Episode 7: Inside the Rift Transcript
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JAS: The residual energy builds up, coming to a breaking point. The ground had no choice but to open up, but now the tinkerer must decide: steel his will, or lose it forever? This is Next in the Order.
[THEME MUSIC]
JAS: All right! Hello one and all and welcome to another episode of Next in the Order! I am your not-so-humble DM, and again I don’t know why I’m singing. But, you know.
WINNIE: It’s because you’re gay and neurodivergent.
JAS: That’s what it is, innit love? All right, I am not-so-humble DM, I’ve already said that. Let’s go, the people, pronouns that change, words are hard. What’s the vibe?
WINNIE: This is recorded at the same day as the last episode, not to ruin your temporal whatever-it-is. Yeah, I am still Winnie, and I still use she/they.
JAS: Tasty.
MARS: Yeah, like Winnie said. Same day, [NOISE OF UNCERTAINTY]. Fuck around and find out.
JAS: Excellent.
MARS: And my boy’s brain’s getting deep-fried at the moment.
JAS: Speaking of a boy’s brains getting deep-fried, where we last left off, you’ve all gone with Henry to go investigate this weird crack in the ground, and you ended up walking through… you finished your travels and you ended up at his field, where there was in fact a purple, glowing crack in the ground. It was causing a aura of fear in the cattle, where we talked to Maurice, who I have been threatened with my life if I do anything to harm Maurice. So, I just need it to be known that I have people staring at me, threatening to kill me if I even so much as look at Maurice wrong. Yes?
WINNIE: I would also like it to be noted that if your crack is purple and glowing, you should probably see a doctor about that.
MARS: Preferably not Professor Amadon, he’s not that kind of doctor.
JAS: Yeah, but… hey, it’s important to get tested regularly. Don’t be silly, wrap your willy.
NORTH: You sound like an advertisement.
JAS: It is.
MAR: It’s a public service campaign.
JAS: It is. D) All of the above. Anyway, so we have a purple glowing crack.
MAR: I feel like we have more pressing matters than the purple glowing crack in the ground.
JAS: And inside the purple glowing crack, Sylacrum saw a thing called a Fissure Core Fragment, that he decided to then pick up, and it made his brain start to melt. Also, from some kind of weird field, there came out a cow who changed into a Chimera, and then a cow that liquefied and is now an ooze.
MERCER and WINNIE: It’s a mooze!
MARS: Yeah, it’s just chocolate milk.
MAR: (distressed) No!
MARS: I’m chocolate, I can say it.
MERCER: Mars! I’m gonna crawl under the table about it.
JAS: I also would like to crawl under the table about it, but I practice good mic technique.
WINNIE: Eeby deeby.
JAS: Anyway.
NORTH: Anyway, Sylacrum brain go brr.
JAS: Sylacrum brain go… [MAKES VAGUE MELTING/LIQUEFYING SOUND].
WINNIE: You’re gonna have to make that noise again.
JAS: [MAKES NOISE AGAIN] So, we just finished with Sylacrum’s brain going [MAKES SOUND AGAIN], and it is now the top of the round, where we have Valus. Valus, what you wanna do? We got a mooze and a chi-moo-ra. Nope, couldn’t get the moo in there. Cow-mera. Got it.
NORTH: I have a bit of a question about how a spell works.
JAS: Of course.
NORTH: So, Mage Armor. Does AC 13 + Dexterity modifier, which isn’t shit for me, but it’s better than what I have. So it says the spell ends if the target dons armor, or if you dismiss the spell as an action. So if I use that this turn, can I come back and use a different spell next turn? Or would I have to dismiss this one.
JAS: You would not have to dismiss it, you just keep it on. It’s not concentration, is it?
NORTH: No.
JAS: No, so literally, you can keep it - you put it on, and you’re Gucci. You can cast other spells the next turn, you can do whatever.
MAR: Does Mage Armor get nae-nae’d if Valus drops to zero hit points.
JAS: I don’t…
MAR: I don’t think so.
JAS: ‘Cause it’s unless you dispel it or the duration, or if you put on armor.
MAR: And the duration is eight hours, right?
NORTH: Duration is eight hours, so.
JAS: Yeah, I think even if you get nae-nae’d, you can still keep it on.
MAR: Love that!
JAS: Also, don’t forget that Valus has a bunch of temporary hit points.
MAR: Yeah, Valus has a bunch.
NORTH: How many more rounds does that last?
MAR: We’ve got four more rounds, I believe. So, hold on. I have been concentrating… you should have eighteen. So, on your turn you gain three more, so you should have eighteen temporary hit points right now.
NORTH: Okay.
MAR: It has been six rounds, so there are four more rounds, and a round gets added on my turn. So is that, on the eleventh, it goes away?
JAS: Yes.
MAR: So, we’ve got four more full turns of the temporary hit points. And those get taken away before your normal hit points, so you don’t just lose all of those hit points. But if you need help getting rid of the temporary hit points when that comes, we can do that. But you’ve got four more rounds on that, and I’m keeping track of that.
NORTH: Yeah, fuck that. I’m gonna do Magic Missile on the Chimera.
JAS: Okay. Go for it.
NORTH: Does it require a…?
JAS: Oh, it automatically hits! Go ahead and roll your damage.
NORTH: It deals 1d4 three times, so 3d4 rolls.
JAS: Get those pointy boys.
NORTH: That’s a 4, nice. One, two, and four. So it says 1d4 plus 1 force damage.
JAS: So that is 10, so 13.
NORTH: Okay. In total?
JAS: Yup, 13 force damage. Cool. cool, cool. For reference for those keeping up, the Chimera has taken 39 points of damage. Just because we’re starting a new episode, I wanna give people that context. All right, it is Caelum’s turn.
MERCER: I’m gonna whack it again.
JAS: Whack it! Go for it.
MERCER: Well… god damn it. Dirty 20.
JAS: Dirty 20’s gonna hit. Roll damage.
MERCER: That’s gonna be 4 points of damage.
JAS: Okay. All right, is that your turn?
MERCER: Yeah. I have an singular ki point that I would like to save.
JAS: Fair enough. Then it is going to be the ooze’s turn, and it is going to crawl up and it is going to make a weird-ass attack on Valus. That is going to be a 12 to hit.
NORTH: Yeah, it hits. It hits.
JAS: With your Mage Armor?
NORTH: I do have Mage Armor on! It doesn’t hit, I have a 13 now.
MERCER: You didn’t cast Mage Armor, you cast Magic Missile.
JAS: Damn, that does hit then. All right, you are going to take nine bludgeoning damage and three acid damage. Next up is the Chimera, and it is going to… oop, we gotta check to see if something bad happens. This is our in front of the board roll to see if something bad happens.
NORTH: On a scale of one to ten, how bad is the bad thing that could happen?
JAS: It would probably insta-down Valus.
MAR: (alarmed) With the temporary hit points?!
JAS: Not with the temporary hit points.
MAR: Okay.
MARS: So a normal bad, then?
JAS: All right. Three. [MERCER: Thank fuck.] Y’all are good. Cool, then instead, it is going to other stuff. It is going to since Cire and Caelum are flanking it, it is going to make a tail attack at Cire. That is going to be a 23 to hit. No, 21, actually.
MAR: Still hits.
JAS: Still hits, though. Okay, tail attack is going to do eleven bludgeoning damage.
MAR: Okay.
JAS: And then it is going to make a bite attack with its snake head at Caelum. I’m sorry. I’m sorry, that’s a natural 20.
MERCER: (cheerfully distressed) Okay!
JAS: But I didn’t hit you last session. So that is going to do 2d6+4 is the original, so 12+4, 16, plus 2d6. Plus eight. So.
MERCER: I’m down.
JAS: 24 - did you take damage before?
MERCER: I did. I took eleven points of damage before and I only have 32 hit points. I’m down.
JAS: Eebert deebert.
WINNIE: Okay, this is actually perfect timing because it is now my turn.
JAS: No, it is not.
WINNIE: It’s not? What?
MARS: Oh, fuck, the mooze.
MAR: No, the mooze already went. The Chimera has another attack.
JAS: Mm-hmm. But once it sees you go down, it is going to turn its attention more towards Cire, because I am being nice today.
MERCER: I mean, I already have a backup character.
JAS: Yes, but. It is going to ram at you, and it is a dirty 20 to hit.
MAR: Yup, that hits.
JAS: Okay, that is going to be 10 bludgeoning damage.
MAR: Sorry, I need to find my eraser.
JAS: How is Cire doing?
MAR: Cire is… I don’t think bloodied, but I have to do some math. No, she’s not bloodied.
JAS: Okay, cool. It’s Hesperis’ turn in the order now.
WINNIE: Here is where Hesperis gets to show off one of her fucky-wucky little talents, but this also something, not as a character decision, but as a player decision. Do you want to make a gamble. Mercer?
MERCER: Yeah, sure.
WINNIE: Okay. Are you sure? You don’t want to know what the gamble is?
MERCER: Enlighten me. What is the gamble?
WINNIE: Hesperis has a funky little homebrew thing that Jas and I have talked about, where Hesperis can sacrifice one hit point, and she will pluck a seed from her hair, from the wisteria blossoms in her hair, and as a bonus action, she can stick it in your mouth, like force-feed it to you. And you have to make a Constitution saving throw. If you succeed, you are restored to one hit point, and you are technically stabilized. If you fail, it counts as two failed death saves. So that’s the gamble you get to make.
MERCER: What is the DC?
WINNIE: 13.
MERCER: Yeah, sure, fuck it. Why not, I don’t have a negative to Con.
WINNIE: So Hesperis is going to enter the range of the… she’s going to leave.
JAS: You need to make a Wisdom saving throw first.
WINNIE: Okay.
NORTH: I’d also like to throw out that if you plan on doing anything with your bass, your don’t have the battery anymore.
WINNIE: I am aware. That’s a 5.
JAS: With a 5, you fail, and you are frightened. And it causes you to use the rest of your movement to get out of the field, dash out. You run as far as you can.
WINNIE: In which case, I do not, in fact.
JAS: No gamble this turn.
WINNIE: Yiup.
JAS: All right, Cire, it is your turn.
MAR: Okay, so this is going to be the seventh round of concentration on Valus’ Heroism. Cire is going to move around the Chimera to where Caelum is down, and is not going to leave the melee range of the Chimera. So no opportunity attack. Cire is going to lay her hands on either of Caelum’s shoulders, and use Lay on Hands, and you regain twenty hit points.
MERCER: Thank you bestie, thank you.
JAS: Yee-haw.
MERCER: Thank God.
MAR: And Cire is out of Lay on Hands, and she has used her action to do that.
JAS: Any bonus action?
MAR: Let me look, I don’t think so. I used my Channel Divinity last turn - none of my Channel Divinities are bonus actions, what am I thinking? Oh, I do have something that is a bonus action that uses my Channel Divinity. Never mind, I’m not losing it, but I don’t have a bonus action that I can use, I don’t believe.
JAS: Okay.
MAR: So yeah, my action is going to be get Caelum. Actually, I take it back, I’m gonna cast Shield of Faith on Valus.
JAS: Okay.
MAR: That’s a +2 bonus to your AC. Wait, no I’m not, because I’m concentrating. I forgot about concentration - both of my bonus action spells are concentration.
JAS: Pain.
MAR: No, I don’t have any bonus actions I can do right now. It’s not my turn any more.
JAS: Okay, great.
MAR: I’m losing it.
NORTH: I appreciate the thought.
MAR: I tried to do this last turn in the order too, I was like, “I wanna cast Shield of Faith on Valus” and then I remembered, I am already giving Valus temporary hit points.
JAS: Okay, we roll a d4 to see if anything else comes out. Nope. Cool. Sylacrum, it is your turn. I need a Wisdom saving throw.
MARS: What dice is gonna fuck me… you know what? We’re going with the unlucky one, because, you know. You said a Wisdom save, right?
JAS: Wisdom save.
MARS: Fourteen?
JAS: A fourteen… you…
MARS: Oh wait, hold on, I misread that. Sixteen.
JAS: Okay, sixteen, then, you feel a piece of yourself latch onto the Fissure Core. But you feel… your brain feels okay, actually, like it is not melting quite as much as before, but it still might be a little bit melting, but you have latched onto this Fissure Core fragment, just a little bit. And that takes your whole turn.
MARS: Am I still stunned?
JAS: Yes, you are still stunned.
MARS: Okay, then my magic weapon concentration on the lance is fucked.
JAS: Yeah, no, you can’t do jack shit. All right, Valus, it is your turn.
WINNIE: (whispering) You gain hit points.
MAR: Oh yes, you gain three more temporary hit points. So you should be up to 21 temporary hit points, although you have lost some of those.
NORTH: Yeah, so I’ll just adjust my current HP.
JAS: Whatcha gonna do? You got an ooze in melee range with you.
NORTH: Oh, man. Too bad people are around me. I’m going to back off my max move distance, if that’s possible?
JAS: You can do that, but you would take an opportunity attack from the ooze,
NORTH: Oh, ‘cause I’d be leaving melee range. Hmm. Interesting. Okay, I’m gonna cast Mage Armor.
JAS: Okay. Cool.
NORTH: Which now makes my Armor Class 13.
MARS: Is Mage Armor an action or a bonus action?
NORTH: Mage Armor is one action.
MARS: Okay.
JAS: You wanna do anything with your bonus action, or are you Gucci?
NORTH: I’m not entirely sure what I can do with a bonus action, so I’m good.
JAS: If you have any spells that are casting time of one bonus action, though Mage Armor is a…
MAR: Mage Armor is a first level spell, so it would have to be a cantrip.
JAS: It would have to be a cantrip, yeah.
NORTH: Yeah, I don’t have anything else I can do.
JAS: Okay. All right, then that is Valus’ turn. Next up is Caelum.
MERCER: I’m angry.
JAS: Yup.
MERCER: So I am going to whack this thing and if I hit it, I am going to pop pop.
JAS: Excellent. See if you whack it.
MERCER: Well, I can almost guarantee that I don’t. It’s a nine.
JAS: No, you do not whack it. You are still disoriented from getting your shit rocked by a snake head.
MERCER: Delightful.
JAS: Yeah, you go… you… yeah. Eeby deeby.
MERCER: Eeby deeby.
JAS: It is the ooze’s turn, and since it’s still up on Valus, it’s going to try and hit Valus again. It kind of hardens its form, to congeal a little bit to whack at you. But it leaves behind… no. That’s a seven.
NORTH: (relieved) Okay.
JAS: Okay, cool, next up is the Chimera. In front of the board.
NORTH: I want this thing dead.
WINNIE: That’s a 2. Thank goodness.
JAS: All right, cool. It is going to again make its… since it’s got its head towards Cire… it’s actually got its heads toward both of y’all.
MAR: Yeah, ‘cause we’re next to each other.
JAS: Yeah. It is going to use the snake head to bite at Cire, it’s going to be a 21.
MAR: Yeah, that hits.
JAS: That is going to be seven points of damage.
MAR: Okay, Cire is bloodied.
JAS: Cool. It is then going to claw at Caelum. No. No. No, it’s not gonna hit.
MERCER: Thank God.
JAS: And then it is going to try and ram its horns.
MAR: At which one of us?
JAS: At Cire. And that’s going to… that’s gonna hit, I can’t do math, it’s a sixteen plus seven. That’s going to hit. And that’s going to be 8 bludgeoning damage.
MAR: Okay.
JAS: How’s Cire looking?
MAR: She has eleven hit points.
JAS: Okay.
MARS: Hey, wait a damn minute, where the fuck is Henry?
JAS: Oh, my god, I forgot to roll for Henry.
MAR: Did Henry not come in?
MARS: He led us to the field.
JAS: Oh, my god. Henry’s there. Eebert deebert. I forgot to roll for Henry, let me add him to the initiative. He is going…
NORTH: Henry got terrified by the aura.
JAS: Yeah, he ran for one round, but now he has succeeded his Wisdom saving throw, yup, he succeeded his Wisdom saving throw.
NORTH: He had to go get his better gun, Big Bertha.
[LAUGHTER]
MARS: It’s called Betsy, actually.
JAS: Okay, Henry is now in the order. I’m going to let him take a turn because he hasn’t, because, oh my god, totally forgot.
NORTH: I completely forgot he existed.
MARS: How could you forget a DILF?
JAS: I don’t know how I forgot my boy Henry. I just did, okay?
WINNIE: I’m a lesbian. That’s how I forget a DILF.
JAS: God, retweet. Except for Geralt of Rivia, he can get it.
WINNIE: Any day.
MAR: I’m sorry, I have to say this, since we have mentioned him. He’s man-adjacent at best.
JAS: This is true. Henry full on shoots the Chimera, and he hits the lion head and deals… it is 2d10. He deals 10 points of gun damage to it. And the Chimera is bloodied.
WINNIE: Tasty.
MAR: I fully forgot to roll advantage the last time I tried to hit the Chimera from flanking with Caelum. I am boo-boo the fool.
MERCER: I also didn’t roll at advantage!
MAR: We weren’t flanking last turn because we were next to each other, ‘cause I used Lay on Hands on you.
MERCER: We were next to each other.
JAS: We’re doing great. Yeah?
NORTH: I’m sorry, this is the last time I will bring this up. I don’t know anything about the Witcher. Does that count as monsterfucking?
MAR: (laughing) Yes, actually. It does.
WINNIE: Technically, yes. Emotionally, no.
MAR: Yeah. It’s only monsterfucking on a technicality.
MARS: There’s a 20 minute lecture on this, we don’t have time for it.
WINNIE: It’s only monsterfucking if you’re in one of the AUs where Geralt has fangs.
JAS: Is that your one qualification for it to be a monster?
WINNIE: No…
MAR: Also, that is the one time that I will out of character…
WINNIE: Say fuck?
JAS: Anyway! It’s Hesperis’ turn in the order.
WINNIE: Okay, I am going to once again attempt to enter whatever.
JAS: Okay, make a Wisdom saving throw.
WINNIE: Eeby deeby
NORTH, MARS, & JAS: What was it?
WINNIE: That’s nat 1 boo-boo.
MARS: Oh, no.
JAS: Hesperis starts crying.
WINNIE: Yeah that’s on brand.
NORTH: I just imagine Hesperis full sprinting in and then turning around and full sprinting out, just sprinting in and sprinting out.
JAS: That’s exactly what happens.
MAR: She’s just running back and forth.
WINNIE: Can Hesperis do the thing… I haven’t played a non-rogue in a hot minute, so I can’t remember if non-rogues have the dash, disengage, whatever.
JAS: So Hesperis would use full movement to run, and then her action to dash, so it’s 60 feet of movement.
WINNIE: So I still have my action and stuff? I just can’t be…
JAS: No. You use your entire action. Technically you have a bonus action, but not really.
MAR: Dashing as a bonus action is a rogue ability.
WINNIE: So I can’t go hide behind Maurice?
JAS: Correct.
WINNIE: Can I aim myself in the direction of Maurice as I’m running?
JAS: You run past Maurice.
WINNIE: Cool.
MAR: ‘Cause you use your full movement to run away.
WINNIE: That’s only 30 feet, boo-boo.
JAS: Yeah, you use 30 feet to go back, and try… ‘cause originally, used 30 feet to try and get in, dashed away.
MAR: ‘Cause if you’re frightened you have to use your movement and your action to run away.
JAS: Exactly. So last time, used 30 feet to get in, 30 feet to get out. Now uses 30 feet to get in, and again, 30 feet to get out. So, [SAD NOISE]. All right, that’s Hesperis’ turn. Cire.
MAR: I am once again going to kind of skirt around the melee range of the Chimera to flank with Caelum, and then I am going to attempt to bonk.
JAS: Yeah, bonk at advantage.
MAR: Actually, no, I’m going to use.
MARS: Just for the listeners, which one are you bonking with?
MAR: Oh, yeah. I actually should have said that to begin with. The greatsword.
MARS: I figured as much, but.
JAS: Tasty.
NORTH: Is there something special you can do with the greatsword?
MAR: With any melee attack, I can smite, but I have to know whether I hit or not first. I don’t think I did, that’s a 12.
JAS: Twelve is not gonna do it. [SAD NOISE]. At advantage?
MAR: Yes, at advantage, I rolled a 2 and a 6.
JAS: Ass.
NORTH: This is going really well.
MARS: Wow, we already hit the TPK arc.
NORTH: Don’t say that, don’t say that about my boy.
JAS: Since Sylacrum passed his Wisdom save, nothing comes out of the crack this time. So, that is its turn. It is Sylacrum’s turn and I need another Wisdom saving throw.
MARS: All right.
NORTH: Very worried about this.
JAS: Yeah, fair.
MARS: Eebert deebert. That’s a 10.
JAS: A ten, you..
MARS: Oh, wait, hold on a second. Why does a 17 look like a fucking four? No, like literally, that’s a…
JAS: Wait, did you roll a seven- what did you roll?
MARS: 17, I think.
NORTH: Let me see.
MERCER: Let me see.
MARS: That one.
NORTH: Yeah, that is a seventeen. That does look like a four, actually.
MERCER: Yeah, that’s a 17.
MARS: Upside-down, though? Look at that. That’s a fucking four.
JAS: Whack. On a seventeen.
MAR: Natural seventeen. Plus numbers.
MARS: Twenty-three.
JAS: On a 23, you feel your brain come back to itself even more, and you feel an even deeper bond with this Fissure Core fragment, but you are still not out of the woods yet. Valus, it is your turn. You’ve got an ooze on you.
MAR: You get hit points.
JAS: You get hit points.
WINNIE: It wouldn’t be a TPK, Hesperis isn’t in range to take damage.
NORTH: I’m going to.. wait, what did I do last time?
MERCER: You cast Mage Armor on yourself last time.
NORTH: Ah, yes. This time, I am going to use Fire Bolt on the mooze.
JAS: All right, do it. Make an attack roll.
NORTH: Let’s see… please.. okay, that’s a nineteen. Does a nineteen hit?
JAS: Nineteen definitely hits.
NORTH: Okay. Let’s see, it’s 1d10. That is a six.
JAS: A six? What kind of damage?
NORTH: It is fire damage.
JAS: Okay, cool. Takes six fire damage. Tasty. Excellent, you burn this ooze just a little bit. It smells gross.
WINNIE: Like a steak.
MARS: I was gonna say burning milk, but…
JAS: All of that is bad. Don’t enjoy any of it. All right.
WINNIE: Hang on, was this a girl cow or a boy cow before?
NORTH: Why is that important?
MARS: ‘Cause it’s not gonna smell like milk if it’s a dude.
JAS: It was a girl cow.
WINNIE: Okay, so it’s gonna smell like burning steak and burning milk.
JAS: Tasty.
NORTH: Is this cow still making noises, or is it just silent?
JAS: It is just an ooze making wet ooze noises.
WINNIE: Ew.
JAS: I was grossed out as I was saying it, if it makes y’all feel better. Caelum, it’s your turn.
MAR: It doesn’t.
MERCER: One second, I need to add a tally to my “what the fuck?” counter.
JAS: Yep, fair enough. You are flanking.
MERCER: Yes, I’m going to attempt, once more, to whack.
JAS: Whack.
NORTH: Whackus bonkus.
MERCER: I rolled a natural twenty, and then the die that went off was in between an eight and a natural twenty.
JAS: Reroll that one, just to see.
MERCER: No, that was a two.
JAS: Great, natural twenty. Bonk.
MERCER: Bonk. Okay, so it’s going to be eight plus… it’s gonna be ten points of that, and then… I’m still angry. I would like to pop.
JAS: Okay, that was ten points with your…
MERCER: Quarterstaff.
JAS: Yeah, with your quarterstaff, that was with the crit bonus?
MERCER: Mm-hmm.
JAS: Okay, perfect. Go ahead and bonk and roll that extra dice.
MERCER: Can I use a dice box for this, ‘cause I can guarantee that one of them is going to at least go off of the fucking.... No to the Wild Magic.
JAS: Okay, so we have no surge, now your DC will be four.
MERCER: Seventeen and nineteen.
JAS: Seventeen and nineteen, both of those hit.
MERCER: Thank you. Okay.
NORTH: Naughty whackus bonkus.
MERCER: So that’s eight and then five, so thirteen more points of damage.
JAS: All right. Tasty. That is good. It is looking not too spectacular. And it is Henry’s turn in the order. Wait, no, it’s the ooze’s turn. I apologize.
MAR: Shit, I forgot to roll my concentration checks for the damage.
JAS: Ah.
MAR: That’s an eighteen, plus five, and that… yeah, I’m gonna lose concentration.
JAS: Okay, so you gotta take away all of your.
MAR: Yeah, you have to take away all of your temporary hit points, and you are no longer immune to being frightened.
MARS: Zoinks.
JAS: You should be at full health.
NORTH: Yeah, but..
WINNIE: That’s not very much for Valus.
NORTH: That’s not very much.
MAR: With Jas’s permission, I’m not going to try and retcon that. It’s not worth retconning because Valus lost the temporary hit points, anyway.
JAS: The ooze is still right there by Valus, and that’s the only person the ooze is by. So, sorry ‘bout it.
NORTH: Is there nothing I can do? Can’t move out of melee range…
JAS: Well, you could, but you’d take an opportunity attack.
MARS: You just have to hope he misses.
JAS: Or you could use your action to disengage. That is a thing that you can do.
MAR: I forget that disengage is an action you can take.
NORTH: I could’ve done that this whole time.
JAS: That’s not gonna hit, that was a tasty ass nat 1. So it kind of… it just oozes oozily.
NORTH: It just bubbles.
JAS: Makes a gurgling noise, and part of it tries to hit you, and doesn’t. Cool. That, now is Henry’s turn. Henry is going to shoot at the ooze again. That’s definitely going to hit the ooze, that is a sixteen plus… shit, what did I give Henry? He has a +6. So yeah. Yes, we’re good. That’s 2d10 again. Ooh! That is sixteen points of gun damage from Henry. It’s the Chimera’s turn.
NORTH: I don’t want it to be the Chimera’s turn.
JAS: Mar, rules lawyer, with flanking, do they get disadvantage on attacks?
MAR: No.
JAS: Okay. You know who’s in its range. Oh, wait, I need my in front of the board roll first. Do we have an eebert deebert?
MAR: I’m gonna cry if we do, actually.
WINNIE: Please don’t eebert my deebert. That’s a three.
[SIGHS OF RELIEF FROM PLAYERS]
MAR: The sigh of relief from Cire and her eleven hit points.
WINNIE: Please don’t eebert my deebert.
JAS: All right, we’re going to…
MAR: I’m trying so hard not to end up on the floor.
JAS: We’re gonna make some attacks. First one’s going to be at Caelum. Caelum, how many hit points do you have?
MERCER: Twenty.
JAS: Okay. Ah, fuck! Yeah, that one’s gonna hit. That’s eighteen plus seven.
MERCER: Yeah.
JAS: Cool, I’m just gonna roll other attack here, no, not gonna hit. That’s ten. So that first attack it bites at you again with the snake head and that does eleven points of piercing damage.
MERCER: Ow.
JAS: And then we’ve got one attack at Cire. No. That’s a two on the die. Cool, it swipes its tail at Cire and misses. Cool, that is going to be Hesperis’ turn.
WINNIE: Once again, I am going to try to enter the field’s vagina. That is a… what saving throw is this?
JAS: It’s Wisdom.
WINNIE: That’s a fourteen.
JAS: That’s the DC.
WINNIE: Meets it beats it?
JAS: Meets it beats it. Hesperis is in!
WINNIE: Hesperis is in, and she is going to…
JAS: You’ve used your movement to get just in, so you can’t get into melee range with anything yet.
WINNIE: Right. I don’t think I need to be in melee range for what I’m about to do. There’s no way for a ten foot radius sphere to not hit an ally, is there?
JAS: Mm-mm. Well. You could. If you angle it correctly on the ooze, not get Valus, on the edge. But you would get cows. And it would probably kill these cows outright.
MARS: Maurice would probably be fine.
NORTH: I would not blame you at all for not doing it.
MARS: Look, we can accept the character death, we cannot accept the death of…
JAS: It would only be three cows.
WINNIE: (distraught) Three cows?! Okay, here’s the dilemma, because Hesperis would probably do it. Because they’re meat cows and they’re going to die anyway to fulfill their purpose. However, I could also argue that she would not do it, because by killing them in this way, they could not fulfill their purpose to feed someone. And also, as a player. Consider, it would deal me so much psychic damage.
NORTH: How many cows is Valus worth?
MAR: Less than three, apparently.
WINNIE: Wait wait wait, wait wait wait. Is there any way that I could catch every one of my party members in a 20 foot radius sphere?
JAS: Maybe. I think you could get everybody except for Henry.
MARS: Yeah.
WINNIE: Rest in peace Henry, I guess. I’m going to cast Calm Emotions. Which, you attempt to suppress strong emotions in a group of people, each humanoid in a twenty-foot radius sphere you choose within range must make a Charisma saving throw. A creature can choose to fail this saving throw if it wishes. If a creature fails its saving throw, choose one of the following two effects. And I would choose the first effect, which is, you can suppress any effect causing a target to be charmed or frightened. When the spell ends, any suppressed effect resumes, provided the duration has not expired in the meantime.
NORTH: What’s the duration?
WINNIE: One minute, and concentration.
NORTH: Can the Chimera not be affected by the fear.
MARS: The Chimera’s not humanoid.
MAR: The Chimera would not be one of the ones that Wink chose.
NORTH: No, I don’t mean by the emotions, I mean by the actual.
WINNIE: I don’t choose them, what I do is I choose a point, and every humanoid within that range.
MAR: Oh, humanoids!
JAS: None of these things are humanoid, that for sure.
MAR: Gotcha.
JAS: So, the Chimera is not affected because it is..
NORTH: A product of the magic?
JAS: Yeah.
NORTH: Okay, that makes sense.
JAS: Like, you wouldn’t scare off an ally.
WINNIE: Wait wait wait, do I have to choose the same effect for everyone? Because it says, if a creature fails its saving throw, choose one of the following two effects.
JAS: Yeah.
WINNIE: I can also make a creature indifferent to creatures of my choice that it is hostile towards.
JAS: I think it’s at disadvantage if you’re engaged in combat with it.
WINNIE: This indifference ends if a target is attacked or harmed by a spell, or if it witnesses any of its friends being harmed. The spell ends, the creature becomes hostile again unless the DM rules otherwise.
JAS: Okay, so… it is on humanoids though. Nope, this is not what this is.
WINNIE: Can I choose a point that gets everybody except Henry?
JAS: Yeah.
WINNIE: Am I also in there?
JAS: Yeah, you can also be in there.
WINNIE: Okay. So I am going to do that. So everybody has to make a Charisma saving throw or you can choose to fail it.
JAS: I just lied. You cannot be in there, because you’re on the edge of the 30 foot radius. So you wouldn’t be able to hit both you and Sylacrum.
WINNIE: Okay, I will choose them, then.
NORTH: What happens if we pass the Charisma check?
MAR: The effect doesn’t take place, but this is an effect that is helping us, so to metagame a little bit, you should probably choose to fail the save.
NORTH: That’s what I was thinking.
MARS: I have a question, though. Is that gonna effect Sylacrum at all?
JAS: No, it’s not. Because what’s going on there is separate.
MARS: Yeah.
JAS: But Hesperis doesn’t know that. Hesperis made her choice.
NORTH: Sylacrum’s on a bit of wild ride.
JAS: Yeah, Sylacrum’s doing something.
MARS: I’m on a bad trip.
JAS: Cire, it is your turn in the order, if Hesperis doesn’t have anything else.
WINNIE: As a bonus action, can I give Bardic Inspiration to somebody, or will that effect my concentration?
JAS: No, it won’t effect your concentration.
WINNIE: Okay, then I am going to give Bardic Inspiration to… oh boy… eenie meenie miney moe, catch a tiger by its toe, if it hollers let it go… Caelum.
JAS: Cire, it is your turn in the order.
MAR: As a bonus action, cast Shield of Faith on Valus, so she is once again concentrating, and I’m not going to keep track of rounds because it’s for up to ten minutes.
NORTH: Which does…?
MAR: It raises your AC by 2. I’m not gonna keep track of rounds, because we’ve got… what, sixty rounds? No, a hundred rounds. ‘Cause a minute is ten rounds. So we’re gonna be done with this one way or another by the end of this.
JAS: Yeah, if we go a hundred rounds, kill me.
MAR: Right. So you have a +2 to your AC as long as I don’t fail a concentration check.
WINNIE: Okay, mine is duration up to a minute which is ten rounds, does my turn count as the first round? That I cast it?
JAS: Yes.
MAR: So Cire is going to cast Shield of Faith on Valus, which is going to leave her one first level spell slot.
JAS: What’s up?
NORTH: What if we run out of attack spells? ‘Cause we’ve used all of our spell slots.
JAS: Hope you have some cantrips, bestie.
MAR: Yeah, that’s basically it.
MARS: Or a weapon.
MAR: Cire is then going to… is Cire still flanking the Chimera with Caelum?
JAS: Yes.
MAR: Cire is going to once again attempt to bonk.
JAS: Bonk.
MAR: With my greatsword.
JAS: Cool.
MAR: It’s a fourteen.
JAS: Fourteen hits.
MAR: Okay, I would like to smite.
JAS: Smite!
MAR: So, once again, I am rolling 2d6 for my greatsword, and 2d8 for my smite, also. I’m not familiar with the D&D mechanics of a Chimera. Is it a fiend or undead?
JAS: No.
MAR: Okay, I rolled a 3 and a 5 on the d8s, and then I rolled two ones on the d6s, which because of my great weapon fighting style, I can reroll. And that is another 3 and another 5. So that’s sixteen plus four, so that’s gonna be twenty points… it’s gonna be eight points of radiant damage and twelve points of slashing damage.
JAS: Okay, cool. The Chimera is looking bad. Yes?
WINNIE: I just realized, it hasn’t been ten minutes since I started talking to Maurice, was it?
JAS: No it has not. You still have Speak With Animals up, don’t you?
WINNIE: Yup!
JAS: Good. Again it is the Fissure Core fragment’s turn, however, again, Sylacrum saved, so nothing happens. Sylacrum, it is your turn, I am going to need another Wisdom saving throw.
NORTH: No pressure, don’t fuck up.
MARS: Okay, here I go.
[THEME MUSIC]
JAS: Hey, what’s up, y’all? It’s Jas, and I’m here to do some fun and funky announcements for you. Today’s announcements are gonna be a little bit wacky, a little bit heavier, so, I won’t be doing full-length ads, but our affiliate links for Instacart and Buzzsprout are still in the description, so please, check those out, support the show that way! Also, you can support us on Patreon, and we just launched a [rhyming with Hi-fi] Ko-FI, [pronounced as coffee] Ko-Fi? Whatever, you can find the link to that in our Linktree on Instagram @nextintheorder.
JAS: First big announcement is that we’re moving to doing the podcast bi-weekly. We wish that we could continue to make weekly episodes happen, but this is a hobby for us, and with all of us being either full-time students or working full-time and having part time jobs, and aaaaa… life, we are just too busy to get episodes edited every week at a sustainable pace. Hopefully by moving to bi-weekly, we will be able to keep oiurselves sane while editing, and maybe hopefully get caught up on transcripting. That’s the goal. So, biweekly, we’re really sorry, but this is the decision that is best for us going forward. Second announcement, Mars is no longer going to be a part of the podcast going forward. We still have three episodes with them in the backlog, not including this one, that we are going to keep and post over the next month, but after Episode 10, Mars will no longer be a part of the podcast. This decision was not made lightly, and we split on mutual terms. We here at NITO wish Mars the very best in whatever endeavors they get up to. As always, thank you to Magic Sword for the use of their song, Battlefield (Dance With The Dead Remix). Link to that is in the description of the episode. I hope you enjoy the rest of the episode. We love you very much. Talk to y’all soon. Buh-bye.
[THEME MUSIC]
MARS: A Wisdom save, right? Twenty-two.
JAS: A twenty-two. You feel it stabilize in your hands. You are now attuned to the Fissure Core fragment, and you have the power over it now. So the fear effect is gone, it can no longer create anything new, and it is now yours. I am giving you the stats of it.
NORTH: I gotta be honest, you just reaching down and grabbing it worked out way better than I thought it would.
WINNIE: I thought you were gonna get nae-nae’d.
MARS: Oh, I did too.
JAS: I would like it to be known, for stat purposes, that worked like death saving throws, but with Wisdom saves. If you had failed three, it would have been bad for you.
MARS: I figured as much.
JAS: So, the DC was 15 on each Wisdom saving throw.
NORTH: I’m interested to know the stats on this thing.
JAS: You had one failure, and you had three successes. Three successes, you are now attuned to it.
MARS: Sorry, I’m reading this real quick.
JAS: I’m gonna go ahead and read it to everyone, because might as well. This is a piece of a Fissure Core. This is just the frame. Attuning happens when it is touched. When attuned, you receive the following benefits. +1 to any spellcasting roll, attack, or check, advantage on saving throws against magical effects, and once per day you can cast Fear using the black light looking side. Additionally, once per day, you can cast Beacon of Hope using the warmly lit side. This object cannot be destroyed by any means short of a Wish spell.
NORTH: What does Beacon of Hope do?
MAR: I think I actually have.. no I don’t.
JAS: No you don’t, it’s a third level spell.
MARS: It’s also a Paladin spell, isn’t it?
MAR: It’s a Cleric spell. I am once again mixing up my spells. I cast Beacon of Hope fairly often in our other campaign.
JAS: Sorry, I’m pulling it up. Beacon of Hope: This spell bestows hope and vitality. Choose any number of creatures within range. For the duration, each target has advantage on Wisdom saving throws and death saving throws, and regains maximum number of hit points possible from any healing.
NORTH: Wow.
MARS: It’s just the frame, right?
JAS: It’s just the frame.
MARS: But I still have all of my actions and attacks.
JAS: Not this turn. That Wisdom saving throw takes up your entire turn, but you’re no longer stunned, you can do what you like, and you now have +1 bonuses.
MARS: It takes up the entire turn or the action?
JAS: Your entire turn.
MARS: Okay, just making sure.
JAS: ‘Cause the Wisdom saving throw happens at the end of your turn. So you spend the turn stunned. But Sylacrum is back in the game and now more powerful. Have fun! Valus, it is your turn in the order.
NORTH: All right, I’m just gonna cast Fire Bolt again.
JAS: Okay, sounds good. Roll to hit.
NORTH: That is a 25. Does that hit?
JAS: Twenty-five definitely hits. You’re doing it on the ooze, right?
NORTH: Yes.
JAS: Yeah, definitely hits.
NORTH: It’s going to be eight points of damage.
JAS: Eight points of damage, very tasty. You have no idea how the ooze is doing, because it’s an ooze. Cool, it is Caelum’s turn in the order, if that completes your turn.
NORTH: It does.
JAS: Cool.
MERCER: I will once again whack.
JAS: Go for it. You’ve got advantage, don’t forget, you are flanking.
MERCER: Thank you. Goddamnit.
MAR: Would you like to borrow my dice box?
JAS: For those who are wondering why we keep getting dice noises, Mercer keeps rolling off of the table.
MERCER: Twenty one.
JAS: Definitely hits.
MERCER: That’s four points of damage.
JAS: Tasty! All right, it is looking really really bad. Really bad. Yes?
NORTH: So, player question, these cards would tell me if a spell could be used as a bonus action, right?
JAS: It will say casting time
NORTH: Yeah, so I guess…
JAS: If it says one BA, that is one bonus action.
NORTH: Okay.
JAS: Cool. It’s the ooze’s turn. The ooze is going to again, because Valus is right there, it’s gonna go for Valus. Does a fifteen hit?
NORTH: Fuck. Meets it beats it.
JAS: Damn. All right, you take… let’s roll it, rolling rolling rolling, you take eight bludgeoning damage.
NORTH: That’s not terrible.
JAS: And three acid damage.
NORTH: Oh. Okay.
MAR: Are you concentrating on any spells right now?
NORTH: Probably Mage Armor.
JAS, MERCER & MAR: [OVERLAPPING CORRECTIONS]
NORTH: Then no. I’m bad at math, so.
MAR: It’s eleven points of damage.
JAS: How are you looking?
NORTH: I got fourteen hit points.
JAS: Cool. It’s Henry’s turn. He is going to shoot the Chimera. That definitely hits. All right.
NORTH: What was it?
JAS: It was a nineteen, plus six is his bonus, so definitely. 25. And with sixteen points of damage, Henry takes down the Chimera. He just… Henry lines up the shot and just, boom! And a bullet goes straight clean through all three heads, perfectly, and the Chimera falls to the ground dead. ‘Cause he’s a DILF, next question. Hesperis, it is your turn. All we have left is the ooze.
WINNIE: This is metagaming, but about how far from naenae’d is the ooze?
JAS: You really wouldn’t have any way of telling.
WINNIE: Can I make fun of its mother?
JAS: You can make fun of its mother.
NORTH: Would you be making fun of the Core, then? The piece of the Core, whatever it is.
WINNIE: No, I’d be making fun of its cow mother.
JAS: Yeah, it was a cow before.
NORTH: Yeah, I guess that’s true. Does it still have cow memories?
[LAUGHTER]
JAS: Does the ooze have cow feelings? It’s a great question.
NORTH: If someone gets turned into a zombie, do they still remember thing? Do you trigger something in this mooze to make it good again?
MAR: This is getting too philosophical for Mar, which means it’s definitely getting too philosophical for Cire.
JAS: Cire is like, I do not wish to think about it.
MAR: Cire has a +0 to Intelligence and a +1 to Wisdom. Her entire sense… all of the Charisma she has is just an air of competence. That’s it. That’s her entire Charisma.
JAS: Yeah. God, imagine having an air of competence.
MAR: Winnie and I talked about this when we were getting lunch between sessions.
JAS: Good.
NORTH and MAR: “Lunch.”
MAR: Dinner.
JAS: Definitely dinner.
MAR: Definitely dinner.
WINNIE: I’m gonna mock.
JAS: Yeah, go for it.
WINNIE: I’m gonna mock this mooze pretty visciously.
NORTH: What do you say to it?
WINNIE: Hesperis… you know what? I’m actually gonna do this… never mind, it’s a cantrip. I can’t do it at a higher level, I am babey.
MAR: You heard it here first, folks. Winnie is babey.
WINNIE: I am babey. I am just going to be like, really? you are such a spineless mooze that you could not even kill us? Nice try, mooze.
JAS: It makes a gurgle noise in response.
WINNIE: Wisdom saving throw.
JAS: Hey, believe it or not, not this thing’s strong suit, that’s a ten.
WINNIE: That does not save, so it’s gonna take 1d4 psychic damage.
JAS: Cool.
MAR: As it should.
WINNIE: It takes one point of psychic damage.
JAS: It gurgles slightly sadly. Cire, it is your turn in the order.
MAR: Okay, first of all, is there a way for me to flank with someone, with the mooze?
JAS: Yeah, Valus is in melee with it.
MAR: Cool, I am going to flank with Valus, and then I am going to attempt to bonk the mooze.
JAS: Bonk the mooze. I hate that y’all call it the mooze.
MAR: Also, we’re gonna use the greataxe this time.
JAS: Oh, spicy.
MAR: That is a sixteen to hit.
JAS: A sixteen definitely hits.
MAR: Cool, and I am going to roll a d12.
JAS: Yeah, do it.
MAR: Okay. That is seven points of slashing damage.
JAS: The ooze is looking oozed. Is that Cire’s turn.
MAR: Yeah, it is. I’m basically tapped out of abilities right now.
JAS: Fair enough. It is Sylacrum’s turn.
MARS: Finally! How far away is the mooze?
JAS: The mooze is probably…
MARS: Within 35 feet?
JAS: Oh, yeah. Definitely. Probably within fifteen-ish feet.
MARS: You know what? Fuck your chicken strips. Sylacrum’s gonna jump up into the air and dive bomb with his lance, right into the slime. Not slime, ooze, and that’s going to be a… that would’ve been a nat 20 if it wasn’t cocked, but it’s fine… does a 7 hit?
JAS: No. No a seven doesn’t.
MARS: I figured as much. That’s fine, that’s my turn.
MAR: Can I just say, slime (derogatory.)
MARS: Actually, I have a question for you. You said the Fissure Core can’t make anything else? As a bonus action, can I see if I can turn the mooze back into a cow?
JAS: Roll a Wisdom check.
MARS: You said a Wisdom check?
JAS: Yeah.
MARS: That’s gonna be a twelve.
JAS: (laughing) No. You have no idea how to even begin. You are looking at this thing, you are looking at the mooze, [NOISE OF UNCERTAINTY] Cool. That is Sylacrum’s turn. Valus, it is your turn.
NORTH: Real quick, are slimes and oozes two separate things in D&D?
MAR: Are slimes things?
JAS: Oozes are technically a specific category of creature, which is fucking wild to me.
NORTH: I was thinking of gelatinous cubes.
JAS: Those are an ooze!
NORTH: They are ooze?
JAS: Yeah, look! Ooze!
MAR: An ooze is a category of creature like humanoid, and fiend, and undead.
JAS: Yep.
NORTH: All righty. I’m sure this thing has an Intelligence score of less than 4, so I am going to cast Fire Bolt again. [JAS: Yeah.] And let’s see… oh, that’s an eight. Does an eight hit?
JAS: Yeah.
NORTH: Really?
MAR: Oozes don’t have armor class worth shit. Like from a meta standpoint, I think a Gelatinous Cube’s AC is a 6.
JAS: It is literally a 6. I am looking at it. This one’s is literally an 8.
MAR: I have run combat as a DM with a Gelatinous Cube.
JAS: They have high levels of hit points, like they have a lot more hit points than usual, and they have a lot of damage resistances.
MAR: They just can’t move very fast. Their Dexterity is absolute garbage, which is why their Armor Class is so low.
NORTH: And that is nine points of damage.
JAS: Nine points… how do you want to do this?
NORTH: Oh baby! Oh, man, I don’t know shit about moozes.
WINNIE: That’s why we can’t wear jingly bracelets, because every time we get a “How do you want to do this,” we all happy stim.
[LAUGHTER]
NORTH: Okay, so, I’m within melee range, so I’m going to dash up, and basically shove my magic caster into the ooze and just explode it with Fire Bolt.
MAR: Valus was supposed to roll this at advantage because they’re flanking. [JAS: This is true] Can you roll it and see if you get a natural twenty?
NORTH: Yeah, sure, why not? That’s another two.
JAS: Great.
MAR: Fair enough. I’m sorry, that wasn’t really relevant to anything, but I wanted to give Valus a natural twenty if…
NORTH: I guess that means everyone around the mooze gets covered in it.
JAS: So you stick your arcane focus into it - what is your arcane focus?
NORTH: Just like a normal wood staff, not anything special.
JAS: Great, you shove your arcane focus into it, and it literally… before you stick it in, the end looks like it’s on fire, and you just shove the fire into this thing and it just explodes. And there is mooze everywhere. It’s gross.
WINNIE: It’s moo goo!
JAS: Moo goo!
MAR: I also need it to be known that a couple seconds ago, there was the happiest DM glint behind Jas’s eyes. Happy DM noises.
JAS: Happy DM noises. Love it when players do cool shit.
MAR: Correct.
JAS: Congratulations. You have a Fissure Core Fragment and you have defeated the mooze and the Chimera. [FANFARE NOISE]
MAR: Has the crack in the ground closed?
JAS: No, it has not.
MAR: Okay. Is it still making weird flashy lights?
JAS: No, the weird flashy lights are now in Sylacrum’s hand.
NORTH: So there’s no more magic coming out of it, the hole is just still in the ground?
WINNIE: So Sylacrum is a moving rave?
JAS: Yes, Sylacrum is a moving rave. And Sylacrum, as you attuned to this, you feel the thrumming in it matches your heart rate now. And with each beat of your heart, it sends this thrumming of magic. And there is no more thrumming in the ground, the ground just looks normal. All the cows have returned to just mildly grazing around y’all. One of them walks over and is sniffing at the Chimera body and it like, “Hmm. Interesting.”
WINNIE: What are they saying?
JAS: Most of them are just hanging out.
WINNIE: Like, grass.
JAS: Just, mmm, grass.
MAR: Mmm, grass.
WINNIE: Bite.
NORTH: What about Maurice?
WINNIE: Mmm, bite.
JAS: Maurice is walking over, and she is just hanging out, and you watch as a little calf comes running past her and starts to try and chew on where some mooze got on the ground, and Maurice is like, (as Maurice) Chance, honey, no, please… oh, okay. Ew.
NORTH: His name is Chance?
JAS: Yeah, the calf’s name is Chance.
MAR: The calf’s name is Chance?
WINNIE: Now I have to write a cute little story about how the calf was almost nae-nae’d or something and it lived and that was very lucky and so Maurice was like, “I’m gonna name you Chance.”
JAS: Wow. Once she pulls chance back from the moozed grass, she -
MAR: The moozed grass!
JAS: She looks at Hesperis and goes, (as Maurice) Thank you, darling, that crack was really such a bother.
WINNIE: [MOOS] You’re welcome.
MARS: Well, that was very moving of you, Hesperis. Get it?
MAR: Cire is going to smack Sylacrum on the head. Not trying to do damage, just go, seriously?
MARS: What, it was funny? Also, can you not smack me? This thing might explode. It’s not going to, but.
MAR: Cire’s gonna smack him again.
NORTH: Tempting fate.
MERCER: What the fuck is that?
MARS: And you see Sylacrum stab his lance into the ground, and take the Fissure Core with both hands. Well, this is something that I thought didn’t exist. But this is part of a Fissure Core.
MERCER: And what the fuck is that?
MARS: I have no fucking idea.
MAR: Can I roll an Insight check to see if Sylacrum is telling us everything that he knows?
JAS: Yeah, go for it.
MERCER: Same.
WINNIE: I just wanna roll a clickity clackity math rock.
MAR: That’s a 10.
NORTH: That is a 14.
MAR: And you roll deception. If you’re not telling the truth, if you’re intentionally trying to deceive us.
MARS: Not intentionally, but leaving some things out. It’s a 3 either way.
MAR: Okay, so we know you’re full of shit.
JAS: It’s not the Sylacrum’s full of shit, it’s more like Sylacrum is not telling you all of it.
MAR: What aren’t you telling us?
MARS: A Fissure Core could theoretically do almost anything. For the most part. It could chance part of a season’s weather into a different season. It could bring vegetation back to Winter, or Endless Day, or I don’t know, change the fucking stars so Endless Day and Endless Night just flip instantly in five minutes. It could also potentially cause another Fracture.
MAR: You could have led with that.
MARS: Well, that’s the thing. I don’t know.
MAR: And this is a piece of it?
MARS: Yeah. Why is it in a dairy farm? I have no idea.
MAR: Technically, it’s beef, but.
MARS: Even more concerning.
MAR: Fair enough. So what do we do?
MARS: Well…
WINNIE: That raises an interesting question for you, Henry. Are these cows even still safe to sell for meat?
JAS: (as Henry) I don’t know. I haven’t had any complaints about anything… these are A-grade cattle here, they’re not…
WINNIE: Right, but that one turned into a cow-mera, and that one turned into a mooze.
MARS: I think that was more this being unhinged.
JAS: (as Henry) Well, I could get an arcanist out here to check into the cows.
MAR: Can I examine the cows and try and see if there’s anything wrong with them or if they would still be safe to eat?
JAS: Yeah.
NORTH: Can I detect magic on the cows?
JAS: You can detect magic on the cows.
MAR: I’m thinking like in terms of a kind of disease-esque way.
JAS: Medicine check?
MAR: Yeah.
JAS: Yeah, you can do a medicine check.
NORTH: Do I roll for Detect Magic? I do, right?
JAS: Yeah, you do, ‘cause of our homebrew fun and funky way of doing it.
NORTH: That is fifteen.
JAS: Fifteen, ‘kay.
MAR: Eighteen.
JAS: Eighteen. So with a fifteen, you detect a little bit of residual magic in the area. You can tell that the area right around in the field around the crack is still pretty magical. It’s still got some magical residue. Basically… but the cows seem fine. There’s light touches of magic along them, but seems fairly fine. Cire, with that medicine check, you would probably surmise that it seems fine. The cows seem fine, they seem functional. They may have a little bit of magic in their stomachs, but you can’t really digest magic, so they probably poop out the magic.
MAR: Okay. This is, I think the weirdest thing I have ever asked to do in a D&D game. Can I try and find some cow shit and see if it has magic in it?
JAS: Yeah, it’s not hard to find cow shit. You’re in a cow pasture.
WINNIE: It’s a cow farm, you’re gonna find cow shit.
JAS: Go ahead and… I’m gonna let that medicine check roll over, and you do see that there is… the cow shit glitters a little bit.
MAR: So they have most likely shit out the magic?
JAS: They have most likely shit out the magic. So it is probably fine.
MAR: Okay.
JAS: This is not what I thought I would be talking about.
MARS: I didn’t either, but I’m all here for it.
MAR: Do we have to roleplay telling Henry this information?
JAS: Yes. I want you to roleplay it. I want it for me, personally.
MARS: Some would say there’s some shit talking going on.
JAS: Aw, damn.
MAR: So, the cows look okay. Valus, I saw you looking at them too?
NORTH: I haven’t detected any magic on them, they seem fine. The ground around the crack, though, is still a bit iffy. I would probably fence it off with something temporary if you could, for a bit.
MAR: And it looks to me like whatever they ate, magic-wise, isn’t something they can digest.
JAS: (as Henry) All right, well, sounds pretty good to me. I’ll just make sure that this area’s fenced off, and…
MAR: I could probably help you with that.
JAS: (as Henry) Okay, that’d be wonderful. Y’all are welcome to crash here for the night, I should have made that clear. ‘Cause… sorry, I ran away. That crack got to me pretty bad. Y’all are welcome to stay here for the night, rest up, take as much time as you need. Don’t stay here for like a month, but…
MARS: Sylacrum just goes, oh don’t worry about running away. The thing almost fried my brain. It happens.
JAS: (as Henry) Fair enough. (as DM) What’s up?
NORTH: Speaking of that thing, should the one who tinkers with things really be the one to hold it?
MARS: Well, here’s the problem with that. Kind of keeping it in his left hand, Sylacrum reaches back into his backpack, and that book he’s been looking through flutters out into his right, and it opens up. As far as I know, this thing is attached to my soul. I think. Probably, but…
NORTH: To your soul?
MARS: For the most part. The first owner of this book… he’s found this before, which is how I know about it, but that’s about it. These pages just kind of [MAKES DISAPPEARING SOUND] after a while. That’s about it. As far as I know it’s attached to me, and I can’t really tinker on it. Because as far as I know, you can’t destroy one of these, unless you Wish for it. But, you know, none of us are genies.
WINNIE: That you know of.
MAR: I also wouldn’t be eager to give it another chance to fry one of our brains.
MARS: Yeah. And to be fair, I’m not even going to be holding it half the time. I think… and Jas, if you’re cool with this, a little bit of flavor, Sylacrum, since they’re attuned to it now, looks at it and goes, I think I can make it smaller… and kind of twist it in on itself.
JAS: The material is not going to allow for that. It is made of… it almost looks like stonework, like little miniature masonry.
MARS: I was thinking metal gears and all that, my bad.
JAS: No, it is one solid piece, right? And it’s probably about an inch thick, that’s it, but it is an inch of solid stone. It looks like it’s made of little tiny bricks almost, like a stone brick. And there is something holding it together, you can’t fold it or twist it or anything like that.
MARS: How wide is it? Is it like the size of a shield?
JAS: No, it is about dinner plate sized. It is a decent size. You would know that it would have another three inches with the outer rim on it, because you have seen diagrams of it in your notebook. But right now, with the piece that you have, it is about a dinner plate size.
MARS: Okay, I know what I’m gonna do then. In that case, Sylacrum just goes, well I’ll just… I have an idea, on where to keep it for now.
JAS: It’s still glowing like a motherfucker, I should mention.
MARS: And Sylacrum, like pulls the hood back, takes off his face mask, is gonna unclip the hood from his (mispronounced) Kevlar, Kevlar, assholes, wrap the Fissure Core in his hood and just slide it into his backpack.
JAS: Okay, yeah, you can totally do that.
MAR: What time of day is it now, Jas?
JAS: It is probably mid-afternoon.
WINNIE: It is an excellent time for a nap.
MAR: I wouldn’t mind a nap. I would like to mention that Cire says this while looking actively bloodied, because she has eleven hit points right now.
MARS: And Sylacrum finally nods and goes, oh, shit, sorry, and is gonna cast Cure Wounds. And you get… where is the d8? Ooh! That’s gonna be… I can’t math. That’s eleven hit points back.
MAR: I’m still bloodied, but I look better.
JAS: Jesus Christ.
MERCER: I’m also quite bloodied.
MAR: Cire has… nothing she can do for you, unfortunately. She has no spell slots, and she has already pumped all of her Lay on Hands into you.
WINNIE: Again, I cannot do anything for you unless you are dying.
MERCER: That was not said in character. That was just me, it’s fine.
WINNIE: Sorry.
MERCER: It’s fine, I will simply use Hit Die.
WINNIE: Yes, take a nap and use your… use a nap to regain some of your strength. Or you could take a little rest under a tree in the field.
JAS: (as Henry) Well, y’all are welcome to stay the night, like I said, I understand… it’s hard to recuperate from things like this, so if you need some time to hang out… I got some fresh beef.
WINNIE: Do you have the as they say… I believe it is Endless Day… hang on? You need to do the regional accent for it to really have effect. (in Hesperis’ voice layered with a bad southern accent) Do you got any of that corn-bread?
[LAUGHTER]
WINNIE: As someone who is natively Southern, doing that actually hurt me.
JAS: (as Henry) Well, I can get you some cornbread, if that’s what you’d like.
WINNIE: Oh, it’s not for me, I will take your beef, I was just asking for my comrades.
MAR: Would you be willing to teach me how to make some?
JAS: (as Henry) I’d love to, sweetheart! Yeah we can totally do that, make some cornbread, we can cook up a good dinner. We can cook up whatever y’all like. Any of the… all the food is about as fresh as you can get, pull it from the land myself, or my ranch hand or whoever. And do a lot of trading with the other farmers around here. They want beef, I want vegetables, it’s perfect. (as DM) And he’s like, (as Henry) We’ll leave this and y’all can come inside, and we can work on what we’re gonna have for dinner.
JAS: [LAUGHING] Mar just showed me a note. Please read it.
MAR: [LAUGHING, APPARENTLY UNABLE TO READ]
WINNIE: Which one is it?
MAR: It’s the one that begins with “Henry.”
WINNIE: Hang on, I need to do a dramatic reading of this. No, you don’t get to read it yet. I’m doing a dramatic reading. Henry… is the rootin-est, and the tootin-est, and the shootin’-est… and a DILF.
JAS: Iconic.
MAR: I wrote that down when Henry nae-nae’d the chimera.
MARS: Yee fuckin haw.
MAR: And now I’m going to simply melt into a puddle of embarrassment for having written it, and also glare at Jas briefly for making someone read it.
JAS: Yeah, it was good. And Henry goes, (as Henry) Well, come on inside, we’ll get some food a-cookin’, we’ll rest those bones of yours, and I don’t know. You can figure out whatever the hell that thing is, (as DM) And he starts to lead you up into the house, and… yeah? You have a thought?
MARS: Sylacrum just kinda goes, I’ll be inside in a sec, I’m gonna go look at the hole this came out of.
JAS: (as Henry) Well, we can wait on you, it’s a little bit of a walk, so you might…
MARS: No, no, no. I’ll be fine. I just need to figure out why the fuck this is in your field.
JAS: (as Henry) Okay, yeah, sure.
MERCER: Caelum is also going to stay behind and is gonna curl up on the grass with Chance and Maurice, and take a nap. And I am going to roll all my hit dice.
MAR: I support Caelum.
MERCER: Because I need hit points.
WINNIE: Can Hesperis play Song of Rest?
JAS: Yeah! And he’s like, (as Henry) If y’all are settling down, we can… I can go start up dinner, and y’all come join me whenever you’re ready.
NORTH: Would this… this doesn’t seem like a long rest.
MAR: It would be a short rest.
JAS: Right now it’s a short rest. Psst. Eventually it’ll be a long rest.
NORTH: Okay, which dice are hit dice? Are they d8s?
JAS: You are d6. Squishy,
NORTH: You get three, right? Per long rest?
MAR: You get four, because you’re level four now.
NORTH: Oh, is that - do you get one more every level?
MARS: Yup.
MAR: You get one per level.
NORTH: Interesting.
MAR: Also, remember to add your Constitution modifier to that.
WINNIE: And what does Song of Rest do?
MAR: Sexy!
JAS: Song of Rest gives an extra d6 to everyone I believe.
WINNIE: Cool.
MAR: It does.
WINNIE: You know Hesperis did not take a single point of damage?
JAS: Yeah, ‘cause she was away from the fight. She also didn’t do much, is the thing.
WINNIE: Yeah, well.
MARS: Did you know Sylacrum didn’t take a single point of damage?
JAS: Sylacrum almost lost his brain.
MAR: Yeah.
NORTH: Sylacrum’’s brain went: [LOW RUMBLING SOUND]
MAR: High risk, high reward.
JAS: Yeah, Sylacrum was a bit preoccupied.
NORTH: Would Sylacrum have died?
MARS: Oh yeah.
JAS: No, but Sylacrum would have gone completely catatonic. So.
MAR: Short rest cornbread lesson?
JAS: Short rest cornbread lesson.
NORTH: Roleplay the lesson, I want to know the recipe for cornbread.
MAR: I don’t have a cornbread recipe!
MERCER: I have a cornbread recipe on my phone!
JAS: I love that.
MERCER: Let me pull you out my notes page!
JAS: All right!
MARS: Do we wanna do a wholesome scene, or whatever the fuck’s going on with…
JAS: Let’s go ahead and we can discuss what’s going on in the crack in the ground, and then we can do a long rest cornbread scene.
WINNIE: Are the chimera’s extra heads… crack heads?
JAS: No!
MAR: Your and Jas’ cats are crackheads.
MARS: I am leaving the podcast, that has broke me.
JAS: This is my villain origin story.
MAR: If this is what broke you, you should not have signed up for this to begin with. You knew what you were signing up for with us.
JAS: All right, we are going to investigate the crack. Roll an… [LAUGHTER FROM WINNIE] I made the joke on purpose.
MAR: This just in, Wink is twelve.
WINNIE: I have the sense of humor of a thirteen year old boy, come at me.
JAS: We know, Winnie. All right, roll an investigation check, Sylacrum.
MARS: A five?
JAS: You’re like, “Wow, that sure is a crack in the ground.” You can see where you pulled the Fissure Core out, but there is nothing you can surmise here.
MARS: So it basically just looks like ground?
JAS: Yeah, I mean, it’s a decently deep crack. It extends well beyond where you found the core in the ground. With a five, I really can’t tell you much. Unless somebody would like to help?
NORTH: I will!
MAR: I’m doing a cornbread lesson!
JAS: Okay. Actually, it would give Sylacrum advantage, if you’re helping.
NORTH: Helping, so I don’t roll anything?
JAS: No.
MARS: You can roll the advantage, if you want.
NORTH: No, that’s probably a bad idea. I just rolled a six and a seven.
MARS: [ROLLING] That’s a… you said Investigation, that’s a twenty-one.
JAS: So, Valus, you point out to Sylacrum, look at the rock there. And you notice, about where the core sits, it is no longer soil, and it has condensed into hard rock. And there is a… it almost looks like the ground fossilized around the Fissure Core Fragment. So it’s been here a while.
MAR: Yeah, ‘cause that’s how subsidence works.
JAS: Exactly! The ground settles down around it, and the pressure makes it into layers. We went into the geology of this, because we’ve been taking geology classes, so we can get into the geology of this. They have been pulling water for the agriculture.
MAR: Tasty!
JAS: So, because of that it has caused the sediment to relax more. And.. not relax, but condense.
MAR: Because air can be compressed, groundwater… cannot be compressed!
JAS: Exactly.
WINNIE: That’s why Santa Clara’s fucked. Shoutouts to you folks who are living in Santa Clara right now.
MAR: That was an example in our latest lab for our geology class.
JAS: Yeah, Winnie, Mar, and I are all in a geology class together, and this is what the result is.
WINNIE: ‘Cause in case you were unaware that you were listening to a bunch of queer college students… we are still in fact… most of us… in classes.
NORTH: Don’t… don’t do that.
MAR: Don’t make North think about the passage of time.
JAS: So you can tell, because of the rock, it has been there for a while. It somehow got buried here, and has been here for hundreds of years now.
WINNIE: Roughly 703, give or take.
JAS: Not gonna give a specific number.
MARS: Well, if you wanna give a specific number I can cast Identify. As a ritual, and try and figure out.
JAS: We’re going to come back to you casting Identify as a ritual if you would like. Okay, cool!
MAR: Jas just looked delighted by that.
JAS: Yes. I was actively distressed that Valus did not have Identify.
MARS: I’ve been had it because I knew this was coming.
JAS: Yes, I am thrilled. Cornbread lesson!
MERCER: Appreciate my dad’s cornbread recipe!
JAS: So Henry takes you up into the house, and it’s this nice little ranch house. It’s pretty small, it seems pretty quaint, and looks like he may have built it. It was hand-built, this house. You don’t know who built it, but you walk in and you see a few things are happening. Henry waves to a couple people working on the ranch, like you see another human, you see an elf, all of them with these deep, tan skins from working in the sun. and they kind of wave, and are talking back and forth, and say hello to Henry, and are like, “You get it sorted out?” and he’s like, “Yeah, man, you can go down there and check it out, it’s weird as hell.” And they’re like, “Well, glad it’s sorted!” You know, kind of chit-chatting, and then you walk into the house, and it is very cute. It is incredibly well-decorated. Very quaint.
WINNIE: Feed into stereotypes, why don’t you?
JAS: Yeah, but, see, it just… it makes brain go brr. And you see in the kitchen, already, is a man who is a firbolg. He is wearing an apron that says Kiss the Cook. He’s got a white T-shirt on and jeans and cowboy boots. And he is standing at the stove, and you can tell that he is cutting up some meat. He’s got some beef in front of him that he’s just butchering up. And he turns around and sees you walk in with Henry, and he goes, (as the man) Honey, I did not expect you to be home for another couple of days. You should have told me, I’d be prepared.
WINNIE: Does Henry kiss the cook?
JAS: Henry does walk over, put his arm around the firbolg and give him a kiss.
MAR: Firbolg househusband?!
JAS: And the firbolg says, (as firbolg) Not that I’m complaining, I missed you, of course. And gives him a kiss on the forehead. The firbolg is significantly taller, standing at about seven and a half feet tall. This is like a six foot four dude, and he is dwarfed by this firbolg.
MAR: I’m going to give the DM and also the audience a little bit of meta narrative information about Cire: Cire is bordering on overwhelmed at a display of affection between two people that are sharing a house. Like, healthy models for relationships? Not a thing in Cire’s… she’s like… she’s tearing up a little bit, actually. She’s like “this is cutest shit I have ever seen.” She doesn’t say that, but that is very much… like if someone cast Detect Thoughts on her, it would be, “this is the cutest shit I have ever seen!”
JAS: That’s very good. And you see the firbolg has still got his arm around Henry, and he turns and goes, (as firbolg) And we’ve got some guests, too! Well, shit babe, you didn’t tell me we’d have guests. (as DM) And Henry says, (as Henry) Well, I didn’t know we’d have guests until about maybe a day ago, and he goes (as firbolg) That’s all right, I forgive you. And then Henry goes (as Henry) Oh! My apologies, Cire, this is my husband Wayne. Wayne, this is Cire. And Henry says, (as Henry) Wayne, she was asking if we could make some cornbread, and maybe teach her how to do it?
JAS: And Wayne says, (as Wayne) Well i don’t see why not. Get in this kitchen, young lady. There’s some aprons over here, they might be a little bit long for you, but… we can get going.
MAR: Cire grabs an apron.
WINNIE: Hesperis is… has sort of followed them from a distance, because she had started playing her little Song of Rest when they were still over by Caelum, so she followed them from sort of a distance, so that she could give them space, and also because she was lagging behind, so now she’s just watching from the doorway.
JAS: And Henry looks around Cire and says, (as Henry) Hesperis, why don’t you come on in? Hesperis, this is Wayne, Wayne, this is Hesperis.
WINNIE: Hello, Wayne.
JAS: Wayne is a little bit taller than you!
WINNIE: Only a little.
JAS: Only a little, but it’s fun to have people who are taller than you, because it doesn’t happen often.
WINNIE: Yes, Hesperis is going to read his apron, look up at him, and kind of slowly walk over and cautiously kiss him on the cheek.
JAS: He laughs and it is… it’s deep and it’s got that Southern drawl stuck in it, but it’s very joyous, and he goes (as Wayne), Oh, I like this one! To Henry. And he says (as Wayne) You wanna join in the cornbread making?
WINNIE: Oh, no thank you, I’m vegan.
JAS: (as Wayne) Oh, yeah, it does have buttermilk in there, so yeah… and eggs, so you can’t have that.
WINNIE: I can… no I can’t eat eggs, you’re right.
NORTH: I love that we’re gonna have this vegan discussion.
JAS: And they start making butter… not buttermilk. You start making cornbread. Cire’s apron is just a plain apron. And he says, (as Wayne) Oh, you can grab one of my aprons, you should be about my height.
WINNIE: I… sure. And she just slips one on.
JAS: Cool. It says like, “Grill Master” with little flames on it.
WINNIE: This is fucking fantastic.
MAR: I adore this, actually.
JAS: So, still kind of holding hands with one hand, Wayne starts to reach up into cabinets and grab things, and without even talking to each other, Henry has already opened up an ice box and starts pulling out the buttermilk, they’ve got some eggs on the counter, and he goes, (as Wayne) All right! And he pulls out this big ass mixing bowl. (as Wayne) We’re gonna make two batches today, one for you and one for you. You can make this one, I’ll make this one, and you can follow along. Sound good?
MAR: Sure.
JAS: And he says, (as Wayne) All right, what we’re gonna do, we’re gonna whisk together an egg and some buttermilk. So let’s take that and put it together. All right, got it all whisked up? Good. And we add some corn meal, and then… he’s like (as Wayne) and here’s the secret ingredient. Add a little bit of pork cracklin. It’s some pork skins, fry ‘em up good, and then you let them for a few days. You gotta let them sit before you put it in the corn bread. And then you crush it up fine and put it in the cornbread, it adds just a little bit of crunch and a little bit of flavor. Got it? And then I’m gonna add some jalapeños to mine, cause we’re gonna make it a little bit spicier. But I understand that some people don’t like the spice, so we’ll make one without.
WINNIE: Hesperis grabs a handful of pork cracklin and shoves it in her mouth.
JAS: Henry looks at you and goes, (as Henry) Hesperis, you know that’s pork, right?
WINNIE: Yes, it is vegan.
MAR: Hesperis is a dryadfolk, so her definition of vegan is a little bit different.
JAS: (as Wayne) Well, I’d imagine so. Whatever floats your boat, honey.
WINNIE: I’d imagine most boats are supposed to float?
MAR: It’s an expression.
JAS: Wayne and Henry kind of look at each other, and just, like, sure, whatever.
WINNIE: I love my southern gay dads.
MERCER: That’s what I wrote. And then I wrote in parentheses, t-shirt idea, question mark.
JAS: And so, you’ve all finished putting together the cornbread, you’ve put them in the ovens, and you have a moment of rest, you have a moment to hang out, and a moment of peace.
[THEME MUSIC]
