The Knights finally get back together after nearly a two month long break.Join us at the gaming table as we get back into Dresden Files RPG.
Knights of the Night
KOTN Actual Play Podcast 53: DFRPG 1_3 "What the Coffee Cup Saw"
(upbeat music) - Hello, and welcome to "Knights of the Night" actual play podcast. This trust and file story, neutral grounds, is run by your storyteller town. And now, please enjoy episode three, titled "What the Coffee Cup Saw." (upbeat music) - No long time, don't let it in. First you'd like to apologize to all this news for missing a few weeks on our release schedule. We actually had no material that we were in a situation to release. - Sorry. - Sorry. - We had to do with a lot of changes in the personal life to some of the nights. We only have one little bit of feedback. - Sure. - Did it complain? - But I will allow, - Oh my guys, where the hell have you been? - I will. - I will allow Scott to read the feedback. - Thanks. - Out of the other players who also were involved with changes in their personal life, for our audience to explain some of us, and some of us being me, had children go off to college, and three of the other players had new additions to their families. So that has been the genesis of why we have been missing. - Another, another time. But now that everything's settled down a bit, we're ready to go. We have a bit of feedback that came over our email channel. - Hi guys, first thing I'd like to congratulate and send Beth Richards to Bob, Ryan, and Scott. All the best and criticals in your campaign of fatherhood. Life does end at 20, as Mike said. Secondly, glad to hear the show was on a roll and hope to hear much more from you. You're slightly yet still memorized, listener, Theron Merckty. I don't think he's memorized. - Mesmerized, did I say? - No. - I think memorized it then, he's got a pretty good memory. - You're slightly yet still mesmerized, listener. Theron Merckty, well, Theron, thanks for the congratulations from Scott anyways, can't speak for Bob or Ryan, I'm sure they spoke to both Ryan last night and Bob today. And both of them are going to be absent for the near future because as Ben has stated before, Ryan has had a baby boy and Bob has had a baby girl. Ryan and Bob are both brothers and both of their children are what? What do you think, a month apart? - Yeah, very close there. - They're still, it's their first children, both Scott. - Well, it's your first children too. - Yes. - And you got three at once. - Three at once. - Hence the reason for the delay and the absence from role playing, but thanks very much Theron, we're glad you're mesmerized and enjoying the various podcasts and thanks for being a listener. - And there's no rocket for comments for Bob? - You know I haven't heard from Rocket lately, so. - I think he's still smarting that Bob didn't, that you didn't die in the fiery while in death at the end and it actually escaped annihilation. - Bob Ryan or Greg, why don't you send us a comment? And they ask me to send us a comment. - And Bob Ryan, how we're doing since you guys aren't here? - I don't know if Bob Ryan or Greg are listening to it. - We'll find out. - Yes, we will. - We'll leave that in there. - I am Tom and I will be the GM running the Dresden Files game. This particular adventure is neutral grounds and starting on my left is, my name is Thomas, I'm playing Martin Capouti, Rich Hired Psychic Detective. - I forgot what I am. - John, I'm playing Zach Mayer, the Princess Wizard. - I'm Scott, playing Nate Velakis. I am a emo white court virgin. - I'm Mike, playing Sean Barnes, a metal head werewolf. - I'm Jim, I'm playing Dana Lainzi. She's a hep elp illusionist. - Okay, and we'll start the game with fate points. Anybody know how much they have? Can anybody use any last time he plays and remember Markdown? If not, we'll just go with the base refresh. - Don't believe I used him for all of you. - I only have a level of seven. - What color would you like at that? - Red. - Red. - Red. - Whatever. - This is a roll. - I can find my refresh. That's what I'm talking about. - Your refresh is down here and it looks like yours would be three. - Three. - Oh, I spend a lot. - You did, yeah, I left over. - Seven. - What? - It says seven. - Seven. - Faithful. - Oh, I've adjusted refresh. - Five. - Like a different plane maneuver. - I've adjusted refresh level. - Okay, that's better. - Seven would be a cat, no powers, but gotcha. - You don't have any many powers, is it? - No, dude. - You can do because you're-- - I'm gonna get your emo blue. - All right, to recap slightly, you guys all came upon the coffee shop at the same time you found the door was unlocked, which is not unusual, but the fact that no one was staffing it was. As you entered further, you saw that things were in disarray, things were knocked onto the floor, and there was actually a body on the floor in front of the counter, and then you found a second one behind the counter. I think almost immediately, Zach went running through the building out towards the exit to quickly check if anybody was still here. And upon entering the hallway, you went into the hallway, then went into the hallway. Zach ran past you and into the back room and was going to run out into the back alley, but in fact ran into somebody in the back room. - It was extreme to something, and then they ran out in there. - Take a shot at them and missed, and the assailant, whoever was still in the place who looked like a thug on drug dealer type. - Then he looked like he was on something or something. - Yeah, he definitely looked, you found out later that he definitely looked glassy-eyed and unusual in his expressions. They were not to the norm. Right out the back door, Zach followed him, stopped him in his tracks by calling up the earth around him, a short fight ensued in the back alley in which he was knocked unconscious. - Were both the individuals in the main area of the coffee shop dead? - Yes. - Looked back on the roads on this guy and saw kind of who was behind it or got some sort of something. - I did. - Go ahead. - I captured the gunman in the back. I held him down, he's my site arm. I figured I'd already been manipulated mentally into doing what he did, and that's why I had this look. - Right, you saw black threads like puppeteer lines controlling him so you knew that he was somehow being controlled. At that point, I believe Sean was guessing that it might be red cord venom that was controlling it as a thrall. But in the end, it ended up that you could not break the site for a number of rounds, and you saw more and more at the same time, leave taking more and more damage and unable to shut the site down. - Was that more because of his non-visibility, was it in training, or was that some other effect of whatever spell was available? - No, it was more his failure to control the site than it was to the site's power. The site does have power, some are more powerful than others. He simply had a bad role. I mean, to-- - The failure controlled the dice. - Yeah, it was his control of the dice, it was rather poor. And in the end, though, I ended up getting him more information. - But at what cost? - No, I'll never forget it. - Ever. - And what he found was that the person, the puppeteer behind the strings was in fact the ex-boy fight. - 'Cause that was Eric McCall. Martin was in the shop, he was using different items to use his psychometry to see the history of the items, and he discovered Damocles had been there in addition to the big bad idiot Damocles with this. - Well, something that terrible fashion sense. - Is something that the wizard needs to maybe all need to be aware of it, but I think it retains mostly to you is that using mind control magic is a big no-no, so violation of the laws. - Yes, he knows that. That's one of the cardinal sins of wizards is, well, not cardinal sins, but-- - Well, one of the cardinal sins is killing somebody with magic. - Yes, that's probably number one. - Number two, though, is affecting someone's mind or controlling someone's mind. - Both. - Yes, I might both, I'm gonna say. - It's kind of what you do. - What through magic? - Through magic. - What about like, insight, emotion, despair, touch? - You're not in a wizard. You don't have to play by the rules. - That's my question. - You're not in a wizard, you don't have to play by the rules, and they have no jurisdiction over you. - Ha, take that to what your court wizards? - I'm just intimidated, I'm gonna beat 'em up and make 'em do what you wanna do. - That's perfectly legitimate. - Let's do it, kids. - And there's a fine line between merging some of magic, for instance, holding them in place with magic and then shooting 'em with a gun. - And then just shooting them. - Eh, she held 'em in place, you know, I mean, there's gray area there. - Well, magic then becomes the accessory to it, correct. - Right, so, to continue, we'll just start exactly there. You guys are in the back. He is in the coffee shop, you're in the coffee shop with him because you just walked in now and went, what the hell's going on? - My arm ran into the back to help. - And you are a right of the doorway to the alleyway, I believe. - I remember I was running over to try to figure out a way to help him snap out of his funk. - Oh, one thing that we didn't mention was the fact that Mike's character, Sean, did do some investigating at the desk that's in the back room, where Diane is normally located at the coffee shop, at the table in the back that's like her office, and she's almost always here at this time of day, and yet she's not. And he did some investigation, but it added up to him going, 'cause he's a werewolf, and he just kind of sniffed at the desk, and he walked into the back of the alley. He tried, was it evaluated? - He'd show their own abilities, sir. - Just went to start marking my turn. - Can you? - I'm in trouble. - Not having played before, missing the last time. I don't know who your players are here. - Okay, so main players in the game. - Yes, I don't know. - It's been a long problem. So, in the city of Baltimore, we have, the white court is the main vampire court. We have Damocles Ravenborn running the red court, which consists of a title of six. - Yeah, we remember they're strong, but they're weak. - And this one, they're weak. Black court is virtually unknown, but there's a serious ghoul problem in Baltimore. - Which is the red court's making a bunch of them, basically? - No. There is a ghoul king that calls himself actually a God king, Gilgamesh, Gilgamesh. - I like it. - Yeah, and he is controlling some of the... - That's a great name. - This is a good name. - The tunnels and stuff. - He's controlling some of the tunnels that lead in the Baltimore area. There are some that are supposedly go from-- - I remember the tunnels. - Yeah, in ghouls. - There's a castle out in the middle of the river, it goes near, and then it just tunnels it, and so he controls those. But also, he's unusually strong in the fact that he has opened up a way to the fey, or as you like to call it, never, never. And-- - No, I don't. Just the never. - Has been able to establish himself as a-- - Free holding lord. - Well, it's sort of like a free holding lord where he is part of the accord, where he-- - Which is-- - Totally unheard of. - You're not feeling the accord? - Yes, remember. He is totally unheard of as ghouls. He is like elevated himself to like a major player. And he is currently warning with the summer court. So in Baltimore, you have the summer court warning with the ghouls. You have the white court as-- - The vampires are in. - They're going on. - And courts ruled by this full damocles. - You had a warden who controlled the Baltimore area who died strangely recently. His son has come back from college to take over. - Strangely, recently or strangely? - Recently, he died and no one's sure how. - Yeah. - And no one's claiming responsibility. And his son is very inexperienced as a warden. And he's the one in charge right now. - So he's not really in charge. - He's not in charge. - Who's dead here? - There's also some wild card magic users in the area. This particular coffee house is the neutral grounds. - Ported grounds. - A quarter of grounds for the area. - No fire, no jail, no nothing. - It's a safe zone for everybody. But apparently, someone has come in-- - It's a nephew. - Taken, maybe? Taken, Diana? She's missing. - Or she ran away. - Why? She's a regular old coffee shop owner. What happens to know about the unknown? - Well, she owns the place of the world. She's owns the place that's the accorded neutral. - Right, but she has something. - She must have some, but as far as anybody knows, she has no powers. - That's it. Okay, she doesn't have any powers. - Other than people? - Apparently political. - Our Tom and Alyssa, who were apparently employees. - Tom and Alyssa were college kids. - And they are now both laying dead at your feet. - Okay. - Oh, then when employees of New York-- - I am, I am. - They were employees at their age shop. They were baristas or whatever. - I'm absolutely morose. - I sigh heavily several times. - Well done. - The deaths, same roller head. - Yeah. - So. - Yeah, a couple of heavy size. - Then, so investigation is called investigation. - Anyone have an investigation? - I don't know, man. - That is a former detective. - So he's all about that, right? - So, you're Max, what are you? - Martin. - Martin. - It was him. - Martin, is Martin looking around, doing all kinds of tests and stuff? 'Cause I mean, he sniffed and didn't find anything. - So, he, all right. So the coffee house-- - Right, Don, right? - Last time we played, they thought they were done. - Yeah, we were. We discovered who did it. - I think we should call the cops. - Yeah, we mean we discovered who did it. - All right, you're so excited, Joe. - Let's assume that Zach comes walking back into the coffee house so we can all be in one location. - Okay. - I had, how convenient. - Well, just so you could talk to each other. The coffee house consists of a room, the main public floor, you have some tables, you've got the counter, you've got, you know, those little stands with coffee cups and then thermoses you can buy and stuff like that. Then you have a hallway and a storage room and a back alley, those are the general zones of this place. And now two murders took place in the main coffee room. - Right. - Business floor. - So, did like anyone go through the office to see if someone was trying to blackmail her or if there's a reason for this to happen? - And what, who? - What are you doing? - I'm the cop. - I guess cop. - Close up. - You're detecting. - When we went, I remember that when we started to investigate, that's when we noticed that somebody was still in the room and they opened fire on us which led to a chase. So I, outside of Martin kind of hanging back and still sifting through some clues, we didn't really go through the office or the back room with any type of a real throw investigation from what I recall. - And anything that I did was, I was just trying to pick up scents that I could follow and track and that's why I was trying to find clues to crack the case. - This coffee smell really good to you. - Coffee? - With the right sense of smell. - And blood is what you see. - Yes. - Snarl. (laughs) - That was a real question, man. Like, you found that stronger? - That's my real response. - Oh, it is. - That's what it was asked by. - Tomorrow. - John is playing Zach, Zach is like an athlete who found out he had magic, so he picked up a apprenticeship with a wizard. The wizard has gone away on business and Zach is all along. - That makes me sick. - You're the only wizard in town until somebody else was like. - Yep. - And you're, I gotta take this guy down. - What's the, what's the, what's the girl's name? - Skirt, Dana? - Dana. - Dana. - Dana. - Behind silent. - Is it I/A? - Or A. - I/A. - You're like a mystic, right? - Something like that. - I'm like a Hatbell, um. - So, do we know, like, our, our, we know all our supernatural stuff? What's going on? - Kind of. - They know of an emo. Virgin. - That's the best. - That's super power. - Wait, to be clear, can we just, what do you hear of his name? - You mean he's a virgin in the sense of the white core? - Yeah. - Hey, okay. - He is fat. - Not when you say virgin, does that mean that you have-- - He's using his white core power. - Like, that's what I meant. - Like, I might be a virgin coffee drinker 'cause I never drinking coffee before. - I'm a virgin vampire to me, I never killed anybody. - I don't know too much about crime scenes, but what do we find out about who killed these people? I mean, they've been shot. - What do we do with the bad guy? - A very shot. - Mm-hmm. - Bad guy. - Bad guy. - Who's wearing the colors of-- - Oh, Dana. - Can I have a show you that out? - You know, his jam of clothes has been through here. How do we know that? - Dana checked that out and what did you find out about the gang banger, do you recall? - No. - She found out that, more than likely, he comes from the e-screen area, which is where, you know, that's the bad part of town. - Okay. - Sorry for anybody involved tomorrow. I really don't know the screen. - From the other one, sorry. - But that's what it says in the book. And she knows that there's one guy in the e-screen that kind of runs the show. - Okay. - And she knows his name or? - She does know, isn't it? - And that's not the goofy one of the guy. - It's not damn ugly. - It's not damn ugly. - No. - This would be a guy that goes by the street name of Lizzer. - Oh. - But his real name is Wallace Gibbs, but not many people know that. - That's a name. - But she is in the know, she knows he. - It's like a cool nickname. - Lizzer? - Lizard, Gilgamesh. - Yeah. - Damn it, please. I mean, there's some cool nicknames floating around. - It's been in-- - Mark. - It's been in the hospital. - None of us had nicknames, it's just kind of sad. Lizzer's been in the hospital or she works in the hospital, but she also, she knows people. That's what she does. - That's what she does. She's got contacts. Okay, so what did we learn about? So what's everything we know about what just went down here besides the fact that it's so dance-sad, they both. (both laughing) - That's about it. - You're feeding on the sadness here? You're feeling-- - No one else is sad. I'm trying to work him up a little bit. He was a little bit of, you know, juice. - I know, for sure. And that's good to this thoroughly. They have been shot. - All right. - And they are-- - We'll both figure that out. - Okay. All right. Anything else that-- - What do you do? - Door was unlocked. The front door, you know, is it open for business? What kind of thing? - We came early. - It's very early in the morning. They normally open at seven. They came at six thirty and the door was already unlocked. - I'm trying to remember, I wish we could replay it. - Yeah, it's not much. - Yeah. - Somebody did a psychometry thing. - Oh, it may not be here, and kind of saw kind of what he wanted. - I saw Damocles run through. - Two possible people. - First Damocles ran through with two groans, you say? - That's what I remember. - I should have read the notes. - I did. - You did see Damocles when you did see him with two people, but the two people were his normal red-court thugs, and it was-- - The guy was-- - The guy was running through, like, running through, shooting, running through-- - Just-- - 'Cause they got a coffee-- - What do you use to say? - The guy was like-- - A coffee. - Well, he used it on a coffee cup, and he saw Damocles walking in with-- - Yeah, it was a coffee cup. - Serious coffee cups have front vision. - I think you just found the title for this episode. - What's that? - What the coffee cup was that? - What if it's like a chameleon coffee cup, and it has eyes beside it, you can see it-- - Then he saw the back shelf of where it was sitting and other coffee cups. - It was about the main label, the main floor. - So what were they doing? - They're running to the-- - Just running. They weren't shooting. - No, they weren't running. - Maybe we're, you know-- - They're shooting at him. - He was throwing with his cocky bullshit attitude that he always does, up towards the counter, and that's, you know, he catches glimpses of what pass. He doesn't get a-- - The whole, yeah, like-- - And then Damocles-- - The film is right. - Said shit, she's dead and ran. - No, you saw him, you know, come in, then you also saw the-- - Boyfriender's there. - The boyfriend, McCallop. - Shut up. - Hold up. - He's got the dreadlocks, he's got hats, he's got an attitude as well. - Didn't I shoot him away once? - Yes, you did. - Don't get McCallop, so he came in next. - He came in-- - Second. - After Damocles left. - It appeared in the history of the coffee cup that it was-- - Tell me what you saw in a coffee cup. - The last, the coffee cup said, it came in second. - It was between Damocles, then McCallop, then Thugs shooting. He actually saw this, you know, he was better with a gun. - A one gangbanger. Pop, every-- - Pop and people. - Everybody's didn't manipulate these tarps, I know the column did. And-- - Thugs, you said we shot 'cause there was one thug, wasn't there shooting? - To be clear, when you looked into the soul of the guy that you captured, you did not see the soul of a killer or someone who has killed recently. You believe, from what you've been told, that you should have been able to somehow feel the representation of this person had just killed. That's a pretty strong emotion. And that wasn't there. - He was manipulated into doing it, would that still be there? - I'm just telling you what you felt. - How do you interpret it? - Because of-- - My job is to stop people from manipulating minds. - So whether or not he killed this person is going to be relevant to the bank, he's going to be the killer, but-- - Did you have killed him, Rock? - Is he your car from dirt? - No, I have a gun. - We're talking about-- - Well, he pre-depressed before you knocked him out. - I'm just asking-- - I think he was angry. - He was so depressed. - We're a little out of practice. - We're a lot of practice, and we're talking at the same time. Jim was asking the same question that you were asking, which is, where is this guy? - Yes. - It's from now from scratch. - I brought him in the back room. - Yeah, okay. So he's laying unconscious in the back room, tied up by-- - So we tie the cops and say we caught this guy here and saw what's here and get this one, 'cause the cops are going to bring in here. - After we have thoroughly invested in it. - We'll hurry up by ourselves. - Yeah, man, let's see, is that right? I mean, I know what the cops do. - I know why we were walking around here and putting our fingerprints over everything. - I think we should leave the cops out. - Colombo, do you think you can go in there and see what's in there? - I think Colombo is just what we call here. - It's just out of your arms. - Colombo can do what Colombo can do. - You can check the back room. - Colombo checks the back room. - Okay. - Should I roll? - Can you investigate some more? - First of all, I have two relevant stunts. You may remember QuickEye, which makes them happen two steps faster, if that's ever a thing that we can. - Okay, so I can say that you are doing it quickly. - And plus one to investigate a crime scene and plus one more step faster. So I do a really, really fast. - You are fast. - And I get to play a slow one, plus four is plus five. Holy crap, wow, that's a whole lot of minuses. - I rolled a negative four to go with my plus five. - Wow, plus one? - So yeah, a total of one. Unfortunately, finding a clue in this cluttered mess that is useful is a little bit harder than average. It would have been more along the line of requiring a good investigation. - I am a... - Can I try investigating stuff too? - Of course you can. - I could spend a fifth point on him. - You take longer than him 'cause he's very quick at it. - I could take a fifth point really well. - You can't, will I do that? - Yes, I think. - And what aspect would you like to use for a reaper? - We're tired, so I could take a fifth in plies that I have a lot of experience. 'Cause it does indeed, and it's sufficient. Go ahead. - Can I help him instead? - Go, wait a minute. - Does he want to apply this? - You, he's gonna have to reroll anyways, but you can help him, I'll let you help him before you rerolls, and to help him investigate would actually be just require a fair effort on your part. So you would have to roll plus two or higher to give him a free plus two, or I could use that for a free reroll. So, you're my favorite. - I don't think he can. - I'm not sure you can use him. - I'm rolling. I got the plus one, and I got plus one 'cause I have average, so that's plus two. - That's enough to give him a plus two. You can take that plus two and bump your average up to good, which would be sufficient than you would not have to. - Okay, then I will do that. - Not have to say it for a reroll. 'Cause you would better than a negative four with the plus two, I could find out more. Yes? I mean, if I roll a higher level than what is just required, I should get more. - Right, you should help me more. - I say this. - In less should. - You honestly don't have anything for more. And then I will just take the plus three and one. - Well, there are things called degrees of success, and-- - I could make it happen even faster. - If you get zero, you have just the minimum that's required of success, which is what you have right now. If you have plus one, it's a notable success. It's clearly a success. It's reliable and it's solid. And but then you need like three or more to have a significant success. - But if I roll anything other than a negative four, if I even roll the average of zero plus two plus five, I'm telling you that if you get three or five chefs of success, I will give you additional information. - Then I'm gonna do what I'll take the point back. - And I roll plus three. - Oh, look at you. - Plus four for my regular investigation. Plus one for the studs. Plus two for him. Plus two more total plus seven plus three is 10. - That is-- - Or league. - On legendary. That is epic success. It's epic legendary. - It's epic plus seven. - It's pretty good. - You know, Epic is seven. He rolled 10. - Oh. - He's off the chart by plus two. It's plus two legendary. - That's fairly legendary. - There you go. If you take the fair, you put the legendary together. - I prefer it say minus three, because of the difficulty, you would merely be epic. - Yeah. - So total extra shifts. - I'll tell you that you are correct. - But it was a fairly legendary success when you only needed a good one legendary. - Yeah, they're a freaking legendary. So what you find is that there are indeed indications, in fact, she's got a ledger on her desk, and the ledger clearly shows timestamps when she was writing down receipts for things that were just this morning, and that she was here not but an hour ago. And-- - Power. - Yes. And that there seems also to be indications that there was a struggle, and that she was taken by force. - She's running on the ledger and that kind of trails off. - No, there's, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, right, like, um, - Help him be a ticket. - Help him be a ticket by force. No, it appears like there's, there's scuff marks on the floor where the chair was ripped backwards, and it looks like a piece of cloth that might have got caught on the side drawer of her desk as she was being ripped out of her seat. So I mean, there's, definite. I mean, there's still a smear of a little bit of blood where she might scratch her knee while, when it ripped her, her clothing. So, and that's fresh enough that you're like, this was very, very recent in the last half hour. And it was because of your epic success - Thank you, Sean. - All of this information. - Sean, we got some blood here from Sniffit. - Can't we find out where she is? - From this? - No. - Is there anything we can use to track her? - From here. - No, I'm just sitting in my head. - No, except maybe by scent. - I have to change into my wolf form, and I just-- - It's so embarrassing. - Well, no. Hey, I'm a rock star, man. I don't care if you want to see the-- - John. - See the goods. - It's not embarrassing for you, but-- - Right. - But, hey, if you like where you see Dana, it's okay. - Let me know, baby. - I'll give you a-- - I just, moving forward, usually when an animal catches a scent, they know what-- Do I have to, look, if I catch Diana's scent, if it's her blood, I'm assuming it's her blood. If I pick up her blood, will I be able to track or recognize her scent in the future? Well, I have to make it roll out. - Absolutely. - Okay. - Depending on situations, you will be required if it's raining out and-- - Of course. - I mean, there might be difficulty to it. - No, I just want to make sure that, you know, once I have a scent, do I have it in my memory? - It's categorized, do you have it? I got it, this is Dana. - Then I shift into my wolf. - I think you unrope and then shift into it, well, just, you know. - Well, I'm wearing loose clothes, it's the morning, you know, so I can have a little dog collar that I keep, you know, stuffing. - All right, so yeah, that's trip done, I look at mine, Dana, when I do it, I'm afraid. And then, I shift, I am now in a wolf form and I cannot speak, and I go over, can you roll over? I will not roll over. - If you come from my, like, again, I can't roll over. - So when we roll, if I'm wild, I'm not tamed, we apply. (laughing) I'll give you my plan with my claw, exactly. - Yeah, so I move over and I, I guess. - Is there any obvious, Dana blood left from when she was, from the struggle when she was taking out or was she just, like, maybe not here? - It took an incredible role, like, he made to even find this. This is, like, a smear of blood, where she just, not tore open, but just scratched. I mean, it's a very minimal amount of blood, and that's something she's leaving a little bit of blood blood. - Yeah, you're not, she's not leaving a dripping tray out of the building. This is a very, very small, minute amount of blood. - All right, peckles of the beast. I have beast senses. And actually, I seem to have that in both human and, where we'll form, let me make sure that that's true. - So you just wanted to strip you, really? - Wait, yeah. Whether in human form or otherwise your senses are strongly tuned, so it's up to you. - I would say you would definitely have an advantage of being in full wool form to perform better at it. - Sure then, then maybe you just want to. - Yeah, sure, I'm okay with that. All right, yeah, so I sniff the blood. - You're a rock star, you're an exhibitionist. Look at me, please. - And that's just the blood, but, you know, the male. You know, we have more time, we don't have a gunman, so I will look around. I don't really have, as far as a skill, I don't have, like, investigative. I guess I'm just collecting information here. - I'm gonna use investigation as your sensory skills. - I would also submit that I do have a skill in lore, which I would, the reason why I have it in my wool form is when I'm using my wool senses to interact with magical stuff. So if there's an element of magical content, there's a, you know, I have an average lore of plus one. - All right, why don't you give me both an investigation role and a lore role? The investigation with your sense, I thought you were using the red mask. - Oh, okay. - What? - All right, the investigation with the set is actually difficult because the whole place is permeated with the blood of the people in the eye and coffee, virtually everywhere. So we're gonna say that that's actually gonna take light of a good success, plus three to succeed. - Right, and I don't have any skills to help support this either in my changed or (keyboard clicking) - All right, here I go. - Yikes! (laughing) - Twice. - Like a longer note! - Minus four on the dice. - I think it's like a-- - You can't-- - That's a minus four night. - Yeah, no, but that's the second one. - That's true. - That's gonna be the name of the most podcast is the minus four night. - There's no valuable-- - There is some type of value for my-- - Pepper or some coffee-- - Maybe there's coffee grounds or-- - There's some spice in this place. - Oh, full spain. (laughing) - She blood right into a big pot of coffee. - The percentage chance if you roll in that is 1.2. We've rolled two of 'em, so. - Wow, it's like Bob's here in spirit. - Yeah, that's right. First all of your dice. Okay, so you know your options. - Do you wanna give me a, like a, do I have like some type of consequence to having-- - You go to your nose now, you just-- - Okay. - You just, you smell blood and you start to get like a little bit wide eyed and wild, it's the nature of the beast, but you, you rain it in. You have the option to spend a fake point to reroll that if you can use one of your aspects. If you wish, but you only have one fake point, so. - Yeah, and I really don't. I'd rather say that for a critical or native situation. - I really, let me know, but I really think we need to call the cops in here before we go. It's not just somebody just walk away from the door. - All right, no, I have to mind-- - I'm sorry, after my investigation, do I need to roll again for the magic? - Check out what would be lore. - Lore. - All right. - That actually would be just-- - Fair. - Okay. - We just need to first success for that. - And I have plus one to this roll. - 'Cause I'm high skill. - And I have-- - Total, plus two. - Total, plus two, plus three for my floor skill, so I have at least a good. - Okay, so that's more than adequate, and you're definitely smelling magic at play here very recently, within the hour. And-- - So I scratch three times, which is my symbol for magic, when I-- - And it's not any of these guys, because you know the smell of Dana's magic, and you know the smell of Zach's magic. - Key I do. - Okay, I would like to remind everyone really quick, that you all have aspects, and some of them define your character and how they act, and what they do. And if you're doing something that is complicating the investigation, or making your life a little more difficult, because it's an aspect of your character, and what they do, please point it out to me, because I would rather you earn fake points that way, than me forcing you to play your character by calling those aspects up. I will attempt to do that as we go along. I'm not a master at it, so I'm not good. And if there's ever a situation where you say, "I'm playing right into my aspect here," how about a point? Please feel free, and I will gladly grant that. - My suggestion would be that you wake up to do to you. You're cuffed around and not unconscious. - Yeah. - And I'd like to dirty Harry here, try to intimidate him, yeah. - Yeah, well, Harry, you know. - Oh, Harry. - Okay. - Yeah. - Crafty. - Let you interrogate him. - I was assuming you could-- - With intimidation, you could be a very good interrogator and we could get some information out of him, maybe. I mean, again, I'm a leader, no detective, but he wasn't going to-- - He didn't do this guy. - He might not have a recollection of it. - But if he does, he might know who-- - Yeah, I won't find the guy, so we got to ask him. - So that's what we do. - Don't we know whatever that guy's name is? What's his name? - McCallen. - Yes. - McCallen's usual hangabout. Don't we know? - McCallen's usual hangabouts. - Well, I believe you do. - Well, if our aspect is neutral grounds regular, I think that's a common aspect for everyone. And Diana was the boss of neutral grounds. Would we have a reason to know where her ex-boyfriend might have been hanging out? - Eric and Diane started this place together and when she decided to go neutral grounds and went after the license to be, there was a severe disagreement between the two of them and he ended up leaving the business. - Okay. - No one of you knew him personally enough to know where his home was, you never-- - Now how long ago was that? Six months ago? - Okay, I just, that's fine, I just fine with your shirt. - And he had a number really since. - Six months? - Sorry. - Six months? - Yeah, since I came to the ass. - He came in one time and there was an argument and his names. - No, I actually, I showed him what it's like when you try to push around a woman. I mean he was pushing her around. - So you're wrong? - He pushed him around like a woman. - So I pushed him around like a woman and I made him sad and I like it. (laughing) - I actually would have fed up that. - Of course, that's why I liked it. - When you couldn't smell anything, when you weren't what formed it, it did. - Like you said. (laughing) Were you a little bit down then? - 'Cause you're not gonna snack off me, vampire. - So he did come back recently, let's say a week or so ago and he did get into a fight with Diane and that's when Nate, Nate here. - Is that man? - He interceded and everyone just thinks that I'm just this thin, emo kid that wears heavy makeup and listens to the cure but which you are, by the way. - Which I am, perhaps so much more. I'm also, like I said, maybe you don't realize that and understand that. I think that we should really wake that dude up and drink Harry after Harry and Jesse was upset. - He's feeding off yourself, like. (laughing) - Sort of a blessing. - So, what do you do? - Take him off. - You know, we don't have a bad guy. Are we gonna leave him here for the cops or are we gonna take him out of here? - We'll leave him here to let talk to him first. - Yeah. - Or growl him. - It's better than to have to find him again later and he's most likely to be arrested for murder. - You got four? - Two people. - Oh yeah, but actually, I-- - You're talking, so I'm assuming you turn back into a human? - I am going to shift back into a human. - Is your intimidation better as a woman? - No, oddly enough. - Probably because I'm not gonna intimidate requires some sexual interaction where as a wolf, I'm just gonna be like, (growling) - When you growl, they just wet themselves. They don't actually give you information 'cause they don't know what the hell you want. - How about this? That's why you have a good cop on the wolf. - Well, how about this? I hear what he says and why I will remain in wolf form and I will kind of, you know, where I might tell the acknowledge that I like his plan. - You're gonna add dumb. You're gonna sit intimidated. - If it's not going the way I want, I will shift into human mode where I will be more intimidating and naked. - Somehow. (laughing) - So even worse. - Is it? - Just carry it because it's your character and you can make him any way you want. - Is he intimidating when he's naked? - Listen, dude. Just wanna know. - I am great at being intimidated and intimidating as a human and maybe it's a four plus 4.5, but not naked. - Okay. - Good enough. - It's your character. - We're gonna tell him, listen, dude. - I'll tell you what. If I'm not gonna-- - You're gonna sleep 'cause wolf on you and if you don't tell us what we wanna know, he's gonna shift you to a human and we're gonna say keep on you as a human. - He's warm. (laughing) - But I think let's first see what I can do with the draws of a werewolf kind of slavoring and growling and, you know. - Is anyone else have intimidation? - I do not have any ability. - I have empathy so I could good cop bad cop. - I got average. - Yeah, average. - That's the same intimidation. - That's better than nothing. Maybe you could ask the questions and Martin, you could be the good cop, he could be the bad cop, he could be the police dog. - Are you gonna assist with a good cop bad cop as things aren't always as they seem to be the nice guy and then all of a sudden. - Do you have empathy? - Oh yeah. - What's your-- - Who's got the better empathy? - I got great possible. - Ah, you can do it. - She can do it. - She can do it. - Sorry. - Yeah. - What do you call it? - Oh, man. - How'd that make you feel? - It made me feel right. (laughing) - Bad cop. - He's feeling right. - Bad cop. - Bad cop. - Bad cop in the lead. (clicking) - Okay, so who wakes him up? - It's empathy, the role for-- - All right. - Good cop. - Yes, and he-- - Yeah, but they would definitely be the role for-- - Intimidate for bad cop, and then-- - I'll invest-- - I think we're all alive. - All right. - Do you investigate the alley problem? - Yeah, is there another room to investigate? - Well, they do. - Well, there's an alley, but-- - Yeah, there's an alley. - Okay, I'll go and investigate. - Come on with those. - I wanna watch this. I wanna see if these-- - Hold on. - Really get sad and turn your derivation and just feeling down. - I'm gonna use-- (laughing) - Throughout this entire-- - Intimidation. - Intimidation. - Intimidation. Is it the crime maneuver? - Intimidate. - I wanna like leave him out in the alley where I can like slowly suck him into the ground every time he gives me. - Nothing. - Intimidate him more? - Yeah, that is like harsh, isn't it? (laughing) - That would probably make him sad. - I got an idea. (laughing) - Yeah, no matter if I could make myself appear to be his boss and ask him-- - May I offer some-- - Well, I can't, everybody. - We have so many ways to scare this. - You do. - Yeah, a lot of you just have to pick one. - So we like-- - Well, you know what, I can just touch him and make him feel despair. Like, he just gets despairing. Maybe he'll give it off. - Maybe he'll stop. - There's nothing to live for. - And then maybe he'll stop trying to make everyone else sad. (laughing) - Because I'll make him sad. - I love food. - The thing is though, when they feel despair that badly, they don't talk, they just cry. - I don't know, despair? - Things will get better when you tell me. - I don't know, you know. - You guys can make it to us. - I'll bring the despair if we need it. - I'm going to change it to human form so I can speak. I just-- - 'Cause the wolf keeps going. - Well, I can't-- - I can't hear what she was. - I can't hear what she was. (laughing) - All right, but it's early in the morning, this is a popular coffee place. Maybe we should-- - Lock the door. - Lock the door and put up the clothes sign if we're going to be in the back interrogating somebody and maybe draw some blinds. But then we're interfering with that crime scene. - Yes, you are, and there's the fact that-- - Trying to shut up with her. - And looking from the front of the building, you don't think you can see the body? - Kinda chuffed up there, yeah. - Oh, I mean, there's one body that's behind the counter. You definitely can't see that. The other body's like in between, there's a couple, you know, maybe someone can't see through the window. But if you draw the blinds, then they definitely can't see. - I'm just saying that if we're going to be spending some time here, we don't need people walking in on us. But good, that's good. - Lock it up. - To prevent that from happening, we're interfering with the fundamental crime scene. - Isn't that right, Detective? - Yeah, don't interfere with the crime scene. - You know, when I'm making my views, I don't want people to be treated quite over and you put your paw prints in the blood, snipped around and licked it. That pretty much destroyed the crime scene. - I put his paw prints in the blood. - He snipped a small smidgen of blood on the side of the blood. - Well, we have been walking around, so I mean, foot pretty. - It's just a real sunshine. - Hey, all I'm saying is, - I was looking pretty much destroyed this crime scene. - 'Cause you put your fingerprints on it. - Yeah, and that's what I'm talking about. - He's talking to a cop. (laughing) - You're panned around all four of you. - You got more information from that city cops than you ever. - Except for the fingerprints that were on it, after we handled it, it touched it. Oh, what do I feel? What do I feel? Oh, the killer's fingerprints were on a Colombo. Okay. Anyway. - Yeah, you got it. - Oh, by the way, in psychological ocean, I don't have to make him sad. I can make him fearful. I can make him happy. I can make him buddy, buddy. I can use any emotion I want. So if this good cop, bad cop ends, I'll just give him a little bit of my emo mojo. Don't let the buddy ears pull you. - I think you're wrong. - My hoodie is cool. - When you funnel a man and then make him sad (laughs) I think you can only make him sad, and I need to look it up for sure. - What's your power effect? - If you touch someone, you make them feel something. You're able to do maneuvers that will allow you to be a role. - I told you, it sounds like anything. - Which is pretty true. - Right. But I think when you, you might like it. - You might like it. - Why? - It's all depends. So is there any emotion? - This ability costs one refresh to start and requires you to pick a single emotion you can incite, be it rage, most fear protectness of the life. - The description. - I do want to feel for one vote. - I can change your world. - It's all a good effect. - So I think you took the spare, right? - It's his one vote. - The spare, 'cause that's what he feeds off. I go and visit it outside, and I'll just whip a snapper and just do their good cup, bad cup, right? - You guys have now been in this coffee shop approaching half an hour. Which means it is getting towards a very, very busy part of the day when everybody's first heading into work. - We really need to work this up for sure. So, you either are gonna do this in here and do it quickly, do it in the back alley, and then work that someone doesn't show up or take this guy somewhere else. - Shaw, we did lock the front door down. - You are? - I didn't hear that. Who locked the front door? - Don't lock the front door. - Don't lock the front door. - Don't lock the front door. - You're driving a fan thing to show? - The fan. - I'm the bass player, the drummer usually has the fan. - You don't drive around? - Which, do I have a vehicle? - We used to, like, shove them in the back of the fan. - Yes. - You have access to the fan, sir. - Okay. - Yeah, I got a van back, man. - You said you wanted to put them in the alley to get sick. - We're gonna seal. We had, like, the guy that was here. - I've got the mystery machine. - I got a van. - Okay, we'll throw them in there with them. - No. - We do, we do. - I hide them from the cop. - That's pretty good. - You do, the magical crime. - Magical cops are on it. - Okay, Mr. Only Wizard in. - Okay, if that's your justification for breaking off these laws, if you're the only cop in the Only Wizard in town, that's a fake point for you. You're taking 'em, throwing 'em in a van, taking 'em somewhere else? - Yeah. - Should I get out of here before we get caught? - No one wants to investigate the bad guy. - Oh. - No one wants to investigate the bad guy. - While they were arguing while he was locking up, while they were dragging the body over to the van, go for it. - All right, man. But first, you think if we don't follow a cop, soon they're gonna start suspecting. - Yeah. - One plus because one. - Which we're here. - We didn't sign in. - Bye. - Let's just get out of here. - How they know we're here? - Yeah. - You guys, I mean. - I've had a few footprints. That's about it. - This place would be littered with fingerprints because it's a place of business. You've been here on other days. So you've left fingerprints all over here as have all of the customers. So it's possible that the next person who comes here and expects the door to be open in seven and finds it locked and looks in and sees a little bit of disarray in my call the cops. If not, at eight o'clock after person, after person tries to get in here again, somebody's callin' somethin'. - I rolled a six to investigate the back, Ali. - Total of six, that's a fantastic roll of plus six. And you find some evidence of what looks like a very recent oil leak of a vehicle that was parked here. 'Cause that was a fantastic roll, by the way. - Mm-hmm. - I found an oil leak, guys. You know what that means. When you get to some of the oil. - Why do I touch that oil leak? - I don't know, I get to catch your material. - That's some oil. - Hey, um, can't you, uh, I might even get to catch you at your bed. - Sure, don't you? - Oh, go and trace this oil back to the car again, bro? - You locked the door, so why don't you say? - I don't do it. - Well, he's-- - She said. - She said, he's being-- - The Mardi. - The magical tracing? - Mardi does the mojo of-- - A thorough brush. - Zach is-- - A thorough rocks. - Yeah, but does-- - Zach's a cannon, he does damage. - Oh, there's vomitorgy, which means that he could, like, take a sample of this oil and then use a tracking spell to find the other oil. - Like human blood. Zach doesn't even have-- - It's car simply. - But I can't track it. - Zach has-- - He's a premise. - Channelling in the sight. - He makes things go boom. - Mm-hmm. - Mm-hmm. - Okay. - All right. - However, Harry tries to-- - He ain't no Harry does. - He knows Harry tries to-- - Martin has the ability to-- - So I see the history of the oil, does he? - This was once a dinosaur. - Not that far back. - Not that far back. - Then it died. - Then I get pressurized under the roof. - If you wanna go ahead-- - Posturism. - Succometry! - Yeah. - Cool, plus two, plus four, six. - I've known-- - Maybe seven if they're still counting. - Yeah, yeah. - Seeing the crime. - Well, maybe you can see-- - Seven. - An license plate from the vehicle-- - Or even just a make would help. - Maybe. - Yes. - You can see the inside. You see-- - I got the car off the engine. - It's dark. - You can't see the van, and it's a large white, you believe, Dodge. And it's one of those, kind of like a big Dodge white van. - That'll help more. - And it's got no writing on the side and you can't make out a license plate. - Yeah, there are hundreds of those. - White van progress. - I get in the van and they-- (upbeat music) - Thanks for listening to 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 forum for comments and suggestions. Or 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 us next episode for more mystery and adventure. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (light music) [MUSIC]