With possible foes skulking behind sand dunes on ever side, naturally the first attack comes from….. Well, that would be a spoiler wouldn’t it.
Knights of the Night
KotN Actual Play Podcast - 155 Numenera - Circle the Wagons
(upbeat music) - Hello, and welcome to "The Knights of the Night" actual boy podcast. This new manera adventure, sand swept, was written and run by your GM Scott. And now, please enjoy episode 155, titled "Circle the Waggots." Actual play begins 33 minutes, 26 seconds. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) - Okay, we have feedback for we get into the episode. On Facebook, we add Tyler Houdek, responding to episode 149. He's back with it. I just finished this episode loving it so far. I love the music in the background. It gives it a final fantasy vibe, which is truly how I picture the new manera setting anyhow. There's some of them. Other final fantasies, not quite so in the manera. - I guess I chose the right one then. - Yeah. - On episode 153, Chris Nathan said, "Nights." I have to say, I'm always impressed with the level of doom that always seems to happen to your group when attempting to do what seems like simple tasks. - It's all Scott's fault. - Yes, it is all Scott's fault. Whether it be a simple hospital visit from a vitamin B employee, a mild investigation into an office building, a quick jaunt through a field of a homestead, a small encounter with a group of men wearing red cloaks, or perhaps tying up a friend to prevent them from harming themselves or anyone else. Something bad seems to happen. It makes it very fun to listen to. Thanks for keeping up the entertainment and I hope you think skipping was enjoyable one. - I liked it. Real sure the same thing's good. - Pretty much. We came over to Scott's house and most of us were there and it was enjoyable. It was a good Thanksgiving. - I ate food. - My ice cream. - Oh my God. - Yeah, but I got to smell it, so it was wonderful. - You got to eat some. - You got to eat some rice cakes. - And rice cakes. - Oh, I love cranberries. - I do too, but after the fourth or fifth slice of that can here, you know. - You can't eat marshmallows, can you? - I don't think my mom has a recipe for, it's called cranberry salad. And it's basically marshmallows, raw cranberries, and it is so good. - Sounds good. - That could be good. Did you bring some sour soup? - No, it's not. - It's in your fridge or it's in your bed. - No, none of this, oh, we had the best sides ever, but then the turkey, they messed that up. - So thank you for the always just Chris. - Well, we didn't ask Jim. Did you have a nice Thanksgiving? - Oh, he had a nice Thanksgiving, thank you. - Thank you for including me. - Good time, good food. Good company. - I ate too much, imagine that. - Yeah, tough. - Let's figure. - Can't imagine. - On Facebook, Miles, Stoffer, Stoffer also said, "Hey nerds, I'm really enjoying your podcast." - Well, man. - I know, come on in bitch, you're a fucking nerd. You know you are. - Yeah, okay. - I'm really enjoying your podcast. I started about 15 episodes ago and I will listen to the older ones, but for now, noumenera is really great. I always wanted to give you a shot up. I live in Osaka, Japan. - Ooh. - Nice. - For work and wife. - Nice. - Getting a piece of Nerdy America is great. Last week, your extra long podcast was fantastic. I loved walking around Osaka Castle listening to your adventures. He actually posted some pictures. - I look at those. - They were fantastic. It was like so cold. The one was like out of balcony overlooking the city of Tokyo, I suppose. He's a little glass of wine there and I imagine him sitting listening to us. - Thank you. - You sit over and look at Tokyo while you drink. - I actually, it's the pool. It's covered in the backyard, but. - Same idea, same concept. - Today's Thanksgiving and I can't wait to listen while drinking a few too many IPAs at my favorite bar. Thanks again. - Well done. - Nice. - A beer for Japanese beer. - Great beer. - Pale ale. - Okay. - It's a type of beer that's, yeah. - It's like Ichaban? - No. - Ichaban pale ale? - IPA is like a category of beer. - Okay, well there you go. What do I know? - Not much much. - Not many beers, but more than I did 'cause you actually named one. I couldn't even name one. Logan Swanson, also from Facebook said, hey gang, quick clarification about the Facebook group idea and then I will absolutely let it rest. It is in no way a place to promote. It's a place for die hard fans to talk to one another. I'm in a new fan group and the content maker has zero things to do with them. They post, as they usually post, and a fan group goes nuts with commentary and back and forth. The only activity involved is inviting the fans. After that, we can go nuts talking about system favorite characters and favorite episodes. Little to no involvement by the night's crew. Again, this is just a suggestion and I'm in a few groups and it brought me some bizarre distant friendships that I absolutely would not otherwise have. I'd like to meet the other die hard fans and others who simply cannot wait for the next episode. So, what happened was-- - That sounds a lot different than what we thought it was. - It's an extent, it sounds almost like a little, I would reverse what they talk back and forth and share their ideas about what happened. - What happened today was Jason McDonald came to me in the dream. - They actually came to you? - Yeah, in the dream. - They came to you and he said, "Tom?" - I said, "Jason, what the fuck have you done in my dream?" Leave me alone, I'm trying to nap. No, he sent me a message on Facebook and he said, "Might if I start the fan group." But I'm like, "Fuck." No, get the good. - Have at it. - Yeah. - And he did, and so Jason started the group and there was a lot of activity already and I only have one concern about it. - What is your concern? - So my one concern is that there's gonna be a lot of activity on this page and I don't intend to include the fan page banter as feedback because there's a lot of it already and there potentially could be too much of it. So, I'm gonna let the fans have their fun and talk and stuff, but I'm afraid that our feedback will drop to nothing because-- - Well, so I'm just reminding people, post under the episodes on the main page still, that stuff will be included into the podcast. The stuff that you put on the fan page, not so much. - Well, why don't we ask them to introduce the topics with our feedback and then discuss those topics on the fan page? - That's fine for their enjoyment and stuff. I'm just saying, anything on the fan page, I'm really not gonna cover in our episode. - And what's it? - Because I don't know where to cut the line. There's already, if we went and covered everything in the last 24 hours that's been put on the fan page, we'd have an hour show. - Really? - You could pick and choose. I mean, right now you do everything. - No, check out the book as far as feedback. - I guess it's possible. - But you don't have to do that if you plan something on the fan pages, not on the other-- - Dynamarily of talking about, not talking about. - Well, how about you guys bring up things from the fan page? - You can all read it, right? - I'll do the official feedback. - All right. - Can you guys keep bringing it? - Yeah, you pretty much all that invited all of us, you who are on Facebook, I think. - Oh, look, he's got it up. - Up and running. - Cool, cool. - I'm not in yet, but-- - I'm sorry. - Request it. - I just missed one minute ago. - Okay. Well, anyways, thank you for taking care of that, Jason, and starting the group. And I'll put a link in the show notes to let everybody know that's listening to the podcast that the fan page exists. And if you're on Facebook, you can join anybody in the group can invite or are okay, anybody that gets better. - I was Jay Mack, the one who did the animation. - Yes, he is. You say what who did the, yeah. - And he's the Australian. - No, he's the Canadian. - He's Canadian. - I don't even have a clue. - Canada. - Well, they're all part of the Queen's empire. - They, Americans, little shame. - No, not at all. Check your currency. I'm a big fan of Canada. I've been to Canada more than probably anyone at this table. I bet. I'll lay down money right now. I've been to Canada more times than anyone at this table. - I actually am probably right as far as I go, and I know my kids. - I'd say 20 plus at this point in my life. - I'm close to that. - No more snakes. - No more snakes. - No more snakes. - Well, you Jim, do you tail off there once we stop going up for the weekend to drink? - I've been up there maybe three times since we stopped hanging up there. - You win. You are the- - Christ. - Canadian of file. - You were the Christ? - Yeah, I don't want it to be the file for the Canadian of file. You know, like an Angela file. - I don't know what it would be. - Can I have a file? - Can I have a file? - You don't get to choose. - We'll have to ask Jason what- - Right, what the file would- - We can't even choose our own seats. How do you get to choose whether it's a Canadian of file? - What do you do now there? - I can't hear him on the damn podcast. So apparently I don't speak loud enough. - The teacher called you to the front of the class. - Told my seat and everything. - It was what knocks Jim out from the quiet talking. That takes some effort. - My goal is quieter than Jim. You know that's a fact. - I don't, but- - Okay. - I do not. - Now you're supposed to whisper and then I do now. - You want to sit up there? You got to say it down there? (laughs) - All right. - This is not official feedback, but I'm gonna- - We think though that this pink table cloth is bright enough, or loud enough for all of us. - Shouting over everyone else. Somebody take a picture, we'll put it on Facebook. Yes, we're using a pink table cloth. - With polka dots, mind you. - At least it doesn't have door, they explore on it. It was part of the door set though. - I imagine it was. We had, I had a chat with Pete Figtree from the Ruthless Diastema podcast. And I just thought I would include it and you didn't make it official feedback. - And Michael's now taking a picture of the pink table cloth. - With the Nimanera World Math as well. - We're not afraid to show the pink table cloth. - I'm not afraid that I have two daughters under the age of 10. I embraced the feminine side. - Just to clarify though, this is your daughter's bed sheet, right? - Well, former bed sheet. - 'Cause it's not yours, she's out of door now. - I want that on the floor. - Door is done, she's seven, there's door is embarrassing now, so. - So Pete, and a chat said, you know, you guys, I hope you never change. I tried watching another AP and I tried, yeah, it might've been on YouTube. And I'm not gonna actually mention the other AP 'cause that would be mine. Because he said there was too much goofiness and crap and that they ruined it. You guys do it just right. - We get it all the way in the feedback, yes, in the pregame. - And the editing floor. - He said, I'm not just saying that. Or else we get rearranged. - Yes. - 'Cause he could go sit in another seat. Would you allow me footage Pete's guy? - I must've been bad. - You guys really tell a story, not just trying to show off with your belches and your dumb jokes and stuff. It actually seems like you guys are playing a game there for yourself, but also for the audience. And that makes a difference. I don't need to listen to people masturbating. Which, when I was reading that to you, my wife caught that and she said, what? I'm across the room. - You do what? - I know what he means. - Right. - Verbalie, man, I'm sure, is what he was going for. - And he said, I love your show. - Your show is closer to a radio theater than any other, and that is what I like about it. You guys actually tell a story. So, to Pete, we say. - I'd say, yeah, thank you, Pete. And I also think that he is somewhat right. Because, in a sense, not to pat our own back, just when he says that we-- - That says Verbalie masturbating. - Yes, no, that would be good. We are great. We are wonderful. No, that would be great. We are great. That we do it not just for ourselves, playing wise, we do it for the audience as well. Because we do, if we talk over each other, we stop and we actually repeat the sentence. - Where we heard what the other person said. - Right, exactly. So, I think we actually do have the audience, not to the forefront, but certainly in the back of our mind, what we're playing. So, I just thought that was a neat comment and wanted to kind of validate what he said, because I think in a small way, it's true. - We actually do. We had one additional piece of feedback, and this was from feedback@chiotianpodcast.com, which might put on the website. Looks beautiful along with that little Amazon logo, which is getting us tons of purchases through the Amazon link and we paid for this month already. So, thanks Mike for updating that. Great job. - As far as it was perfunctory. - Thanks Mike, great job. - But you're just going on to the next thing. It was just, it was totally perfunctory. - It's more not really a chance than Mike, but. - Well, the fact that he finally got me to move and I nudged and finally did it, and then it only took me 15 minutes to do one second. - Well, I'll have that help here. - I just didn't know all about an operation on here. - That's a great time, right? - Maybe if we have some excess funds, we could buy a new tablecloth. - Come on, this is pretty, I like this one. This scissor goes so well with World of Darkness. It's like trying to get that evil, horistic vibe. - Sure. - Yeah. Anyways, our feedback email was from Dan Scale who said, "Hi guys, I think I came to your podcast "looking for a dungeon world actual play and now I'm hooked." I wanted to understand the in-jokes that you guys kept mentioning while playing dungeon world. So, I went back and listened to your Dresden episodes. - Nice. - Being entirely new to both fate and the Dresden universe. Neutral ground was a bit of a slog to get through. - How cool is that? - I know, it's true. But I'm glad I stuck with it because holy crap delivery was fantastic. One of my favorite things to come out of the delivery storyline was your comparing Alan and Roberto. Was your comparing Alan and Roberto to Superman and Batman? The comparison really resonated with me. The fact that Alan and Roberto grew so much as characters to the point of sharing similarities with those iconic archetypes speaks to the strength of those players and the overall story. It's great to see how characters' growth can be driven by forcing players to make tough decisions and you guys do it so well. I just wanted to write in and say thank you for creating these stories, taking the time to record and edit them so skillfully and sharing them with us. Everything about Dresden was great to listen to. I find myself missing the feeling I used to get when I hear that intro music at the start of every episode. Dungeon World was a lot of fun and new manera is going well too. I especially love the new intro music and the background music that fades in when something cool is about to happen. I plan to go back and listen to the World of Darkness adventure in the near future but I can't wait to hear more Dresden. Thanks again for your amazing podcast, Dan Scale, Melbourne, Australia. - All right. - Oh, Australians. - Dan. - So, yeah. Thanks for the wonderful feedback. First off, second point would be, World of Darkness is probably gonna come the closest besides dungeon, I mean, like compared to dungeon world and new manera, World of Darkness become closest to emulating perhaps that feeling he gets from Dresden 'cause it's Dresden mystery versus World of Darkness horror and it's not that far away from each other as far as that goes. I think the characterizations, I think it can be very similar. So, you might enjoy that. - Yeah. I think you shall. - Well, if there is a comparison about Superman and Batman, I like what the new canon of the new Man of Steel movie that apparently Superman can stand next. So, I'm letting it be available for Batman. - So, fuck Batman. - So, I can snap a neck now, I'm just saying. I'm just putting it out there. - I didn't have a question about that. I mean, I know when we played that, you were very emotional in that playing it as a player as well as the character. That you did it mostly as role playing, but I think you were a little upset too as a player about how they ended that adventure. - I wasn't a little. I lost my cool. (laughing) - If you go back and listen to it, the part where I say it's a goddamn mystery to me why this is going on, that is the sign that I have left. - The building. - Yeah, I've left the building, or my character and myself have. - You've become merged. - You've had to have merged. - Your aggravation was. (laughing) - I was in the moment of the. - Yeah, my question would be, how do you feel about that now? Like all the listeners, not all of them, but many of the listeners say that was fantastic. And that's really enjoyed the drama that was involved in that. - At your expense? - Yeah, I mean, do you feel it? - Was it at your expense that you're like? - No more than I felt that was at my expense. - Well, no, I mean, it's a general. - I'm babbling. - Stop verbally masturbating. - I know, really. - I guess it's a combination of a bunch of different things. One, we had a plan that got knocked out, then we had to react and then come up with something on the fly, and then we were out, the credits were rolling, and then something changed. - And it was late at night, and you were ready to go home. - I was, well, that should not really-- - It should not, but it not. - Dude, but it was a factor. It was a-- - Sure. - 'Cause it's just like-- - The joke that we have around the table-- - But that's exactly what I was gonna say is, would you, in the past, where now you can laugh at the fact that the wolf tripped you, and you, you know, he tried to go through the woods-- - I don't think I've ever laughed at the fact. - He's never laughed at that. - Is there a point where now you can look back at that and say, yeah, that was good drama, or is it still bothering? - It still bothers me, because-- - Okay. - I just have a different-- It's really, in a way, we were not role-playing, we were kind of the storytelling aspect of even those early D&D days, where certain things I felt should have just been a given. And the way, like, for example, you look at the Lord of the Rings movies. How the hell is-- - He really is pissed, because he's talking about the wolf. I was talking about Roberto. - Oh, I'm sorry, I just told you about the elves. You know, but we're elves, and that's a whole other story. We shouldn't go on about that. - No, we're not. - The book where it says elves can't trip. (laughing) - Maybe show me the page number. That's all I gave. - Let's go ahead. - Have you ever seen it at all? How do I enjoy it? We'll get there. - I'm not. - 15 years, folks. - Yeah. - 15 years. (laughing) - It's not that I'm, well, I'm not mad about it now. I just, I hate being in conflict with an immediate group versus, there's external conflict of the goal of what we're trying, you know, the enemies that we're trying to fight and defeat. And then there's internal conflict where we can't figure out what we're gonna do for an hour, whether we open the door, close the door, you know, whatever, and then infuriates me. And then you open the door and then everybody wants to do something different anyway. - Well, and then things just take out a life of their own, so it's what's happening. - So they really answered the question. - Does it still bug me? We'll see when we revisit it, I guess. - I mean, I don't think you mean your character. So much. - It should bug your character. - Right. - It's a valid thing. - I mean, I think everyone agrees that Alan should be pissed off. And so it should, like, I wasn't saying John, I was saying London, you know, like, I should be pissed too, because I had the perfect ending wrapped up and Roberto went and fucked it up. Now, I was in conflict with Roberto throughout the story. It was really about Alan versus Roberto for a lot of that story. Well, we're both having the secret, Alan being the one, it's not about London, but I was not as a player, but as a character, I was pissed at what Roberto did. As a player, I thought, wow, look at that. That's awesome, because to me, the best stories are the ones that have twists and turns and have these stunning gotcha moments. And you could not, I don't think, as a storyteller, have written that gotcha moment. Because you know, you need your character. - Fantastic ending, you had very little to do with me. - No, but I mean, the characters have to and in fate make that occur. So I wasn't pissed at them at all as a person, but as a character, London was absolutely livid, but I can separate that. I think Mike had a little trouble separating that at the end, but I think that Mike doesn't enjoy the inner party conflict as much as some of us do. That's pretty fair. - Yeah, well, I also think that there is a lot of the problems that I feel are directed at my character more because of Alan as a character, or as the authority that he represents, the White Council. And we are, you know, once again, we're five or six different groups or factions trying to work together to achieve a goal. - But is that the most interesting stories? - I mean, Lord of the Rings, they had varying degrees of allegiance and you know, there were factions there. - And then true, and then they grew up. - They got off all Dresden books. There's factions, there's temporary alliances, there's one of the books. - I read two and a half of the books before I gave up. - Well, it's funny, I should mention that because in anticipation of going back to Dresden, I'm rereading Death Masks, which deals specifically with how Harry deals with denarians and the Knights of the Cross and what is, because technically, he's a human, regardless. So no matter how monstrous he becomes. - You can't hit him with a fireball. - I can't kill him with magic. - Sure. - I can kill him with a sword. - I can kill him with anything else. - No, but I think, - Just gave back to you over a question though, is I don't think he was asking if Alan was still upset with a burrow. I think he was asking if Mike was. Is that why he's reading it wrong? - No, I was just wondering if it still bothers you and you still add- - Well, there's, I mean, I've talked to you about it and I suppose I should have talked to everybody about it, but there's levels here. There's about four different levels of things going on. There's stuff that happens in the character in the event of the game. There's the stuff that happens with John as your son that I'm like, all right, you're his father. He's a younger man. And I'm like, all right, how hard can I go at this kid? I know that on one level there is the, no, it's all the table, we're all adults. Let's go at it. Then there is the weird way that I was brought up and there's just something programmed into me. The same way I laugh when I'm told to lie to cops or whatever is that I don't go after someone's wife or children, especially friends. And it's just one of those things where it's like, 'cause when the, actually the place where I really kind of flipped a switch was when he very loudly called me a coward and I had a moment where I'm like-- - Called Hell in a coward. - Well, I had a moment where I'm like, well, that's what I mean. - Yeah. - Did he, was that in context of my character? Or is that in context? - He's never challenging your bravery in an old playing center. - Well, character. - Right, so-- - But you're having a bad day. - Well, I'm just saying that in the context and in the motion of the scene where you're trying, 'cause this is a different storytelling where you're more invested in your, like it is, it's become a radio play. And there's moments where it's like, 'cause then I start badly like an idiot because I start to say something and then I stop myself because I just am that way. I'm like, I'm not going to say something that either will become insulting or I will regret later. So I will sieve and burn silently and remove myself from the situation as soon as I can without really saying anything more because I don't trust myself to speak fairly. - Then he goes home and kicks the dog. - Or a dog. - No, I won't kick the dog. - Did I think we could do to make you more detached from that? - No, well like you said, it's, or like was pointed out, I think that's part of, first of all, I don't think we should change anything that we're doing because one person feels comfortable about it. - Are you supposed to ask before we should change something we're doing? - If anyone procured it. - Would you have been? - If he uses your character's name as opposed to. - I think it would have held my context. But again, when you're in that moment, like I was in the same kind of moment where I was trying to decide how to save Donovan. And I could see it. - That was a very emotional scene, although it wasn't personal. Like you knew it wasn't me attacking you. - I think personally, from someone who's known Mike as we all have to varying degrees for a long period of time, I think it was a perfect storm of being thrust in a leadership role in a story that was meant to have us kind of drive in different directions and kind of have some inner party conflict. - Not to mention I'm sure, and you can obviously cut this out if I'm absolutely wrong. But I'm sure there was some out of, some real life, you know, actual life stresses that were going on there as well. And you come here and you're trying to relax and have fun. And here's this group being torn in three different directions. And there's a lot of emotion invested in that. And maybe, you know, it's late at night, you're tired. You know, there's just a lot of things that went into that one little burst where, 'cause you don't see you lose your distinction between character and yourself very often. So I think that was just a very unique situation. All of that can be cut it out if you're uncomfortable with it. - I just think it was a perfect storm of things going on. - I just haven't, really, I'm not a fan of horror. - And it might've been too that you have a feeling on why the way the drugs and the universe should work, 'cause you've read the books. - Sure. - And you like the books and you enjoy them. And then you wanted that to be our adventure and it's not. - There's not, Harry and his. - In the grand scheme of-- - There's more diversion. - I think we're encountering the same situation in Numenara. - There's more division within the group than in the Jurassic story. - I guess we're almost done with Numenara from that. So I mean, it's over, but the exact same thing happened in Numenara, where the external conflict became functionally irrelevant, because really, the whole story was driven by the internal conflict. - All right. - That's the way it worked out. And so my point is, I would like, just from my point of view, as we move forward, that if we're all working and growing in the same direction to defeat the, the antagonist that we're the villain that we're trying to go after. - Super nice. - Or we're gonna change the dynamic and we're always gonna be bigger and fighting amongst each other, which is okay to a point, because that is interesting. - It is. - And it's okay to be challenging your character and challenge beliefs and stuff, but at the end of the day, we still have to move forward and do the things and-- - There has to be the, I think the inner party conflict should be minimalized. - No, no, not minimalized. Just subservant to the external antagonist. It should still occur, because it's a very boring story if everyone gets along. - Hey, buddy, hey, how's it going? Yeah, we're all great. - Well, it's all hang out. - But kill this master, we'll go on to the next. - Yeah, exactly. - Then become-- - Then become dumb. - So this then becomes the-- - You just move on and get onto the master. - And there's no real conflict besides the rogue and the party who might be trying to sneak a few gold piece off the side. But I think that the inner party conflict is what makes it really interesting. But I think Mike's also right that there has to be an external force strong enough to keep the story going forward and everyone driving and rowing in the same direction. - A bigger picture, villain. Like, for example, there's cases in the Dresden books that you haven't read where his arch enemy, Marconi, or Marconi, is that the pair, you said? - Yeah. - And him have to unite to fight a bigger bad, right? And they don't like each other, they don't trust each other, but for the time that they have to work together, that is put on hold and they succeed at doing what they're doing, and then they go their separate ways. - At least speaking of Dresden, I saw that I was rowing in the same direction and I just thought it needed to end a different way. We went to take out the big bad. - I thought it needed to die rather than, I mean, we accomplished the same thing in the end. - Yeah, Scott caught me off guard by saying that you guys are in conflict in the entire story 'cause I don't think you were, unless it was behind the scenes where he has a-- - Very suspicion, and you're a warden. Okay, that's underlined. - He didn't know what causes my powers yet, but yes. - Right, but it was never even known to you so how could you be upset about it? It was just the ending that it really exploded. - Well, as I write down things that I observe and in the context of the game, so 'cause I have to keep track of who's the supernatural threats and who aren't. So Jim's behavior, whether he was a vampire or not. (laughing) - Apparently I escaped you. (laughing) - You know, or throwing a hell of fire or letting vampires-- - Well again, now is there's very less-- - There's very less than a residential area, which is still a favorite of them. - That was hit. - I know it was-- - Nothing new and super natural. - It's got in trouble now. It fits really fucking well. - Right. But I think it's also an authority issue. I just, no one likes the leader and no one likes to follow orders or-- - No one likes warden's. - No one, well, you know, it's funny 'cause as I'm reading the books about that very issue, you know, warden's have this known reputation and it's not a good one. They're seen as executioners. - Right. - And not willing to discuss or talk or anything. If you see one, it usually means you're about to die. - Catch a jury. - Yeah, they're tried to drag. - Yeah, we were ahead of group that got along and everybody with got along and-- - No, I can't-- - No, no, no. - In our recent history, yeah. - Scott said I wanted to be-- - Maybe an old Dungeons and Dragons group, maybe. - Yeah, but that's realistic as hell. I mean, if there's an adventure party that got together with half a dozen-- - Realism individuals who got along famously, I've never heard of them before as hell. - Yeah, we can do the own degree sometimes. - I don't think it would be in the sense that 'cause there's one of the adventures we've played in World of Darkness before. At one point, I'm like, you know, there's really no reason why I'd be around these people. If I'm role-playing my character-- - We're talking to the ones we didn't-- - The ones we did record and the ones we didn't. At one point, I'm like, all right, I'm totally aneffectual, I'm being haunted. - I hate all these people. - I hate all these people. I'm gonna go get a job somewhere in the South. You know, I'm gonna go over, there's plenty of sunshine and I don't have to worry about this old town. Bands, I would run in fear. I would time to get out of dodge. - But truthfully, I think we're playing pretty realistically. If you took a bunch of people that don't know each other and you threw 'em in this situation, they're not gonna trust each other. You and I trust each other because we're brother, we're siblings. - That's the role-playing part. You know, people have mentioned three or four times now that I've heard about it being like a radio play. And I think we're all trying, to a certain extent, you play your character. And I mean, does any of us in this table have any acting experience? - I don't know, I don't know. - I was in other than anyone's lecture. - No, there's one. I was like 12. - Great school. - Yeah, I mean, none of us are actors and yet that's what we're doing every week. - Well, a loose example would be going on a Boy Scout 15 mile hike. These are people that I don't associate with really and several of them I really don't like at all. But while I'm on that hike, we do have to kind of, we have to work together to accomplish some of these obstacles and get to the end of the hike. And so in a way, I agree. I think you should be completely different. Come with like those old Admiral Bird expeditions where people that survive in the wild are tough, they're resilient, they're very independent and they're fiercely so. But they also need to know when they have to work together and everyone pulled them up at the same time. And we can go argue about it later, but now it's not the time to argue about it. - Are we argued about it in combat so far? - I mean, I'm taking maybe an amalgam of everything. - Okay. - But again, then see, having this conversation makes me feel like somehow I'm a fulcrum of things aren't the way exactly that I want and I don't want that to be that. - Right, no, no, I get you. - I'm not a fan of horror and I never have been, even though I do like vampires, moral stuff, but that is okay, things on. - But so are you saying horror? Are you referring to World of Darkness? - Like World of Darkness. - Dressing as well. - I always consider dressing more of adventure, like modern day adventure way. - Even the game though, 'cause the game's a little different than the books. - Yeah, yeah. - I think you might feel differently after you've redesigned your character so you're not so much a glass cannon. - You are out of the verge of death all the time, because I certainly wasn't. And if your character was better or balanced, 'cause I don't really remember what it was. - Scott's major complaint is he never felt like he was in danger. - I don't think I ever did. - Well, that's 'cause he never put himself in danger. He was in a bodyguard. - He was actually sitting in the car as most of it. (laughs) - You're talking about Dresden? - Yeah. - Okay. - All right, well, with that, we'll just wrap up the feedback we'll get on to the actual episode. Thank you all for whoever used the Amazon link and, you know, you don't have to stop now. Keep using it. - You're a Christmas subscriber. - Any more shopping days left in the year? - Right. And Amazon will get that to you before Christmas. And you gotta get a December iTunes review in there, 'cause, you know, you want a month. - For Christmas. - Don't forget for Christmas. - It's Christmas. It's a Christmas. It's a KOTN crew. Oh, I did want to mention one last thing before we go on to the episode. And that was that we have a podcast. For those of you who are enjoying Nominera, I might suggest for you to listen to. It's a podcast called "Gium Intrusions" by Star Walker Studios. And they've only got about maybe five or six episodes, but it's definitely worth a listen to. If anybody's enjoying Nominera, give them a listen. We'll include their link in the show notes. - Yeah, he started out right in the basics of the first episode. - So you've listened to him as well? - Yeah. Good stuff. - It definitely is. And he's got a total of six episodes. And now that I check the feed. So give it a listen if you're enjoying Nominera. And we'll get on to the adventure then. - This is chapter five of the Nominera Adventure Sandswept. I am the GM Scott. And with me here tonight is. - I'm Jim. I'm playing Eshman, who is a Ms. Gonano, who works miracles and will someday be a super god and kill everybody. - Then we just kill them by a duck from happening. - Before he becomes-- - I'm glad to be seated up here. - I'm Tom, and I'm playing Tila, and intelligent Jack, who housed at the moon, and attacks party members. - Not the only one. - I'm Mike, playing Boz, a tough slave who fuses flesh and steel. - I'm Michael playing Nina, a stealthy Nanna who exists partially out of phase. - And partially in phase. - Partially in phase. - Partially in Boz. - I'm in phase. - I'm Thomas, playing Felix, a strong-willed Jack who hunts with great skill. - I'm John, playing Sig, a mutant Nanna who talks to machines. - All right, a brief recap of what happened last week, well, at least towards the end of the episode. You had decided, someone had spotted, I think it was, I wanna say someone rolled incredibly, it was Sig and Nina. - You did better, but-- - Right, but it was still two. - In the year old, 18, she rolled several on 20. And so you spotted what looked to be some potential ab humans or some type of humanoid type people moving from dune to dune off to the west, maybe less than an eighth a mile away. You then decided as a group that the more stealthy of you, yes. - Which way were they moving? - They were moving with you. So they're moving to the south and they were to the west. 'Cause you're heading south into the desert, deeper into the desert. So then you decided to have three of your party members try to, surreptitiously, disengage from the rest of the group, hide behind a dune on the eastern side of the trail, and then hopefully be able to somehow get behind them and thwart their ambush. What ended up happening was two of the three of you, very discreetly and stealthily, moved into position behind the large dune that is marked on this very rough map off to the east. Boz, with the help of Tila, trying to do some hedge magic, tried to disguise it so that Boz, since he's made half of metal, could slip unseen, taking the reins and driving the anean and the wagon forward. He tried to slip off and made a bit of noise and didn't do a great job of quietly moving into position behind the dune that the other two had already successfully moved behind, the others being Nina and Felix. So at this point, the caravan continues to move south slowly. It's maybe a couple hundred feet from you to the south. The three of you Felix, Nina and Boz, are safely ensconced behind this dune. The dune might be at the very top eight to 10 feet. It's not super high dune, but certainly enough for you to be concealed behind. As I mentioned in the past too, the road was getting sandier as you moved further to the south. When you move off of the trail and behind this dune on the eastern side of the trail, you definitely are stepping into deeper sand. Not quick sand, nothing's giving away, but you just notice that walking's harder, it's more difficult, it's definitely more labored, as you move off the path and into some deeper sand behind the dune. And that's where we're at right now. You've lost sight of the creatures that were moving to the west, we're moving to the south, but we're to the west of you. And they were following your pathway to the south. So the three of you are safely ensconced behind. The rest of you are driving the wagon, trying to maintain a facade of nothing's changed. - We might slow them over. - It tastes a little just so they can keep up with us, or we don't hate some too much. - Right, okay, so those of you who are behind the dune, is there an action you would like to take? Are you trying to crawl to the top to appear over, to see where those creatures might be? Are you trying to move to either side of the dune, to get a view from there? Are you gonna try to pretty quickly run from one dune to the next? What's the general game plan for you behind those dunes? That dune. - I say we should mostly hide, but when I can peek around the corner, I think I might be the best of that. - You'd probably be the best of that. However, I'm starting to think that maybe this wasn't so bright and we're splitting the party too much, and I feel that we should probably, let's scout quickly and then move to try to keep pace with the group that is heading towards the wagon. - Okay, at this point, I would like everyone to make some type of perception check. So I'm gonna say perception is an intellect-based skill, I'm pretty sure. If you have some sort of training, and it obviously doesn't remove a level of difficulty, and if your name is Tila, you get an automatic two reduction in the difficulty level, regardless of whether or not you have the skill. - I have stealth. Is that something like alertness? - It was good enough for me to remove one level. Your training's stealth, you have any specialization. - No. - It definitely qualifies what we're looking for here. The difficulty of this task, I'm gonna say is challenging. That's a level five difficulty, so it has a 15 as its target numbers. With the reduction of two levels, Tila, you go from challenging to demanding, so you drop down to a nine. This is not something that you can put effort towards. No one can put effort towards it because you either notice it or you don't. It's not something you could actually actively do in this particular situation. So if your name is not Tila, you're doing something that's challenging, unless you can reduce a level. - Ashman, level five, do you have any type of perception or anything to reduce that? - No. - Okay, so your target number is 15, roll. - 19. - Excellent job, which you actually have minor effect. So you roll very well. - Cool. - Tila. So you're down to a demanding, which is a nine. - I roll the nine, which is fortunately in my current state I have to subtract two, so I rolled seven, fail. - So you go down to a seven and you do fail, which is exactly how I didn't think would happen. Okay, boss. - Just a straight up roll. - Okay, 15. So one. - Okay, we'll get back to you. - Your half machine, it's not your forte. - But how did he get his head stuck up his ass? - I don't understand. - I think there's something. - Just wait, you'll see. - I'm talking about hitting it. You're the one. - You're the one complaining about a head stuck for your ass when you're trying to eat everybody, you're gonna start casting stones at me. - It doesn't look like a one knee, like I'd get some tip of all you get screwed. - Yeah, it'd be bummed by the whole guy. - It's a GM intervention, and I don't even have to give you an experience point for us. - There's no loot. (laughing) - All right. - Don't look at it. - I don't know if it's going to smile. - All right. - So Nina has stealth, which says ambush hiding and shadowing and sculpting, so. - Yeah. - Instead I get a minus. - Yes, so you go from challenging level five to difficult, level four, which is a 12. - 15. - Excellent. - Felix? - I'm going to use my flex skill to flex stealth. Flex skill allows you to become trained in one thing, and I'm trying to steal your thing. I just wanted to set it up so. - Oh no, you want to succeed. - Yeah, I want to succeed, and I want to be able to shoot from hiding at these guys because that gives me a significant boost. - Am I right out in front of you giving my one, so be careful. - What's going on in the middle? - So yeah, reduce difficulty by one, which means I need to roll 12. - 12, 'cause it is difficult. - And you roll badly right off the thing, eight. - And that takes us to six. - What do you got? - No stealth-based skills, or perception-based skills. - I have to use my level up to increase the score to have our preparing new manner. - I'm right. - That's what I was doing, excellent. - So you're 15. You need a 15 and you roll 89, is that correct? Okay, I'll start with Eshman, who's furthest away. There is some, almost as if it's at a decimal level that's below human hearing, but it's like there seems to be some kind of, something's from underground, some kind of thumping, or some kind of movement, or grading of stones together. Something is happening that there's a very, very deep, almost visceral, like in your body-type feeling of a slight rumbling you can feel from the distance. It's not the wagon, and it's not the anneal with its hooves clapping down upon the sand and glass of the pathway. - And I'm thinking back to the image of that lady holding her ears and the sand and the picture I was looking at, the someone I was looking at. - Coming around the table to Nina, who was the next person who succeeded, you too feel a deep rumble within your body. You don't hear it even, it's like you feel it, but the disconcerting part is right after you feel that, you're basically kind of against the doom, kind of hiding a bit, so you're standing, maybe you're even leaning against the doom, but at your feet, the sand starts to slide or shift away from you, so to the west. It's like, as if it's rolling off the dune and sliding further away, but you're not on the dune, you're standing in several inches of sand, but the sand is starting to slide, like it's jiggling and vibrating, and it's starting to slide off of your boots and heading off to the west a bit. Felix. - I'm on top of the dune. - You are. - I was just over the crest, I put all the way up, I was gonna see if I could see you guys. - No, you weren't. - No, that was no plan. - But that was the plan. - I don't know if I had time. - I said, what are you guys doing? Are you looking over the top or looking over the sides, and no one-- - They said over the side, I remember that, I forgot to talk. - Right, I just, yeah, I just get in here, it is all I'm saying, I would like you to be there, but I didn't hear it. So you did not notice it, so you don't notice the rumbling. Say you did not catch it either. - He has a sense for noumenera with a short range, that becomes active. - Right, and he did not sense, it's not noumenera based. - Did my minor effect give me anything? - Yeah, I didn't give you a minor effect. So let's give a minor effect. I wanna say that because you were able to shout out, Nina noticed what happened, but she was kind of mesmerized by the sand kind of going over her shoes, and Boz and Felix, who were totally oblivious to it, and Nina, who was not oblivious to it, but didn't think to warn them, she was thinking about moving herself quickly, so no one is surprised, whereas normally they would have been surprised. Except for Boz, because although you shouted out, he went, "Huh?" Because he rolled a one, so he is the only one that is surprised, and basically your warning helped Felix, but wasn't enough to rise above the one that Boz rolled. So what happens is everyone really can make an initiative roll. - Yay. - Going first with Ashman, what did you roll for an initiative, please? - 17. - 17, Tila? - Three. - That's very appropriate? - I should roll a five, but it's three. - Right. - Boz? - 20. - Whoa. - Not so appropriate, but-- - Snapped out of it. - Well, he spots quickly once you figure it out, what's going on? - For some reason, I just imagine that my isolate turned bright red, and I was in danger mode, so-- - Right, yeah, that's good. Okay, so it is kind of appropriate. Nina? - Seven. - All right, Felix? - Also seven. - Sig. - Eight. - Eight, and-- - High rolling, there's a guy. - Okay, Boz, you would normally go first, but you first turn your surprise, because of the one. What happens is the sand starts to fall away from your feet. You look to your left as you're standing against the dune, which is to the west, and two or three feet away from you, there's a sinkhole that's rapidly falling in. It's maybe about 15 to 20 foot in circumference, so the sand starts rolling into the sinkhole, Boz, you were standing on the edge, and you slipped into the sinkhole as the sand was moving, and you lost your balance, and you grab hold of something, and you lose this turn as you basically have one foot dangling over the edge, you're on your knee, and you're reaching onto some piece of shrubbery, basically, that kind of kept you from falling into the sinkhole as the sand kind of collapses in. - Does it shrubs up either really deep roots or no roots? - Right, this one has really deep roots we're gonna go with. What you can see as the sand starts to fall in, and the hole's probably, at this point, being eight to 10 feet in depth, as you see these spindly legs that look arachnid in, they're definitely round or sand color, so they're definitely furry or fuzzy. This is a very large arachnid, seems to have burrowed into the sand, and it's now bringing its legs or its appendages out. A quick flash, a quick view shows that the, most of the appendages that you see starting to clamor out, and in what looks to be like a long pointed, almost like a talon of some sort. That's about six of the legs, and the other two. I will see how you can, no, not quite a pincer. One long gated, like, for, almost for, is if it could be thrust straight into the carcass of its intended victim. The two in the front, which are the ones closest to you guys, do have pincers on the end of them. So the legs end in pincers. You can't quite see their body itself, 'cause the sand is kind of falling in on it, but you can see these appendages coming out these legs, and they look at least 10 feet, maybe 15 foot in length. Ugh, I hate spiders. That's what the creature did, is just basically started to burrow itself out, as the sand's collapsing in. But as you're hanging on, one leg dangling over the edge, as you see these large legs leaning towards you, and kind of feeling and sensing out as to where the prey might be, that it probably detected, maybe from the vibrations of your feet on the side of the doom. Eshman, you can go. You have no idea what's happening. You might hear a few startle cries, but that's about it, that all that you can hear at this point. - We're still moving, probably at a slow speed. - Yeah, you need still pulling the wagon forward. - Is it freaking out about this whole thing? - No, you're kind of unaware. - Yes. - Yeah, I'm probably standing up and looking back to see how they're doing, if I can, and scanning the area, trying to figure out what the source of this. - Right, if you look at the map, the way the dunes are, you don't really have a visual on them. - Do I have a visual on the sinkhole behind it? - You can, there's a small do next to it, but you could definitely see, maybe a little bit of sand moving, you don't know if it's a breeze or what it might be, but because of the way those dunes are positioned so close to each other, any angle of you looking back to the northeast, you're having a hard time really picking up much of anything. - I'm probably saying stop the cart. Something going on. - Okay, and that takes us then to Sig, who is at eight. - I'm not sure Sig gets out of the cart, he just kind of huckers down, thinking they might have crossbows and actively stretches his senses up to the areas around, which is something he has to do in order to be able to sense a new manera. - Right. - But in my travels here, at least seen ab-humans. - Yes. - Probably traveling with a group, maybe attacked by them. Do they typically run with ciphers and stuff? Use them effectively? - Depending on the ab-humans, it's definitely a possibility. - They're intelligent enough to do that though. - Yeah, I would say so. Again, depending on the type of ab-human they're-- - That's my logic behind it. - They're just raining my senses to detect if they're priming anything or sneaking up. - Good enough. All right, that takes us to either Felix or Nina where we'd like to go first. - I scream like a little girl and start running up the den. - Yeah, all right. That's climbing. And let's go ahead and make a climbing roll. - You trying to climb? - Yeah. - I'm trying to climb. I'm trying to be you. - The stand's gonna give away a bit as you're climbing, but it's a relatively gentle slope. It's only eight to 10 feet high. This is not a huge challenge. It makes it challenging the fact that there's working death nearby. - My scream is rotten, which both is a suggestion and describes what I'm doing. - Right, so I would say that this is, what would people can usually do this? A standard test, which has a difficulty level of two, your target is six. To try to clamor up to the top of this den. - Light, speed. - This is speed. Are you spending anything to bring that down or are you just gonna try to beat the six? - I think I will spend. No wait, I haven't had your one, so I've cost two here. - Exactly. - Oh, two. - Wow, you took it from a six down to a three. So in your panic, maybe a white-hot bit of fear came over you and you made it about halfway up the dune, but you didn't get to the top. You certainly, you didn't fail like in the sense that you're still standing where you were, but you're about halfway up the dune, which in slow motion. Unfortunately, right is still within probably range of the legs that are crawling out from the hidey hole that the spider was in. That takes us to Felix. - All right, the giant knot spider is between us and the dune or behind us in comparison to the dune. - There's a 15-foot sink hole there and then there is a large some type of arachnid or arachnid-like creature that is coming out of that. - Is it okay to assume I had my weapon drawn because I mean we were-- - Yeah, I don't have any problem with that. - I'm training climbing, I'm gonna try climbing the hill. - All right, so Felix, go ahead and make a roll. The difficulty target was two, you're trained, but not-- - Specialize. - And are you applying anything to it? - No, you can do it for both of these two. - Three. - Three. You can do it. - That's what Nina said. - Yeah, but you can do it for the chances of rolling a one or two. - Is that one in 20? - Oh, a 15. - There. - So I stand at the top of the hill and I'm like, what are you guys doing? I have an explosive, I wanna throw. - All right, well, you took your turn, obviously, you know, moving and climbing. So that'll be the end of your turn. That rolls back to the top, which will be-- - Oh, hold on. - Well, I need to go here. - You don't need to go. You're all tired and cranky, and your character is too. - Listening to my compatriots behind me and saying something's going on, I start to turn the wagon off the path and towards where I know my friends are. - The annean slows, obviously, for the turn and for the change in the texture of the wheel. - Oh, we all heard Nina scream, I wanna-- - My character is mentally sluggish, so she just is racking, and she turns towards it. - Bos, go. - Is Nina close to me? Like, she ahead of me-- - Now, real quick, Bos, in Ashman, it doesn't matter now 'cause they're separate, but because you both go before the arachnid, you could actually, if you were next to each other, you could decide who went first. You don't have to go an exact initiative order. But because you're separate, you're probably, at this point, a pike doesn't matter, so go ahead and take your turn. I just wanted to point that out. - I know enough about the desert to know that I wanna be out of this. - Oh, yeah, by all means, this is death staring you in the face, so, yeah. - I didn't make a suggestion, dude. - Ron. - Right. - That was a good one. - I'm going to regain my balance and climb out of this whatever winding pit as fast as I can. But if Nina is in jeopardy, too, I'll try to move and move to help her. - Try to draw a bit of a picture for you. You're at the base of this dune. You're hanging over its edge, grabbing on with one hand to some dry shrubbery that's basically holding you a lot. So you're at the precipice of a sinkhole that is expanding, it is getting wider. - She's by halfway up the slope. I mean, just digging herself. Actually, she's going more into the slope than she is going up at this point, but it's understandable with the fear that she must be feeling. Felix is sitting on top of it, reaching towards her, trying to backen her. So right now, yeah, you're the closest to the creature, and you're the one that's in the most peril. - And then in that case, is it better to move farther up the dune or to cut sideways and try to beat the expanding sinkhole? - It's your guess, and this is an instantaneous guess. - I'm not going to roll a dice to just make a spicy one. - No, I think that you've lived in the desert for most of your life. So I think that you would know the dune itself is probably safer than trying to go to the sides where there's just less sand. - I'm going to ring the engineering bell for full speed and-- - Right, clever. - You are going to be making a climb check like everyone else was. Your difficulty will be slightly higher because, again, of your situation on the precipice. - Okay. - So we'll say that, in this particular instance, there was a difficulty of two. We'll bring you up to a difficulty of, I like to read the descriptions because it helps me get a feel for-- - Probably a four. - Requires full attention. Most people have a 50/50 chance to succeed. That would be three. Four would be trained people have a 50/50 chance to succeed. So I'm torn between those two. I think I'm going to go for the four because of the fact that you're hanging over. If you were just standing there, I think that that lends itself to two levels of difficulty. This is going to be, though, right up your alley because I'm going to allow you to make a mite check as opposed to a speed check. And the reason for that is, you're going to use the brush, the plant, to pull yourself up and get your feet underneath you. That's more important than your speed is at this point, is your brute strength. - Okay. - So go ahead. How would you like to alter that role if at all? - I am trained in climbing and I have a mite edge of two. So that means I can-- - Well, you have a pretty one. - So you could put one effort into it and it would only cost you one bite. - Right, so that's what I'll do. I'll put one effort in my climbing sole to reduce it to by two levels. - All right, that takes you down to a standard difficulty level, which is a target number of six. - 17, nine. - All right. So you do manage to pull yourself up to the edge of the sinkhole and then you clamor up about halfway up the dune. So you're about even with Nina, but she's to your right, buzzes to your left Nina. And that is when two scythe-like appendages rain down on your backs as you're clamoring up the dune. So again, I don't roll, you guys roll. The difficulty level is difficult. Oddly enough, that's level four, as far as the challenge goes. So you're being struck by a level four and you need to avoid it. You need to make a defensive roll. - So in this case, how does armor affect this role? - Armor is only a last resort if you get hit. It absorbs the damage that would be dealt. It has nothing to do with your role itself. Your role, if I'm not mistaken, the defensive role is based on speed and you can alter it just like anything else in this game. - All right, okay. Do you have a shield? What are you doing? - Are you doing that? - It's an asset and all speed defense tasks that reduces it one more because it's an asset. - Now normally, to be fair, I would say that there's no way your shield applies because you're not wielding it, but because you're scrambling up and your shield is most likely on your back, which is exactly where the appendages coming down on, I'm gonna say it absolutely applies in this particular case. So two steps of difficulty removed for you, Basz. Sounds like you're using some effort, right? - Yeah, and so I'll use another effort of speed to try to avoid the siving of these spider spikes. 14, nice. - Okay, that's more than enough. So you hear the phoak and the deep grinding of sand is this long blade-like ending of its leg comes at speed and just misses your shoulder and drills into the sand and then the suction sound of it being pulled back out again. - That would be a cool sound. - Nina, you're up. One is also coming towards you. You happen to look backwards and see a black blur kind of coming towards your back. - Nina's adjusted speed is 13 and she's gonna go ahead and spend another one. She's got the edge of one, so. - So you take it down to a nine for you, Nina. So you cry out and try to spin to the side as this large blade-like leg heads towards you. Hopefully roll back. No, I don't like that dice. Can you not roll that big fat red dice anymore? What did you roll? - I think I'm priming it up to roll high 'cause it's-- - Oh, okay, three. - Wow, three and a two. - You're getting there. - Okay. - I'm holding it forward. - I'm holding it forward. - 17 more rolls and you're doing two at 20. - Yes. - Does it restart then or do you just keep rolling 20? - Nina, you take five damage from the scythe. Do you have any armor at all? - And that means your light pool is subtracted by-- - I get one armor, but never used it before, so I'm not sure how that applies. - What do you mean by one armor? Is it a-- - Of a ward that's always on it, it's possible. - Oh, excellent, then that definitely applies. It helps deflect the blade as it enters you. It misses vital organs a little bit and maybe it clips you in the side. So you remove four points of mite. - You have four left. - It's not very much. - It's not very much. - No, it's not very much. - No, it's not. - Now if this-- - Oh, it's not done yet. - If this creature has now scrambled close enough to strike us, that means I can strike it as well. - Yes, next turn you would be able to strike at it. What happens next is, and Nina, you probably have the best view 'cause you spun sideways and got caught on your side. I was saying, your right stomach area, right side area, got sliced and then the blade went into the sand and then pulled back again. So you're bleeding profusely from your right side, your armor, whatever you're wearing. Yeah, your diaphanous gown, excuse me, is-- - Is the blood phasing too? - I would think so. - It drips right through the sand. It looks really weird. - And what you do see is you see the spider-like creature clamoring to one of the sides of the sinkhole. So it is closer, the legs are closer. It's clamoring up. You see many eyeballs atop its central thorax and it has a maw of some type. You can definitely see it as it opens and there's looks to be like dagger-like teeth in there and then you hear a very high-pitched heaning noise come from its mouth. And everyone that is right there, anyone within short distance, which would not apply to the caravan group, needs to make a defensive roll. This is difficulty of four, so it's a 12-roll and it's intellect. - I'm trained in that. - Okay. - It comes with things from-- - Everyone next to that thing or all? - Just next to it. - Okay. - Am I within immediate distance? - Being on top of the hill and him being at the bottom? - I said immediate or short. - I know, I'm just curious. It matters for range to tackle. - Yeah, sure, with immediate distance now. Because what I'm going for is not just in socket sinkhole but the fact that there are appendages that are out and moving around, right? So I think you're within immediate. So 12 is what we're looking for unless you want to spend some effort, obviously, for the intellect roll. Bas, go. - I'm going to spend one effort intellect to resist this keening. - Okay, that takes you down to a nine. You spend three points of intellect? - Oh, yeah, that's right. Pretty much, just one. - Each. - That takes you from 12 difficulty down to nine. - 15. - Right, and you succeeded. Nina, are you going to spend any? - No, I wasn't, and I rolled a 17. - Oh, right. - I think I was screaming so loud that I didn't hear. - Good enough? - I'm trained in mental defense, so I felt I didn't need to spend it, and I rolled an 11, which knocking it down one step, bars only at nine or above. - Right, so you beat it by two. So all three of you succeed as this keening noise tries to burrow its way into your mind, and you're able to either through sheer terror or through other means, especially with Felix being trained in such matters, able to just basically distance yourself, focus on the task at hand, and ignore this noise. - The spider-like creature is now done, and that takes us to the rest of the group, which I believe starts with sick. - As we reel around, it starts to face towards the stone. Can we see the creature? - No, not at all. I think what you can do it, well, you can't see the creature. I think what you can see is probably the flash of a black appendage, and you can probably hear the low keening, or maybe just the hint of a keen, 'cause of the distance and the wind blowing and whatnot. So that's what you can see is the wagon starts, it's slow. - It looks like it works on the hill too, like looking down and... - Yeah, I don't see any reason why. Yeah, it sounds like it would be very doable. - My next section's hinge on whether or not this cart will be faster than me when it picks up speed towards this area. - I guess that depends on what Tila does with it. In general, a walking amine is about as fast as a walking human, but an anine going at a gallop across some slightly uneven desert is probably gonna be a little bit faster than you could go through sand. Wait, its hooves are made for traversing, right? - Then I'm gonna stick to the cart. Now I start flipping through my book of the area and bringing it to the creature section, where it's got wood cuts or different things. And I'm waiting for to get a clear view of this thing. - Okay, good enough. That takes us to Nina and Orphilex 'cause they're Tiat 7, so you can go to any order you'd like. - All of fire is my big old crossbow at this thing. - All right, I'm assuming you pull out the crossbow because you're probably clamoring up the hill without it, or that I wouldn't be able to clamor up while also holding it. So yeah, I'm going to take out my oversized crossbow and I'm not checking. - All right, go ahead. - You're perched atop this thing? I made it all the way down. - They do, yes. - We see you in the top of the spider. - Right now, not the spider. - That'd be cool. - Kill it. - That's the plan. - Kill it with a spider. - What are you aiming for? - I don't know, it's got a ton of eyes. - Yeah. - Figured I'd aim for those. - All right. - You put a thing's eye out, it generally likes to leave unless it has malicious intent and also intelligence. - 99 more eyes. - Actually, if you want to aim for the eyes, I'm going to say that it would be one difficulty level higher as opposed to just hitting the thorax itself. So your decision on how you'd like to handle that. - I'm still going to aim for the eyes. - Okay, if you recall, it was level four. So that was a 12 to hit, taking it up a level for the eyes that would mean five, 15. - Okay, now there's one more difficulty level because I'm using a crossbow bigger than I'm trained for. I have absolutely no way to work around that. - 618. - Yes, except I'm in immediate range and that decreases the difficulty by one when using a ranged weapon. - Back down to 15. - And I'm on a hill, which means I have higher ground, which reduces it another time. - 12. - And then I'm going to spend effort because 12 is still too high, I might miss a second. - And fifth. - Trading damage for effect, damage reduction. - He reduces the damage he does to what? - He will do too, it's really not important. - I'll be later. - You brace yourself on top of the dune, the wind is swirling, you place a bolt into the crossbow, you pull it back, you aim. And we'll say that two is really bad, but what ended up happening was one of the legs of the legs that are crawling up over the top of the edge now of the sinkhole. One of the legs kind of swept by accidentally and struck you and knocked you a bit off balance and your crossbow shot went high and wide above the creature and off into the sand. - Great. - I pull out the other crossbow. - The other crossbow. - He's got a smaller. - Well, that will be next turn because I don't think you can actually take the crossbow out this turn. Nina? - I'm going to attack. - You're not going to go up the hill first? - Half way up the hill. - You could borrow a crossbow. - Yeah, well, it's scared shitless now, I'm pissed, so. - Okay, I'm not making much sense, but I don't think. - Difficulty level of four, so 12. Anything to change that? Are you aiming for anything specific? Are you, you're just firing away at the thorax? - It's closest. - All right. - Stiletto. - Oh, wait a second, you are, you have a stiletto? - That is an arranged attack, you're jumping at it? - Oh, he's within immediate distance, so one of the legs comes close and you swipe at it with your stiletto. Okay, go ahead, and so 12 straight up 'cause I don't think with melee weapons, you don't get any advantage to being an immediate distance, you have to be an immediate distance. - How about a bum? - There's a benefit towards attacking someone with ranged melee in the same turn, I think they have to both hit. - Okay. - I couldn't tell you, just go without it, not really about it. - Now so much above in the sense that, I think that a lot of those legs now are actually above you, so you're not really striking, you don't have the, if you're striking, if you move it to the edge and struck down with the thorax, I'll give you that. No, you're not gonna move to the edge of it and stab down with the thorax. I would give you a one edge advantage for that, but I will, I mean, a one thing advantage, a one level advantage. Okay, so, thinking that it might be easier, you dodge between these legs that are flailing about, you move down right to the edge of the sinkhole, just then you see the eyes and the thorax kind of coming up over the threshold and you grab your cylinder with two hands and you drive it down into the thorax. So it takes it from a 12 down to a nine. - Nice. - Oh, 19, which is a minor effect. You know, how much damage does your weapon do? - Probably lighter than two, definitely like. - Yeah, it does too. - That's two, what? - Two damage. - Okay, so anyway, you can improve that damage. - It inflicts only two points of damage, reduces difficulty in attack while by one step, so fast and easy to use. - Oh, so you actually got another step decrease. - Yeah. - So it took it down to a six. You may, Nina, choose to ignore the armor of the creature or you can strike a specific body part, the eyes, you can knock it back, you can move past it or you can distract it, which gives an advantage for it, like has trouble from next turn attacking and doing things. - If I choose the eyes, am I likely to take out all the eyes or? - And then not all of them, but you doubt, I mean, of all the place you could think to hit it, that would be a really good place to hit it. - I'll go with the eye thing. - I also figured out the ranged and melee attacks. It's called high and low. If one character makes a melee attack or foe against a foe and another makes a ranged attack, they can coordinate their actions. As a result, if both attacks damage the foe, the difficulty of the foe's next task is modified by one step to extension. - Okay, so you missed, unfortunately, but had you hit, then next turn it would have been minus one step anyways, because of the high and low, the melee and the ranged attack, but unfortunately Felix got jostled during his attack. But Nina does not get jostled. She dodges the legs of the spider, moves right to the edge of the sinkhole and takes a stiletto dagger with two hands and jams it into the eyes of the spider creature, the arachnid creature that was just coming over the ridge of the sinkhole, the creature shrieks, takes the full two damage 'cause there's no armor in his eyes. There's literally a bank of eyes there. At least eight or nine of them, but you strike home and through a couple of them at least, and it seems to have all of them are looking at this stiletto. Now they are, it seemed to have a major impact upon the creature when you struck your stiletto into his eye. There's definitely was a shriek and it's shrinking back and falling back a bit from the damage of the attack. And that takes us to Tila. - I'm attempting to steer over here in a north easterly direction in between the two dunes. I'm kicking it as fast as it can go, I guess. - Right, obviously it's slightly dangerous 'cause you're still mid turn, but you definitely-- - I've definitely-- - Speed it up and I'll say that you need to make a roll to control the anene as it's galloping now or trying to gallop mid turn through the desert. - Strangely enough, my flex skill today is animal suspension. - Oh, how nice. - That was mine yesterday. It's a good thing to be a-- - That is really on point for this particular experience. I want to say that a train driver would have a difficult time doing this, which is a 50/50 chance. So your difficulty is four, which gives you a target number of 12. - Okay. - Now animal husbandry will take you down to three level, nine target number. - Right. And I'm gonna put a little effort into this, which I have an edge of one, so that it's two out of my pull. - This is gonna be intellect. - Of course. - Okay, making sure. So they are now down to two six, which is two difficulty, six target, and minus two to your roll, because you're-- - I hate to be surprised too, because I'm cranky. - Yes. - I had a bad day yesterday. I didn't get to eat anymore. - You're like enthropic. And I rolled a 10. - All right, you make the turn quite well. The cart teeters a bit as it hits the sand and kind of comes down sideways, and the wheels absorb the shock on the right side of the cart, and it kind of studies itself after jostling a pretty severe jostling back and forth. As a matter of fact, I'm gonna give Ashman and Sig and Ichabod to the extent, although he's not here, a roll to maintain their footing is going from the trail to the off road, if you will, has definitely added some challenge to him. - I was wondering, think about us, the one who was sleeping up on the guys who were sleeping up on us. Remember, there was a person behind the group? - Yeah, I'm not sure what Ichabod's doing. - So that's gonna be an attack until we're fully engaged with the spider, sir. - Thorin, man. - All right, so this is gonna be a speed check, and I'm gonna say that 50/50 chance for most people, and nine, as far as the target number, three for the difficulty level for Sig and Ashman. Go ahead and decide if you wanna put in the effort in that and go ahead and make your roll and announce it. So Ashman, go first, please. - I'm not gonna put in the effort in it. I'm just gonna roll. - You got a nine. Good luck. - Ashman, roll to six. - He's six, and this is gonna roll a little bit down. - Eight. - So both of you-- - I lost the wagon. - No, the roll wasn't terrible. - I dropped the wagon, definitely. - So you both just basically find yourself jostled. You drop your book, you lose your footing and you fall to your knees, or you might fall on your backside. Nothing else besides that. You just lose your footing and kind of lose your chance to see out of the wagon at this time. The turns roll on, and it takes us to Bas, who is midway up the hill. You see the arachnid recoiling. You see eyes basically being ripped open, green, viscous, fluid, basically. - Shooting out from its damaged eyes. It's just, it's quite the sight. - All right, since I'm still holding onto that brush that has the deep roots, I kind of wrap it once around my hand to make sure it's stable. - Sure. - I'm proficient with weapons, so I assume that I can draw an attack or do I need to take a-- - No, you're fine. - Okay, so I draw my broadsword and I thrust at one of these flailing legs, preferably the saber one that has caused so much damage. - Trying to damage the saber. - That's great. I was gonna say, you probably only can hit its legs because it's kind of recoiling back into the pit. So perfect example. Yeah, one of the legs is up. You said you wanted one of the piercing ones, and that one of the claws, correct? - We wish our leg is-- - You have ample opportunity. There's a couple of them floating about. - Oh good, I guess. - Speaking about, so. - Yeah, I prefer the one that's been hitting me, but-- - Okay, the one that hit you, it's still dripping, well, no, it missed you, actually. - You're right. - And so you pick out that one, you swing it, it's difficulty level is four. Your target number is 12 to hit it, minus any things that you-- - Okay, so I'm using a fighting move. That doesn't, a fighting move is just a fighting move. It doesn't bring it down. - The thousand says it brings it down, it does not. - Okay, to spend effort one costs me one. - To spend effort two would be, I believe-- - Because that's one of-- - Because that's three points. - Right. - So-- - That takes it down to difficulty level three, target number nine. - All right, I should be able to hit it with the money. - You should. - So I swing my father's broadsword. - Oh my goodness gracious, a two wanting. - Oh, no, no, no, no, in fact, I lose my sword. - No, there's no negative first sword. - No, no, no, no, no, oh, surely one. - So you swing wildly at, you've lost your footing in the sand is just it, you kind of brace yourself with the vine like thing protruding from the dune, but when you wound up for your attack, you kind of washed your feet slipped in the sand and your swing went a bit astray as the creature continues to retreat into a lair. - It's retreating. - Eshman, well, it's kind of moving back after the stab of the stiletto knife. - Okay. - Eshman. - We did it last week, but I want to remind Nina and Nina and Boz that I gave Boz a stem pill that gave him a bonus in physical challenges and Nina a retaliation module that you can clamp on your clothing and electrocute people that are attacking. - Okay, I did that. - You did that? - When? - In preparation for the drop that on. - All right, I got you. - So that probably should have happened already? - Real quick, Boz, you swung and missed and it was so terrible, your broadsword went flying into the hole where the spider's at with your two. - Do you have anything to pay that off? - Yeah. - Do you have any experience to pay that off? You can refuse it by giving me one or you can take the two, keep one for yourself, give one to somebody else who's done something tonight that's been impressive to you and take the GM intervention. - You have one. - Take it, Mike. - Yeah, I'll take the intervention, give this to you since you're the only one that's been hitting. - Well, who's you? - To Nina and then-- - I got more weapons. - Yeah, the broadsword slips out of his hand and goes end over end into the sand pit where the spider wears. - Does it sink into the sand? - Well, it's 10 or 15 foot downhill. We can really see it. This one plus there's a huge spider carcass there, so we'll just say it disappears. All right, that takes us now to Ashman who sounds like he may be-- - On slot? - Yeah. - I mean-- - Rain, short range of doing anything to this bug. - Is he within 50 feet of the giant knot spot? - Take a look. - At this point, I'm gonna say, sure, why not? I don't like your sight line though, Jim, because you see a dune, not the one right in front of you, but the dune beyond that. I'm thinking that's exactly in the way of where the spider's retreating to. - How many turners are gonna take us together? - You're gonna split those two dunes and be really close to your dune next turn. - I'm guessing they were only about 100 feet away. - Okay. - A couple hundred feet. - Just wanted to make sure I'm not wasting it. - No, not wasting your time at all. - I'm climbing to the edge of the cart. - You're picking yourself back up. It doesn't count, but in that-- - Carlin over to the edge of the cart, getting ready to get off the cart when I'm in. - Which side of the cart are you looking, are you gonna be hanging on? - I'm gonna be getting off on this side of the cart. - That doesn't do much for me. - At some point. - On the west side of the cart, thank you. - And getting off toward the dune whenever we get close enough. - You clamor back up, you pick yourself back up, grab the edge of the wagon, lift yourself up on the west side of the wagon as it's heading towards the spider, and make a intellect roll, please. Do you even get to know the whole thing, just roll? - 12. - Do you place wing thighs? - Yes. - This dune right here, at that dune right there, you see some type of creature come over the crust of that, and hopefully he has some type of bow-like weapon in his hands. Yes. - And for the audience, this one is way over on the west side, across the road from where we are, and probably 75 feet. - 75 to 80 feet away. - Pullman on the dune. - That's Ashman, and that'll take us to the spider. The spider retreats further into the hole, and there are two individuals that are within striking distance at this point. It's no longer within striking this dune view, it's back down, maybe like halfway into its hole at this point. So with two of its graspers, there's only two people who are close right now that would be Nina and Boz, right around the edge. Nina, much closer to the edge, Boz, pretty close to the edge, and it reaches with its pincers, the two that it has towards you, which is the only thing that really is in range at this point. Both of you will need to make a defense roll. Boz, you wanna go first? - Sure, is this a speed or might defense roll? - This will be a normal speed defense roll. It's gonna be level four, so it's 12. You probably don't wanna miss this roll, just a friendly. - Sure. - Well, I've got a shield that makes it a little bit easier, so I'll spend one effort to lower it. - To a two difficulty target number of six. - Okay. - All right. - Two speed points. - Three speed. - Two speed points, true. - 'Cause he has an edge. - Oh, he does have an edge in speed? - Yeah, edge in might and speed. - I didn't know that. - Two edge in might. - Right, 'cause I'm a glaive, yeah. - It's what you do. Okay, six are higher. - Best. (laughing) - Four. - So, the four is unfortunate. What is happening is-- - What do you do, Boz, go, hold on. You spend an experience point. - And roll again. - Yeah, I would expect-- - You were in this shit. - All right, I'll roll. - You did earn that shit. - Keep that though, 'cause you got another one. Remember, we just didn't give it to you. - At the start of the, from last week, you got an experience point. - Oh, yeah, I like it. - And then I gave you two more, but you gave one obviously to Nina. So you have two total. You're spending one to re-roll that four, correct? - Yes. - What a good decision. - Excellent decision. - Yeah, much better. - High enough to roll your shield up, and the pins are kind of grabbed either side of the shield and breaks across the front of it, gouging huge gouges into your shield, but protecting you from being pulled into the pit. - Okay. - Nina. - That's the target number then. - The target number. - I think it's plastic. - The target number is 12. The difficulty level is four, just like it was when you got a spirit. It's the same attack, but with a different appendage. So you can spend an effort to bring that down to nine, but you don't have a shield, I don't think. Do you have some kind of electrical device or something that's supposed to be like that? - Yeah, but it only protects them from damage. - It was an armor spike, wasn't it? - Well, I don't think it protects them from damage. It causes damage to the other side. - It causes damage to the damage. - Well, I should have known that when she was sliced, so what kind of damage does that do? I'll mark it down. - Electrical? - One per hit. - Okay. - That's only when it's active, or something like that. - She had it active. - It's not a one-time use? - No, it's for the foot. - It'll-- - Well, yes, it is a one-time use. The entire bout. - Okay, so go ahead. Are you spending effort to take it from a 12 down to a nine? - I think I must. - I think you must as well. So that is its speed, which is right up your alley, so it either costs you one or two, depending on how much edge you have. - You got a measure of one. - So it costs you two more speed. You need to make the roll target nine. - 13. - 13. So this is a case where you literally dodge the attack. To be fair, this spider, for like a better term, has fluid in its eyes that is spreading all over, distracting its vision. And it's also reaching up and over the side of the sand dune, and kind of grasping, and you're able to just backpedal onto the, a little bit onto the dune and avoid its grasp. So luckily, neither one of you were pulled into the sand pit, and that will take us then past the spider to Zig, who is first in line. - So there's a guy like 100 meters on that ledge, and-- - I wouldn't say it's 100 meters. - I would say it's more, it's more like, is this short range? - 35 meters, maybe 30 meters. - Okay. - He's maybe about 90 feet away. - This is an range. - This is short range. - Okay. - Zig jumps up to the western edge of the cart, and spots the Wilman, the Eshman, called out. - Yes. - And he uses his esoteric push to shove the guy down the back side of the dune he's on. - Ah, okay. - Nice. - And that succeeds automatically. This poor lonely ab-human has no-- - Well, you definitely, you push a creature object at an immediate distance. The target must be your size or smaller, must not be affixed to anything, and must be within short range. - Okay, that's good. - The push is quick. The force is too crude to be manipulated. For example, you can't switch a lever or anything like that. This is an action. It costs don't take points, it doesn't do any damage unless-- - Sure, that's right. - It gets into some spikes or something. - Yeah, he looks as if he's been punched, he doubles over, looking like he got the wind knocked out of him. It's tough to tell, again, what it is. There's definitely, the facial area is dark, and it's not human. You definitely see, like, it's just the shape is not human, but at this distance, it's really hard to tell. It's also covered in various cloaks and rags. So you see it double over, it's been punched in the stomach, and it rolls off the dune out of your sight. - The way you've played this before, I used it on something larger than me, and there was a reciprocal force on me. - Yeah, no reciprocal force this time, because it is your size or smaller. - Okay. - Great. - And that takes us to Felix and Nina, who are now tied. You guys can go in whatever order you wish to. - Stay still down the hill and do something about that. - The only way you could strike at the forex of the creature or the eyes would be to literally jump on top of it inside the hole. It's a good, almost 10 feet down, or with a range weapon, or you can attack one of the legs that are still above, just barely above the edge of the sanding. - Running up to the top of this. Just short of the top of the dune. - Okay, go ahead and make a climbing roll again, please. - It's a level of two, which is a six, the target number you're looking for. - Yay. - All right. So Nina, thinking the caution is a better part of valor here, decides to not swipe at one of the legs and do further damage, but to scramble back to the top of the dune. - I actually want to close the top so I can look over it, 'cause I hear something else is going on. - Right. - And I'm wondering if that's not the next thing to worry about. - To go wrong, Felix. - All right, I heard the warning. I figured this creature's done. We've cut out a few of its eyes and slapped it silly. - Yes. - It's probably gonna run away unless it's intelligent and has malicious intent. And if that happens, it's got a nice chew toy. - Right. - So I'm gonna pay attention to the other problem we weren't just warned about. - The ab humans coming over the bridge. And well, I'm going to try to hide and reload my oversized crossbow so that when they come over next time, I can get a bonus for-- - So take three steps down the dune, kind of slide across the stand as you kind of plant one leg to stop yourself from the slide. Then you pull out a, is it an arrow, or is it a bolt? - It's a bolt. - It's a bolt. - So you pull out a bolt, put it in there, and you have to make a mic check to reload it to pull back the-- - I don't think there's any role that you have to. If it was under duress, I would be okay with you doing that, but there's no practice right now. - Yeah, I don't see any major duress right here. - And then conceal myself. - For someone who spent his life hunting and tracking, I think that's fine, just to reload this turn and move an immediate distance down the hill. - Right. Can I conceal myself as well, just pull my-- - Well, you are, you are concealed because you're on the back end of the dune, unless-- - Are we side by side more or much? You're looking over the top or the side, or-- - Yeah, he was on top. - I slid down a bit so we have to close. - So he's basically at your feet right now. His head is at your feet as he's kind of hidden down on the spider side, if you will, the east side of the dune, trying to hide from what he believes to be the ab-human tribesmen to the west. And that would be Tila at three. I'm gonna assume Tila that you look to the west really quickly when you heard shouts from inside the wagon. So you're aware that there are some ab-humans that are attacking to the west, or maybe potentially attacking. You have no way of knowing that the spider is no longer correct. - No, I don't, and my primary concern is my brother. So I'm going at double speed this way, which is a northeast, which hopefully will also put this dune in between us and-- - And ab-humans? - Ab-humans to the west, and coming about as far as I can, which is probably somewhere in this neighborhood. - Yeah, that looks about right. - Which is, I don't know, 25 feet or so from where the worm would be in all this. - Yes, I'm gonna make another role as far as handling the anene. You were able to steady the wagon, but there are dips and crevices-- - Yeah, it is off-road. - Rocks, and you're going at double speed of the anene. So there's only, yeah, it has to be a role. I'm gonna go ahead and again, give it a difficulty of level of four, because trained people would have a hard time in this particular instance. So that would be a target of 12. - Right, and I have animal husband tree, which takes it down to nine. - It's the target number of nine. - And I foolishly believe I have this under control now, so I don't spend any effort. - All right. - The spider's still in the circle more than that? - Yes. - 11, which minus two is nine. - You did have another control. So you're able to keep the wagon upright, and the anene, not having snapped off any of its legs. The way the wagon is behind the anene, they don't, again, don't have a good view. - Nah, 'cause you're starting to get a view. - There's another dune in the way. - But the anene is also a tall creature in a distance, you know, in it's in front of you. So it is blocking the view of the hole. So you might catch a quick flare of a brownish sand colored spider leg, but that's probably all you could do at this point. 'Cause if you go towards a dune, you got that little dune in front of you blocking, yeah. - I got a picture of seeing the hole, and then just, you know, every once in a while, a little something flying in. - Yeah, I think that's a good. - Well, is it a hole, or is it claps back in when it retreats? - As of right now, it's a hole. - Okay. - Will it collapse back in? It'll probably do this. - My point was, I don't know if I could see the hole. If I come around the dune and I don't see a hole, I never knew there was a hole. I never knew there was a hole. - I think probably ride right over the damn thing. - Right, no, I think you could, I'm gonna say that you could see, 'cause that hole is a little bit bigger than that, 'cause it's stretched all the way almost to the edge of the dune. So I'm gonna say that you can see that there is a depression. - Yeah, I just met, if I come around this dune-- - A serious consequence. - What I would try to do is pull as close as possible to the dune so they could jump on, which wouldn't lead me right across the hole. Because now you know, right, yeah. Then I'd like Tila to make a role, intellect role, please. - Oh, good, any adjustment. - Nope, just go ahead and roll. - Just rolling. - You're a busy girl. - I am, I roll nine, which is seven, by the way. - Right, 'cause I suck. - Nope, nothing happening. And this is the end of the turn, and you are unable to see that, to the east of you, which is opposite the ab-human, to the east of you, crawling slowly atop this dune, and then there's another dune over here. Crawling up here are two dark forms of ab-humans crawling into position, but unfortunately, you did not see that as you were busy controlling the Indian, the wagon, as the ambush seems to be closing in about you. Which end is this towards? - The east, the opposite side. - That's why I didn't get a view of it. - Exactly, you guys were looking off to the west, the one that you saw, and it pushed off of the dune, and missed the other ab-humans coming from the other direction. And we'll stop it there, but metagaming wise, this is a completely separate group, it's not the group that was over there, they didn't somehow magically get over the other side, they actually were trailing you on both sides, you didn't see the one side, you saw the other one. And so now the ambush was coming together. - My intent is to pick these guys up and go north, away from this, because ambushes don't work if they have to chase after you. - And they'll be in the open at that point, so that's what I'm thinking. - Six next move was going to be to grab a handful of sand, run up to the spider, and push it into his eyes. - You're on the back of the line. - Distracted, and we can try to get away. - It's going to leave, you don't have to run down. - And you're on a wagon moving at breakneck speed. - Well, you don't know this yet, but you do metagaming wise, it has slipped about 10 feet down into the hole, and it's just attacking above kind of almost randomly, 'cause its eyes are filled with that viscous fluid from the couple eyes that she stabbed. - Okay, it's already retreating. - So, it seems to be retreating, and at least, regather itself, or maybe even retreating entirely from the battle due to the really nice- - Take these lasers. - Stab out of time. (upbeat music) - Thanks for listening to the Knights of the Night at Actual Play Podcast. Visit kotnpodcast.com for more information on this and other adventures, where you will find character stats, photos, storytelling, props, and even a form for comments and suggestions, where you could email us directly at feedback at kotnpodcast.com, or contact us via Twitter, or leave a message on Facebook. All music for this podcast was created and performed by Zen Audio Smith. If you'd like custom professional music created for your podcast or business, please visit ZenaudioSmith.com. And please, join this next episode for more mystery and adventure. (upbeat music) - Hello, how are you? (laughing) - What are you doing? - Ashman, baby. - I came in righty, baby. - I'm gonna talk to machines. No, that's damn it, fuck it. - Are my mouth goin' animal? - One more. - I'm Jim. - I'm Jim. - I'm Thomas playing a shit. - Well, chocolate, you asshole. (laughing) - That's the chocolate, it burns. - First year, the octopus is me. - Just real quick, give me a little insight. We're at home and he's editing. 'Cause he's just like, I imagine he's got headphones on, he's listening, he's just barking out, he's like, God damn it, Jim, you're a cracker. John, you're eating him. God, I'm just bubbling about some stupid butt again. (laughing) - He's so accurate. (laughing) - I'm just gonna give it to him, 'cause they need to fucking know, they need to know. - I'm just gonna say that too. - You're sitting there with the headphones on, just goin'. - God damn it, he doesn't actually shout, because other people are in the room, but he'll pull you over every once in a while and say, listen to this. - Listen to this, I don't want to hear it again. (laughing) - I know it's the sound of- - This is a new one though. - Sometimes it's like five minutes. - No. (laughing) - Listen, listen, listen, all the whole thing. - 150 episodes and he still can't figure it out. (laughing) - You know that one? - I think he said that too. (laughing) - I think he said things like that as well, yeah. - He's gonna have to take everything you cut out, put it in one long audio file and release it. - I would never do that to our fan. - Not our fan, just lay on the phone. - Oh, that would be a good April Foolster, just email it. - Or we'll run away soon. - I'll try. (beeping) - Meen T-Lucks, excuse me. (beeping) - You said, "Can I stop the fan group?" - You said, "Fuck no." - Fuck no, fuck yes, fuck no, just fuck. (laughing) - What in reality you made? - Get the fuck out of my name, fuck. - I don't give a shit, Jason, go for it. (beeping) - The world of dungeon was a lot of fun and human error is going well. - Dungeon world. - Yeah, you're right. Newman and Newmanair. The world of dungeon, the dungeon of worlds, (laughing) - Okay. you like it in it. The dungeon world was a lot.