintel, like a lintel that she's leaning on.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Jack: And with a finger, she's drawing a path in the dust.
Austin: Oh, that's fun.
Jack: Like, crossing it out.
Ali: Oh.
Jack: And I wonder if Marn is sort of like acting as the spotter, looking through the binoculars—
Austin: Yeah.
Jack: —and being like, “Oh, no, wait, actually, maybe try it that way,” or whatever.
Austin: Yeah.
Ali: Oh, yeah, for sure. Like, don't go through those bushes, they're thorny. And like, don't go over there, ‘cause you're gonna be seen.
Austin: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Jack: Yeah. Okay!
Austin: That outcropping looks like it’s about to fall if you put any weight on it, so don't try to cross there. Yeah.
Jack: Discern, Haven, plus one.
Austin: You got it.
Jack: Oh my god!
Austin: Eight! Success, no Stress. There you go. Good rolls.
Jack: This is what it’s like to roll well. [Ali laughs]
Austin: Uh huh. So yeah, you’re able to—
Art: See, that’s what I said. [Austin and Jack laugh] This is the day.
Austin: This is the day, yeah. You mark out a path. It's kind of a weird path, because there's one moment of just like, you just need to blend in.
Jack: [laughing] Oh, yikes.
Austin: Because, I mean, look at…you know, she is across. If she's back on that trade hall, right, she’s across the way on this second level, this higher level of the town up on this kind of little mini plateau. And so it's like, yeah, you can get down through the mountains pretty easily past her sight. You can, you know, cut through the mining camp, because they'll have tents up, and you’ll be able to keep your head down through there. But then there's just a stretch of area that is just like, that's the area where like, you know, people can set up their bazaar tents or whatever on trade day outside of the trade hall. But there ain’t nothing there today. It's just open air. And so it's just a matter of like, find the group and walk with the group, you know? Maybe there are people heading over to the trade hall. I don't know. But that last little bit is gonna be tricky, but the way down there is not gonna be…is not a problem anymore.
Jack: Okay.
Austin: No longer Risky to get there. Still a roll, you know? But not Risky.
Jack: So, some thoughts here. We could send down Es, who is looking for a [laughs softly] very powerful weapon. That would require Es to overpower the sniper. Which I’m sure you could do, Es. I didn't mean that as a “Es can't do it.” We could send down Alekest, who might have better luck blending in, ‘cause as far as they're concerned, he's not part of the— he's not someone they're looking for.
Austin: He is wearing extremely fancy train armor, though. Or porcelain armor, right?
Jack: He could give his armor to me, and he could head down there.
Austin: Um, so…I guess he does— he does owe you a thing, right?
Jack: He does, yeah, but, uh…
Austin: We did not figure out what that is yet.
Jack: That might become useful.
Austin: Yeah.
Jack: [laughs softly] A favor to call in.
Austin: Uh huh.
Jack: Who else might be best suited for—
Austin: [laughs] He’s gonna give you the fucking…what's the rocket launcher from Destiny? The Gjallarhorn? Is that what that’s called?
Jack: The Gjallarhorn. [laughs]
Austin: [in Alekest voice] I’ve been holding onto this for something— for a special situation.
Jack: I mean, if anybody would have rocket launchers, it would be the Shape Knights.
Austin: Oh yeah, it would be this fuck— yeah, uh huh.
Jack: Uh, who else might be a good sniper pick?
Austin: It’s anybody who can get there and get the job done, you know?
Jack: Well, it's not me, because I'm wounded, I'm limping, you know.
Ali: Right.
Janine: I mean, [sighs] you know, I can fly and also have a grappling hook thing that grabs stuff. I feel like it—
Jack: Well, great! [Austin Ali, and Janine laugh]
Janine: I just…
Austin: It sounds like Es to me.
Janine: It just feels like that's…that's, uh…
Austin: Uh huh.
Janine: It'd be nice to have another distraction or like not be doing it solo, ‘cause it sounds like these are scary people. I guess I've never like fought one directly.
Jack: Oh, god.
Janine: So I’m taking your word for that, but…
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Jack: Janine. [Janine laughs]
Art: Um, this requires some like generous reading of an ability.
Austin: Uh huh?
Art: But “You can fit yourself there any gap small enough for a bee by having your swarm chew up and reform your body on the other side.” It doesn't have a maximum size of the gap.
Austin: It doesn’t have…yeah, I, yeah, uh huh. You know what that means.
Janine: Are you gonna reform inside his gun— inside the gun? Her gun? Sorry, I don't...
Austin: Her gun.
Art: Just reform just on the other side.
Austin: No.
Art: Just behind him. Just—
Austin: Her.
Ali: You could just be a swarm of bugs.
Art: Chew up here— or, her, sorry.
Austin: You're saying you're— that's not how— he doesn't— he doesn't become a swarm of bugs.
Ali: Oh.
Art: Like Dracula—
Austin: Yes.
Art: —I will become a swarm of bugs.
Austin: You're saying—
Art: Is that a real Dracula thing or is that just a Castlevania thing?
Austin: I don't know. I don’t remember.
Jack: Rats is usually Dracula, swarm of rats.
Austin: Rats, mist, a wolf.
Jack: Shoutout to Roman Coppola.
Art: Yeah.
Austin: Yeah.
Art: Same thing.
Austin: But you're— the thing that Art is saying is that you can— that a gap can be the space between the door and the floor, or a gap can be the mile between where you are all now and this. [Ali laughs]
Jack: I don’t buy this. I’m sorry, Art.
Ali: I agree.
Jack: I’m sorry. [Janine laughs]
Art: Yeah, well, actually, I think the real gap that I'm saying is between like this tree and this tree.
Ali: Yeah.
Austin: Sure, right. I don't— I don’t—
Art: I’m passing through this gap.
Austin: Uh huh.
Ali: True.
Art: A bee could— a single bee could fit through this gap.
Ali: Yeah.
Austin: I’m gonna reread this.
Jack: If we agree to this, Duvall can just teleport. [Ali laughs]
Austin: But no, it takes forever, is the thing. Right? It still takes…
Art: [laughs softly] It does take like six hours.
Austin: It takes six hours. [Jack and Ali laugh]
Jack: Oh, sure. Okay, I’m back on board.
Austin: This is the thing.
Jack: This is really funny.
Austin: [laughs] ‘Cause it’s…
Janine: I mean, you know what else is a gap.
Austin: I'm gonna read it.
Janine: Is the space between the Earth and the atmosphere. [laughs]
Austin: Right, uh huh. [Jack laughs] This is…what's the name of this, Art?
Art: Uh, Hiveborn.
Austin: Hiveborn: “You were reborn in one of the Great Hives; your body, though still mortal, is waxen and papery. Gain the Warren domain.” Did you do that? Did you take the Warren domain?
Art: Yes, I have Warren.
Austin: Okay, I’m making sure you have it. “You can fit yourself—” you can fit yourself—
Art: Uh huh.
Austin: “—through any gap small enough for a bee by having your swarm chew you up and reform your body on the other side.”
Art: Uh huh.
Austin: “This process takes upwards of six hours.”
Art: Upwards of six hours. [Art and Jack laugh]
Austin: Yeah. “You can rush to get it done in an hour instead, but mark D8 Stress to Blood as a result.” [sighs] It's a real…it's a real stretch, because I do think you can fit yourself through any gap. Through, the preposition, is very important. [Ali laughs] Not across any gap. Not you can travel between any spaces.
Jack: [laughs] Between, yeah.
Ali: Okay, but this is…this is worth considering, because then—
Austin: Yes.
Ali: We've introduced that Duvall the man—
Austin: Yeah.
Ali: —can go, like, go down the mountain, I guess.
Austin: Yeah.
Ali: And then like get into like a building, for instance. Or like…
Austin: Totally.
Ali: You know what I mean?
Jack: Yeah, we can install Duvall somewhere else.
Art: Yeah.
Austin: It only takes six hours.
Art: Only takes six hours!
Austin: Or one hour plus D8 Blood.
Ali: Well, and you know, and then the rest of us go down the next morning. You know, this is the plan. This isn't the plan.
Jack: Covered by Es, who has—
Ali: This could be a plan.
Jack: Yeah.
Ali: Yeah.
Jack: Um, I think also, it's like…we have a great sightline here, and they don't know we're here right now. So if we could get…if we could install people in Blackwick, that would be sick.
Austin: We gotta be careful of not overplanning this.
Jack: Yeah.
Austin: I know that's…
Jack: I mean, but right now, we're in a cave— we're in a… [Jack and Ali laugh softly] We’re in an observatory on the mountain, you know?
Austin: Yes. Yeah, I get it.
Ali: I do have a question from the sight that we have right now, and I don't know that it'll be relevant, but is any of the—
Austin: Mm-hmm?
Ali: —women from the Priory of the Mother-Beast still in town, or…?
Austin: They are not.
Ali: Okay, yeah.
Austin: Or none that you see. Uh, I think it's…it's probably fair to say that a couple got killed when the Magistrates first showed up.
Ali: Fair. Fair.
Austin: You know that you did see, uh, not from there, but from the Boundless Conclave, Stanislaka, the Boundless Conclave and Slumbous priestess.
Ali: Mm.
Austin: She is around, but she obviously does not have the connection to the Mother-Beast abbey.
Ali: Oh, sure, sure, sure. Besides being promoted by the lady who left.
Austin: By the— by Boundless Conclave, yeah, exactly.
Ali: Okay.
Austin: Yeah. But yes, no, you've not seen any of their like cool ceramic faces. [Ali laughs] Or flower faces, depending on which one you look at. Um…trying to think if there's anybody else that is like worth saying is here. You know, the doctor is here, who has a— who has her doctor shop up near the town council. The automat is running. There are, you know, the miners are here. The farmers are here. The…I think that's all the main stuff, right? Um…yeah. I'm double checking like Haunts to make sure there's not a Haunt I’ve forgotten or something, but…yep. You know, the court is yours.
[1:20:13]
Ali: Um, while we have a gap just to let people marinate a little bit, we had like a fictional wounds get fixed up scene, but I still have five Blood Protection— I mean Blood Stress.
Austin: Er— yeah.
Ali: And I would love to beseech the goddess—
Austin: Ooh, what’s this?
Ali: —to refresh a D4 Blood Stress. This is once per session, so try not to get shot later.
Austin: Hell yeah.
Ali: But I feel like I should do this now, and then….
Austin: Yeah.
Ali: You know?
Austin: Yeah. Yeah, let’s do it.
Ali: Yeah.
Austin: What's that look like?
Ali: I think it's Marn just like praying, right? Like, just really…
Austin: Yeah.
Ali: Like… [laughs softly]
Austin: Is there no, um, is there no, like…it's just prayer turns to healing? There's no practical application thereof? There's no, like…part of me feels like…part of me feels like it's almost like… [sighs] My pitch for this is that she guides your hands as you like stitch yourself up.
Ali: Oh, sure, sure, sure.
Austin: Because there's something about like the Telluricists and their connection to the goddess that like…there's a real “God sent the boat” in my mind with them. [Ali laughs] Do you know what I mean? And it's like, no, you got to do it still, but you don't have to roll to do it. You just get to roll to do the— you just get to roll how much you heal. You don't have to roll to do the Mend.
Ali: Yeah.
Austin: You know?
Ali: Yeah, yeah.
Austin: ‘Cause healing yourself is a Risky Mend roll. And that's…you could end up way worse by trying that shit. [Ali laughs] And so this is just like, no, it works, right? She…you say the right prayer. It's like, you know, saying the right…the right prayers that almost have like the rhythm to them that guide you as you take care of yourself.
Ali: Right, yeah, 'cause there's definitely something like ritual or like methodical about how Marn would give themselves stitches.
Austin: Exactly. Exactly.
Ali: And also being in this moment of being like, I have to save these people, and I don't even know what the first step of this is.
Austin: Totally.
Ali: Like, thinking about religion in that moment and like trying to find—
Austin: Totally.
Ali: —the confidence while doing this like, “procedure,” quote, unquote, seems… [deep breath] That’s a one D4? Clear one d4?
Austin: Is that what it says? Yeah, I think that that's right. This is Our Glorious Lady, right?
Ali: Yeah.
Austin: Yeah, it is. so yeah, D4. Roll good. Crossed my fingers.
Ali: I rolled a four.
Austin: Ooh, look at that!
Ali: Love that for me.
Austin: Drop that— drop that down to one.
Ali: Love religion and the grace of the goddess.
Austin: [chuckles softly] All right.
Janine: Friends at the Table, we love religion. [Ali laughs]
Austin: That’s right. That’s what we— we're always saying this. Uh, what's up? What's next?
Janine: I want to hear it is okay if the sniper dies.
Ali: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Janine: Okay.
Ali: You should go down there and kill her and put on her helmet and be like, I'm sniping up here.
Janine: [laughs] I’m the sniper now.
Ali: [laughing] And then we can go downstairs.
Janine: It's me, the eyeball. I’m the sniper.
Austin: Uh huh. Yeah, you know? Kind of lines up.
Janine: The best one ever, really.
Austin: Yeah, uh huh.
Janine: Yeah, okay.
Austin: Do you want to try this? Do you want to give this a shot?
Janine: I'm going. Like, I’m…
Austin: All right.
Janine: This is…
Austin: We’ve established it’s Stand—
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: It’s a Standard roll to get there because of the…
Jack: This is so bad…
Austin: Because of the scouting. And this is gonna be— how are you doing it? Is this Sneak? This is probably Sneak.
Janine: Uh…I'm double checking something really quick here.
Austin: Uh huh. What you don't have is the right domains.
Janine: No, I never do.
Austin: Uh huh.
Janine: I've never once had the right domains, because we just…I’ve just never been in parties where we're doing Cursed or Occult, really.
Austin: Uh huh.
Janine: I think Occult maybe sometimes, but.
Austin: You've done Occult stuff. You've done Occult stuff.
Janine: Cursed never comes up, which is a bummer.
Austin: Uh huh. You just stay in non-Cursed places.
Janine: I should’ve taken that power that lets me just make an area Cursed. [laughs]
Ali: Ooh. [Jack laughs]
Austin: Uh huh, yeah.
Art: There’s still time.
Jack: Bring your own Cursed.
Austin: Yeah. Yeah.
Janine: There is. BYOC.
Austin: The thing is, you make smart choices about not going to Cursed places, like the big cursed woods or the deck of the boat in the big cursed woods.
Janine: If I didn't want to do…if I didn't want to have my room service party, I would’ve gone and done that.
Austin: Yeah, yeah.
Janine: But I had— I was kinda— I was penned in by my need to have— to do that.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Janine: Uh…okay, yeah. I was trying to— I was looking to see if I had an advantage doing Sneak checks in my true form, and it’s— I don't, they just aren't Risky anymore ‘cause of a thing I have.
Austin: Mm. Gotcha.
Janine: Yeah, I guess I'll just sneak the old fashioned way.
Austin: All right. So then, that’s—
Art: How are we gonna know if this worked?
Jack: We can see.
Austin: Yeah, you can watch as Es begins to go down the…
Art: We can watch that closely?
Jack: Marn’s got a…
Art: Okay.
Jack: Yeah, this is like us playing PUBG or something and watching as someone—
Austin: Yes. [Ali laughs]
Jack: —like, one of our friends tries to infiltrate the thing. [Janine, Jack, and Ali laugh]
Janine: Mm.
Austin: That's…that seems right. That seems right to me. Yeah.
Janine: Mm-hmm.
Austin: This is a tough roll. And are you out of that dance Mastery now? Or is there…is that…
Janine: I have one left.
Austin: All right, well.
Ali: Ooh.
Janine: I had two.
Austin: Now's the fucking moment, I guess.
Janine: Mm-hmm.
Austin: This is Sneak plus Mastery plus your base one, so it’s three dice. Standard.
Jack: And it’s Standard?
Austin: Uh huh.
Janine: Okie dokie. What's the do— I mean, it doesn't matter, the domain, but…
Austin: Uh, it's Haven or Wild.
Janine: Okay.
Austin: As we've established.
Janine: [sighs] Okay.
Austin: Down in the city proper, you’ll gain—
Janine: I got a ten!
Austin: Holy shit.
Jack: Oh, wow!
Austin: Five, six, a ten.
Ali: Yow.
Austin: A critical success. Unbelievable.
Ali: That’s a Mastery ten.
Austin: That's a ma— yeah, uh huh. [Ali laughs] Well, you know. Yeah you manage to…in fact, what I'll do is on that ten, I'll roll that ten forward into Mastery on the next roll. Because…I mean, you tell me, but I think on a ten you’ve just aced this completely.
Janine: [quickly] Yes.
Austin: Tell me what it looks like.
Janine: Why would I say otherwise? [laughs]
Austin: No, but I'm saying—
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: I'm giving you the paintbrush.
Janine: Um, I think—
Austin: Also because it can be interesting to fuck up sometimes. Friends at the Table says the reason you would say no to that is…
Janine: That’s true. It’s true. I…not right now though, certainly.
Austin: Uh huh.
Janine: [sighs] I think…I think a lot of this is like being aware of line of sight and eye line, right?
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Janine: Because there is the abbey and also a bunch of hills and shit—
Austin: Yeah.
Janine: —in between the trade hall and the Weather Room. I think it is just a…it's like slow. It's not glamorous or fun.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Janine: Which Es— you know, Es, I normally try and be glamorous and fun with Es. But I think this is…this is a sort of like very aware and careful approach, but it— I mean, I hesitate to say careful, because the thing she's doing is still pretty fundamentally a very dangerous idea.
Austin: Yeah.
Janine: But here we are.
Austin: Here we are. So yeah, you manage to get through there. You— and you nail the big final thing, which again is in line with the way that we've talked about Es adopting, you know, the sort of Syntyche, you know, human humanness of just, there's the point at which you have to make the long walk to the trade hall, and you just do it.
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: You just walk across. You nod at someone, you know, they nod back at you, like it's not a big deal. No one, you know, says your name. No one, you know, is like, “Oh, there's Es from the Blackwick Group.” You march all the way there. You slide back into like some back hallway of the trade hall. You find a ladder up to the loft above. From the loft, you're able to get— you know, if you want to.
Janine: Oh, well, that…I wasn't actually gonna do that stuff.
Austin: Oh, okay. [Janine laughs] Well, then, how far in do you— you got a ten, so how far in are you going?
Janine: Um, so, my plan was to get close to the trade hall and then kind of do a dazzle attack, kind of. [laughs]
Ali: Mm.
Janine: Like a, you know, pop into true form, pop up in the air—
Austin: Ah.
Janine: —get the, uh…get the capture hook—
Austin: Sure.
Janine: And just take their fucking gun.
Austin: Sure. Give me that roll.
Janine: That’s my…
Austin: Yeah.
Janine: That’s the dream right there.
Austin: All right. I mean, that is, that…so, do you have to…True Form you can just activate, right, whenever you want?
Janine: Yes, True Form is just whenever the hell I want to.
Austin: Okay.
Janine: Or if I take major Fallout, it kind of forces me into it.
Austin: Right. So then, yeah, you get Mastery on Hunt and Kill checks. And that, to me, this sounds like Kill Haven to me. Or I guess it's— or Hunt.
Janine: Is it Kill or Hunt?
Austin: It’s up to you.
Janine: Yeah. I mean…
Austin: I guess it’s Hunt if you're trying to take away the…if you're trying to take away the weapon, if you're trying to disarm her, then that to me sounds like Hunt or…
Janine: I also don’t have Hunt, so I wish I’d shut up about that.
Austin: Uh huh.
Janine: [laughs] Um, I mean, I can always just change my plan and go for horrible stuff.
Austin: I mean, if she's dead, you can pick that gun up at your will, you know? I guess the thing that you're trying to emphasize here is that you have this capture hook, right? Which, which is fun, because it's…
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: Yeah.
Janine: And the last time I tried to use it, it didn't really work out.
Austin: Yeah.
Janine: [laughs] I really wanted to have a cool capture hook moment.
Austin: Yeah. One of the key things with it is that it's Debilitating, which gives you Mastery if you hit with it, right, on the next thing. So there's a degree to which there's like, that's part of how the capture hook works, right? Is if you get the hit on it, you've kind of, you know, tied her up in some sort of way or caught her with a sort of, you know, bolo style, you know, entanglement. Which could give you benefits as you maybe go try to grab the gun from her or something.
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: Right?
Janine: I wonder if maybe the smart thing is to actually go for her arms, because then I can still like do some damage and also have a chance to get the gun, kind of like narratively.
Austin: Yeah.
Janine: Okay.
[1:30:00]
Austin: To me, sounds like a Kill roll.
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: Or, you know, it could be a Sneak roll, but I guess the— it's not a Sneak roll if you're gonna do this big explosive “I'm turning into the big floating eye” in the middle of the day and, you know, doing that.
Janine: Yeah, that’s not…I mean—
Austin: That’s not Sneak at that point.
Janine: I mean, I have a thing specifically to allow that to be…
Austin: Oh, you do!
Janine: To allow Sneak to not be…
Austin: Then, yeah.
Janine: Sneak’s not Risky anymore.
Austin: Yeah, then I would say…then I would say…
Janine: So it can be a sneaky eye, but…
Austin: [reading] “The darkness of the City Beneath beats black within your veins. Gain the Sneak skill. When you enter your True Form, Sneak and Evade rolls are no longer considered Risky.” I'd say you can use…I'd say you can use Sneak for this. If your plan is to get the drop on her in this way.
Janine: Yes.
Austin: I think that could be Sneak. You know.
Janine: Yeah. Okay.
Austin: And that could…and with Sneak, you could…with Sneak plus the capture hook, I think that's enough to talk about disarming her, hurting her hands, trying to grab the gun away. I think that that makes perfect sense.
Janine: Yeah. Okay.
Austin: So, let's do it. Sneak.
Janine: Sneak, Haven.
Austin: Haven.
Janine: And Mastery for that last thing.
Austin: And Mastery. Yeah.
Janine: All right.
Austin: And if it hits, once per situation, you can get Mastery, so.
Janine: Still Standard or Risky?
Austin: Still Standard.
Janine: I guess it’s Standard 'cause I have that thing, right.
Austin: Yeah.
Janine: Okay.
Austin: Oh my god.
Janine: Got another ten!
Austin: Unbelievable.
Jack: Wow!
Austin: One, eight, ten. So, do your damage.
Art: Oh, this is gonna be over. This is gonna be over so soon.
Austin: Do your damage, but it's—
Art: It’s gonna be lunchtime, and we’re gonna…be mayor.
Austin: [laughs] It’s D8. You're gonna roll that dam— that D8 twice. It’s D8, because on a crit on an attack, you up the die number by one, by one step.
Janine: Oh, okay.
Austin: So it’s D8, and you're gonna roll that twice and take highest.
Janine: Okay. All right.
Austin: ‘Cause it's Brutal now. So there's eight.
Janine: That’s an eight, which is—
Austin: Well, it's gonna be eight! It's gonna be eight, isn’t it?
Janine: Yeah, it’s a D8, so why even fucking…
Austin: But let’s see the other one, just for fun’s sake.
Janine: One. [laughs]
Austin: And that's a one! So we’re gonna take the eight. You're gonna take—
Janine: That was worth it. That was worth rolling for fun’s sake. [laughs]
Austin: Yeah, see? And then…and Debilitating, which means that, yeah, she is she is…I’ll read this again. “Once per situation, when you inflict Stress with this item to one or more targets, the next attack made against them is rolled with Mastery.” You did eight damage, huh? Hold up.
Janine: Mm-hmm.
Austin: Let me see what that…where that puts her. Uh, ba ba ba ba ba…Ennib. Okay. She is…she is…what do you do with this hook, as a big eye monster?
Janine: Okay. Um, as a big eye monster— so, I've been picturing this as like a…as like a…I guess I've been picturing it as like a grappling hook with like a ratcheting, like it pulls me in close. Although you mentioned like a bolo thing, and now I'm not sure I know what it is.
Austin: No, the thing that you're talking about makes sense, yeah.
Janine: Okay.
Austin: I just meant bolo in the sense that like you could wrap it around someone's legs, for instance, and like hog tie them with it or something. You know what I mean?
Janine: Yeah. Um, I would love to capture hook her arms together and then—
Austin: Yeah.
Janine: —like, zip line in and grab her fucking gun, or go for it at least.
Austin: Yeah, on that crit and at eight damage, uh, yeah. Her arms, like, clap together. She's like trying to, you know. There is— I still want to sell her as being…
Janine: A badass?
Austin: Or at least competent, right?
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: Which is to say, you get the drop on her. You've done…I think…it can't just be that you hit her arms with that much— with eight damage, you know? I think you may have like hit her in the head and then dropped. And then it fell down, and you yanked on it back—
Janine: I mean…
Austin: —so that it tied up her hands or something?
Janine: What if…I mean, if I grabbed her hands, but then also, again, I'm like pulling myself in?
Austin: Yeah, if you close the distance. Yep, you huh.
Janine: ‘Cause I'm flying, so I'm just like, I just kind of body check her.
Austin: Boom. Yeah, totally.
Janine: Maybe.
Austin: You could even use the bladed hand fan that you have, you know, in the visual of this, to also get a hit in, you know?
Janine: Oh yeah.
Austin: ‘Cause eight damage is a fucking lot of—
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: Eight Brutal damage. And, you know, the thing that she does instantly is goes to grab her knife from her belt to try to cut herself free. But she's moving slow, because you've tied her hands together and that's much harder, and you're over her, and she's…you know, I think you get a good close up look at Ennib now, right? She's a human. She has brown hair and freckles. She's, you know, kind of thin compared, I'd say, to the rest of her crew, which are all— they're all pretty bulky folks. And there is a moment upon seeing you that goes from fear to recognition in the mode of like, “Ope, the Blackwick Group is here. You are— you're one of our targets.” And then the recognition shifts from…shifts from the recognition that, you know, you are a target to the recognition that she is going to lose and that she needs to do the thing she's supposed to do when she loses. And her hand moves from…goes to move from her knife like pouch, her knife sheath, to start to go to a pouch on the right hand side of her body. What do you do?
Janine: Um, I, uh…oh, I just realized the thing I was gonna do might just kill her, which would…well, I mean…so, hmm. Mm… [laughs] Now I'm like, okay, wait, are we actually— are we…
Austin: I don't know.
Janine: Are we just gonna kill her? Um…
Ali: You were given the go ahead.
Janine: Yeah.
Ali: I mean…
Janine: I think I…yeah, no, I am.
Austin: Marn said go ahead. [Ali laughs] Yeah.
Janine: That’s true. I've been given the go ahead, and also I've been…I've been in “rush into danger before anyone else” mode.
Austin: Yeah.
Janine: So.
Austin: Yeah, I gave you that, by the way. I checked that box.
Janine: Yeah. I thought I checked it by accident and wasn't sure.
Austin: No, I got it.
Janine: So that’s good to know.
Austin: Yeah.
Janine: Um, yeah, I'm gonna Exsanguinate. I'm going to—
Austin: Ooh, okay.
Janine: Because— specifically because when I…I remember when I Exsanguinated, um…Adel— Ad—
Austin: Yeah, uh, Agdeline.
Janine: Agdeline.
Austin: Yeah, Agdeline.
Janine: There was a moment where she was…that it sort of like put her unconscious, basically.
Austin: Yeah, mm-hmm.
Janine: It didn’t kill her.
Austin: Yeah.
Janine: So I think actually that's the ideal. And if it does kill her, then eh, you know, I tried.
Austin: Mm-hmm.
Janine: But.
Austin: Alright, give me that…give me that roll.
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: That's another Kill. And you have Mastery because of the…
Janine: Oh, by the way, it has Piercing now, also.
Austin: Love that for you.
Janine: I upgraded Exsanguinate to Maestro, so. [laughs softly]
Austin: Ah, I see.
Janine: Mm-hmm. So, Kill D6, Ranged, Piercing.
Austin: Yeah. Let's see if these rolls continue.
Janine: Do I have— I have Mastery, right?
Austin: You do you have Mastery from the…from the Debilitating on that previous one.
Janine: Cool.
Austin: She’s moved a little too slow to to put up her normal defenses. And that's a nine!
Janine: Eight, eight, nine.
Austin: Eight, eight, nine. Give me your D6 damage. And that's six damage.
Janine: Six! That’s…what? [laughs]
Jack: Holy shit.
Austin: So, you turned into a big eyeball, floated up there.
Janine: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Austin: Caught her in the head with the…with the grappling hook thing. Locked her hands together, zipped forward, slashed her once, then pulled her consciousness out of her head with your other hand before she could reach into her other pouch, which now you can see and is revealed to you was an explosive charge that she was going to set off.
Janine: Mm-hmm.
Austin: Obviously.
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: Right, to…
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: Both to try to hurt you but also to— as an alarm, right?
Janine: Mm-hmm.
Austin: This is a, like, “Hey! Hey, hey, hey! Bad time is here.” It is a red smoke charge, which is…you know, it's just another piece of dynamite for you, basically. [Ali and Janine laugh] It's a little bit— it's weaker than that, actually, if I look at the actual stats. Let me actually make sure that it's— [typing] that I give it to you right, here.
Janine: But it would be a good diversion, in this case, if we want to fucking…
Austin: Yes. Yeah, so it's…it's a…what did I say? Red smoke charge.
Janine: Mm-hmm.
Austin: It's Kill D6, Loud, Spread, limited one. So it's not as dangerous. It's not like just raw dynamite that's gonna fuck up the area.
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: So. So yeah, Loud, Spread. Which actually, this dynamite should be Spread also. That makes sense. I'm gonna add that to this, because, you know, it's an area of effect thing. So yeah, boom, and then…and then I'm guessing you loot the rest of what she's got going on here?
Janine: Yes, absolutely.
Austin: All right. So, number one: also in that pouch, D4 herbal cough drops with the Wild domain. That’s a resource.
Jack: You don’t want to cough if you're a sniper.
Austin: You don’t.
Ali: Can I get one of those, like in real life?
Austin: Ah, right?
Jack: Aw.
Janine: [sympathetic] Mm. [Ali laughs]
Austin: [sympathetic noise] Buddy. I'm just gonna put all this in here. So, herbal cough drops, D4, Wild. Magistrate badge, D8, Haven.
Ali: Ooh.
Austin: You already got the red smoke charge. And then there is the Fulmina-blessed rifle, and that is, uh…that is your “Acquire a rare or powerful object.”
Janine: Wow!
Austin: That is Kill D12, Debilitating, Piercing, Extreme Range—
Janine: Hell yeah.
Austin: Clean.
Janine: Good haul. Beats done.
Austin: Kills with it do not damage like things on someone's body, do not damage resources. And then, here's the thing, is that it's limited five, at, you know, at D12. Otherwise drops to D8, because you only have the five bullets she has on her.
Janine: Right.
Austin: You only have these five Fulmina-blessed bullets. And you can get other—
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: —bullets for it, but like, you can't get other bullets blessed by this priest. I mean, I guess you could. You could find a priest of Fulmina and get more bullets for it, but that's, you know, that's a thing you'd have to figure out yourself. So I’ve pasted that in here. It’s a good gun. It's a real good gun.
Janine: Yeah. Es might just leave, guys. I got all my stuff done. [Austin, Janine, and Jack laugh] Have fun! I’m gonna…
Austin: Do you have a signal? Do you have a signal to like show them that you're good? Or do you imagine they just kind of saw, saw all that happen?
Janine: Um…you know, I think if you're looking for an eyeball monster to be doing stuff, you probably see that. I don't know.
Austin: Yeah, probably. Yeah.
Janine: If you were looking at the sniper thing.
Austin: But nobody else saw it somehow, so yeah.
Janine: Yeah.
Austin: But from the Weather Room, all that just happened.
Janine: No one else was looking for an eyeball.
Austin: Uh, I think we get…so, Bucho has seen you do this before, right? Back at Yellowfield, has seen you in eyeball mode, presumably.
Janine: Oh, he must— yes, yeah, must have.
Austin: Alekest has not, and Alekest, uh… [Jack chuckles] I think, Pickman, Alekest comes over to you and is like:
Austin (as Alekest): Oh. Uh, heritrix, right?
Jack (as Pickman): Uh huh.
Austin (as Alekest): [deep breath] Mean business, mean business.
Jack (as Pickman): Mean business?
Austin (as Alekest): That’s it. Just, I wouldn't want to fight one. I have, but I would like to not again.
Jack (as Pickman): Do you have a problem with Es?
Austin (as Alekest): No. [Janine laughs] You need to calm down.
Jack (as Pickman): What?
Austin (as Alekest): You're all nerved up. If you go down there and you're paranoid about us, something's gonna…something's gonna sneak up on you.
[Music plays: “Sangfielle”]