Part 2 of our first DnD 5E night. We find our who is making all that noise and then discover an interesting mystery.
Actual Play starts 6:30
Knights of the Night
241_DnD_5E_Bury_the_Lead
[music] Hello and welcome to Nights of the Night actual play podcast. This Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition campaign, "Heart of Fire" was written and run by your DM Mike. And now, please enjoy episode 241, titled "Bury the Lead." Actual play begins 6 minutes, 30 seconds. [music] Alright, we'll start the feedback with an I2 review. Has it been a while or am I just not remembering? Yeah, it's been roughly a month. We get about one a month. And by the way, we have a total of 93 ratings or reviews from iTunes, so we need seven more to reach 100, which is of course just the number. No, actually one of them was one star. And a couple over four. The few four, but the majority, the best majority. This one, in fact, is five star. Like that segway. It doesn't work when you mention it the segway. This was from Sprong Chain, and its title was "Amazing Actual Play." Exclamation. I've rated this AP podcast before, and it was before I was caught up in all the stories. And let me just say, if I could give more than five stars, I would in an instant. Thank you for the amazing stories, and I hope they continue coming for many years. I didn't know you could review more than once, if any kind of interesting. Maybe he braided it, and then he offered to review. Maybe. So Sprong Chain anyways, thank you for the five star. As I mentioned before with iTunes, the more we get, the more we show up in the search logarithm, so it leads to more or less in yourself. We only had one post on Facebook, and this was in regards to episode 240. Weapon maintenance is its own prayer. I like that title. It was a good title. I don't remember what I know. I said it twice. Thomas said once he was talked over, and I noticed it the second time. Actually, I noticed it the first time, but I don't think anybody else will notice that. For the second time, I did notice it. Luke G Postman said, "As for the picture of Dali, did you commission that?" No, absolutely not. When we have characters, we tend to just go out and use our Google food to pick out pictures that look like our characters, and that's one that I thought looked kind of like Dali. Back to Luke's comments, "As a weight-shifting sword, this brings up nostalgia for 3.0 curial weapons?" Oh, that's where they have mercury on the inside, which makes it swing really fucking hard, because all the liquid goes to it when you swing it, and it's really, really dumb. I'm sure it's useful in the mechanical stats, but I'm not sure that would help at all. Actually, in softball, I used to play in some guy who had a bat that had a weight in it that would shift as you swam. You know, it would start at the bottom, and then we'd shift up, which would give you more torque, and it would ruin. Of course, it really didn't matter. He could hit the ball farther than me, regardless of what type of bat he used. I don't think he needed help. If you leave it in a bit more, I'd just make curial weapons. I just want to explain. I don't think having a weapon that is a hollow tube is very smart when people swing battle axes the size of your chest at you. It's just going to go bad. I'm going to get mercury poisoning and get it all down. With the softball bats, the same thing, the softball bat that he had eventually got a pretty decent dent in it. You're just throwing a softball at it. You're not throwing another bat. Is it based on a historical weapon? Maybe? I don't know. I don't think so. I've never looked at it. I've heard of leg-shopping used to correct the balance and the hilt and stuff like that, and that's different, but I don't think that somebody just thought of a clever idea, which really, when you look at it, probably wasn't that clever of an idea, because of as Thomas mentioned it. It's weak in the blade, right? I mean, you're making a hollow sort. Yeah. It doesn't really sound all that smart. The only thing that they would usually do is they either fuller or put the gutter fuller, I think they call it, fuller the blade, so to let the blade flow or to to wipe off easy or drain easy or to cause more problems or damage. Actually, the best thing to do, well, I'm sorry, I'm going to go to a sword class, but curving the blade helps cutting power. That's why scimitars and katanas are so effective. We have a blade specialist who listens. Perhaps he'll chime in. It'll clear me to shut up. Wasn't the guy flying with it. You're an idiot. You're nothing. Okay. I mean. Luke continues with, as a title, pull choice, how the heck did I roll an unnatural 20 not end up in the options? Did you miss that? I don't know. He's right. That was pretty good. That would have been a great title. Given one of my own commission pieces, I would have instantly voted for it. Luke put in a link to a picture which he commissioned to be drawn for his role-playing game. He says it comes with a story that's not quite safe for work and that he believes the picture itself might be not safe for work, but yes, he's been told his criteria for that is tamed. Well, with that, that's the end of the feedback for this week. Other than a quick mention from the Facebook chat, if you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all. One of the listeners joined both liking the page and he joined the fan page, and it turns out this is binder of Unbound Books, who said he is Mike's biggest fan and it's great to see him jamming. Tell him that he's got a friend here on the far side of the world. He goes from New Zealand. Oh, cool. I want to go there someday. Well, I'll put you up. I'm saying that for him. He didn't say any such thing. But the 16 hours would take to get there. It's kind of turning me off. He also said that he had to set up for this adventure has been fantastic and that he's enjoying it. So with that, we will once again pimp our Amazon link on our blog page and thank our Patreon donors. Hopefully they've gotten their t-shirts by now. If you get a chance, throw up a picture of you in the shirt. That'd be great. We'd like to see that. And with that, we will let Mike take over. All right, hi there, I'm Mike, your DM for the campaign, Heart of Flame. Starting on my right is... Michael playing Van Tesh Vodek, a gold warman cleric of Torm, that got a courage and self-sacred vice, a member of the Runehammer Clan. I am Jim playing Theoden Runehammer Clan member, fighter, mutton dwarf, still flushing out the character. I'm Tom playing Dally, a level three sorcerer, tinkerer, forest gnome, refugee, and adopted daughter of thorough Runehammer. Bob playing Gillick Runehammer, a level three ranger of Torm. I'm Scott, playing Dane Runehammer, a paladin of the guy Torm, of the god of courage and self-sacred vice, a member of the Runehammer Clan, and that's it. Tom's playing Barrow, the Jordan Fighter, part of the Runehammer Clan as well, but I have yet to side on the last name. John playing Kirth, the rogue wizard, Ward of the State, in general, very well. And you hear the sounds of metal armor, kind of clanking, or clanking. Is there a language we can discern? You don't hear any language. It's just the shuffling of... They're not singing. But it's a steady pace and it doesn't seem to be... Well, you guys all were very receptive and very attentive, but don't think that this is any kind of concealment or stealth. They all seem to be going right up the road. It's sound like a dwarf sound. Let's probably have shorter footsteps than other Tim Minnoids. I think that's fair to say in terms of what everyone rolled, that it does probably sound like dwarves coming up. Yes, for long, you see a troop of armed and armored dwarves coming up the road towards you. They're not coming from behind. They're coming from the direction we were headed. Right. How do they look? They look like they're bandaged. They look like they've got some dried blood on their weapons and armor, and there's a total of eight of them, and two of them are dragging litters. So there's a total? So there's a total of ten, two being dragged out of litters. They're close enough for us to recognize them. Yes. In fact, yes. Are they part of the hammer clan? Well, they're not close enough for that, but if you look at them, they're carrying a standard with them. Do we recognize? Yes, of course. Burrow, Thedon, and Yillig. Do we have a standard? Of course, we do. I would say that we have a brand like a root hammer standard. And that's also like when you are... Got one of my opponents. How does Halberd do that soon? Sure, my hammer. So, yeah, do you recognize it as one of the, uh, a patrol group that is part of the axeurler plan? The axeurlers. Ah, I did. That's my idea for their ability to crawl axes at people. Not the iron group. Yeah, so they're coming up, they're coming up the road, and, uh, it looks like they are carrying, either, they're bandished, wounded, and, too, very still looking more as others. Um, I step out into the road and then look back quickly towards Vantesh for his permission. I nod and step out. Right. So, I, um, will, like, approach and hail them and see if they can use some assistance. Great. So, I step out of the woods and their first reaction is to snap a bunch of crossbows at you. Right. But when they see its fellow dwarves, they, uh, kind of, they're still still at, but they're, you can see how their shoulders kind of slum to the, ah, relief. They call out to you and pre-hail them back and I approach and ask who their leader is and they create two of him. If they could give us a report on what they've seen on the road or what they've experienced. Sure. One of them sits off. Although, I may quickly say, I mean, it looks like someone's dying on one of the letters. Obviously, I'm not going to ask for a report on how the road is if one of them's bleeding out. You know, so I'd like to be able to take a quick look and make sure that their wounds can be tended to in short order, but it's not of immediate urgency. Oh, okay. So, as you approach, they, you know, everyone kind of calls a halt and does everyone come out or is it just Bodeck and Dane? I also come out. Yeah, okay. I'm kind of hiding behind, ah, Dane, but I'm there. Okay. So, this patrolman, he is still a, ah, this patrol dwarf. It's still, got, still has discipline, so he kind of orders his fellow dwarves, like, you know, the whole position. We welcome these newcomers, but these tired, battered dwarves kind of take up the position, like again, not in the middle of the road. They'll kind of move off to the side and take up some shelter by the trees. There's two dwarves on the letters. The one comes up who's closest to them. Probably you, Dane, you said. I walked out first, but then I didn't wait. I, like, look back for approval from Vantash and then move forward, so he might have caught up with me. That's where I'm going to be interested in the proceedings, of course, but I'm looking at the wounded as well and to see if there's anything I can do. Right. Do we know, do we have any other people that might be able to tend wounds that are clear? I know medicine really well. Okay. I can heal Dara. A little bit. I can follow up with her eyes and bones. As being a herb. Blow torch. Okay, so the first thing you do is, this guy comes up and he's like, "Help." My name's Fargan Axerler. The leader is over here on the letter, and he is Borgon. Dane goes up to them, and do you have, let's see, your skill to... Do you have a, was it wisdom healing, or is it intelligence healing? I believe it's wisdom medicine. Okay, so if you want to do a quick, I guess, diagnosis, or do you want to see... Sure, I mean... Or do you just want to start healing them? No, I'm not going to, I mean, I asked, you know, "Hail, rock, brothers." How fair is the road, it looks rough. Is there anyone in need of the healing of a storm? If you have a priest that can heal, we're desperately in need, to help. Well then, you know, we'll wait for a report later. I will. Fantash, I have lay-on hands, which allows me to heal 15, up to 15 points a day. But I also have three spell slots. I just want to metagame a little bit just to get a feel for you. No, I understand. Not a horror healer. At this point though, you know, like for example, I'm not saying that you want to be myzers with your powers, but understand what it takes to replenish them. So, like you need short rests longer. I can talk a little bit about the last time. In your packs, do you guys also have healing kits or any of those? I do not. So my point is that you can use these healing gear and healing kits to perform like an ability check to maybe stop the bleeding. Maybe do a better deal. It's a little right. Yeah, it's a smaller healing, but it's something. But so I have three spell slots. Yeah, I'm a reckless, so I'm there all for offensive capabilities for Dane. So I don't have any cure light wound selected. Well, I do. Okay. And I'm... Okay. ...attention choirs to there, whoever their medic is. Right. You know, to see. Yeah, I'm doing great. And quick trio. I could also cure life. So what happens is Dane goes to Morgan, who's on a litter, and begins evaluating him with his healing power senses, whatever, trying to assess. And that's what he's going to be doing now for a couple turns. So how about you, Dominic? I want to talk to their medic and see who needs most help and also their leader. His name is Fargan. And Fargan says that they had been on a routine. They were on their patrol route. And they were on their way back. And overnight, that they had seen some odd lights in the sky. That they went to go investigate. And they were following some odd tracks and trails that were being made in the hills here. And while they were checking those out, and they never really got to track them all the way down, but they were ambushed by some red cyborgs. What? They killed them all. At least they killed all the ones that attacked them. And they'd get a bonfire of their orcish bodies. But not before that they had done a fair number on their patrol. So strange lights and movement. You're talking like UFOs and Bigfoot? Explain yourself. Dally is actually going around and talking to some of the other regular troops. She has an investigation and she's trying to determine if the lights that the captains discovered, whoever's currently in charge, is describing are the ones that she's seen. The chaos, lights, and distance. What happens in between, I'll kind of skip ahead, but what you're asking and what Dally is asking is kind of along the same lines, but you do notice a theme. And that is that some of the patrol here have training as wizards or a magic talent. So those ones spoke of seeing what looked like auroras in the sky. There was just something that didn't feel right, and so when they went to go. We've been seeing that kind of op-anon in the sky, sir. They, I mean, just in general? Yes, from your advantage up at the rock fall, you would see what would be described as find auroras, coalescing energy, kind of waiting back and forth, kind of subtle. And it doesn't look anything violent or dangerous, but you haven't seen anything like it before. It's not really the spell casters, people with spell-casting talent haven't seen it before. And these guys saw something actually closed by going on, so they went to check it out? Right. And then that's also when they came across some odd tracks. Sorry. If I may clarify that those with magical talent see this, if someone else looks at the sky, they don't see it. No, right. Okay. To them, it's a normal light. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. Are you that you are not being followed? Would you wipe out the orcs? We might not. Okay. Couple hours down the road, you're going to find a big pile of orc ash. What did it seem like? A raiding party? A scouting party? It was a scouting party, red tribe, and I think that they were young. And he kind of used you a meaningful look. And Bodeck and Gillick, do you roll wisdom inside, or if you don't have insight, just do a wisdom check? Sorry. I actually borrowed what you can roll too, because you're a trained warrior as well. I've got a plus five and I rolled a twelve. Seventeen. Thank you. And then I have a trained warrior. I have a orc as my favorite enemy. I'm just trying to see if I have any advantage. I will give you a plus two for that. You know what orcs are your favorite? I mean, you know exactly what this means. I'll skip ahead. It is the time of year when the youth of the orc tribes have to prove themselves in battle. And the only way that they become truly part of their own tribe is they must take a trophy from a dwarf that they have slain in battle. Not only are there raiding parties and scouting parties out here, but you've got the red tribe out there looking for dwarves in order to prove themselves worthy of their plan, which means that you could be looking at a very high risk of raids on any settlements that are in the area. Are there any settlements on the way to the farm set? You don't think there are because of this very reason, but that's not to say there aren't any denizens of the woods, any independence, kurf, you know, knows that sometimes people don't like to live in the city or they kind of hang out. And you, as a ranger, you know that there are druids or that there's people that just got to live their life the way they want to live in. So there might be some random people, but there's no established group. There's no established group. But most people that are out here know that this is that time of the season and they've got to hide up or show up or go, "Well, it doesn't. It's one of those things that the last time this happened was actually several years ago, and the dwarves organized such a beat down on the or tribes that the red tribe hasn't been seen in a while. But if news of the dragon's death is emboldening groups to come out, and if this is the first time in a while that you might have seen them, well, seven years to a dwarf isn't that long of a while, but the point is it's a good chance that this is not the first one that we're going to know. And it's like if this is part of their coming of age ceremony, then this might be a bigger problem. And you know that because as a hundred of orcs, you know intimately some of their customs and their tricks and their situation. And you think that this combined with what you know about terrorist farms and maybe why we haven't heard from them in a bit is because not both of them. Okay, so Dane, you look at the leader, the leader has a head wound that has made him unconscious, and he's got life threatening wounds. He has been bandaged up. You think he could. They keep on heading towards Rockfall. He'll probably make it. Yeah, that's obviously not good enough. He's been healed with medicine in the sense that he's been stabilized. He's received first aid and has been stabilized. When you say first aid, you mean the medicine skill? Field dressing by the dwarves in their patrol. So that would be the medicine skill? Yeah, like we can't do medicine again on him. He needs actual healing, correct? Yeah, he would probably need some. Is he the worst case to have? Yes. The other one just has some broken bones that he's going to definitely live, but he can't really walk. Well, I think he's worth a cure like wounds. How many of those do you have? I'm not real clear on that right here. Okay. Why do you know? I can also cast a cure like wounds three times. Three times? Three times per day. Reperted. Long rest or whatever. What are you? I'm a ranger. Oh, of torn. Awesome. You want to do the honors then? Sure. I'll heal him up. It looks like he can use it. I think you can do heal wounds for each one, so that will take two of your spells. One for the leader, one if you want to heal the other one. Yeah, I'll go ahead and do that. All right. They're rockers. Yeah, I mean those. Guillard knows his tricks. Also, he has gathered some of those other herbs that he knows and he uses to make his healing. Right. And you perform the spell. And that's one day plus your proficiency. Or your wisdom. I think it's wisdom bones. Okay. Yeah. Which is? What's the one? Okay. Guillard comes up and invokes his divine power, puts his hand on the leader, Fargan. Pass the spell. Oh, that's nine. Wow. Fargan's eyes pop open and he sits up on the litter grabbing his-- Gasping. He's a battle axe. He's like, "What?" What? He's looking around wildly for the fight. But he realizes that he's surrounded by dwarves and his own people and people he hasn't seen. In short order, you guys describe what happened and he comes down. But he gets up off the litter. And while he does still have some wounds, they're certainly not life-threatening anymore. And he is able to move around. The same is done for the other dwarf who is a female dwarf who is a-- Oh. Same player. Yeah. Oh, she's a cleric. She had her legs broken. Oh, I wanted to heal her first and then she could heal him. She could heal the cleric up first. That's what you do. Guillard lays on hands. He doesn't need to, but he does. He lays the same down. Oh. Oh. Trying to roll a seven, so it's-- No, that's so good. Dude, she receives the healing. She gassed with the healing energy, fixes and mends her legs. She's able to stand up to-- again, she still has some wounds left over, but-- Yeah, that whopping two. Yeah. Dude, what she thinks you and-- She's like, "My name's Greg up." What's your-- Girl of the Valley. Just talk appreciative issue. Listen to me. Well, she's a lot younger than you are. She's only a hundred years old. It's like anything. Babies. You'll be fine. It looks like they are going to be able to proceed and carry on. They ask is there anything you guys need us to report anything back, or any messages we can deliver for you? How far out were you guys in? Did you go as far as these farms? No, our patrol didn't take us to Terrace Farms. In fact, we weren't even going to be on this road, but when the Orps ambushed us, we attacked them and ended up chasing them this way. And it was just faster to catch this road and take it into the city. We were looking for those tracks that we saw were farther to the south and west. What say you, Vantesh? Do you think we should pursue a known enemy, or do we continue on with the-- No, no. They killed and burned all the people. Yeah. We already killed in Durgramal. You said something about tracks, Daniel? Yeah. That's what kind of led us off of our patrol. We kept them finding these tracks in the woods. We found evidence of a lot of bipedal humanoids moving from, you know, almost in straight lines and gathering to places. But we never quite found that place. But it looked like they weren't trying to follow trails or anything like that. But they want to work. They all kind of stop and kind of talk amongst themselves a little bit. They're not trying to conceal anything from you. But everyone has like a little bit of information. They have boots on. Was it bare feet? Was it large? Was it small? It's hard to describe. It just looked like large numbers of somebody moving through our area. But we never found any sign other than these tracks. But I don't know, they seem to be coming from all over different places. But they all seem to be heading towards a specific place. And that place would have been-- Well, it's about four hours farther south and it's-- That's where the tracks all came together. They seem to be heading. Like we found and followed the tracks that were going for a mile in this direction. Almost in straight line. And then they met up with another sign. And then we found some others and they would just seem all be converging on a spot. Again, the size of the footprints. Average village. Some of them looked like boots, some of them looked like feet. But they weren't following a trail. No, they weren't following a trail. Obviously none of you are trackers. Now. I'm getting a shot at a terrible information. What concerns me is the straight line. But we saw like-- They're being drawn to-- Yeah, that just makes me happy. We're trying to put some clothes in. Mindlessly, you know. Yes, you know. Goals. Let the golems go. Or undead. Black blood and just some other weird things. It didn't make any sense to us. They mentioned black blood as the end. Thank you. That's an orb with that. It's stuck. We had to bury the lead. Black blood. Well, someone just mentioned it. I think it was a black blood too. Like what? No, I just-- How do I want it? It's a black blood. That one's mud. It's an orb. It looked like blood. Do arcs have black blood? I'm a gnome. I don't know for shit. I've killed plenty of shit. They do, don't they? True. True it says, yeah. They are relatively mindless creatures as well. So-- So, Orcs. Out on dead, what's the difference? I wonder if you said that he didn't delight. Wait a minute. Like you hunt Orcs. Do they normally travel? Mindlessly in a direction? Ignoring all paths. Walking into trees. This area that you're talking about that they were collecting at. Is it in the same general direction as Terris Farms? Or are you seeing this? It's kind of on the way towards Terris Farms. Did you guys patrol over to Terris Farms? No. We were dragging down and finishing off those Orcs. You had no news of Terris Farms. No. We didn't think to-- We've been out in the field for almost two weeks now, and we're heading back. How many of these guys are there? Oh, there's 10 total. Is there any chance we could talk a few of them into going with us and when we find out what's going on, send them back with information in case we get wiped out? Would that be wise? Yeah, bring it clear. Bring it clear. Bring it clear. Not 'cause she's a woman because she can heal. I'll go back. You mean send them back? I don't think that it's necessarily a poor idea, Dally. I just-- they've been out for two weeks and they need to report back, and I think us-- We're fresh city. Us, you know, basically requisitioning several of their members. I see it as a sign of weakness that we can't handle the job given to us by the-- Oh, so I see it as a sign of smartness. It's supposed to be a bit more. Dally does kind of raise a little bit of a good point, but not a little bit of a good point. She doesn't understand the-- Yeah, she doesn't understand the-- No, I absolutely don't. No. The ideals-- Exactly. --of the dwarves and-- The room hammers don't need to ask the axlers for help. But you both have good points, but, like, hey, you guys are still pretty fresh and just out of the gate, and you have-- Yes, but Dally's point is if they're reporting back, let's give them something to report. They're going back with no information here. Right, well, if we send someone back, we can always send the-- The game? Which one? We can only send back the narrative well. They'll get arrested. You're supposed to be watching him. He's the award of the cleric, he has to stay put. We're staying together. That's fine. Fargain's-- Okay, she doesn't understand. Get, like, Fargain's axlers and your death. Grow it up. This is the same thing to you. Thank you. Get, like, bows in his back cracks. Oh. He doesn't get up as quickly as he went out. Oh, okay, okay. We don't need them. He just stays bad for us. He goes, uh, all right, you know, good luck, and I'll, uh, I'll report in that to me, saw you guys, and your deeds will be nose. But, excellent. Safe travels, Rock Brothers. Coach, you won't know our deeds. That's the fart, but okay, that's fine. Point-made, Dolly, move on. That was the smallest work I've ever seen. Okay, so they proceed in much better spirits, and, you know, they're not dragging their wounded comrades, and you've saved the leader of a patrol and, uh, help them. We will restore two of their hit points. We rock. Okay. So they proceed north while you can proceed south. We do this. Mm-hmm. So those tracks are sorta on the way to the farmstead, and you see those on the top of it. So, yeah, that kind of intrigues you, and you begin to kind of keep your eye out for it. Since you're bent close to the ground, anyways. Yeah. Who can keep an eye out on the sky for the whatever the heck it's magic stuff? And so now, let's see, we're past noon, so now we're coming up into the, uh, early afternoon. I start messing with, say, you can't see the colors in the sky. They're there now. They're all over the place. They're swirling. Look, right there. I think you're on drugs. Mm-hmm. With its gun specialized. Yeah, but taking any of that weird stuff, uh, what's the name of that? No. Look, there's a blue swirl, right there. Right there, up in the sky. Right next to us. A blue sky. Chris Dally also likes playing this game of who's got the spider. So the mechanical spider keeps, she keeps putting it on people's shoulders. Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. It'll get smashed. Yeah. Yeah, you don't have to find out how much spider. We're ordering. You don't have to find the spider stays in my backpack until I need it. Or maybe she can convince some of the birds to dive in. Well, that, and that, she would try. Dally, definitely do that. Okay. So you just pull on his beard. No. It's a good nesting material. When you track, or when you discover tracks, that is a wisdom perception role for you, right? It is a survival. It is a survival role. I have advantage on wisdom or survival checks to track favorite enemies. I also have an advantage in the mountains. I have it double my proficiency bonus. This is a good place for you to be. All right. Track and arch level. So that makes it a plus two job. You want to make it plus two for you? Well, I do have advantage. Plus two, I think, wisdom. I'm going to say you guys are proceeding. Yeah, because of wisdom checks, I get to double my proficiency bonus. And survival is a wisdom. Okay. So for the next three hour, I'm going to give like three hour segments before we get to a next stop point like maybe to have some dinner. So I want you to make a wisdom perception check to see if you detect or come across any of these tracks. It's not actually a perception. It's survival. All right. Survival. I'm sorry. I have double proficiency and I get advantage on them. Well, two twenties. Two twenties and you get plus five? Yeah, plus five. And because you're in the mountains? Because I'm in the mountains and orcs are my favorite enemy. So if they are orcs tracks, then I will get the double my proficiency. Okay. So let's see what your role? That's 15. The woods become thicker. The air becomes warmer. You're coming farther down the mountain. Actually, you're into the hills now. The foothills of the mountain. You guys have been traveling now for most of the day. And you do come across what could have been like a hunter's lodge. The grass is tall. You can see paths in the grass. Like somebody walked through. It's hard to walk through it but somebody shambled through it. Like trampled. Or trampled. Or not a game trail. No. Someone who is injured or just heavily wounded? You can't tell. You just detected the track. You'd have to maybe give me another role on that particular. Or dead. What are your favorite enemies? Ork and goblin. We did it. His favorite. His favorite was a kill. Right. Grow your wisdom check for your survival skill to interpret these tracks. No advantage then. They don't look like war tracks. Okay. 17? So that is 23. Good one. Okay. So, while you backtrack to the lodge, behind the lodge, you see what looks like churned earth. And the tracks seem to come from the churned earth area and go farther down the hill. Churned earth. They originate from there? Yeah. They seem to originate from... Tilled soil? Not tilled. More like the soil has almost been pushed up and out and the turf has been ripped out. And then something burst from the ground. Ork from a grave. Do I spot anything else? Is there anything unusual about this soil? Is it a burial? Ooh. Did you find a lodge? Do some? Yeah, there's a lodge there. You found a house. Yeah. Okay. Isn't it going to rain? You mentioned it was going to rain. And we're in the mountains. You're going to live in areas. You want to live in areas. The lazy dwarf says. Let's have a picnic. The kerf. Bodeck. And then give me a perception check. Right. Wisdom perception check. I'm sorry. I'm telling you what you do that. I'm sorry. I'm telling you what you do that. I'm just not looking at your own. Right. I roll natural 20-22. Actually, that works right into... That's my trap. Makes perfect sense to me. Bodeck, what'd you get? 21. Holy cow. We are very much in tune this evening. Dally only got 11. All right. Your cat's night. It's going to be your madness. In tune to this. Criff, what'd you get? An eight. An eight. And they... Criff likes the bug too. There's a lot. Do I get it all? You were... Nature... Survival... No. You've already got some information. This was a different thing. Okay. What I'm going to tell you is what you see is something that seems to have been pulled up from or ripped out of the earth. And you can see the clumps of dirt following this trail. And then the tracks go through and almost take a straight line from this grave. Far go down the hill. And it's more to the southwest. And you can lose sight of it because you're right here. Now, Bodeck, when you're sitting at this next to this earth, you feel a sense of wrongness. You feel very uncomfortable. And Dane feels it even deeper. He's not only is this wrong, but there's just something like almost that lights a fire in you almost like that this is a monstrosity. This is an aberration. This is... you cannot let this stand that whatever made this is profane. Yeah, profane is a great word. This is wrong and you do not like it. And whatever made this you feel needs to be destroyed. Now, we don't have any indication that this was a cemetery or anything like that. It's just like a field or part of the... I didn't really open up those guys. That was a good point, Bodeck. So otherwise I can join in this army too. Bodeck, you think that and you look around the tree earth and you find what appears to be a simple marker stone with a dwarven rune on it that you can read. And it basically is a great marker. By the gods. I'm dead. I personally believe that whatever order is given by the warsmith are superseded by this abomination that has occurred. You all want to see undead, but have you checked? There's a body still there? It's churned earth. I mean, I'm assuming we can see that there's nothing there. You didn't see that. Actually... Kurtz, could you give me an intelligence arcade check? Okay. Oh, good lord. I'm nine. Yeah, you can't be bothered. I haven't been this far under the book yet. I really want to break to read, but no one wants to stop. Okay. There is a sorcerer in the group. You know that, right? She's looking at bugs. Well, that's because I'm told there are no exceptions. I did see investigation or... Oh, hold on. Investigation. Yeah, both of those. I'm sorry. Did they tell you to do an arcade? Yeah. She rolled really toward me. No, I was doing a perception. Oh, sorry. My bad. Oh, I'm sorry. 'Cause I'm sure we need to alert her. Okay, can you take a look at this? Stop looking at the fucking bug. Well, Dali sees how much this disturbs Dane. And she gets a little closer look. And maybe one of her little tuning forks starts vibrating on her. Yeah, no. Yeah, no. Oh, the five. Your spotter's like... You can hear me. Shut up. Yes, you can hear me. That's the bug. That's only ten. So, I'm like... Girl, it's like a thing. I'm ready to kill some zombies. I like how it works. Just out of curiosity. Do you have a... Whatever it's not. No. I do not. It's more clear, compelling work. I do not. If I have a divine sense... I do not have to deck magic. Action can locate celestial fiend or undead within sixty feet. Also, presence of place, object as per the hallowed stone. I mean, that sounds... Well, that is why your senses, your divine senses are firing off. Warning messages. Yeah. Dali looks at it. And... It does seem wrong to her, but she doesn't understand why or how. It's just like... Oh, this is weird. It's just something dad did. Should be bad. And he started moving. That's why. But she's never seen this before. And it's like, "Oh, this is kind of odd." So, she doesn't quite understand what she's seeing or what it might mean. She's probably... Is there anything that would be an affront to our religious, to myself, or Vantage Bodex religious background? Any profane symbols or... No. Magics that... Like it's clear you don't want to touch it. You want to give me a shovel? I'll check it out. You can see that, okay, that there is... It looks like what might have been a shallow grave. Right. There's not a body in there. It's not a hole to another tunnel. Because you guys know tunnels and you're not going to see a tunnel. Okay. What time of day is it now? Right now you are approaching the middle of the afternoon. Okay. So, we're not to dare yet. No. I would suggest we follow this path with haste. I agree. And remove this abomination. I'll follow the trail. Do you have something that could, uh, a spell or a holy water... I think they could somehow fix this earth that's been just... The hell of grass that aren't hell of any more. Yes. Do you have a hell of a spell? Uh, no. Well, the problem with my spells is somehow I misplaced my sheet of the ones that I had selected. So, I've got a whole list of spells here. And I don't want to be picking, I'm sure he's picking them. Let me, let me just answer that for you to help out. Well, the feeling that you get from this grave does repulse you. Neither one of your spell casters seemed to feel that there was something like really there to worry about. I'm not worried. If something happened, not something is there, but something happened there. Do you have a ritual to recommit the body when I get it back? We can. I'm just going to take a moment. Go ahead. I mean, you could kick off. I'm just going to take a second and say some prayers over and over. I have a holy symbol. A blessing or something. I have some incense. I'm just going to try to... I've got quite a number of these. No, just one, I think. Right now, there's a small one. One here. You'll give me a wisdom survival role as you begin to track. I suggest that we all go double the time, too. If we're hot on the trail here, let's... I don't take much more than maybe at the most five minutes to say some prayers and burn some incense and maybe a little bit of holy water in the area. I think it's three. This is unnatural. Three it is. Right. But this is good. You're still in the mountains? You are in the hills now. You're wondering if you know if it gets this bonus. Right. Oh. Yeah, you're still hanging from the others. I'll give it to you. Okay. It's the roadwork traveling, going in the same direction as the shambles. You are almost... It looks like the tracks go across the road into the woods beyond, but they are going roughly in a parallel direction. We're following one set of tracks right now. Right now, it's one set of tracks. Does anyone else have any kind of tracking or something like that? Yeah. Okay. Good fix though. I could roll at it, but I'm not trained. Let's just follow the advantage. If you want. Gilla gets plus two proficiency, not an advantage. Oh, okay. That's where the terrain is. The favored enemy I get advantage. Okay. It's plus five. You're moving along and you are following this trail. And as you go, you see signs of kind of like more of that loose dirt as if the dirt were kind of like falling. I'm going to point that out. Yeah. You cross over the road, go into the woods. You can still see each other pretty well. Again, the sun's out. It's kind of like a green haze all in the woods, but not in a unhealthy, scary way. It's just you're going through these large trees. And as professional soldiers that have fought on these mountains, you notice that the tracks are almost making like a straight line until they come and hit a tree. And then they hit a tree, then come across and keep on going in a straight. So it's almost as if whoever made the tracks would bump into an object and would take however way to get around that object and keep on going in a straight line. And you guys can't see anything that they're following with your magic sights or whatever. Not at this point, no. You do realize that what you've found now kind of coincides with the reports that the Dwarven Patrol had given you that to the south and west, we had seen some lights and that we were trying to investigate before we got ambushed by the orcs. So you're to keep on going and you follow it towards the bottom of this hill. That's where you notice what appear to be several other very plain and obvious almost trails in the grass and in the tall grass, and they all seem to be converging onto a spot that's up ahead. They're all coming from different directions. Different directions, yeah. And you come to the bottom of the hill and you kind of come into a clearing and that clearing levels out into a meadow and you see trees all around you and you're kind of, you know, the sun's now shining on you and it's about four o'clock in the afternoon. And you see what appears to be a five foot diameter circle, as if there had been a giant bonfire or something, but in the middle of this meadow. How far is it away? For you right now, let's just say you're at the top of the hill looking down and you can kind of get a good look at it. It's about, let's say, 90 feet away. Alright, let's rig for silent running and send somebody to check it out. If I were correctly, all the paths seem to terminate here. They all seem to converge and terminate on this blackened circle. It could be the bonfire that roasted all the orcs after they killed them, but I don't know. I heard it was about two hours away and we could try. You hear the sounds of insects. You hear the sounds of life in the forest. It's nothing. You don't feel a sense of, at least from your vantage on the hill right now. And there are trees around too. It seems to be a focal point of the bodies that we're traveling. Yeah, towards the surface. Do we smell anything? Do we smell any burning, any lingering campfire smell? Any bonfire type of smell? No, okay. Give me a perception check, please. That would be everybody? Yes, everyone. What the fuck? Dude, is this 220's on this thing? No, there's no. You're rolling them. It's all 220 again. Holy cow. I'm not even good at perception, but I think the evil of this place registers strongly. You're sleeping through that slap and you're right in the face. Van Tesh, I have something called Divine Sense, which allows me to detect whether an area has been desecrated in some way. It also lets me sense if there's any fiends or undead within a 60-foot radius, so perhaps I should approach it and do a Divine Sense. My concern is tripping any alarms that can be in place. I have no reason to believe there are, but I thought maybe Kirth could leak. Well, let's see what happens with our perception check. Yeah, and then go from there. Kirth got a 15. And Barrow? One. He's really set on the idea that it's the orc pile. He's looking for a horse after this. Okay. Van Tesh, you are looking down. You get a closer look, or at least you begin to notice more details. And Dane feels like I need to be here at this moment in time and space. This is important that I'm involved in this area. You feel your sense of purpose just vibrating in you right now. All right. And we're about how far away? You're about 90 feet. Okay. All the tracks converge upon this scoured patch of ground. You see a circle of what appears to be almost like blackened, cracked earth. And there's a band outside of the circle of what appears to be like new grass. Bright green sprouting and even some wildflowers sprouting within it. And then beyond this narrow band of this bright green grass, you see what looks like piles of black and gray ash that look like kind of like cold spent charcoal. Would each of these cold, dry ash piles terminate at the end of a path of short grass? From your advantage, you think that's what it seems to look like, but you'd probably need to get closer. That might be tracked through the ash. On my perception check, I rolled a 20, and I was more paying attention to the surrounding area to see if there was an ambush waiting for us, like in the woods. Right. And that's a great role. But judging by the sound of the insects and the wildlife, the breeze, you don't smell or detect anything that would make you think work stench. You feel that right now you're not being observed or it's relatively empty terrain right now. That's what I'm going to maintain focus on. This is the surrounding area. I'm not concentrating on circle at all. Like the other people worry about. I would definitely draw my greatsword and say you want me to proceed down there with kirth. What? Oh, close. Sorry. When am I getting mounted here? Or 90 feet away. I need to be within 60 to do my to be able to detect. Is that 60 within the burnt ash circle? The circle is 90 feet away from you at the bottom of the sill. The outer ring is 10 feet closer. That doesn't seem to be any imminent ambush. So I'm going to suggest we all fan out and approach slowly. You can be the first one, but I don't want to be 90 feet away from you as you're. Correct. Makes sense. I want it to stay. To be fair, I only need to get about 30 feet or so closer to use the power of torn. Let's take it into 60 feet then. I'm going to walk up to with everybody else. Or right outside of where this ash starts and I'll let the professional. So I... There does not seem to be any type of threat that you can see. Yeah. The piles of ash, kind of like what Dali said, do seem to terminate at the... Each one seems to terminate from a path. And could I get an arcana roll from Kurt and Dali? There we go. What photo specialisation did you choose from? Dali rolled a 22. And then Kurt, you had a? 22. 22. Wow. Okay, good. We nod, knowing we had each other. It's the squirrels, go talk to them. It's like all the fucking gold squirrels. So you detect three things about this circle. Circle? That's what the circle is. And you look at the drips of ash. Your magical senses and your skill checks tell you that there seems to be residue of necrotic energy. That's not gold. Now, the green band, however, of the fresh, sprouting grass, and this is something that you've Dali's read about, and Kurt maybe suspects and maybe is also secretly read about too. But it is pure positive energy. By positive you mean good? No. From your studies about chaos magic, you understand the forces that help create chaos magic and cleaner shifting. And you're like the material plane, and then there's a negative plane, and then you have a positive plane. Okay. You know, necrotic energy kind of derives from negative, but is kind of manipulated by the necromantic arts. So the point is, so you have the necrotic ash. You have the positive plane energy of this green band. And then the blackened circle itself is negative plane. It has that signature or vibe or that telltale. And so what you have here is somehow a planar convergence. And you are utterly fascinated, and both of you are fascinated. But the problem that you feel here is that you're seeing three things in close proximity to each other, that you didn't know that this was even magically possible. So could that center thing be bad? Someone put the good thing around it, and it's center things drawing bad things to it to make it more powerful, but it's sitting in the good ring on the outside and zapping them or something? I don't know. That's a broken conspiracy theory. Can I give a divine sense just to make sure? Sure. Because as arcane as this seems to be, it speaks to me on a level that is different than the magic users or the sorcerers. Divine sense is a 60 foot radius. First thing first, it tells me if there's any celestial fiend or undead 60 feet from me, 60 feet above me, 60 feet below me. There are no any of those creatures or entities that you describe. Within the same radius, you also detect the presence of any place or object that has been consecrated or desecrated. You do not detect anything that would be considered desecrated or consecrated. Okay. You mentioned that the negative plane energy can be tapped by necromantic casters. Is that a true statement? That the negative energy is used by... You think it is? Who uses the positive? Catacasters. Clerks. Positive energy. What do you want? History, religion, investigation, or canon? Well, I guess another, because you give me another quick arcade roll. It's 24. Holy cow. When we attack, we're going to roll into 1/2. 1/2 critical mess. All right. Well, okay, great. So, wow, this is really up your alley. This is sparking your interest like you've never believed. What you know about playing mechanics, being that your specialty is chaos magic, which kind of comes into play with chaos magic, is a lot of the energy for healing comes from positive plane. I was also granted by gods. The negative plane is also a place where dark magic taps into. That raw stuff is transformed using different schools of... Different gods? Either different gods, or you suspect that even different schools of magic have used it. Now, being a sorcerer, you are more... They control raw magic and it's intrinsic. They're born with it. They can do it. They're natural. They're born natural magic users. Cirth, being a wizard, is like, I've studied, learned, but it's not intrinsic. I acquired this power and this knowledge and I know how to manipulate the forces to get the effects that I want. So, Dolly doesn't actually consider yourself a sorcerer, but she does know that she imbues objects with power. Right. If you can use that. So, right, and that's going to be described that this is on a scale that you can never achieve. Oh, no. That you've never heard of being achieved and you don't know how it could possibly have been achieved without training this entire place into a giant crater. Mm-hmm. So, basically, there's a lot of energy going on here that should just blow a big hole in the ground. You guys have discovered what you think. Then there's some kind of event that is happening here that is harnessing and controlling enormously powerful forces. Do I know anything about this area? I don't know if I've traveled in this area. I would say that this is your close enough to your place that you are familiar with this year. Anything unusual about this landmark sort of thing? Uh, hold on. Yeah, they're... Are you saying that this is... A known quantity? Well, yeah. I don't know. This is a stone. A ley line. Okay. This is a ley line. Or this is something that stands out about this area. This is an ancient temple. Keep in mind this would be something that a ranger would know. Yeah. So, I would have knowledge of nature and stuff. Right. I don't think there's really good reason why there's this all this power in the middle of the lane. I don't think it was the last one in the middle of the lane. I don't think it was the last one in the middle of the lane in the middle of the lane. We're at. This is a recent thing. I would say that you know that historically, for hundreds of years, there have been many battles fought out around these lands. So, everywhere you've been walking is a battlefield at some point in time. I mean, these hills have seen death before, but is there anything significant? Was there any particular construction or play? This isn't a haunted wood. This isn't a swamp or a known person that's been hanging out here that you know about. Right. Or at least you don't think you've ever heard. But nothing specific about this meadow here. Okay. No, there's no lamp. In fact, based on where you've seen some of these auroras before, you've kind of seen them in different places. But Delli tends to think of unusual things happening, and what she says unusual, she meets magic. They always have an item at the center of them. Her things are all caused by mechanical things that she creates. There's usually a weapon that's imbued with magic, a focal point that's causing it to happen. So, if there's a circle here, what's in the center is what she's looking for? Go dig it up. I'm not going into the center. I'm looking in the center. She wants to. Well, I just grabbed the center as being this blackened cracked earth. Right. It's gone. Okay, so. Has anybody walked past the ashes and walked past the... Well, we know what it is. I think we've all stopped before. Yeah, no one has brought it. Well, actually Delli probably absolutely starts staring at the center and walking towards it. She's trying to figure out what's there. Until Dang kind of puts a hand on a shoulder and goes, "What are you doing?" "Where are you going?" "Dang, what spell did you try?" Or could you use this divine senses? Mm-hmm. True. All right. That was successful. Well, it was successful in the sense that there doesn't seem to be any desecration of this land. This seems to be a more arcane type of evil magic. Can I just step into the ashes? Yeah, I'm almost trying. You step into them? Yeah. All right, I tried kicking some ash into the ashes. Positive area. Positive area. You know, the grass and the wildfires. Wait a minute. Wait, do they cross what appears to be the barrier? Yeah, there doesn't seem to be any barrier. I'm just telling you what was on the ground. All the power that you've sensed here is like an echo and residual. It's not present. It's not crackling and humming. Yeah. This looks like a past event. A very recent event. All right. Danny steps into the next round. I thought I was a chaotic one. Yeah. So could you hold on? Hold on. Please. Hold on. Roll your wisdom perception and see what you see or see if you detect anything. The what? The what? The what? The what? He says you roll the what? Go ahead. We'll really step onto the ground there. It feels very hard underneath your boots. Almost kind of crunches and crackles. And directing the center, you think you might see something kind of glitter there in the cracks of the earth? I send my mage hand. Describe to me what you're doing now. Cirth, instead of having two working hands, has a gimp one, a normal right hand and a mage hand. Then you can make invisible pickpockets and locks and send it up to 30 feet away. Okay. So this isn't like limited to just your normal range. So you use your mage hand. It's like a cantripter. So you're reaching out with a gimp arm and lifts this thing in the air. All right. And the curse? Would you like some protection before you go ahead and do that, just in case there's some evil about it? I think carrying more than 10 pounds. No, spell wise. Would you like the protection of the whole? Protection of the whole. I know I didn't detect any evil. That doesn't mean that your, I mean, I see a mage hand come into the, into existence and start holding down. That's invisible. It's invisible. Yeah. If I wouldn't say that at all then. And it said will, right? So you don't, you don't do a cantripter. He's maybe trying to feed away. Did you mention, see, what I'm reaching with his gimp arm? Yeah. Something in the center lifts up. He has to, he has to use his gimp arm to mimic the behavior of the mage hand. That's what he does. He doesn't have to. That's what he does. Well, that's what he described. Did you indicate that you were going to do that or would you just do it? Yeah. I just kind of did that. Okay. Then I'm not going to. That's, we'll believe it there. That's what happens when he takes up the, the, the, the. Thank you for listening tonight's of the night actual play podcast. If you'd like to send us questions, comments or feedback you can reach us in a number of ways. From Twitter @KOTN_podcast or by email feedback@KOTNpodcast.com. And don't forget the iTunes reviews. Or our Facebook page, Facebook.com/KOTN.podcast. Speaking of Facebook, join like-minded folks at our Facebook fan page. And lastly, there's our blog page, KOTNpodcast.com, where there's an Amazon link on the right-hand side. Thanks to Zen Audio Smith for the intro and outro music. Get your own music at zenaudiosmith.com. And join us next week for more mystery and adventure. So before long, since you kind of already, you know, jumped ahead. That's great. Fargain and Gordon. Good words. Fargain, Gordon. They're Norwegian. Fargain, Oregon. What should you be the same? So we got 200 subscribers. Last session? Yes. No, I've experienced a lot of the amount of experience. Yeah, it just came up with 2,000 experiences. Maybe that's hard to do. Correct. Maybe that's- I used a spreadsheet as well. I don't expect anything. No, your says 900. So- I think I put that in. What happens is- You put this in. Okay, okay. Why does mine say 2000? Back to the adventure. No, no. Sorry. Meanwhile, back to the ranch. Inside, it's not even a skill. It is. What is it? You had it. You were really good at it. Oh, hey. There it is. Keep saying "I". Stop that. So, Yelly, the listeners should know my voice by it. Rocket does. Mr. Miyagi is- Rub his hands together. I don't know what's up. Yeah, her chest wasn't what the problem was. Her legs broke in. Her legs broke in. Her legs broke in. They're all connected. I'm going to have him do it again. He's a warden. He's a warden. He's a warden. He's a warden. Mmm. What- Why are you- You made it wrong. What are your- What? You didn't bring in my notes. Um. And Dane, cursed, and bodeck. Curved. Curved. I'm sorry. Curved. I thought I cursed someone cursed. Damn you. Dang. So good. It's a bug. It's climbing in the dirt. The dirt. There's no grave markers. I mean- There was a dwarf. There was a grave marker here. And bodeck found it. And it was a dwarven- It was a simple stone dwarven marker. And when he reads it, it just- It gives a- A name and a date. And the name is- Stop talking like that. I'm sorry. The name is- Ston. Ston. And the date on it- Bodeck calculates to be, you know, almost 50 years ago. Obviously the Earth has been turned much better. Yeah. The Earth looks like it was turned like last night or maybe even sooner. It sounds at least- I agree, as your consciousness, I agree that- Thank you. Um, you think that, uh, this bears investigation and you begin to- Could even be related. How willing to- Maybe you got like a little magic- What are your devices? Is like a little magic tiger county? Claire, how much spider is there? Um, it's a- Magic can farm. This is a landline. Oh, it's not going to be able to separate myself from the party because I won't be here next time. And- We might need to clarify- We might need to clarify- The following, but- Soul towns. Mm-hmm. We can always do Sunday that week if necessary. Uh, you gotta put this in your bag too. You're getting back to the back. Uh-huh. I haven't met them, huh? I remember using some sort of- And- And- And- And- And- And- And- And- And- Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. We can always do Sunday that week if necessary. Uh, You gotta put this in your bag too. You have to try the shiny leather. Well- Shiny what? I'm a shiny button. I get it. Mm-hmm. Yeah, you know what that shiny thing is going to be? It's going to be able to denariant corn. Yeah, Yeah, I'm going to touch it. I can clean it everywhere. It's going to be a demon hand. Yeah, It's a magnet. Roll up a new character. Yeah, but- Well, it's an active will, you know. It's just picking up- What are your magical, sympathetic hand counts? We're in the best community. Okay. This one's yours. Thank you. Alright, I think. They're fairly- Uh, both of them. Uh, The- That one's your dad. Or, uh, your- Oh, your uncle's. No, this one's- No, that one's- No, that's the- Is it the player's handbook for the, uh, display- Oh, okay. This one's ours. Sorry, I thought it was the- Uh, I didn't call it. Doesn't matter, it's good. Okay. Come on, we needed a cliffhanger. That was cliffhanger. I'm just happy to provide one. I should be able to get- So if I don't have anything. I think this is your DM's good. I don't know this one. I don't know this one. I don't know what it means for 4-0. I think Mike has my DM's good. Uh, I just- Just do. I've got the monster manual and- Yeah, I don't have the DM guy in this- So that must be your- Your- You have your name in it? I think you're better not. All right, then that must be my book. I'm kidding, it's your- Well, I'm not gonna use it. I won't be here for a couple weeks. You're welcome to- Thank you, sir. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Thank you.