Episode Transcript
[00:00:31] Speaker A: Welcome to Carrots and suffering. My name is Nate, and I am your dungeon master on this actual play, real play. Let's play podcast of Dungeons and Dragons fifth edition. We are not an official podcast for the game or the company that owns the intellectual property here. We are just nerds, recording and editing what we do on the weekends. If you are just joining us, I recommend going back to episode one of either campaign one, season one, or campaign two, season three. Then you can understand the whole story we're telling, and that generally helps with any kind of understanding. For campaign one, I tried to fill a niche in podcast rpg land at the time. I didn't see very many intrigue campaigns. So there you go. And campaign two. We're doing something very traditional. So traditional, in fact, that I'm taking inspiration from published authors from 30 years ago. If you like what you hear, please tell a friend. If you leave us a rating and review, it's like telling us that you are our friend. And we get very excited about that. All right, on to the show.
Last time on carrots and suffering, our heroes rather unheroically debated resting. Instead of chasing down the dragon that was just unleashed on Sternheim, would they do what heroes do and chase the dragon? Or would they do what players in a mechanical bound universe do and take a rest to restore their lost spell slots and hit points? You don't have to go after it now. I just have figured out what happens if you don't.
[00:01:57] Speaker B: You were clear there would be consequences.
[00:02:01] Speaker A: It is not going to wait outside.
[00:02:03] Speaker B: For an hour or 8 hours. We were talking 8 hours.
[00:02:07] Speaker C: Okay, what if I zone to a different zone?
[00:02:10] Speaker A: Yeah, that would work.
[00:02:11] Speaker D: There should only be consequences to our actions, not our inactions.
[00:02:17] Speaker A: While chasing after the dragon, our heroes ran into the centaur battle position, which was hunkered down watching the dragon destroy the town that recently killed several of their members and promptly failed to rally the troops. And now, below the level of this tall prairie grass are twelve Centaurs. There are now twelve bristling spears pointed in your direction. What do you do?
[00:02:39] Speaker C: Point towards wherever the large bone dragon is. Point towards that and keep running.
[00:02:46] Speaker B: We have to go after the dragon.
[00:02:47] Speaker D: And you should help us.
[00:02:49] Speaker A: You go. The mayor seems to be forcibly stopped by centaurs.
[00:02:56] Speaker D: I mean, I don't care enough about the mayor to.
[00:03:00] Speaker B: I also don't care about the mayor, but I'm kind of pissed at them too.
[00:03:07] Speaker D: I'm not thrilled about this either. We can have very stern words with them later.
[00:03:11] Speaker A: Then there was a battle of great ferocity in which our heroes made use of three helper rogues, several local farmers and militiamen, and a dragon sling blade they stole from the mayor. None of these attacks are ones. So they all hit.
[00:03:23] Speaker B: Oh, God.
[00:03:24] Speaker D: Oh, no.
[00:03:24] Speaker B: We used all of our health potions, too.
[00:03:27] Speaker A: Crap.
That is 61 damage.
[00:03:31] Speaker B: Oh, my God.
[00:03:32] Speaker A: Half because you're raging. So drop that down to 30.
[00:03:36] Speaker C: Sure.
[00:03:36] Speaker D: Well, that's something.
[00:03:38] Speaker B: Do you have, like, one hit point left?
[00:03:40] Speaker C: I got seven.
[00:03:41] Speaker B: Oh, my God.
[00:03:42] Speaker D: I don't know what we thought we could do here.
[00:03:46] Speaker B: We're trying to do the right thing. Sternheim isn't rising up to help us.
[00:03:51] Speaker D: Can I try to persuade people to help again? You know what? I'm going to do it. Why would we defend a town that won't even defend itself?
That's an at 20.
[00:04:03] Speaker A: Is it really?
[00:04:04] Speaker D: Yes.
20 is six. Creden, shots. Stand and fight. You must defend your town.
[00:04:11] Speaker A: The dragon whips his tail around, slapping you.
[00:04:16] Speaker D: Can I high 50.
[00:04:20] Speaker A: Slapping you pretty hard. 19 damage.
[00:04:23] Speaker D: As you know, Creedon is known for her beefiness. That is a seven.
[00:04:29] Speaker A: Great. You go flying.
[00:04:32] Speaker B: Oh, my God.
[00:04:33] Speaker A: You go through a wall of a house.
[00:04:35] Speaker B: Oh, God.
[00:04:37] Speaker A: Please take another seven damage.
As you smash into a hut. Assuming you're still conscious, you are now prone inside a house. A little the dragon's turn. It picks up a house and then proceeds to just swing it through the crowd.
[00:04:57] Speaker B: Oh, my God.
[00:04:58] Speaker D: It wasn't the house I was in. Is it.
[00:05:03] Speaker C: Cool? All right. Yes. I'm down.
[00:05:05] Speaker D: Oh, I'm down. I'm out. Nap time.
[00:05:10] Speaker B: Six plus five is eleven. And then she braces herself.
[00:05:13] Speaker A: Your raven crushes the skull of the dragon with forehead points to spare. And its gigantic upper torso falls about 3ft from you.
[00:05:26] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:05:28] Speaker A: To end the last episode, one of Creedon's moms appeared too late to save the day. But luckily, the heroes managed a slim victory.
Creedon, about 45 minutes from when you made your call, there is a flash of light in the middle of Sternheim. And there are seven paladins from Astragal.
[00:05:52] Speaker D: Oh, shit. I forgot to tell my mom that we beat it.
[00:05:55] Speaker C: I mean, that just happened.
[00:05:56] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:05:57] Speaker D: The town is going to still be deed. Maybe send some builders.
[00:06:01] Speaker A: One of them appears to be your mom.
[00:06:03] Speaker D: Oh, God.
[00:06:04] Speaker B: We get to meet Creedon's mom.
[00:06:07] Speaker D: Honestly, I think Creedon runs up and hugs her and starts crying.
[00:06:13] Speaker A: Okay, let's get back into it.
I am Nate, and I will be your dungeon master.
[00:06:28] Speaker B: I am Mandy, and I play boulain the death cleric.
[00:06:31] Speaker D: I am claire, and I play Creedin the warlock of love and getting hit through houses.
[00:06:38] Speaker C: Hi, I'm Robert the greedy.
[00:06:45] Speaker B: Greedy? He's only greedy now.
[00:06:48] Speaker C: Named Zyrus, the newly named barbarian.
He just changed his name to greed.
[00:06:56] Speaker B: Robert and Ziris are now interchangeable.
[00:06:59] Speaker A: The same with greed.
[00:07:02] Speaker D: Play what you know.
[00:07:04] Speaker A: So let's start off with. You guys have it, level five. So let's talk about the amazingness that is level five characters. Xeris. What does level five look like?
[00:07:14] Speaker C: Well, Nate, I'm so glad you've asked that.
At level five, as a Marshall class, I get an extra attack. Oh, and as a barbarian, I get to run faster.
[00:07:26] Speaker A: Excellent. Faster running, extra hacking. All good things.
[00:07:31] Speaker B: All things as yours desperately needed.
[00:07:33] Speaker C: More hacking and faster getting to grips with the enemy. That's it. Oh, also, I guess I punched. No, I don't punch harder yet. Okay. Nope.
[00:07:41] Speaker D: Your proficiency bonus probably went up.
[00:07:43] Speaker A: You may punch more.
[00:07:44] Speaker C: Do I do. I was wondering if my barbarian damage went up and it did not because it's based on something else.
[00:07:51] Speaker A: Okay, what's new with Creedon?
[00:07:52] Speaker D: In addition to my proficiency bonus increase, I now have access to third level spells. And I learned dispel magic. Thought that that might come in handy. And then I also got a new eldritch invocation. And I took the book of ancient secrets, which is available to me as a pact of the Tome warlock. So I can now cast, detect magic and comprehend languages as a ritual only. Those are additional spells. Perceptive listeners may remember that I actually already had comprehend languages. I did a little classic spell shuffle and replaced that in my regular spell list with armor of Agathus.
[00:08:28] Speaker A: Cool.
[00:08:28] Speaker D: And that's it. Little more health feeling.
[00:08:31] Speaker B: Extra cool.
[00:08:31] Speaker A: Boulain, what's up with you?
[00:08:33] Speaker B: Well, she's up to a whole 38 hit points. Also, proficiency bonus increase. And I gained the feature to destroy undead as part of my channel divinity. So anytime I use channel divinity, I automatically destroy undead. That are a challenge rating of one.
[00:08:50] Speaker A: Half or, you know, normal skeletons and zombies.
[00:08:54] Speaker B: Normal skeletons and zombies. So if we hit Palmville this time, you're ready. They'd be fucko'd. And then I also gained two third level spell slots. And part of the grave domain feature is they gave me the spells I got revivify, which Robert will be ecstatic about, and vampiric touch.
[00:09:12] Speaker D: Oh, good, at least somebody got it.
[00:09:14] Speaker B: Yes, I'm also. Because I have room for another third level spell. Probably one of my go to's is going to be remove curse. There's some others I'm eyeing to.
[00:09:23] Speaker D: Okay, remove curse seems handy, given that we already used our scroll and there.
[00:09:29] Speaker B: Is a cursed weapon in our midst.
[00:09:34] Speaker C: This is fine. This is fine.
[00:09:36] Speaker D: What cursed weapon?
[00:09:38] Speaker C: Look. Okay, here's the deal. You give me a year. After a year, you tell me it's a problem. Fine. We'll deal with it.
[00:09:46] Speaker B: Or she'll just do it while you're sleeping.
[00:09:48] Speaker C: That's not very neighborly.
[00:09:49] Speaker D: You have absolute confidence that you would never fall to such petty tricks as curses.
[00:09:55] Speaker C: This is not a curse.
[00:09:57] Speaker D: It's not a curse.
It's a blessing.
[00:10:00] Speaker B: Even no one's the villain of their own story.
[00:10:03] Speaker D: It's a boon from brother ambition.
[00:10:06] Speaker C: Exactly. Yes.
[00:10:09] Speaker B: And then we have to figure out what the fuck is going on in Sternheim.
[00:10:14] Speaker D: Oh my God. My mom's still face.
[00:10:16] Speaker A: Creedon's mom, the bishop. Bishop Brightwin, Creedon's mom demands that you all take it easy for a day. And includes in that the three people from Fenrir. Although you have not told her they are from Fenrir yet. And includes in that the two militiamen who survived out of the many that were killed by the dragon. And so you all find yourself with a hero's feast in the inn which is still standing and a nice room and a long rest.
[00:10:47] Speaker B: The rogues from Fenrir got cured, right? We established that.
[00:10:51] Speaker A: So it was clear that they were cursed. And Creedon's mom actually is quite talented at remove curse and will remove those three curses. So they are humans. You haven't told her the story yet of who they are, where they're from and how they got cursed. But the curse was obvious, so she took care of that.
[00:11:10] Speaker C: So if I try to go sleep in the barracks again, am I able to?
[00:11:14] Speaker A: Yeah, I don't think anybody's going to stop you. Also, the barracks has like 18 fewer people in it now.
[00:11:20] Speaker C: Great.
[00:11:21] Speaker B: Will he be able to sleep there? If it isn't crowded.
If he isn't snuggled up with his neighbor's armpit or whatever.
[00:11:32] Speaker C: Not as comfortably.
[00:11:33] Speaker A: They sleep head to toe in the barracks.
He's not snuggled up with someone's trench foot.
[00:11:40] Speaker B: So he has to try to curl over on himself and sleep against his own trench foot just to make it authentic.
[00:11:50] Speaker D: I'll precedent your pillow to smell a bit like somebody else's.
[00:11:54] Speaker B: Bo.
[00:11:56] Speaker C: I will go to the barracks myself, thank you.
[00:12:02] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:12:03] Speaker D: If I go in there, I'll just feel great guilt. I'm avoiding it.
[00:12:08] Speaker A: Morning comes to the town of Sternheim. And morning comes with the sound of hammering and sawing as people are rebuilding three to five crushed houses and a perimeter ramparts, Fence. There's a lot of work going on. Seems the churches here has authorized it and is paying people. And so a lot of farmers and people who were not injured by the dragon attack are out making a quick buck. Also interesting, by the time you all wake up at first light, Grimble Tanglebeard, the provincial governor, has arrived with four paladins from Tuscan. The one other interesting thing which you have not heard or seen since your time in old Fenrir. There are newsies, paperboys running around selling newspapers for three copper. They're all over town because the paper for the month was just released.
[00:13:07] Speaker B: Boulain will buy a paper.
[00:13:08] Speaker A: The paper has several interesting things. So it's called the Tuscan Times.
Tuscan fantasy times.
[00:13:16] Speaker B: And it's not a porn rag.
[00:13:18] Speaker A: No.
[00:13:19] Speaker B: Are you sure? She looked at the ads on the back page.
[00:13:25] Speaker A: So the Tuscan Times is interesting because there are four major stories, each one taking up one quarter of the front page and each one continuing for two pages elsewhere in the newspaper. The first story is undead Ravage Palmville. There are very few details in this story. It's clearly being written from some scattered reports from people who fled Palmville for Astragar after the incident. Most of them are quoted in the paper as. Then there was just undead everywhere. So there's no attribution of fault. There is a thank you that there were actually agents from Astragar in town. It does not mention you are a group by name, because none of the people who you interacted with fled north, they fled south. So the dark arbiters is not mentioned anywhere. Though you suspect you are the agents of the capital in question. Then there's a story about Chester Tanglebeard, who apparently just arrived in the capital of Astragar under heavy armed guard, having been removed for corruption spanning decades involving taking bribes. Again, clearly not talking to you. Talking mostly to the guards that escorted tanglebeard up to Astragar. So there's a reference to some kind of revolutionary named like Frikers in there. But the story isn't really about him. He's listed as an accomplice.
[00:15:05] Speaker B: All right, whatever.
[00:15:07] Speaker A: There's a reference to several local business leaders, which you assume is actually birdie.
It's actually not birdie. You assume that that is actually Mary and Kaima. Mary and Kaima, who were implicated as well. But it does not go into detail about the nature of what kind of business they were running. But they were apparently caught up in the sting. And then there's two more stories. And these are interesting and detailed, as if only someone deeply involved in both things could have been the source. Here, one of them talks about the arch sage Mason who allowed his apprentice to experiment with necromancy and used mind magic to hide the evidence of this in his town. The story is very detailed. It includes really specific reports. It has four or five comments about the arch sage Mason's inethical use of mind magic, enchantment spells, and is really damning. And then it calls for his immediate resignation.
[00:16:16] Speaker D: Done.
Also, they're stealing our hot goths. We were supposed to give that gossip. Maybe we decided to.
[00:16:27] Speaker A: And the fourth story is real interesting. Mayor Val Richtis, apparently in this story, hired local mercenaries to stir up trouble with centaurs in order to hide certain crimes he wanted to commit in town.
[00:16:48] Speaker D: They're fast.
I'm guessing that it's the sharp edge.
[00:16:52] Speaker B: So the sharp edge of the pub were complicit in his crimes.
[00:16:56] Speaker A: As you read through the documents, there are no mention of the sharp edge of the pub in any of these.
[00:17:06] Speaker B: We know.
[00:17:06] Speaker C: Yeah, of course. Now I know that the reporter of both these stories is the sharp edge. I'm not happy.
[00:17:16] Speaker B: You never are.
[00:17:18] Speaker D: Is this the paper that Samu runs?
[00:17:21] Speaker A: This is the paper that Samu Elliard runs, yes. Out of Tuscan, and it is apparently on the way, being spread through the empire right now. Sternheim is actually very close to Tuscan, so you're probably the second city who gets to read this. The only other thing you'll notice is that you are, in fact, missing two days. The date on the paper is not what you would have expected.
[00:17:44] Speaker B: Boulain will notice the date on the paper, and then she'll pull out her little daily journal that she keeps and say the date cannot be right.
[00:17:54] Speaker A: You keep a daily journal? She does Romi investigation.
[00:17:58] Speaker B: Oh, that bad? That was bad. That's a four.
[00:18:04] Speaker A: Great. You open to just the last page.
You flip back one or two pages, and you see that there are pages corresponding to these two days in your journal. You appear to have just basically written the same thing three times on three pages with one date. Actually, you wrote them all for the same date.
[00:18:26] Speaker B: Boulain hands it to Creedon.
[00:18:29] Speaker D: Which date is the last entry? Was it the day that we fought.
[00:18:32] Speaker A: The pox Creedon roll me investigation?
[00:18:34] Speaker C: It was the day after.
[00:18:35] Speaker D: Oh, my God. I have no dice.
[00:18:38] Speaker C: We went, we slept. We talked to Archmage Mason, and the day we talked to Archmage Mason is the day that's missing. Actually, the two days after that are the days that are missing.
[00:18:47] Speaker A: Roll me investigation. Cirrus and I can confirm or deny this theory.
[00:18:52] Speaker C: I mean, I'm confirming it for myself, but, yeah, I'll roll you investigation.
[00:18:55] Speaker B: No, I think we fucked up twice in the course of going after the pox and we don't remember 2020?
[00:19:02] Speaker C: No, it's Mason. Mason's the problem.
[00:19:05] Speaker B: No, I know he did it, but I think we did two attempts to go after the pox and failed. And he wiped our memories.
[00:19:11] Speaker A: So the three journal entries, all three describe you preparing to scout out the location of the pox and the cult.
[00:19:21] Speaker C: Yeah, that was the day we fought.
[00:19:23] Speaker D: My investigation was eight good things.
[00:19:26] Speaker B: You're figuring this out?
[00:19:28] Speaker A: Got it. With a 20. That is sufficient to know that it is pretty clear you set up to kick down that door to go in and deal with that threat three times.
[00:19:39] Speaker D: Could that have been related to that light that helped us?
[00:19:42] Speaker C: So we literally did the same thing three times? Yes, that's what it looks like.
[00:19:47] Speaker B: I would surmise that we only succeeded the third time. Do you remember he said that knowledge of the pox led to people worshipping it? I wonder if we succumbed to that and he took it away.
[00:20:02] Speaker C: Maybe.
[00:20:03] Speaker D: I don't know. But I don't like that he hid this.
[00:20:05] Speaker C: I would definitely like some answers as well.
[00:20:08] Speaker A: Creedon, you can roll me knowledge. Arcana, if you would like to gain a little bit of information about what this could possibly imply.
[00:20:17] Speaker D: I know these things. Probably. Oh, my God. I got another eight. But plus two, it's a ten.
[00:20:23] Speaker B: This.
[00:20:23] Speaker D: Wait, no, plus three, it's an eleven.
[00:20:26] Speaker A: Creighton, you are not aware of any spells that would do this.
[00:20:29] Speaker B: I also got an eleven.
[00:20:31] Speaker A: Boolain, you are not aware of any spells that would do this? Mom.
[00:20:38] Speaker C: My score was an 18.
[00:20:40] Speaker D: I'm kidding. Creighton does not want to talk to her.
[00:20:41] Speaker B: Mom.
[00:20:42] Speaker A: An 18. This sounds like nothing less than a divine miracle. There is very little magic that could wipe your memory clean of all of your decisions, day after day, reliably.
[00:20:58] Speaker D: And we witnessed a divine miracle in that fight.
[00:21:01] Speaker B: Well.
[00:21:01] Speaker D: Or I did.
[00:21:02] Speaker B: Yeah, you did. Yeah. We were both unconscious when that happened.
[00:21:06] Speaker D: I would have told you about it, though. I believe I did.
[00:21:08] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:21:09] Speaker A: You don't think anything short of an extremely powerful divine level magic spell could do what this has apparently done to you?
[00:21:20] Speaker B: All right, well, we do not know where he went. Yeah, we can assume he will be in touch at some point because of the thing.
So perhaps we could ask him then?
[00:21:32] Speaker C: Yes, definitely on the list of questions.
[00:21:35] Speaker B: I think we should keep in mind that he is likely very much more powerful than the three of us combined.
[00:21:41] Speaker C: Probably.
[00:21:42] Speaker D: I mean, we know that he has previous names. We're pretty sure he's this Darren character.
[00:21:47] Speaker B: This is mostly for Zuris's benefit.
[00:21:52] Speaker A: This is a heavy hint not to attack him immediately. Wait for the upper hand.
[00:21:58] Speaker C: So my best guess is that he is clearly divinely powered, if not divine himself.
[00:22:09] Speaker B: Divine himself? You think he is one of the gods in mortal form?
[00:22:13] Speaker C: I mean, remember how we first encountered him?
[00:22:16] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:22:17] Speaker D: I was about to wonder if our accounts of witnessing gods in person, are they often too bright to look at? He was very bright.
[00:22:26] Speaker A: Knowledge, religion?
[00:22:27] Speaker C: I would love to.
[00:22:29] Speaker B: I would like to roll that, too. Ooh. Ooh. I did.
[00:22:31] Speaker C: Well, that was not a good role.
[00:22:32] Speaker D: Three, which is appropriate.
[00:22:34] Speaker B: I got a 23.
[00:22:36] Speaker C: That's good, because that was not a good role for you.
[00:22:38] Speaker A: Boulain. Gods tend to directly communicate with people in three forms. Form one is in dreams, in which case you see an image of them, usually a representation. So the silent judge often appears as an empty cloak or a raven. Two is an avatar, which is usually a physical creation that you can see and interact with. And then three is usually a blinding light.
Yeah.
[00:23:06] Speaker B: Belain sits back as she thinks, and she says, yes, the gods can appear as blinding lights.
[00:23:14] Speaker C: So regardless of this individual's nature of divinity, it is clear, at least without more information, that that is not a problem. Just a question.
[00:23:29] Speaker B: Well, we do not know for sure that he is one of our gods.
[00:23:33] Speaker C: Then it will be a problem.
[00:23:37] Speaker D: I mean, the fact that he is hunting down these old vestigial gods makes me wonder if perhaps he's one of them himself. That is possible just as beef with them.
[00:23:47] Speaker C: That is what gives me faith to believe that he is an agent of the luminous one, cleansing the vestiges of whatever past needs to be burned away.
[00:23:59] Speaker B: I mean, we ultimately do not know the nature of his motivation, but if he is blessed by one of our gods, or if he is one of our gods, then, well, I still want answers.
[00:24:13] Speaker C: Like I said, it leaves questions, not an enemy.
[00:24:15] Speaker A: Tanglebeard, Grimble will pull you together very quickly and come in and say we have a meeting very shortly with Bishop Brightwind. And before we have that meeting, Bishop Brightwind technically outranks me. And so I need to understand from you guys your side of this story.
[00:24:38] Speaker B: Which one? There are four here.
[00:24:39] Speaker C: Yeah. Which story?
[00:24:42] Speaker A: Okay, so we have some problems. Obviously, you've read the paper. Thank you for exposing the corruption in Hilock. There's going to be some family drama on my side.
[00:24:55] Speaker B: Yes. We are sorry for you for that.
[00:24:58] Speaker A: I thank you for the apology. But it's good that the first thing I did was remove my cousin because it looks less like I was involved in the corruption.
[00:25:07] Speaker B: Wasn't it his nephew?
[00:25:08] Speaker C: That reminds me. Here is the rod.
[00:25:10] Speaker A: Thank you.
He grabs the rod and says, I will have this sent to the temple of the radiant one immediately. I appreciate your work. What happened with the dead things?
[00:25:24] Speaker B: The rod of Astra was being used to contain a vestigial, would be God of death named Vecna and the soul of the priest who summoned the undead in Palmville about a hundred years ago. And when we removed it, it unleashed both those things. And the dead in the cemetery came out of the cemetery and plagued the.
[00:25:54] Speaker C: Town until we were able to contain the rampaging spirit.
[00:25:57] Speaker A: Grimble looks very troubled, and he says, I've never heard of anything like this.
[00:26:03] Speaker B: Yes, the story surrounding St. Astra XIV has perhaps not been told quite true to form. We have some details that shed some illumination on it. There were two priests who were quite wronged in that encounter, but they also did some wrong in their own right. So it was a complex story.
[00:26:24] Speaker A: The tale goes that St. Astra rode into town and found heathens raising the dead to enslave the population in chaos surrounding the rise of the thorns. And he righted those wrongs and brought the town officially into the empire of Astragar. And then so fell in love with that town that he stayed there for the rest of his days.
[00:26:54] Speaker B: I believe he may have stayed there to make sure nobody removed the rod. I cannot speak to whether he loved the town or not, but the two who raised the undead were silent judge priests who I knew, and they did it because they were trying to contain the.
[00:27:13] Speaker A: Okay, okay.
[00:27:15] Speaker B: He would not accept that explanation and tried to kill them and their family. And so they summoned this vestigial death God to help them. And Astra wound up containing all of them within the catacombs.
[00:27:28] Speaker A: I'm going to be honest with you guys. Your job is done.
Here's the money. And he drops down a bag with 25 gold pieces in it.
[00:27:38] Speaker B: Total. Not a piece.
[00:27:40] Speaker A: Each.
[00:27:40] Speaker B: Each. Okay.
[00:27:41] Speaker A: And he leans back and says, with the situation resolved, the church of the radiant one is pleased. If we dredge up this history and injure one of their saints in the process, the church of the radiant one will not be pleased.
[00:28:05] Speaker C: I personally consider at this point, giving that sort of information to someone like Eliard can't amount to treason or heresy.
[00:28:17] Speaker A: Samu, the college professor journalist.
[00:28:20] Speaker B: But two valid priests of the silent judge were wronged in that encounter.
[00:28:25] Speaker A: I can appreciate your concerns, Boulain, but let me be clear. I got this job because I am capable of handling the politics that are required to keep Astragar from abandoning Fenrir to the thorns. Official corruption. Okay, corruption of a saint that would trigger a church investigation the likes that we have not seen in centuries.
[00:28:56] Speaker B: Well, he was not a saint yet when he did that.
[00:28:59] Speaker A: Yes, but in theory, there is a process for validating the saints before they are named a saint. And if this was, in fact, a spectacular failure of that process, it maybe.
[00:29:11] Speaker B: Should come to light and be reexamined.
[00:29:13] Speaker A: I'll tell you what. Let's table this for a little bit, because I think Bishop Brightwind would have a strong opinion about this as well.
And Bishop Brightwind, unlike me, can't be fired.
[00:29:30] Speaker C: Is there an alternative path to maybe instead of saying that these silent judge priests were wronged by St. Astra, what if it were twisted a little bit to simply say that they were wronged by politics and painted in a poor light and their names cleared?
[00:29:52] Speaker B: The problem is, they were not entirely in the clear. Cirrus.
[00:29:58] Speaker C: I understand that, but it seems like there are two grievances here. One is that these priests were drugged through the mud, more than was appropriate, were vilified. And my goal is to right as many wrongs as possible without creating more.
[00:30:13] Speaker B: He has a point. Do we have to say they were wronged by St. Astra?
[00:30:17] Speaker A: No, we don't. And to be honest with you, if the empire had sent paladins to do this, nobody would say anything. So you're in a position to make the truth.
[00:30:30] Speaker C: And I think that sounds like a compromise both sides can agree to.
[00:30:34] Speaker A: All right, just do me a favor. Please do not talk to Samu.
Please do not talk to Samu. And secondarily, please do not bring the most powerful church faction down on us by pissing off the church of the radiant one. It's all I ask. Clear their names. Great. I'm up for that. Let's correct the historical record, but let's not. I don't know what the next governor will do, but I can guarantee you there'll be a next r1 fast if we go in that way.
[00:31:09] Speaker B: All right. Tanglebeard.
[00:31:10] Speaker A: I feel like I got a whole good quality report from Khan. Bardish wrote me a multiple page, very comprehensive, detailed report of what happened in Hilock. I feel like you guys came out shining gold in that example is, like, still.
[00:31:30] Speaker D: Yeah.
[00:31:31] Speaker A: Yeah, he is. He's awaiting trial. They're going to do Chester's trial first. He is a bigger deal. So I don't think we need to debrief on that. Unless you think there's something that was left out of the official report that you want to report.
[00:31:43] Speaker B: Not that I can think of, no.
[00:31:45] Speaker C: Except that Southlock remains untouched.
[00:31:47] Speaker B: That is true.
[00:31:49] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:31:49] Speaker B: And apparently, there is still a Hydra plaguing hilock.
[00:31:53] Speaker A: That Hydra has been an unfinished job for almost 40 years. I don't expect you to try to take on a legendary beast in its lair. Haven't asked for that. Won't ask for that. However, my assistant, Thorn Pickerin, I suspect, informed you of that. And I would strongly recommend you ignore him.
[00:32:17] Speaker B: That's like telling us not to push the red button.
[00:32:21] Speaker A: Those jobs were left undone because people died trying them.
[00:32:24] Speaker C: Ran into arch Sage Mason.
[00:32:27] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:32:28] Speaker C: We took the western road back up.
There was something hideous in the lake, if you can call it a lake.
[00:32:38] Speaker B: It is a lake now.
[00:32:39] Speaker C: It should return to being a lake soon.
[00:32:42] Speaker A: That's good. How is the arch sage?
[00:32:45] Speaker B: Gone.
[00:32:45] Speaker C: Retired.
[00:32:46] Speaker B: Oh, wait. Didn't. Hold on. Hold on. Out of character. Didn't he say he was dead?
[00:32:50] Speaker D: He has passed.
[00:32:51] Speaker B: He told us to tell people he was dead.
[00:32:53] Speaker D: Yes, he asked us to tell people that he's dead.
[00:32:55] Speaker A: He gave you a note that says he's sick and will die eminently. You have a note.
[00:33:00] Speaker D: Okay. Oh, we pass over the note.
This is how he's doing.
[00:33:05] Speaker B: We don't say retired or gone.
[00:33:08] Speaker D: He is about to expire.
[00:33:10] Speaker A: Those are all great euphemisms for sickness in hospice. Yeah. He reads the note and he says, this is great news. This will make the chalice faction of the church thrilled.
[00:33:20] Speaker B: Why?
[00:33:21] Speaker A: Well, he was allowed to live out his natural life as the mayor. No one expected him to live that long.
He's the last vestige of a royalty.
[00:33:31] Speaker D: The last what?
[00:33:33] Speaker A: Running around in this empire. He should be a church official, and we will replace him immediately with a church official.
[00:33:39] Speaker B: Well, I think they will find north bank a more pleasant place. Henceforth, we took care of another vestigial would be God of disease that was plaguing the entire area. Not an official job, unfortunately.
[00:33:53] Speaker D: It'll still smell terrible, but, yeah, it should be better.
[00:33:56] Speaker A: Cripple looks at you and he's like. You guys keep saying God would be God. Vestigial God. What are you talking about?
[00:34:02] Speaker D: I didn't say anything.
[00:34:04] Speaker C: We've encountered some beings of great power that have given lesser minds the inclination they might be divine.
[00:34:14] Speaker B: They are beings that have aspirations of godhead.
[00:34:17] Speaker A: Like really powerful fairies. I got you.
[00:34:20] Speaker D: Sure.
[00:34:21] Speaker B: All right.
[00:34:22] Speaker A: I'm told really powerful fairies have delusions of godhood. Someday. I gotcha. Okay.
All right. And that brings us to Sternheim. How did a dragon skeleton attack Sternheim? Was that from Palmville?
[00:34:36] Speaker C: Wait, before we get to.
[00:34:38] Speaker B: Yes, yes, it was from Palmville.
[00:34:42] Speaker C: There's a man and a corpse in the crypt of Smith in the cemetery. He was a werewolf. He's been cured of werewolfism. Lacanthropy.
But he is guilty.
[00:34:59] Speaker B: I like to think that Zurich calls it werewolfism.
[00:35:09] Speaker C: But he and the corpse he holds his daughter are guilty of many murders.
[00:35:15] Speaker B: They are. But the reason I sent word to Tuscan for an escort is because he came out of Fenrir 20 years ago. And I do not believe we have heard of anyone coming out of Fenrir.
[00:35:29] Speaker A: Fascinating. A Fenrir survivor.
[00:35:31] Speaker B: So I thought, while he does need to stand trial for murder, the authorities at Astragar would be quite interested to talk to.
[00:35:40] Speaker C: Yes.
[00:35:41] Speaker A: Yeah. The Church of the luminous one, I think, would be the best home for that investigation, with their affiliation with fairy magic.
[00:35:48] Speaker B: To warn you, he is quite hostile. So when you go in after him in the mausoleum, he will likely try to attack and flee.
[00:35:55] Speaker A: Not to worry. That is why I brought these burly men. Gentlemen, round him up. We're taking them north now. Sternheim. Giant bone dragon.
[00:36:05] Speaker B: Yes. We should have spent yesterday getting a story together about this.
[00:36:11] Speaker A: The sharp edge of the pub gave me a report that Mayor Val expressly hired them to remove a dangerous, warlike individual from the nomadic tribe. And they did.
[00:36:24] Speaker B: We believe Mayor Val may have been using that as a distraction to commit two murders in town.
[00:36:33] Speaker A: Where is the Mayor now?
[00:36:34] Speaker B: The centaurs have him.
[00:36:36] Speaker A: Wow. And what are they going to do with him?
[00:36:38] Speaker B: We had retrieved him, but because the dragon had just broken loose from his lair, we ran across the centaurs on our way to deal with the dragon. And the centaurs insisted we leave Val with them. And we did not have time to.
[00:36:51] Speaker C: Argue and to complicate the story, in our attempt to retrieve mayor Val from catacombs that led toward the thorns, there was a spirit released that reanimated the bones of that dragon.
[00:37:07] Speaker A: That sounds. That must be some kind of fairy magic.
[00:37:10] Speaker B: It was gnarly.
[00:37:12] Speaker C: Must be some kind of fairy magic.
[00:37:14] Speaker A: Okay, so we have continued threats from the fay in the thorns. Wow. All right, is there anything else I need to know before we go talk to Bishop Brightwind?
[00:37:24] Speaker B: We believe Val may have been to blame for the entire conflict with the centaurs. The centaurs believe Sternheim is hostile. Sternheim believes the centaurs are hostile. I think Mayor Val was hostile.
[00:37:37] Speaker A: Creedon, what do you think about Mayor Val? Is he guilty of this stuff?
[00:37:40] Speaker D: Honestly? I believe that he is. I think that he let his ambitions cloud his judgment, and he did a lot of wrong.
[00:37:50] Speaker B: We are not entirely clear on why.
[00:37:53] Speaker A: So we lack motive.
[00:37:54] Speaker D: Yeah, we haven't had that much time to talk to him because there was a giant dragon and we wanted to take care of that problem. It was kind of more pressing.
[00:38:02] Speaker A: Okay, let's go talk to Bishop Brightwind. I have an idea for how we can proceed. All right, so you were taken to a little church where Bishop Brightwind has set up an office with all of her paladins and Grimble's paladins. There are, like, ten armed officers here. This is a formidable fighting force if ever there was one. And it has a very courtly, regal decorum to it. So when you step into the room, everything feels suddenly very official. Everyone is in uniform. Grimble Tanglebeard walks up and addresses Bishop Brightwind with their full title of Astragar, priestess of divine mercy, goddess of love. Bishop Brightwind addresses Grimble Tanglebeard with his full title, provincial governor, priest of divine hammer, goddess of innovation. And then they sit down, and just as they're about to sit down, three more people wander in the back of the door.
You recognize Max, dread zero, and chastity.
[00:39:12] Speaker D: Dread zero.
[00:39:18] Speaker B: Oh, how good to see them.
[00:39:20] Speaker D: How did his name get cooler?
[00:39:23] Speaker A: It was always dread.
[00:39:24] Speaker B: It was always dread zero. I think it was.
[00:39:26] Speaker D: I thought that it was just dread.
[00:39:28] Speaker A: Max just kept calling him Dread.
[00:39:30] Speaker B: How are they looking?
[00:39:32] Speaker A: They look like they've been through some shit and came out stronger. You imagine you look the same.
[00:39:39] Speaker D: I scowl.
[00:39:41] Speaker A: They sit in the back, and grimble nods at them and says, I'll be with you in a minute, folks. And he turns around and says, bishop, I believe we have several items of business we need to deal with. My employees. And he gestures behind himself to u three and then gestures the other way to the sharp edge of the pub. Have many things that they've reported to me, and we have a number of issues that we need to resolve. And she says, all right, where would you like to start? And Grumble says, well, first off, arch Sage Mason has retired.
[00:40:13] Speaker B: And did you say retired or expired?
[00:40:16] Speaker D: Expired.
[00:40:17] Speaker A: He says, retired, actually.
[00:40:20] Speaker B: All right.
[00:40:20] Speaker A: And he pulls out the letter and hands it over and says, oh, he's very ill. Well, at 900 plus years old, it shouldn't be a surprise. We will need to appoint someone to replace him immediately as provincial governor. That is your duty. And Grimble says, yeah, but you're here, you kind of outrank me a little bit, so how about we pick somebody? And she says, well, I did bring with me a priest of the luminous one who is quite capable of casting teleportation magics and the art of wizardry. We could keep a wizard theme going, only a much more legitimate one now. And Grimble says, yeah, okay, upside to that continuity, downside to that, I think people start calling him the art sage and it was a stupid title.
She nods and she looks over at Creighton and says, creighton, my daughter, who do you think I should send? I have at my disposal a paladin of divine mercy or a priest of the luminous one, Robert Swavian.
Feel free to call on any help from the audience if you'd like.
[00:41:37] Speaker D: Do you have something you'd like to say?
[00:41:39] Speaker C: I think I would make an excellent candidate.
[00:41:45] Speaker D: And that's how Vera slept our camp.
[00:41:51] Speaker B: Boulain has been sitting fairly impassively as she just turns her head slowly to look at zero.
[00:42:00] Speaker A: I think Grimble says, I have bigger plans for you, sir, than mayor of the worst town.
Hello everyone, and welcome to the Midroll listener Malcolm pointed out a rules issue today, so we're going to talk about that for our Midroll. Now, I do frequently say that rules are not the most important thing, and I stand by that. I do frequently change them and I edit out a lot of our rules conversations so you don't have to hear them. But I do try to be fair and consistent and accurate to the rules when they do make the podcast. In this case we were actually wrong in how we were handling a rule, so let's talk about it. I want to start off by saying that DND rules are not perfect. In fact, no rule system is perfect. They're always an attempt to abstract something like reality into an easy to adjudicate success or failure. And that way you're not sitting around doing physics equations instead of playing the game. The only thing that matters about a rule set is can we use it to get the kind of result we want consistently and generally. I've been pretty happy with five e's ability to do that. Despite the happiness, they didn't make it easy all the time. For example, there are spell scrolls and there are wondrous item scrolls that create spelllike effects. They're not the same. They're not handled the same. In fact, I have a whole rant about other situations that don't work quite right, like poisons and damage immunities where scorpions and snakes have poison in their mouths that kills them according to their stat blocks. If you want to do gritty realism or jump scares, there's whole rules that come with certain classes, like let's say a ranger with the observant feet in the wanderer background, that just don't make the system work very well. For that type of play, there are lots of reasons to criticize the rules as they exist, and I'm about to criticize one more. Today's topic is ability checks. DND has three types of checks which are on the surface exactly the same in process and procedure, so it takes a trained eye to spot the difference when you're basically just doing exactly the same thing. In DND, everything that's not a damage amount that you're rolling is resolved in the same way you roll a D 20. You add your proficiency bonus if you have training in the thing you're doing, you add an appropriate attribute bonus to represent your natural skills, and then you add any miscellaneous bonuses from magics and spells and other circumstances.
Despite the fact that there is a deep familiarity with all DND players on this process, you're actually doing three distinct, separate rules. The first is called attack, which is when you hit something with a spell or a weapon. The second is a saving throw, which is when you resist an attack of some kind.
Now the rules start to get messy with this third option. The third option is the ability check. Why messy, you say? Well, ability checks represent all skills, all tools, and any edge cases where skills or tools don't apply. And it's also not a saving throw or an attack. If you look at the design of the typical character sheet, you will not see this distinction or terminology called out. In fact, you'll see some misleading information like saves being next to skills and tools being off to the side, you would not actually infer that this is the way the rules work. Now, DND could have called these skill checks and tool checks, and then they could have said, well, there are no edge cases. Choose a skill, enroll it, and in that world, there would have been four clear, crisp options that are well labeled and it would have made a little bit more sense. But no, they went with three options where one of them is called an ability check, which you might have tried to think was defined as a role where you add your ability modifier, which is true with attacks and saves, but that is not actually the definition of ability check. In this game. So what is this? This is bad naming that slipped into the game design through the play testing, and it results in confusion, confusion that we share. So Creedon, our warlock character, has a spell called Hex. It does two things without rolling. The character hexes someone and then they get bonus damage whenever they were about to do damage anyway. And also the enemy has disadvantage on ability checks that involve one of the six abilities, strength decks, con wisdom, intelligence, or charisma. According to the rules, that means tools and skill rolls, which does help xeros out, but we have been using it to apply to saving throws. Why? Well, honestly, we didn't have the rule right. We thought saves and skills were a part of ability checks and they're not. They're separate. The real question is, what are we going to do about it in the future? So I talked it out with my team, as I do whenever we have rules, flubs, or we do something wrong, and we decided we're going to continue to allow hex to apply to saves. It is not what is written in the rules. We're going to change the rule. Why? Well, one, it's consistent with what we've been doing. Two, it's easier to remember than the actual rule. Three, skills and tool checks are not rolled often enough by monsters in the course of combat to come up very often. And four, I like that Creedon is a team player, helping both Boulain and Xeris by impacting both saves and skills. Otherwise, it was just skills as written. Would only be helping Xeris for his occasional wrestling checks. I'm not sure anyone should be rooting for our corrupt policeman prosecuting attorney character. Now, of course you should root for Robert to have a good story arc and a good time. But Xeris, you don't have to root for Xeris. All right? We're going to make decisions that benefit the whole party here.
[00:47:57] Speaker D: Creedon will speak up and say, despite my personal investment in spreading the church of divine mercy, I honestly think the luminous one's presence could be more beneficial in this area. They've dealt with a lot of foreign magics that have really impacted the town heavily. And I think that while they are recovering from all of that, luminous one could provide them with the most aid and most of what they need.
[00:48:23] Speaker A: Very wise counsel. Does anyone else in the room have anything they want to add?
[00:48:27] Speaker C: I would like to second that. Wise council.
[00:48:29] Speaker A: Very wise.
[00:48:30] Speaker D: And glances at Boulain like, is that smart?
[00:48:34] Speaker B: Boulain winks at her.
[00:48:36] Speaker D: I'll take it.
[00:48:38] Speaker A: Bishop Brightwin turns and says, you, sir, are now the new mayor of Northbank. I will have your supplies and your family sent to you. Please head out immediately. They were without leadership. And this wizard, who took it upon themselves to teleport this entourage directly into the middle of Sternheim, nods and says, very well, I will head out immediately. And with that, they take their staff, draw a little circle on the ground around them, and there is a weird shift in air pressure, and they are gone. And Bishop Brightwin says, well, gotta love the efficiency.
[00:49:16] Speaker D: What kind of system of government is this? This is some wild nepotism right there.
[00:49:23] Speaker A: Next up.
And grimble, says, hilock, he is without a governor. The interim governor is guard Captain Mav Lakarak. He is a devoted priest of sister truth, a paladin, if you will, but very much a military man. And Hilock is a trade route. It does have the threat of the thorns and the threat of a hydra, and I am told from reports, the threat of a dragon and a crocodile to the south. Perhaps military leadership is in order. And it would be a dwarf replacing a dwarf, which is some continuity and birshop. Brightwind says, yeah, but I think the next person needs to be shorter lived. No offense to your people, but we're capping a 100 year corruption. Let's cycle through a few people to freshen the air.
[00:50:14] Speaker B: Boulain again turns her head to look at Cirrus to see if he volunteers again.
[00:50:20] Speaker D: I mean, didn't we agree to help out?
[00:50:22] Speaker C: Khan Hilock is a much better established position than north Bank. I agree.
Definitely bigger things.
[00:50:31] Speaker D: Khan Baradich did great work there. Is he being considered Khan?
[00:50:35] Speaker A: Oh, he's very young for mayorship. Still in his 20s. He'd be the youngest mayor we've ever appointed. I'm not sure I'm interested in making that much history. What do you think?
[00:50:47] Speaker C: I think Khan was the most upstanding citizen we saw there.
[00:50:50] Speaker D: Indeed.
[00:50:51] Speaker A: The other option is we could send a paladin of divine hammer and gestures over to one of the men, that is with Grimble Tanglebeard, who is here to take a werewolf man into custody.
[00:51:04] Speaker C: Hilock is a complicated and nuanced situation. An outsider will encounter more resistance and will make the process of healing the wounds longer.
[00:51:19] Speaker B: I agree. Vardish understands the workings of that town and everyone in it. He would be the best suited to take the lead.
[00:51:26] Speaker D: The corruption there runs fairly deep, and someone familiar with it in the various factions, I think, would stand a much better chance at reinning everything back in.
[00:51:34] Speaker C: And also someone as appalled by it as we were.
[00:51:38] Speaker A: That is a good point. You're implying that Captain Mav Lakarak was not as appalled by it.
[00:51:44] Speaker B: Lakarak obeyed his orders from Chester and did not tend to question them.
[00:51:50] Speaker A: Grimble says, look, I have the authority to field promote either Khanbardish or Mav Lakarak. As far as I can tell, they both have pros and cons. I love the idea of a sister truth priest at the helm over a brother ambition priest at the helm, particularly after a corruption scandal. But it seems to me that submilitary might, might be in order. Things are getting dangerous in that area. Maybe a young man is just what they need. And Brightwind says, well, I won't fight you. It's your role. And Grimmel says, all right, I will draft up the letter appointing Khan Bardish the new mayor of Hilock.
[00:52:30] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:52:31] Speaker D: Now, the mayor of Hilock is an ally in our pockets.
[00:52:36] Speaker A: And that brings us to our next issue, which is the mayor of Sternheim. Sir, is there any truth to this report? And she slaps down a copy of the Newspaper and grimble turns and says, well, my agents have investigated Sternheim. And he gestures not to you, but to the sharp edge of the pup. And they assure me they have worked for the mayor. And everything seemed on the up and up at the time. I think that this story might be a little exaggerated. That said, the mayor does appear to have committed a crime, gross negligence, very nearly leading to a war that was completely avoidable. And Bishop Brightwin says, okay, where is the mayor? And Grimble says, the centaurs have him. But I have an idea about that. We have one official of sister truth here capable of being a judge in this trial, and that is a trial that will stand up to scrutiny from Astragar. Whereas if we leave the centaurs to conduct the trial, I don't think it will. Yes, Siris, am I that judge?
[00:53:42] Speaker C: You are outstanding.
[00:53:47] Speaker D: I love this.
[00:53:48] Speaker A: But to have a fair trial, we are going to need a prosecution and a defense. Gulaine and Creedon, you two will see to the prosecution. Your mission is to prove his guilt. You seem both convinced that that is the case.
[00:54:03] Speaker C: We could do a trial by combat and let the gods decide.
[00:54:06] Speaker A: If he calls for his own trial by combat, then you as the judge have the prerogative to allow that.
[00:54:14] Speaker C: Outstanding.
[00:54:19] Speaker A: Which brings us to who needs to prove him innocent. And he turns around and says, chastity and Max, how about you take the defense, please? Your job is to represent the mayor as best as you can in this. And Chastity says, we could do that. And Max says, we can't do that. And Chastity says, just a second. I need to confer with my man, and grabs Max's arm and hauls him outside. And you can hear her just berating him.
[00:54:49] Speaker D: I'm going to get Max to tell us all he knows.
[00:54:51] Speaker B: Yeah, I know, right? I'm just going to put Max on the stand and grill him.
[00:54:55] Speaker D: I mean, I assume we're going to have some time to build our cases. I don't even need to get him on the stand.
[00:54:59] Speaker A: And then they walk back in and Chastity says, yep, we'll do it.
[00:55:03] Speaker C: Bishop, Brightwind.
[00:55:04] Speaker A: Yes, Siris.
[00:55:06] Speaker C: Seeing as the accused is a official of some repute, may I suggest that for any questioning we employ a zone of truth. If that magic is available to us.
[00:55:21] Speaker A: I have the ability to cast this magic. It would be available to us. Xeris, your duty in this case is to convince the centaurs to submit to your trial. It is the most legitimate trial we can offer. The verdict would be meaningful throughout all of old Fenrir and Astrakar, so it shouldn't be a hard decision. But if they agree to abide by the rules of your trial, you can invoke that use of magic and I will be there to cast it.
[00:55:49] Speaker C: We're going to the centaurs to do this trial. We're not bringing him here.
[00:55:53] Speaker A: I do not wish to start a fight with the nomads. They have him. Let's get him back without killing anyone. We can hold the trial in the middle of a field if we need to. Just get him back without a fight.
[00:56:06] Speaker B: And if they have already killed him?
[00:56:09] Speaker A: They're a peaceful people. I strongly suspect they have not killed him, but I do think they will.
[00:56:14] Speaker D: What is the timeline for this trial? Do we have some time to.
[00:56:18] Speaker A: We need to wrap it up quickly. The town needs to have about a quarter of it completely rebuilt, and frankly, we need a new mayor. I'm going to go ahead and make the step. This is Grimble talking. I'm going to go ahead and take the step to remove him from office right now. That should buy us a couple more days, but we need to appoint a new mayor immediately.
[00:56:35] Speaker C: Bolane.
[00:56:35] Speaker B: Yes, sir.
[00:56:37] Speaker C: Send ascending to the centaurs.
[00:56:39] Speaker B: What would you like me to say?
[00:56:42] Speaker C: Honestly?
[00:56:43] Speaker D: Convince him to do trial by combat.
[00:56:47] Speaker C: Just kill him. I mean, that's what I want them to do instead. Maybe they can meet us somewhere.
[00:56:55] Speaker B: Should we have them meet us outside of town?
[00:56:58] Speaker C: Well, yeah, somewhere neutral.
[00:57:01] Speaker B: All right.
Do you want me to do this right this minute?
[00:57:06] Speaker C: It sounds like we're doing something urgent, but, yeah, whenever this convenes, we can do it.
[00:57:10] Speaker B: Okay. All right.
[00:57:11] Speaker C: Bishop Brightwind, we will send message to the centaurs and have them meet us. Hopefully they're amenable to that.
[00:57:17] Speaker A: Excellent. Grimble. Who are our candidates for mayor of Sternheim? And Grimble says, to be honest with you, my remaining men are too green for this.
[00:57:28] Speaker C: Xerith, I have seen excellent work from Max. His word fame is great. And I think Max would be excellent for the position.
[00:57:37] Speaker A: Chastity says, I think we have bigger things planned for Max. And Bishop Brightwin says, I do have one divine mercy paladin who could qualify as mayor. But then I am out of candidates also.
[00:57:52] Speaker D: Well, yeah, use that one then.
[00:57:56] Speaker A: And, Zerus, roll me. Persuasion.
[00:57:58] Speaker D: This town's definitely going to need to do some repopulating, since I'm doing this.
[00:58:02] Speaker C: To hamstring my opponent for purely selfish reasons, by removing one of their members. Do I get advantage?
[00:58:10] Speaker A: You do. Yeah, you do.
[00:58:14] Speaker C: Oh, they're both a seven. Man, that is crazy. That brings us to a persuasion of twelve.
[00:58:20] Speaker A: Okay. She nods and seems to take your suggestions seriously, but in the end decides she has a more trustworthy person that she's more familiar with. And so. All right. Sternheim will now be run by a paladin of divine mercy.
[00:58:38] Speaker B: Point of order.
[00:58:39] Speaker D: How old are Max dread in chastity?
[00:58:41] Speaker C: It's going to be like, fucking 15. I don't know.
[00:58:44] Speaker A: Max and dread are, like, 19.
[00:58:47] Speaker D: So we were going to be like Khan, new youngest mayor. But we're going to just sneak in. We're going to sneak in this teenager even earlier.
[00:58:57] Speaker A: Chastity is in her late twenty s.
[00:58:59] Speaker D: Okay, that makes her relationship a little less creepy. In my mind, it's nearing cougar territory there.
In my mind, she was, like, 40, and I was like, she's dating one of these guys.
I don't like it.
[00:59:14] Speaker C: Cougar creepy is half plus seven.
[00:59:17] Speaker A: Karen's come in all ages, so. Okay. The room settles down, and then the bishop says, is there any other business, Grimble? And Grimble says, I am not aware of any other business. And the bishop leans back and, uh, there's one other thing. There was three individuals who assisted in the dragon attack that were badly cursed. How did they get cursed? It was clearly fairy magic of some kind. And Grimble tilts his head and says, I have no answers to that. And turns and says, agents, any of the six of you, how were they cursed?
[00:59:53] Speaker C: Can I insight on Brightwind's disposition towards that. Basically what I'm actually looking for is if I tell her the truth, will she get angry at.
[01:00:04] Speaker A: Hmm. Roll me insight.
[01:00:05] Speaker B: I would also like to roll insight before we answer this question.
[01:00:08] Speaker A: Oh, God.
[01:00:09] Speaker D: I'll try that, too.
[01:00:10] Speaker A: Terrible.
[01:00:11] Speaker B: I rolled a one, and she's my mom.
[01:00:13] Speaker D: I might know better. Can I have advantage on this one because it's my mom?
[01:00:16] Speaker A: You can have advantage because it's your mom. Yes.
[01:00:19] Speaker D: Okay, good. Because I rolled a two on my first one. All right, 18 plus something. I'm scored of 521.
[01:00:27] Speaker A: So, Creedon, you're not used to your mom in full professional mode, which is what she's in right now. But knowing your mother, she is deeply concerned about fairy magic and deeply concerned for the well being of the people whose curses she removed. So she is looking for some kind of assurance that they are healthy and that the source of their affliction is gone.
[01:00:56] Speaker B: Okay. Out of character. Just now when we were talking about the dragon getting released, what did Zuris say? That.
What did he say?
[01:01:04] Speaker A: Said to Grimble tanglebeard that a soul was released somehow. And Grimble said, that must be fairy magic.
[01:01:12] Speaker C: I didn't say somehow. I just said we found the mayor in the catacombs. In the process of retrieving him, a spirit was released.
[01:01:19] Speaker B: Okay, did you say anything about we were in a conflict with anybody or.
[01:01:22] Speaker D: No, I did not.
[01:01:24] Speaker C: I told the truth, but I did not say that.
[01:01:26] Speaker B: Okay. Boulain will say we ran across them in the same catacombs where the dragon spirit was released. If there was fairy magic involved in the dragon spirit, they may have been cursed by fairies.
[01:01:39] Speaker A: Grimble nods and Bishop Brightwin says, I'm sorry, I missed something here. You were there when this dragon's spirit was released?
[01:01:50] Speaker D: Yeah.
[01:01:52] Speaker A: Please explain to me the circumstances by which this dragon came out of the thorns to destroy Sternheim.
[01:02:01] Speaker C: I dumbly turned my head to Creedon.
[01:02:05] Speaker D: Okay. Question. I mean, there are fairy creatures about, right? So if I do mention that we ran into some.
[01:02:12] Speaker B: What was it?
[01:02:13] Speaker D: Fairy dwarves, would that cause a riot?
[01:02:15] Speaker A: You know that there are fairy creatures about in the world and that fairy creatures who move to this side of the plane to out of the fairy wilds and into the mortal plane slowly become more mortal. They start to age and die and other things like that. And as long as they embrace the gods of this realm and leave behind the gods of their realm, the church is okay with that. You also know that you were dealing with fairies that very much did not act like they belong on this realm.
[01:02:48] Speaker D: Okay, I think I'm going to somebody yell at me if they don't like me saying this, but I'm going to try to try to aid our case here while also explaining some things. Whenever we found the mare, he was in the company of some fairy dwarves that seemed to take issue with the three allies that aided us in fighting the dragon in our conflict. In dispatching those fairy dwarves, they broke an object, or, like, they broke something. And then this all released a glass vial. They smashed a vial that we believe contained the soul of this dragon. Although it materialized through the ceiling, we didn't see it actually enter the dragon. But then, shortly afterwards, the dragon began its rampage.
[01:03:33] Speaker B: We believe the dragon was the same one that stole the gold that came out of Sternheim about 80 years ago.
[01:03:41] Speaker A: Okay, so, mischievous fairies who do not belong in this plane, hiding in the thorns, cursed these men and perform some sort of forbidden necromantic soul magic on the dying dragon.
[01:03:59] Speaker B: That is very likely what happened, yes.
[01:04:02] Speaker A: And you have killed them?
[01:04:04] Speaker B: Yes.
[01:04:04] Speaker C: Very dead.
[01:04:05] Speaker A: Thank you.
[01:04:06] Speaker D: Although we were able to find. But I believe that we got all of the ones that were present in that part of the catacombs.
[01:04:13] Speaker A: Thank you very much. Your services to the church are noted. Such heretical activity cannot be allowed to persist in the kingdom. All right. The dragon issue remains a shame. We will see to the fallen today. This will be a day of mourning. I would like to get the trial underway, though. So will we direct the town to a day of mourning. Judge, the trial is yours. See to it as soon as possible, and send your verdict to the provincial governor.
[01:04:45] Speaker D: Are you leaving now?
[01:04:47] Speaker A: Well, I've healed everyone there is to heal. I believe I will stay until the end of the trial, just in case you need the zone of truth magic. But then I will need to go. Yes, I came when you called, but Astragar is where all of my duties lie.
[01:05:02] Speaker C: Some of the details of the case are arcane in nature. May I speak with a learned arcanist as well?
[01:05:11] Speaker A: Unfortunately, our most learned arcanist just left. Just teleported to north bank.
[01:05:20] Speaker C: That's unfortunate. Do we have a novice Creedon?
[01:05:23] Speaker A: Your mom looks at you and says, I believe it is my daughter. Great.
[01:05:27] Speaker C: I will confer with her. Thank you.
[01:05:29] Speaker A: All right. I will let you plan your trial then. And with that, she dismisses this court that she's holding with a wave of her hands, and the paladins move to usher you all out into the street. We do so.
[01:05:43] Speaker B: Normally, Boulain would probably be the person presiding over this day of mourning, but she's just been assigned a prosecution duty.
[01:05:52] Speaker A: Yeah, okay, you can leave it to Creedon if you want. In order to preside over the day of just, you know, the detective work of figuring out what you're going to present at trial, then is left to Creedon.
[01:06:07] Speaker D: I'm extremely competent and good at taking great notes and studying in stuff. I've established this behavior repeatedly.
[01:06:19] Speaker B: Well, no, she wants to be part of the trial.
[01:06:22] Speaker D: Yeah, it's also more fun.
[01:06:24] Speaker B: We're also all key witnesses in this trial. All right, so she pulls zeros aside and says, what would you like this message to the centaurs to say 25 words.
[01:06:34] Speaker C: Meet us in the clearing to bring justice to what's his face, what's his name again?
[01:06:40] Speaker B: Val.
[01:06:40] Speaker A: Val.
[01:06:41] Speaker C: To bring justice to Val. Yep. Please send representatives and Val. Love Xeros.
[01:06:47] Speaker B: Love Xeros.
[01:06:51] Speaker C: Regards, Xeris.
[01:06:53] Speaker D: Creedon over here is love and is very excited.
[01:06:55] Speaker B: For a second, she will go off a little bit and she'll touch the raven on her chest and compose this message that says if Mayor Val Richtus is still alive, he is due to stand trial. Please bring him to the field outside of Sternheim. We will meet you there and send representatives. Love zeros.
[01:07:14] Speaker C: Oh, wow. Nice.
[01:07:28] Speaker A: And that is our show today. Don't forget to leave us a rating and review. Special thanks to Todd Ferguson of my pet machine for our tunes, Julie at elaborate Flight of Fancy for our logo, and author John Terra, the original author of Sternheim, back in second edition d d days. With that, how will the heroes handle the mayor and the politicians? Find out next time on carrots and suffering A-D-D odyssey.
