The gang gathers together and start to compile a list of what they know and where they should go next.
Allan makes a rather strange suggestion on how they can find his missing mentor..
Actual Play begins at 8:19
Knights of the Night
KOTN Actual Play Podcast 68: "Delivery - Magic Ain't Pretty"
[Music] Hello, and welcome to Night to the Night actual play podcast. This Dresden file story, delivery, was written and run by your GM Tom. And now, please enjoy Episode 68, titled Magic Ain't Pretty. [Music] Before we get into playing, we have a little bit of feedback. The first bit was, I got a message in Cantonese last night. I'm guessing it's Cantonese. Because Google didn't translate it as Chinese very well. Could be Mandarin. We know somebody in China right now. Right, it's one of our former players, Melissa. I don't know if she sent it to me by accident, or if, because I'm high. I don't know what the hell that means, and Google doesn't either. Because it was a string of Chinese characters. Well, it was actually an English alphabet, but you can throw it into Google Translate and say, tell me what you think, and they take a shot at it. Google didn't have any clue, and I didn't, and they didn't have a Cantonese. They had a traditional Chinese, and it didn't. It was Mandarin, not Cantonese. Is it Mandarin? I think, well, I don't know, but there's Cantonese, and then there's Mandarin, and they're both. Mandarin is a common name. I think Mandarin is what is considered Chinese, and Cantonese. But Melissa was studying a particular language, and I knew it. Of course, she had to go with the more esoteric of the language, and that was Cantonese. At the very least, we want to say hello, Melissa. Neen, how? Very good, Mike. We all say what? That's quite good. Very good? You've had conversations before, David. With Melissa. Cantonese. Chinese. Chinese. Mandarin. We got one email from our feedback at qotnpodcast.com from Terence, and the subject was "loving shitlock." I don't care. Right. I tend not to love shitlock, though. Wow, yeah, and he says, "I was randomly searching for actual play," in quotes in iTunes yesterday, and happened to come across your group. You got me through a very dull Friday. I'm sporadically playing in a group that's World of Darkness based, but in the GM's own world. So listening to you all is helping give me a better sense of the World of Darkness mechanics. It was bees in Benjamin's garden. Looking forward to listening through shitlock and going on to delivery. Thanks from Terence. Well, thanks, Terence. We always appreciate that. I like somebody who goes all the way back to the beginning and listens. All 60 of our episodes. Absolutely. That's really cool. And, you know, I'm glad he gives him a different perspective on the World of Darkness because everyone can play differently. But it's good that he's getting some of the mechanics from it because we kept a lot of mechanics in on that first podcast. I'm sure he'll enjoy delivery as much as he does shitlock and hopefully shitlock. But we'd even better for him as he goes deeper into the story. Yeah, I'm not sure exactly how far he's gotten into it so far, but it is a good story line. It was a lot of fun to play, that's for sure. Our second bit of feedback is from our friend Rocket. From the first. Oh, Rocket. What was Rocket having to say today? I am really enjoying the dressing game and I like the different character aspects from the introduction. To answer Scott's question, I am springing the bees as a resource for the Vampiric Prince of DC. And the Theo, Theo, not Chrissy. Perhaps Rocket, I'm sorry, I don't know if it's a misspelling or not. Allies that he has to produce weapons to gather information for the vast, sabot conspiracy that the Karen of Great Falls, Virginia has to battle from their rural base. I might run a hunter game in the same setting with the Bee Spirits as the focal point for the story. The detail and planning that Scott did for this game will allow me to seamlessly use the Bee Spirits in the old World of Darkness as corrected animal spirits with vain influence. The Bee Spirits may also be inhabiting a vampire or two on the sly to their own agenda. Well, there you go. That was in regards to the question you asked, if you ever used it. I had posted that question to him and I appreciate the feedback. Rocket sounds like an interesting take on our story line and I hope it works well for you. We appreciate future updates as your story evolves. Our last two pieces of feedback are iTunes reviews. Two of them, both of them five star. Are they for Dresden or shitlock? Well, here's the first one, Sean. Terence says, "Can't rate this high enough. I need at least a couple more stars to rate this properly." The recording is awesome. The characters are phenomenally crafted and everyone brings their own unique qualities to the game. I was caught up on all my usual actual play podcasts and desperately needed something to break up the crowd of a very dull work day. The podcast was my salvation. Thanks, KOTN. Hey. I can't pronounce six exclamation points. That was the same Terence from before? I believe that is exactly the same Terence from our feedback. Thank you, not only for the feedback, but for the review Terence, because the reviews are always helpful. And the five stars. The more we get, the more we pop up in searches on iTunes, so it's kind of important. It's a good thing. Thanks, Terence. And the last bit is another five star review from iTunes. From? I just listened to your Dresden stuff and it picked my interest in the system. I've been listening since the single digit episode. And one thing I've loved was the ambient sounds and I loved the storm sounds in the latest episodes. Excellent. Well, thank you. Draghi. Draghi. Draghi. T-R-A-W-G-Y. Draghi. Okay. Draghi. Thanks for the review, Draghi. We're glad you enjoy the Dresden storyline. We're having fun playing it as well. The production of adding to them has been really, really nice. Although it's kind of weird because in a way, you played it for us to listen to as we play. As players. As players. To play with it, which really was helpful. But, you know, when we edit and cut it, it's hard. It's hard. And that's actually why I get it. I think when you've got a song going along and you hear chunks of it cut out because someone's coughing. Or someone says a particularly long hum or somebody sneezes or knocks over a cup and all the hell breaks loose. Whatever the case, it gets a much more flowing and natural sound to do it afterwards. But the nut takes from the player. Since I've been hearing such positive reviews through the podcast about the wait times handling the ambient sounds for the Dresden series. That maybe I will just use very small doses of the, you know, to set the mood for the players. During the game. But not let it go on for 20 to 25 minutes. Just a quick 30 second to one minute snippet to allow you guys to feel the mood I'm trying to project. And then play the scene out as opposed to, you know, three hours of sound loop going on right on again. Yeah, if I ever do a sound loop, it's at a very, very low level. And it's only to break up and cover these scruffles of cups and, you know, those types of noises. And it also has ambiance, you know. When you're in a bar that has jazz, then you want to do a little bit of jazz music. But that's about the only reason. One last piece I forgot. We did have something from DJ Allen on Facebook. Mike up. Oh, okay. On our Facebook, DJ Allen says, I finished book three of the Dresden files. The first book I've gotten all the way through. And while I do, true. And while I don't really think I've grasped anything extra from listening to you guys, I do have slightly more appreciation for the game now. Keep it up. Those first two books are abysmal. And I think we've all mentioned multiple times in book three is where it starts. Where the series has started. But anyways, with that, we will wrap up and we'll get on to our play session. So, there's a blast. You can see that that dip a bit, but it keeps going. We are out of combat. Badger. As... Allen, fly after him. I don't have the ability to fly. Well, I suppose I could cast a spell to fly, but... It's never worth it. Then you have to land. It's a big mess. That's not going to be the hard part. Put this on the ground. That most definitely will happen. As Allen is in the room, the office. Well, I am wearing it here. Absolutely. I'm thunderstruck that this homecoming has... Has not at all been nice and good. And I'm trying to determine... Well, I guess this room looks like a windstorm happened in it. I can't. Well, I dropped the spell or whatever residual of it. And I'm going to start using my senses to look around. I mean, first of all, does it look like William's old office or has this also been cleaned out? No, this looks like William's old office. In fact, he was a bit of a slob. Yeah. And there are stuff... Well, now there's stuff all over the place, but even before, when you first walked into the room, either... Meghan had been ransacking it and throwing things around, or he was being his typical slob. And you can verify that by going in the room behind it, which was where it was all of his files. She was originally in the receptionary, right? When she attacked Maxwell? No, she was in the office going through his desk. This is information you get from Maxwell as he comes back in. She also is pissed off that the other vampire got away, but... Guys, can you inform us off? He informs you that. What do you think? I catch people who run away, and he can fly. Next time we were fighting people who could fly. Don't detain and kill Gordon next time. He informs you. Maxwell tells you that when he came into the office, she was going through the desk. So what's next? Now, do I remember anything about William Donovan having concealed compartments in his desk? Or would that really be where he keeps key information? Does he have a safe or kind of like either a lab the way Harry Dresden kind of did? Or like a track door? Or would he have a special space that he would conceal things that as the robin to his Batman that I would have full access to and remember? And I'm willing to roll a lore. And I guess spend... Well, I don't want to spend my... I can't talk about it. (laughter) I'm gonna make him up because I got to apparently fight vampires now. Can I get back to fighting dogs? They were really doing great against the dogs. (laughter) I didn't get to shoot anything. One background. That's a great... Somebody hit it. I have a great lore because I try to remember... Bill. Thanks, boss. Bill, Bill, Bill. What have you... What has been going on here, man? Well, you do recall that he had a lab underneath this building. Okay. And that the entrance is in the file cabinet room. There's a trap door, and then he read down to his small... As I recall, there would probably be awards of defense or protection or concealment on it. Are they A-active? Which, if they're active, that might be a clue, or that it might tell something, or if there... Is there anything like they've been messed with or disarmed? Okay. So you're convening with everyone in the file cabinet room and taking a look at the... Take a look around. I'm kind of still torn. I mentioned to Maxwell that not only did you not catch that person that you were running after. But I know who the woman was, or at least I knew who she used to be. And she was the daughter of the person who's office this is. I thought things were changing, Cleveland. A lot of things. I'm pretty impressed that you chased off the vampire by yourself. You know, that's a good point. That's a good point. Not one, but two. And they didn't exactly get hurt, or we didn't force them off. They just wanted to get out of town. Like, they don't want to be... I have a feeling that they're not 100% full power. Otherwise, I think they would stay around and try to take us out. Maybe it's close to morning. No, it's actually... It's midnight when we got here. No, that's a good point. But they should have napped and so easily scared off unless there's something else going on. Whatever they're looking for, you should try to find what they were looking for. Oh, okay, sure. It's usually done. Oh, yeah, of course. Can I please find whatever it was that they were looking for? Yeah, just make a roll. Yeah, that'd take a long time to set up my thaumaturgy. Oh, you know what? I don't want to find anything. This is the sky. There's only so much more. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. I want to go see what they might have been trying to pull out or what files they might have been looking for. And they might have been looking for. Sure, investigation. I'm a soul. You're smoking? Yeah, I'm smoking. I got it wonderful. Great. What am I supposed to do? First of all, after the battle's over, everyone that has any kind of mental or physical stress that disappears. I don't think any of you took any consequences, so that's fine. Okay. So you're a criminal. I am. Trust recovers. You look at the desk and you're trying to determine maybe what she was looking for. It's hard to tell. You don't know what kind of person William Donovan was. But you get the idea that he was a cluttered and messy individual. And it doesn't look like she had much time to go through his desk. So you can't really figure out her mindset of what she was looking for. Drawers are open. One of them is spilled an upside down and it looks like some of the things are kicked about or pushed around. But you're not sure what she was looking for. Question. Do I remember Bill Donovan as being meticulous and orderly and looking at now I could maybe see a state of... He's become this slob apparently. Or did I always know him to be kind of a slob? You know him to be a bit of a pack rat. Okay. But he was a messy pack rat. A little neater than this. Okay. So there might have been some deterioration going on where he was just getting worse because the back room, it is a mess. Well there's certainly no computer files or anything like that to worry about. How about trying to figure out what cases he was working on last? He's job he's working on. Whatever. Sure. I mean I look at his desk and I'm going by how I remember him doing his work. I look in the spot where his latest information would typically have been. Okay. I want to help him out. Yeah. Give me, I don't know who wants to do the investigation and who wants to assist her. If this is investigation, I'm really not good at true investigation. So you can tell me where to look. Right. He's better at investigation than you are. So what could you use knowledge of Bill Donovan to give him an assistance? Well I could say that Bill liked to keep his top right drawer where all the currents, whatever he's currently working on, he would always put in this drawer. Or I would give him some other clue that some other behavior or I think you would have a fair chance of having good knowledge on how to help him. But what skill are you going to use to try to reach that fair? Would Law account as a memory or as an employee? Let's go with the scholarship maybe. Unfortunately I don't have scholarship. There's a plan concentrating on figuring out what he's looking for. How about this? A lot of time has passed since I've dealt so maybe Bill's become more of a stranger. But how about if I go with my investigation or empathy skill to try to share reading people. I could say empathy would work. All right. But it's not my best so I'll do my best to contribute to... You need to say fair result. Then why would I call it fair result? I always have to roll. All right. So I get a good noise. I get a fair result. So your empathy would just average? Yeah. Okay. So you do manage to remember information that will give admin a plus two. Give him a minus. Oh, he just... Which gives me a superb? Well, you are a good investigator indeed. Edmund does find a log book, something along the lines of a ledger. Don't open it. That has some events that are as recent as from a week ago. And they mention two people in particular. One of them is Orion Nelson, an appointment with Orion Nelson. And the other is a Sarah Lemons. Lemons. L-E-M-M-O-N-S. Lemons. We're going to begin please. Sarah Lemons. Sarah L-E-M-M-O-N. Oh, I'm Jello. Sarah Lemons. Going on. The note with Ryan Nelson mentions a meeting. The entry for Sarah seems to be not a particular meeting, but like surrounded by question marks. Yeah. So I recall any type of symbology that he might have used or any type of ciphers or symbols he might have used to code his log books or maybe give emphasis to certain things. It's been a while since you've done with him, but you know that he tended to be a bit of a doodler. And you see around the Sarah thing a lot of indication of frustration and uncertainty. And around Ryan Nelson, I mean it wasn't a specific code he would use when he was keeping his work notes. Did teach you certain magical languages and such. But his notes with work were usually pretty straightforward. I wonder if this has any connection to the person looking for a woman that was talking to London. But then again I was assuming that Ryan and Sarah are connected in this. You can read two separate things. Unless there's something else in his desk for this area. And also I would like to examine the area where Megan had a fantastic punch and hit the wall. To see if there's any blood or residue or anything when she punched to see that. Or if there's any... The tracker? I was wondering. Possibly. I think it's been a spend of faith when you try something. What would you like to try? I meant just about everybody as an aspect and I want to know who Sarah Lemon says. You don't have to spend a fake point for that. You can make a contacts role to see whether or not you would know who Sarah Lemon says. You could then spend a fake point you had plus two to it using that aspect. So I can make a contact which I have at average. Right. I have a target in mind. Okay. So I'm looking for I got a fair with my role. Okay. That is not the target you needed to know worse. I don't want you to spend a fake point because I can tell you right now adding plus two is not going to be enough for you. You never have an inkling of who Sarah Lemon says. You haven't heard of her. Can I have you using that role to figure out who either of them are? You can do an additional role to figure out who Ryan Elson is sure. I have a target in mind for him. Same result I got fair. You also failed but this time I will tell you if you do spend the point you will know because you only needed a good you missed by one. Okay. So I do know just about everyone. You spend a fake point on that aspect and the fact is you have heard of Ryan Nelson before and he is involved with the what's called the Paranet which is. Right. Yeah. Okay. It's the way in case people know the darkest hands don't know dressed and it's basically people in the know keeping contact with each other and what's going on. It's those have lesser power. It's the hedge wizards, the low power, the witches, those. They try to cover each other's back and yeah. It's a small fry sticking together. Right. He's the local head guy. In Cleveland he's the local head guy. We should probably know that guy. It's just on average. Hey. It only required. I know. It's pretty easy. Wow. I mean you have to be in the know but. Yeah. They may not take kindly to a warden dropping by. Maybe. They tend to fear my kind. Right. Or any attention from the white council. I'm calling. Why is that? Calling what? Calling London on my cell phone. Because since it's our job to police the use of magic and here's a bunch of untrained and licensed people using magic. Come down here once in a while. Buy the book. No, I don't like it but I have to do it. So I owe it to them. So Edmund takes out his phone. dials London on his burner. A disposable phone that he's currently using at the time. Numbers were exchanged in the last meeting. Your phone rings as you're sitting in. LaCave du Vin. I answer. You have it unvibrated. Noncommittally. Just hello. I mean I don't have to be talking to you but hello. No I mean he doesn't give a name. Okay. LaCave London here just in case someone talked to my conscious. He called my number. Hello. You missed a lot of fun too. I gave him a short version of it. Saw some guy chasing us and took out the dogs. Him and some shake out of the way. Here's some information we found. Here's two names we heard of before. You want to come down here to see if you want to do some cycle tracing or to bring anything back. If we can keep our meeting you can bring something here. I don't think. I was thinking about one of the dogs had to leave it there. No. Because they've been where this guy's been. Perhaps a drop of blood. Oh well. As opposed to old carcass or head. Since this is a public place. Okay. I've wrapped you in a hobby. I've brought you a whole little carcass. Twelve midnight still if you guys can make it. And we're here. I'm comfortably ensconced upon my third class wine. And I'll do a little research to find out who those two individuals are. You just named. Yeah. Well, unfortunately, as hellhounds are prone to do. They start turning into goo. You've got a pile of echos plasma left over. They don't tend to leave bodies behind. Right. So, we should go check that hole in the wall. Maybe she'll have to finger nail it in there. Who's the best at investigations? That would be me. Okay. Okay. I'm looking to see if she left out. Figure nail or any blood. Would you put a fist in the wall? Okay. Go ahead. Go ahead. Put it right in. Okay. It just ripped off. I've got an epic look. Ah, an epic look. It's good enough to find a small scrape of skin that was taken off as her hand came back through the wall. Perhaps she hit a stud in the wall and there's a nail and just got enough. I should have put your fist through drywall. You're going to lose something. Never mind. She's buying up these all and that fleshy is the rest of them, but maybe she didn't need something behind. So, I can grab it and throw it in a bag or... Get your little tweezers in your evidence bag. Do I remember Bill Donovan's wife and the mother of Megan? You do know that you came back to Cleveland for her funeral. It was a number of years ago. Okay. Maybe she'll wait a second. Yeah, just because she's dead. Oh! Oh! Wait a second. I just happened to have a specialty in ectomyency. No way. I don't suppose she would be buried at Lakeview Cemetery or...? Why? Yeah, she did. Who's that? Hey, I just remembered I can talk to the dead. Oh, yeah. It's one of your powers. Let's go do that. Well, thank you. Megan's mother and Donovan's wife, and maybe there is some insight or... Oh, why don't you pass away? Well, I came back for her funeral, so she's been away some time, but... Oh, when I came back for the funeral, was... was Megan a vampire? No, I wouldn't have known that. No, yeah. That's a stupid question. She was calling her over here like that. Whatever. I'll see you later. It's still with you tomorrow. I'm busy. Okay. You believe it was like six years ago? It's so hard to tell. Time goes so fast, but it was a substantial amount of time ago. Time goes to work for him. What was the stamp stamp again? Her name was Megan Donovan. She was the daughter, or the only daughter? The only daughter, and the only child of... The only daughter and child of the Maryland Donovan. William and Demerelyn Donovan. Megan, as far as you know, didn't have any powers. Okay. Well, there you go. Well, now she has powers, but... not from her dad, I'm guessing. The power to being a real bitch. Are we still an upper shirt? If the old wizards did a bad guy or not. We don't? Do we? Are you asking me? Yes. We're just just trying to find him. We still don't need to be here a bad guy. I'm just here to do a job, and we'll see what's going on. I'm not entirely convinced that Bill could have fallen so far. I'm back to clean up this mess. Alright, so you guys do what? Well, everything you want from here is all? No. Is there any reason to... Well, I was going to go into his lab, too. We talked about it, but going back was the seal intact on his... Can you make a quick lower roll, please? A superb roll. Yeah, you get close enough to the door, and it's a hum. Okay. It's a hum with power, and it seems to be sealed. And am I able to get a sense of the weave of the sealer's spell? With that roll, yes, this essence and energy just reeks of your mentor. Okay. And refresh my memory in the Dresden world if you are dead. Does your magic persist, or if you're dead? Long time magic sometimes needs upkeep, like wards. You know what I mean? Well, I would have to say the fact that Cleveland is still surrounded by something put up by Mr. Rockefeller hundreds of years ago, and he's been dead quite a while. It seems that magic persists. Oh, okay. I'm just trying to think it through. Okay, that's fine. Well, in that case, I'm kind of willing to leap the lap if it's still sealed and intact. Oh, fuck it, go ahead. You can do it. I'll just stand all the way. Maybe not right now. I can walk in the parking lot and wait. Maybe I need to come back to this. Maybe I'd like to perform this when I'm a little bit more rested in during the daytime. And also, I would like to get to the character in... You're sounding really good right now. It's a wine bar. They can't hear it. Yeah, but they'll change if I chip or you're in a wine bar. So then they have net dog net. There's definitely being served by some of the things that are infinitely superior to you. You want fries with that, sir? So, are you done at the office? Go to the wine bar. I think I'm done here. I don't necessarily want to open the lab up wall. I trust you and all. You were the first person I called when I got to the city, but... So you guys travel across town to the east side. And then over to Coventry or Cleveland's Bohemia to meet up with London. We did get a sample of Megan, correct? Yeah. Roberto. London and Roberto. And yes. Bit of the skin scraped off. It'll be enough. Okay, after the battle, I'd say you probably took about 15 or 20 minutes to explore, investigate, get everything you could. So roughly about one o'clock. I'm sorry, one last thing. Were the doors forced? Yes. Or was it... They were... Interesting. They could turn the mist, but the doors were forced. Thresholds, man. You got to worry about that? Yeah, there you go. Okay, see. Are they invalidated in the throne home? Yeah. I trained it with their fists. Whoa. I don't know what to say. The place of business doesn't have as much of a threshold as a home where you lived. So I don't know. Yeah, but this is a wizard's... Well, that's true. Yeah, but the walk of the news office is flat. Could be another reason why they ran away. Probably not, because you're right. Harry's office, people and creatures could walk in without causing too much trouble. You guys arrive at the table? There's some strange individuals sitting there with Revoto. I assess the situation. Does London look like he is uncomfortable by this train? Oh wait, no. He is uncomfortable. Good assessment. Good assessment. I forgot about the seeming. I forgot about the seeming. I forgot about the seeming. London! Hi, how are ya? Oh. I've been back drinking your old white red wine. I thought I was saying you here. Give me a roll for how well your seeming is, man. Oh. This one's so, so. I believe the seeming is disciplined, so this one is great. What? When they come in, you know, a little wink of the eye. I would say come towards the table and I stand up to greet each one of them. You guys can all roll to see if you see through it. It'd be lower. I don't think it would be lower for mystic perception. I'm going to go. I'm going to go. Empathy isn't reading people to see if that's him or not. I'm going to go by lower for mystic perception. Empathy. It's much easier if you have the sight. I think, yeah. Good. So you have that, right? I do have the sight, but I'm not invoking it. I've got it good. If it hadn't been for the wink, you wouldn't have known that was him. So if I have the sight, do I automatically know? No. Only if you open the sight, which is a dangerous thing. Yeah, I don't want to get that. You don't want to look at him. I've got a fantastic. All right. You know, you're looking at the mannerisms. You're used to watching people and the way he sits and the way he moves. You're like, well, and the fact that he's sitting with Roberto, come on. I have a great lore. I have a great lore. And that was equal to the town? Equal. The attacker wins on a tie, but there's stipulation. Like with a weapon, you don't do any damage. I would say this way. Anything gets a plus one. Do you think it'd be fair to say that, well, I recognize it's a seeming guy who can't penetrate it to see that. Right. I mean, again, he's sitting next to Roberto and he gives you a wink. It's not a big surprise. But of the three of you, the only one that really penetrated it was Mr. F. Guy over there with his training. Just watching how he sits. My investigation is very low. Thank you. But anyway, they come join you. That's right. I don't know if they're served. Whatever you guys want to drink. Is this place where magic can occur? I'm recording this as overtime. It's not a boss. I guess my point is I'm wondering if perhaps we should take a precaution and, I mean, I can cast a simple spell to just, you know, make it a private conversation to prevent eavesdrop. This neighborhood does have an above average share of the supernatural. But he controls the air. He could just make a pocket of vacuum. That's fine, but he's got to do it. Okay. Yeah. I mean, I would recommend it. So it costs one mental strain. You throw up a shield of privacy. A cone of silence. Would you believe a cone of silence? I don't think I just make our voices. I don't need to necessarily tell people. No, I'm not. There's no way that sounds. But you just really can't understand what's going on. You can assign it to objects for our places. Yeah. I will. Good. And it's pretty cool. So close. But I might, so it takes my discipline down to a good, but I was-- How powerful was this? Then I was going to put, like, a power two. This is a block to awareness. Yeah. For eavesdropping. I'm just trying to-- I think if people were trying to eavesdrop, it would be an alert and stroll. It's all I'm saying. So it's a block. There'd be something along the investigation level. I would not. I would be alert. You're hearing this, aren't you? Take one point of mental stress. Yes. Well, I'd call over waitress so that they can get there around drinks. She comes over and takes your orders. Yes. Okay, if your vint is not-- It's not-- it's not stuffy. In the sense of wine. Take orders. Well, this is why I had to ride your beers here. Okay. Give me glass, whatever he's drinking. Okay. Bordeaux. French. Lafitte, 52. And you, sir? I don't know what you're going to do. Very well. Okay. What job have you paid over time? Yes, but you're supposed to pay. Whatever. Roman Coke. You're not paying me enough for that. Well, he's not paying you at all. He is. All right, fine. You're not paying me enough for that. She returns shortly with the drinks. Or water and lemon. Fill me in. We tell them about the residence that has apparently been vacated, has Ryan Realty and some of the things we found there, and how it was almost devoid of any... It was Ross Realty. Oh, David. Ross Realty, correct? It was clean clean. It was like super clean, so there's no trace of them, which I thought was kind of unusual. So we went to the office to... Yeah, predictable. One might call it suspiciously clean. Right. Especially considering we live there. We went to the office. We encountered two vampires that were apparently looking for something. One of the vampires, I did not see the man. They... Well, they didn't try to sex their way into Maxwell's head. So it's not white court and... We got a rumor? No, it wasn't red court. No, both red court and white court both use sex. We previously heard rumor that the black court had a new breed of vampire out there. Well, one of them turned into a... Let's see me be them. One turned into a bat, one turned into mist. One of them... Both of them got away. One of them is named Meghan Donovan, and she's the daughter of William Donovan. Can I... And that is news to me. The other? Can I describe this guy in the station with any detail whatsoever? 'Cause he was an empty dance. I don't. One of our rollers. I mean, you can describe to him what you saw, which was... A guy... I think in the office direction. A younger, probably an early 20s, shorter than average, say, 5'9", 5'8". Kind of Mediterranean looking. Dark hair. Oh, him. All right. So I will make my contacts roll to see for rumors and... If you know anything like this? Yes. I believe contacts is gathering information, getting the tip off, knowing people and rumors. So, if I know them, it's under contacts. Okay. And what, of course, what I would know about them as well. It's super. And that's exactly what you needed. So, you actually have heard of this couple. You didn't know the name Meghan. Makes sense now. Right. And you're not exactly sure of the name of the gentleman either. But you have heard that they're kind of a team that has been going around lightly and seem to be working for the clinic. They're hitting certain jobs. They're doing certain things that are causing people to pay attention to them. Do you mean they're freelance or mercenary or that they're just... Back by the clinic. Okay. Some of the jobs that have been done that seem to be specifically clinic oriented. So they seem to be working there. My question would be, are they trying to make names for themselves? Or are they doing a poor job of keeping themselves concealed so that people know who they are? The second. They seem to be doing a poor job. I mean, they're doing work and they're getting some of it done, but they don't seem to be being particularly careful about being caught. Does London have any idea how would they make an opportunity if she's a daughter of Mr. Donovan? Actually, you didn't have a name. You had the description. In particular, these two. They're newer in a sense of she wasn't operating while Mr. Donovan was feeling the warden role. That would be correct. It's only the last couple weeks or two, maybe three weeks. You believe the first time you heard about this vampire couple. Black court vampires are not wide known in Cleveland. They are relatively rare, and the fact that there was a young couple, it doesn't really fit the mold of black court vampires. They are old, decrepit, and if they're newborn. A little bit about the clinic, though, and they're interested in the black court. So, obviously, it makes one pause. It could be black male on Mr. Donovan. I think having his daughter would certainly be leveraged against Bill. And numerous usually aren't the skill or control. Right? So, that leads me to believe that that might be the case. So, perhaps, as we discussed earlier, this even more than Mr. Donovan has been seen in colluding, or at least in the circle of, is it, Constance? Rockefeller? Cleveland Clinic would be communist. Well, if you were wondering what that relationship might be, this certainly points in the direction, although it might be too early to make it a firm. I think colluding might be the wrong word, but I suspect, perhaps, given Meghan's condition, coercion is certainly suspect. Right. Well, before we knew about Meghan, it seemed as if there could be some collusion there. And we were uncertain as to why they, where it was, and I'm down playing it for him, because I think I know that he's actually working with her, or to some extent, but I'm trying to minimize it for Mike's character. What about Sarah lemons? 29, or? What do I have on her? Yeah, that was the same superb. You're kind of surprised to hear that name. I'm relatively surprised to hear that. So, the second person you were supposed to track, and that you tracked to the house, when you got back, you looked up the address, and it was the lemons family. Sarah, and her husband, who then, the house was owned by them. And you do recall that when you did a trace on her, the spell failed, but it failed in a way that you knew why, and it was because she was no longer living, and that type of tracking requires a different type of spell. Right. So, how did she play into this evening? She was in his log for things he was doing last. Her name was just in there with a bunch of question marks, like he was wondering who she was. It was days ago. The log was only a few days ago, right, that we found this entry? Yeah, that is correct. So, she's dead. He was interested in her black court vampires. I'm sorry, a pretty obvious tie-in, but maybe something a little bit. Could we back up your reference to Sarah lemons? Is that she owned what property? You said that she owned something that we already checked out, or she was one of the buyers? Well, I don't know what you want to tell him. No, I think I'm comfortable enough with this arrangement and the previous relationship with these. Especially with the Wharton, because he seems to be incapable of dishonesty. Unlike his predecessor, but he seems... Not yet corrupted by Cleveland. Right, and he hasn't been here enough to be corrupted, so I feel comfortable enough. We're not meeting at my headquarters. I have a bodyguard. It's obvious that something's going on, so... I don't go in depth about the current angst I'm feeling about not being able to reach all my resources and not being able to do what I normally do because of my predicament, but I am willing to open up about the fact of the last couple days and what went down. I don't see any advantage right now. I'm all about advantage, and I don't see any advantage holding it back from the gentleman I'm working with right now. So you have an address in Bay Village where the Lumens household was located, or is located? I share that. And if we have anything, do you bring back anything of Mr. Donovan's to be able to try? The whole reason that you actually went to... Well, we got attacked by vampires and hellhounds, and I got distracted. Yes. Damn it. We got his logbook that he'd just written in three days ago. Can you whisper? I might be able to do something with it. Okay. You have something even more tenuous? We had his old house. Oh, we got on. That was bleached, I thought. Yeah, that was all cleanse, remember? Look at me. But this is his handwriting. Look at that. Look at that. I'm gorgeous, isn't it? I mean, your sweaty hands was on the paper. So, let's say we can rewind a bit. But you are a warden after all you deal with magic every single day. You're in his office, what do you want to try to get that's? Well, obviously something for a tracking spell, and that requires a piece of hair, skin, or blood. Or fingernails, or if there's a... I mean, it's gross, but if there's a bathroom, you know, find... Oh, no, he's about to flip. Well, there's... Well, if he's been such a slob, then, you know, maybe there is still stubble hair in the sink, where he's not, you know, shaving occasionally. She really got, want to get gross. No, we don't really know. The magic is, you know, magic is not pretty sometimes. It might be a puber too. On the ram. You don't know. Wow. I'm sorry, I went there, but this is magic. And if you want to track somebody, sometimes you get... How do you come home? Here, come back home. Maybe you have to be a pube, like... What are you doing today? I got a bag of old cubes short. We can't hear. Seriously, you bring me the most profound and expert tracker of a pube. This is what you want me to track? You're gone, man. We didn't find a booger. You have some class. You found a booger under the table. Oh my God. Oh. Time for you. You sent Edmond into the bathroom. Edmond, what are you looking for in the bathroom? Please, dear God, don't tell me. I'm looking for, like, you're in a coma. Give me an investigation, bro. Obviously, you can look for that. But I'm looking for something that's really going to find someone. Look. Thank God. Oh, wow, that's a great role. That's going to be like, I'm guessing epic. The third best role? That is an epic role. And epic roles do not refuse, like... We found a bunch of them, but he doesn't need them because... Because it was epic. Except for the pubes that I find out. That's right. You knew. You check his comb and... It was a whole pile. Where in the first place are you going to look? You're going to look for him. Jesus Christ! I run my spingo underneath the toilet. I wonder where they had on the hat rack. There you go. You get his hat. You pull it off. There's a little, slightly graying hair you pull from his hat. Gross. Long. Good. Again. That's short. Long. Get it back. Put it in there. Label it. Tuck it in your pocket. Okay. We can't play that music. No. Fast forward. Back to... The meeting. We haven't heard that. Jesus knows anything about what happened there, so it's okay. It's all good. Excellent work. Good job. See? Please continue. I guess the major point here is... There's upwards of three people that we can begin to track at this place. We can head out to bay and manage them. But I missed something. Who was this? Le Mans character. How did they find out? This name? Where did they pull it from? It was from the log look of Bill Donovan, one of the last things that he'd been writing about on his current case is that he was the first person. The last person in the life, which is some question marks that he was interested in. Okay. Again, the name was surrounded with doodles with lots of, you know... Exhalation marks and arrows. Yeah, like questions. So, we could visit the London residents in Bay Village. We could try to track Megan and her undead partner in crime. Aren't we trying to learn? We could try to find Mr. Donovan and cut to the chase. It is what started it, but I guess... Also, Mrs. Donovan's ghost if you want to talk to her. Well, my priority is to find Bill. Bill Donovan. Mrs. Russell's wife. But, yes, but if there's work to do in the process of doing that... I guess my question... The city. Yeah, which... I still have a mandate to protect the people and to clean up this mess, so... Which text probably already, though? I can sort of listen so much to the priorities. It's more... Are we prepared at this point to go straight to Donovan who could be tied in with... Wisconsin's at the clinic with no information whatsoever. Might it behoove us to make some other investigations? First, to learn the dynamic of what's occurring and then make a more educated assessment at that point. Why would the... Oh, we could just charge it. I've heard it again. It's a strike. So this is the lack of the black court who needs to be looking up stuff at. That doesn't make a lot of sense to me as to the information we know at this point. We know that Mr. Donovan was actually working with Constance and Constance is reputed to be involved with some black courts influences the clinic. So unless these are renegade, unless they're investigating Mr. Donovan's disappearance as well. How much do we know about the other sister in the next whole game currently? Yeah. Do we know that they're both doing that? Abby's doing everything. I know that I would know that. I don't know how much, you know, people would know that just would face knowledge of Cleveland as opposed to high level context in rumors and whatnot. It's a better question for Jim. I probably wouldn't know that. Who knows about... So I'm going to keep this pretty much. I mean, we know about the clinic and Constance is just looking to better the man's where Abby's looking to cure him. Yeah, but... That's as a game world. Yeah. Who would know that as players? You would know that Jim, your character, Edmund, would definitely know that. London, as far as in the know, he's probably the most in the know of the politics of the Cleveland. The thing that you would not, without need of a role, those are the two characters that would definitely not be. No, but is there something you would need to ask to get, you know, like, would you ask a question knowing that a Rockefeller is involved at the clinic? I don't want to lose your idea if you could put it into gameplay, you know, logically. Yeah, logically and intelligently. I don't think it could. At this point? I think it's a thin connection so far, if I understand. Yeah, they're very... Just that this character, Lemon, might be tied in with the other sister and they're investigating. Well, I don't know how... She's dead now, right? She's dead now. She could be a vampire. Well, the only connection I see between where we were to the Cleveland clinic to the daughters is that Megan Donovan and this guy, these young looking black court vampires were in town. And the only other known place of black court vampires would be the University Hospital of Cleveland Clinic, so... He said those guys had been known to be working for the clinic. And these people have been... that's the connection, that's the only connection. Yeah, I'm not sure how that girl died and she's tied in with the University of vampires now. Without more investigation, I'm not sure how Lemon's name is involved other than that she was... It wasn't very complicated. It was just that maybe she's on that side of the fence and that's the conflict going on here. I don't know how accurate this is, but I think it should also be stated that not every black court vampire in Cleveland is affiliated with the clinic or university hospitals. Yes, I can. But the majority, I would say, would be somehow... The majority of active ones. Influenced, but I don't see every single one. Well, isn't that the whole point and purpose of a court and the vampires is that they're all kind of... Organizers, necessarily. Black court, it is safe. Black court don't really go that way. There's not enough of them to have a court. The Cleveland situation is a little different in that... There's a bit more here. There's a bit more, but they're like... They're like meteors. They burst brightly onto the scene and within a very short time they burn out. Because of the experiments that are going on in the Cleveland Clinic, you'll see black court vampires hit the street. They don't last long. Because the experiments that they're doing, that you've heard about, seem to burn them out. They're being modified and changed. They act differently, but they don't last long. Hopefully that's good. We'll see, we have several avenues. And my priority is to be the acting warden of Cleveland. So I have to follow the book and investigate these things. And finding Bill as part of that, but is probably not necessarily an immediate priority. I think we would be really overstepping our current knowledge to go right after this reduction. One thing, what's that? Yeah, we may be lacking knowledge, but we might. Well, I'm still going to go after him, but he's not my number one priority. Do you think checking out the limited residence, which is what kind of caused us to breathe in the past, is a good idea to find out what happened there? Meghan or the London residents, I think we need a little bit more information before we can actually formulate a game plan that can be successful. Even if I could find Mr. Donovan charging into a situation without knowing where these allegiances are or anyone's allegiance are, it sounds a bit risque to me. And I try to minimize the risk as much as possible. For the safety of the citizens, I say we go from here first to now. Well, I'd like to sleep on it, I'd like to go back to my hotel. And that's a valid point. If you guys break for the night and go to sleep and we reconvene in the morning, those of you who have a refresh higher than your current total of fake points, we'll get to bump it up to that point. Those who are currently above it are equal, there will be no change. That's where I don't understand until I have one point left out of the three. So you would gain two by resting. So we'll call it here for the night and I assume you're all going to your respective modes to rest. I know. If you stay up through the night doing something, you eventually have to make endurance rolls to stay off and stuff. That is correct. I don't. You want to hear? Thanks for listening to the Knights of the Night actual play podcast. Visit kotnpodcast.com for more information on this and other adventures, where you will find character stats, photos, storytelling, perhaps, and even a form from the internet. Or you could email us directly at feedback@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 us next episode for more mystery and adventure. I brought you a doggy. I brought you a whole little carcass. If you really want to get gross, magic is, you know, magic is not pretty sometimes. It might be a puberty while there's another man. You don't know. I'm sorry, I went there, but this is magic. And if you want to track somebody, sometimes you can... You have to be a pube like... You bring me the most profound and expert tracker of a pube. This is what you want me to track? You're gone, man. We didn't find a bugger. We have some class. You found a bugger under the table. Oh my god. I'm tired with you.