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Ep. 97 The Eye of A Hurricane - De Profundis
101 Plays3 years ago
The party catches up to the bearer of the all important book "The World Away" and takes in the theatre of war now surrounding them...
Follow us on our Twitters - @FellowshipTable
Intro written and produced by Joseph McDade - https://josephmcdade.com/
The Fellowship Party Twitter Pages:
- The DM/Mark - @HastilyRolledDM
- Drago/Ian - @IRolledA1
- Folly/Callum - @TheD20Gamer
- Princess Helena/Casey - @unicorncrit
- Carstan/Will - @Natural20Will
- Robin/Darren - @DarrenPage06
- Claude/Danny - @totalpartythrlz
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Transcript
Episode Introduction
00:00:00
Speaker
I'm going to continue. Well, I'll play the bagpipes find another orifice to blow it from
00:00:36
Speaker
Hello everyone and welcome to this week's episode of the Fellowship of the Tabletop. We are a live playfivey D&D podcast set in the magical home-brewed world of Eryth.
Player Introductions
00:00:45
Speaker
My name is Mark and I am the Dungeon Master and also with us for today's episode we have Casey who plays the human champion, Helena Sleekguard. We've got Ian who plays the Dragonborn Barbarian Drago.
00:01:14
Speaker
Nobody ever lets me play with my bagpipes. We've got Danny who plays the human fighter rogue Robin. Yeah, I got nothing. We've got Danny who plays the human cleric Claude. Bonjour. That's quite a tame one for everyone. I did try to think on you. You just killed us all on that. That's great. I thought Ian was going to choke. I've taken to now picking you in the order of the least prepared you look and just seeing what happens. See, I was fucking there, mate. I was good.
00:01:34
Speaker
What up? You've got...
00:01:41
Speaker
Casey was right on it though. You can't follow Casey. That's what we're all starting to know. And you shouldn't because she doesn't want you to follow her. Unless you're following her on Twitter. Where can we find you on Twitter? Unicorn Crit. Well played. Well played.
Recap & Character Interactions
00:01:57
Speaker
Thank you. And speaking of being well played, you guys played well last week on the Fellowship of the Tabletop. Boom. What is this? And job competition we've got going on. You're doing it ever so well.
00:02:07
Speaker
wish. And speaking of doing ever so well, we had some great RP conversing with each other. We had some long and deep conversations during a short rest, which we haven't really used much this this arc. And we managed to talk through a couple of things with Robin and Lucian with Claude, etc. with the others. We worked on the problems with
00:02:27
Speaker
Folly remembered, after getting punched in the face by Drago, him seeing Kelsan and what Kelsan told him might follow the broken trees through the tunnels of the clearing. Kelsan flew up with the help of Folly to look around and get their bearings. They found what they think are this line of the broken trees, which might be the path
00:02:46
Speaker
to the Blight. He also saw the tower off in the distance and saw the dragon, the undead dragon which looms over the land, the dangerous and indomitable Gal Greth, as he tried to escape from the massive amount of energy and power of Claude's Forbidden Spell as it managed to get out of the area in time towards the tower and away.
Vance's Energetic Plan
00:03:13
Speaker
We finish the episode with Vance running in with a look of almost controlled elation and chaos, like a child that's just figured out how to burn something, running in and looking at the group and announcing that he had a plan. And he stands there staring at you all, sweat dripping down his face, panting, as he looks at each of you in turn.
Strategizing with Armies
00:03:34
Speaker
Sorry, is there anything you'd like to say? He's thinking about it. No, I'm not thinking. I've got the plan.
00:03:41
Speaker
We've got a plan. What is it? Fucking get on with it. Come on. Is it a cunning plan? I don't know what you're talking about, Bard. Kostan. You know, Claude. Yeah, give me my sword back. Give me the sword back. Yeah. Takes it. It takes the sword. Hold it for a second. No, fuck this. Take it back again. Hold it a second. Okay. Claude, tell them the thing you told me earlier. About the army. Come on.
00:04:11
Speaker
Oh, I made a small suggestion to the very knowledgeable general that maybe now is a good time to bring an army forward. And the army has never been able to come forward because to cast the spell, teleportation in such an array, such a space, we need an open area of clear land close by of a useful position. If we cast it here, pointless. We've got trees to traverse. We could never get an army through here in any kind of order.
00:04:41
Speaker
But there is rumor that there is areas of land close to the tower, close to the rift, that would be perfect, that are defended, that if we could clear them out and you can give me and my mages some time to cast a solid teleportation, I'm talking runes, I'm talking the time it needs to develop properly,
00:05:09
Speaker
If we could set up two, maybe three of these points, we could empty Spirit Monde readout. We could call on the fourth battalion on the eastern front. Hell, we could step one up to the very center of the royal empire and call in some of their best soldiers. And that might not turn the tide, but it indeed might give you the time
00:05:38
Speaker
to get to the tower split the armies we've got we've got contribution to the forces the black mouth rangers in oh yeah yeah we can i can get some of them too some of them bad boys yeah right okay uh his head's kind of working at a thousand miles an hour at this right okay all right amplify it where do you need us to be
00:06:07
Speaker
From what I've heard of our scouts at the rift, near the rift, there are tens of thousands of the undead, of these abominations, of these creatures, near enough to them down in the basin
00:06:23
Speaker
When we go there, you'll make sense. But there are areas of barren land that aren't being used except for weak goblins, kobolds, et cetera, all around the edges. If we clear these areas out in strategic locations, it will give us an advantage. We can bring through specific armies at specific points, make portals big enough to bring in thousands of troops.
00:06:43
Speaker
draw the forces away, make a passageway through to the tower to get you through, to give you a chance. Are you talking about multiple portals for each army or one big portal grabbing everyone? Multiple. I'm just thinking if one gets shut down or surrounded, we need to bring troops in from somewhere else.
00:07:05
Speaker
Okay, so you need us to clear out separate pockets of strategic positions so that you can set up portals to grab an army. Final question. Is this still within the stronghold of Claude's spell? I don't know. I don't know how far we are from the tower specifically. Karsten, you were there up in the air swimming. What did you see?
00:07:34
Speaker
Well, we I saw the tower I also saw the the big like what we think is the the broken trees and the tower It's outside of Claude's Spell so we haven't destroyed anyone dead there There was also this really weird black sea around it the sea Is like this this black it looked like it was moving like it was water really weird I Haven't heard of any sea
00:08:03
Speaker
So what, around the tower? That's what I saw. Okay, we're gonna have to look at that. Are you sure it wasn't blurred or something, Kastan? I mean, unless it was like all the dead and there were that many that it looked like water. Yeah, still to the point though of our next task you were so excited about. I'm confused on how you expect us to get this done.
00:08:32
Speaker
We're best stuck together and it sounds like you want multiple versions of us in different areas trying to make a safe place for multiple portals. What's your actual plan? The idea is this. This area of land is bigger than you think. The very center of the blight is bigger than you think. If you can get down to these specific areas,
00:08:59
Speaker
the the the people the animal many areas you keep saying areas how many areas give us some facts three we can help you i've got to know i have enough majors to set up three now three we do them one at a time and we do them quietly we get down there we don't let anyone escape
00:09:22
Speaker
We don't let anyone set off any alarms or calls or other areas or do anything to get anyone else's attention. I'm not saying we go stealth. I'm saying we get in there, we either kill or subdue whatever's there, do what we need to do, and then get the fuck out of there again. Once the portal's set up, once the runes are in position, they won't have the power to be able to destroy that. So we can do it and then leave. And then we can allow the actual armies to fight off those that remain.
00:09:51
Speaker
It sounds standard enough, but what kind of things are we facing in there? You said cobolts, and do you have reconnaissance there? What are we facing? This is from one scout that made it back. I don't know of the specifics of it, but all I know is that the power is concentrated specifically towards the center at the tower. The power around the edges, the forces out there,
00:10:17
Speaker
They will be hangers on, they will be those vying for allegiance to the Blight. They will be nothing compared to what we are. What about if we got closer? Couldn't Claude just cast his spell again and that would get rid of all the dead from the tower? And then we could just walk in? Yes, it would probably get rid of the dead. But I don't think they're all dead. Yeah, but they couldn't get in for a long time. We could set it off and then we've got a day, Claude? How long does it last?
00:10:45
Speaker
I've got a day of it like this. I couldn't keep casting it. We could then spend a day walking. We could nuke this place and then, you know. You could definitely help us. Absolutely. Okay. And then could you teleport your armies? Because I heard over heard Claude saying about a password. Couldn't you teleport the armies into this safe space? Passwords, teddy bear.
00:11:10
Speaker
Yeah, as long as as long as Claude stayed within the boundaries of this one, I mean, it's only like we could go like six miles and then, yeah, just. OK, where's the nearest place that you want this pool being set up? We need to go and actually look first. Like I said, this is all recon from a single scout. I don't know for certain the
Visions & Battle Outcomes
00:11:31
Speaker
direct position, but I will be able to point them out to you if our scouts information was correct.
00:11:36
Speaker
It's okay. We are very, very perceptive people on this team. So I've noticed you get as close. We can, we can search it out, but where are we heading first? Like, you know, this area, we don't, you're saying that we need to be in three places. Tell us which ones and in which order. It points to the West and recount, recount what folly told him in the previous episode, follow the broken trees through the tunnel to the clearing.
00:12:07
Speaker
From that clearing, you oversee and overlook the basin, which is the large thousands and thousands of miles of land that's been excavated by this blight and where their forces are located. We go down the other side of the basin and on the rim, the area around the edges of this land is where we'll find our our footholds that we can bring in the forces of the living.
00:12:35
Speaker
Three separate footholds. Three separate footholds. And they don't have a name other than just footholds at the moment. To be honest, they could just be a cobold encampment there. They could be, I don't know what they've put there, but they're wide open land. Some of them are protected by cliff walls. It'd be a good point to build a bit of a vanguard force to defend the portal to bring more in. Oh, you basically want to use this so you can actually have forces encircle and beseech the actual portal itself in case we fail.
00:13:06
Speaker
To be honest, that's a backup plan. My main plan was to draw the forces away. And yes, Claude, you will be able to cast whatever you call this, and he's looking up around the space around you. But if that scout, and from what we've seen and heard, is anything to go off, the Blight haven't just called on the undead. These are other realms, other forces.
00:13:36
Speaker
Some speak of demons. Some speak of devils. Some speak of abominations. Will your spell work on all of them? Well, yeah, but I think I have to choose. It's time. Right. No. The lawyer in the corner is saying, no. Hold on. I haven't really... Suddenly a man in a black suit sits on a briefcase going, my client can choose whatever he wants to destroy.
00:14:03
Speaker
Don't answer that, Claude. Don't answer that. We'll drop us a Knowledge Bomb. Yes. Spell damages all types of creatures I choose. So demons and devils would be exempt. Yeah. I mean, you could choose all of them if you wanted to. You could. So there is a limited amount of creatures that you can affect all of them. Does that sound like a plan? It's the only plan we've got.
00:14:30
Speaker
I like plans. It's a better plan than, to be honest, the DM had previously. Much more interesting, much more cinematic. Thank you, Claude, for that idea. Are we all in agreement then? This is incredibly dangerous. I'll explain more when we get there. It'll make more sense when you can see the place for yourself. How long do you think it's taking?
00:14:58
Speaker
However long it takes to walk, how far? Seven, eight miles? There's nothing here. I don't imagine we'll face any kind of problem. So we could move at pace. We could probably reach it by, well, what we refer to as nightfall, but the sun never really seems to leave. We can rest. We can talk over a plan. And then in the morning, we could put our plan into action. Three fights, three portals, and then the tower.
00:15:32
Speaker
I'm trying not to piss you guys off but Lucy and Vance can you go away for a bit so we can discuss this as a group. I'm no offence but you're talking like you just said very dangerous things and sometimes we need to discuss it as a group.
00:15:52
Speaker
Of course. And Vance turns and walks off back towards the western side, towards where he thinks the trees are where they should head next. I'm Vance, why am I saying my own name? Lucian, let me show you, I think, the rule we need through. And he's making it almost very obvious as a way to kind of get him away. And Lucian kind of looks at Vance, looks at the group,
00:16:15
Speaker
Bloody hell. Yeah, okay, fine. Have your private conversation. Yes, fine. Show me the trees. Show me where, yeah, okay, let's go. And he walks off. Claude, stay here. I know you like trees. It's not for you. We're not hugging trees here. Not hugging. So Draggo, we'll turn to the group and hands out. What's everyone's thoughts? It's a plan, I mean.
00:16:42
Speaker
I suppose if he wants us to secure these points so they can bring armies in and then Claude does his thing I think it'll be a hard thing for us to do because I don't think we'll have a chance to rest every day after each one. Tired is positively suicidal I think. I love it. Well do you have a better idea Karsten?
00:17:05
Speaker
Well, I mean, my idea was just to get Claude within, like, however many miles he needs to be and then pop off his little spell and that then eliminates him when we end the blight without all this happen. I'm sure that's what could happen, but before then, we need to do what I think Vance has suggested. I think if I understand it correctly, that when we went into your dream, Princess, we were seeing the future, maybe,
00:17:35
Speaker
And if we need to create a scene of chaos so that we can get to the top of the tower, we need to be able to call in these armies. So if we did see the future, we've got to get, we've got to get this place like, you know, a proper battlefield. Yes, but Claude, if you think about it, my dream, I don't know if you remember it very well.
00:17:58
Speaker
The people we were stepping over to get to the tower, they were dead. Yeah, and their heads pointing to the party were on the floor. Yes, I think maybe what we saw necessarily wasn't the future, but something that was a possibility. It was there to terrify us, there to put fear within us.
00:18:20
Speaker
Either way, getting the armies to the battlefield will give us the distraction we need to get to the top of the tower, isn't it? And if we need to do some sort of split when we get there, then so be it. Well, I think we might have to conserve our strength. I don't know the idea of a split. I think that there's more power in us sticking together, even if that means doing portals as a portal by portal base. If we get to the tower and
00:18:50
Speaker
I have a book, Claude has the Reaver, then we go together and... That's the priority, isn't it? That's fine. I think that decision will be made for us when we get to them.
Locating Kelsan & Book Retrieval
00:19:02
Speaker
I think if we take in the first stages, which is like the portals... I agree. I agree with you, I think after that.
00:19:12
Speaker
we don't know but you and Claude you've seen this I'll lean on your decisions but I would rather not a split at any point but what will be will be but I think the first port of call is is lighting these pools I would like to do it together I don't suggest that we go and do
00:19:31
Speaker
but two on each portal, I think each port should be taken by us. I don't think Vance has us making the portals. I think we have to secure the area and then the portals will appear. No, I totally agree. I mean, it does make sense. I suppose we do all this and we still don't have Calstan here. We're going to be pretty much announcing ourselves if we bring armies in. So maybe we should get all the things we need before we do it all. I think I have to agree.
00:20:01
Speaker
Is it possible to do prep work for the portals? Obviously, perhaps we could prep the portals. It's not us casting it. I think Vance will send a message or use Claude. But they still have to cross. We could still prepare and then attempt to find Kelsan in this book possibly tomorrow when Claude needs magical ability to seem to refresh.
00:20:27
Speaker
Don't flick your hand at magical abilities like it's Honky Tonk
00:20:37
Speaker
I think I think that I think what Vance was saying was that the areas we're going to might be like camps or little defense positions, and they may be filled with things we have to clear out the preparation is just killing things. So it's where we kill things and announce ourselves and and and then go find the book or we find the book and then we then we kill the things then the armies arrive, then we go start the book and then we all go have dinner somewhere really nice.
00:21:04
Speaker
I like that. Yeah. Okay. Okay. So everyone agree. We go, we go find, we go find book, kill San book portal tower. Okay. Okay. Um, sounds. Yeah. Do you want to go and find your brother and maybe talk to him about this? We could have some swammer or something. What's that? Very Avengers. I like it. Nice. Nice. Nice. Nice.
00:21:35
Speaker
Lucian, a quick word. Yeah, okay. Can Vance listen? I feel like we're at school again. Of course. No, it's fine. You finished looking at the trees. Anything interesting? Oh, yeah, they're dead. It's, you know, this is the way to the west, you know. Anyway, we were just killing time. Okay, don't worry about us. The DM can't think of anything clever to put here, so he's just going to, you know, brush past it and let you talk.
00:22:02
Speaker
It's fine. We've had a change of plan slightly. Before getting together with the armies and going forward to find and place the portals, etc, we feel it's best to find the book first, to locate Kelsan and to retrieve the book before we go. That makes sense.
00:22:26
Speaker
The world away has to be close to us and I'm sure it won't take long to be able to locate it. Who has it? Kelsan. Kelsan. And Kelsan was here? Yes. And spoke to someone in your group? Yes. And they didn't take the book? No, they fucking didn't. Right, okay. Just checking. So... Fuck you, Folly. Fuck you all!
00:22:55
Speaker
How do we go about, firstly, you know, pasting over a really obvious plot hook that I thought he would have done. How do we go about... You have screwed us here. I could go like two questions. How do we go about finding Kelsan? Any ideas? Sorry, Sis. He's the brother, so I thought maybe he could give us something.
00:23:22
Speaker
No, sorry, Vance, I'd hate to interrupt, but Claude has a spell that locates creatures, and he spent his last spell slot tonight trying to find Gris... Grissel? What's his name? Grazet. To no avail, so he wants to use the same spell again in the morning when his spells have regenerated.
00:23:48
Speaker
Unless you have any other tips, advice, tricks, anything that you think would be suitable to know at this time. Well, if anyone would know anything about Kelsan, it would be Vance. Vance, anything? Nope, nothing. Brilliant. Fantastic. Great start. So yeah, let's wait. Perhaps rather than waiting here, we could travel there and we can start to scope things out and that'll then get us closer to where Kelsan is rather than just wait here for a day.
00:24:20
Speaker
I mean, for us, the closer we get to the rift, the closer we get to opening those portals, the better. I understand you need this book to complete your religious right, which may or may not close the blight. I'm hoping it bloody does.
00:24:35
Speaker
The armies are a second option. We haven't had a chance to get people in this close in a while. This could be the only chance we have of a military front this close. Is there any way, Lucian, that we can get word before you need to, you know, to hasten things a little? Get word to your armies? Yes. Vance has already been sending messages. Right. They are preparing. He's been sending the code word out to all the battalions that are part of this force.
00:25:03
Speaker
to all of the hailstorm surge, to the obsidianis.
00:25:07
Speaker
even to small corners of the Magickarium and other forces in Goldview that are willing to lend support. Some of the Obciscra will be joining us. Some of them will be the mages that open the portal. Some of the best mages we have, I say we, some of the best mages we, the living have are the Obciscra. And two of them will be coming over to open two of the portals, at least
00:25:36
Speaker
So yes, the wheels are turning. We have a message to Blackmouth. Your friend Claude wanted a message to the Blackmouth Rangers that has taken place. We have sent messages far and wide up to the Osran Islands and down to the Horal Empire and to the dwarves in the Far of the East, even to the Kingdom of Shadowmen, though hearing a response from them will be highly unlikely.
00:26:04
Speaker
So everybody that needs to know knows. They know our plan. Whether or not they come through with it or not is a different matter, but they know our plan. We know that our armies will approach. We know that the Sperimond readout will empty for a final rout against the undead. And that alone will be a force to be reckoned with. And with this change in plan of us going to collect this book beforehand, is that going to mess up any timings with anybody else?
00:26:30
Speaker
They will prepare and they will wait for our signal, as long as that will need to be. Now, onto your friend though, this... I say, sorry, your friend, Vance, your brother, Kelsan, that we are looking for. But you wanted, we'll be walking just towards the blight, within the bubble. I figured that if we stay within the bubble, if our theory is correct that Kelsan might be doing the influence of the blight, it would make sense that he might be going towards the middle of the blight.
00:27:02
Speaker
That would make sense. I'll be sure he's under the control of this... blight then.
00:27:07
Speaker
I mean, that's what Folly said, but Folly says lots of things. Folly! And he's going to... Lucy's going to shout out. You know what? Fuck it. Everyone, huddle up. Let's come over here. Come over here. Actually, we'll come to you. Stay there. No,
Journey Through Blighted Lands
00:27:18
Speaker
no, no. I know. We'll meet you halfway. How about that? We'll just keep current, conversing on each other. I think, yeah. It's only a couple of steps, guys. Come on. I know, but, you know... You could say we're halfway there. Living on a... Anyway... Keep it, I swear.
00:27:36
Speaker
You know, Folly used to work on the docks. No, the... Oh, okay. Robin did as well. And then they met an elf called Elphiv, who turned out was a dick. Claude joined them on the Othrin Isles. Okay, all right, all right. Anyway... Yes, what do you want? What do you want? Yes, you. That's who I was talking to. Now listen.
00:28:05
Speaker
I know your plan now to find Kelsan first. Sorry. Kelsan Claude. Too many Ks. Gotcha. Now, your bard friend seems to believe that he would have headed towards the centre of the blight. Would you agree with that notion or did you get a different sense from him? I'm just trying to get a sense of if we're heading in the right direction and we're not going to have to walk back on ourselves.
00:28:33
Speaker
I believe it most likely, yes. This Grazed person seems to be pulling him somewhere. And I have very much all the reason to believe that Grazed is at the center of the blight. He seems to be this person leading the whole thing. So if he's being pulled along, it would make sense that Kelsan would be there with him. So in theory, we could catch up with him on the way if he's walking the same way we are. It is possible. Or see him, at least. If we could see him, we could possibly catch up.
00:29:06
Speaker
Very well. Vance, so let's sit fine with you. As long as we get the armies here, I don't mind what we do. But for all intents and purposes, my brother is dead. Any semblance of him that remains, I will put him to rest. I know my brother. I know this is not him. We might be able to fix him. We'll cross that bridge when we come to it. But yes, I'm happy. As happy as one can be in these godforsaken lands.
00:29:38
Speaker
Well, let's go team. Yeah. So we have a plan. Right. We're going. Yep. Okay. Everyone gather your things. I'd say be wary, but we're in a big old protection bubble. Thanks, Claude. We're heading west.
00:29:55
Speaker
And he's going to, once I want to pick up the things, Vance is going to lead the vanguard of the group and head off through the... Oh, Mr. Vance. Mr. Vance. It's Mr. Skullblade, but sure, what do you want? Okay, Mr. Skullblade, sir. You stopped to be playing before. Aren't I still not allowed to play the bagpipes or just want to know where I stand? That is correct. You are banned from playing the bagpipes. It is not allowed in these lands. He's lying to you.
00:30:27
Speaker
Princess, can I please play the bagpipes? I thought we were all about not... Are you the princess, Folly? I just wanted to interrupt. I'm not a princess, but I thought we were supposed to be keeping ourselves quiet. Listen, the thing is, we've still got that spell upon the land, so we're seven and a half miles, I think actually now's the time that maybe we should have a jolly.
00:30:51
Speaker
A jolly like Folly. A fucking jolly, yeah. How do you know my sister? Yeah, yeah, do you know what? Fuck it. Castan, play the bagpipes. Sing us a song. Actually, could you... There's also some ale or something. Charlie, you've been writing in your book for so long about our ventures. Maybe now's the time to curate one of those songs that you've been threatening with us. Maybe once we've won. Yeah, you know what? I tend to agree with everyone here. But I play a song or we'll kill you. Yeah, that sounds good, doesn't it, gang? Yeah, yeah.
00:31:20
Speaker
No, too far? No, not too far. It's perfect. You'll fit well. I mean, you know, you want to play the bagpipes, so play. Sing at the same time. You are a bard at the end of the day. You can't sing and play bagpipes at the same time. Well, find a way. Are you going to get punched by a prince? Absolutely. And Foddy's going to punch you by this sound of things. I'm going to continue. Well, I'll play the bagpipes. Find another orifice to blow it from.
00:31:53
Speaker
Let's open him. Fantastic. You play the bagpipes? Are you going to give us a performance check to see how well you do? I know you love a good performance check. 48. I was really hoping for a song. You're going to pull out some sort of epic song about our journeys. Me too. What was the score? Sorry, what was the wrong? 27. 27. You play the bagpipes deftly and everyone gives you a rousing round of applause at the end whilst on their walk.
00:32:23
Speaker
Don't take autonomous control of my character. I ain't applauding till I hear a song. They're bagpipes as well. I mean, come on. Yeah. I find with bagpipes, they always seem to end and you think, oh, oh gosh, that was it. It ends very abruptly. You kind of think there's a bit more and it never ends on like a nice kind of solid note.
00:32:43
Speaker
To any bagpipe listeners that we may have, if you want to do a bagpipe opening to our podcast, I will include it. Just send it our way. You know how to it is. And if you don't, you'll hear him at the end of the episode. As the silence falls again across the group, they look expecting me as the bagpipes go away. OK, OK, OK. Yes!
00:33:05
Speaker
Come on! Castad will sing a song and he'll sort of beat a beat and he'll be like Feed the raven, feed the crow Sharpen sword and string your bow Strike the head off every foe Feed the raven, feed the crow Cut your foes down one by one Cut them down when they try to run Cut them down till the battle's won Sacrifice to elido
00:33:37
Speaker
You even got the God in there, you got Alito in there too. Champion. I didn't want to interrupt him. When he starts singing about crows and ravens, I would have sent Nero just to perch on his shoulder, wings to stand for himself. Yeah. Drago would have, when you first opened
Tunnel Travel & Fears
00:33:53
Speaker
your mouth, brow furrowed, getting ready to tell you to shut up. But as soon as you started singing, his face would have turned from anger to shock and then surprise and then ends with a smile.
00:34:06
Speaker
Take a double inspiration, Will. I don't know if this is a thing, but you get two D6. You can only use them one at a time, so you just get two separate bites of inspiration. Unless there's anything pressing, I'd hate to drag out walking. We were just going to walk, walk, walk, and get a majority of this go and happen. Nothing happens. There might have been stuff that was going to happen.
00:34:32
Speaker
But nothing happens because there is a protective shield for 7.5 miles around this location and so all the i was actually one point you're walking through and there's a bit of a clearing as you come through this clearing you do see the fizzling corpses of eight or nine large hulking beasts that are now nothing but ash which was one of your encounters and
00:34:51
Speaker
that you've just decimated as you walk through, still steaming. As you go further on, deeper in, you see a few, you look up to some of the trees and you can see these creatures literally kind of like Pompeii style, kind of burnt to a crisp in location. Again, as you continue to walk through, cast. Do we still get the XP for those? No, you don't. Well, just cast. Just Claude does. He's level 20 now.
00:35:19
Speaker
You don't get the XP for that, no. You joke about Wish, but I'm sure a level 20 cleric can choose to use divine intervention.
00:35:31
Speaker
Yes, so during this walk, Drago is deep in thought, thinking about the Blight, preparing for the upcoming battles ahead, just doing a check on everyone as well, just to see how they seem as they're walking. Can he tell much from their posture and stuff like that? Not going to roll perception because Drago is dumb as shit, but he's just kind of thinking these things. He's not going to get anything from it other than, okay, the group looks ready from a very limited perspective. However, he is going to go to cast the no Claude. Sorry, Will.
00:36:03
Speaker
He's gonna sidle on up next to Claude. Claude, you still got the ability to cast a message to anyone? Yep. Can you cast one to Tali? Yeah. Find out how she's doing. Yeah, sure. Maybe give her an update of what we're doing, or you can tell her that we're all fine,
00:36:30
Speaker
I don't want to worry her, but just give her a, it's been a while since we checked in, maybe just a quick update. What would be the least worrying thing to do? Tell her what we're doing or just ask how she is. I'd go with ask how she is, find out there. And then I don't know, use your intuition. Got you. Got me. I'm going to cast sending and I will say the following. Hi, Tali. It's Claude Uncompany here.
00:37:00
Speaker
Just got some downtime, forward check in. How are you? How's pub? How's your bookie work? Love, love, love, love. You send the message effectively and then you get a response. Hey Claude, still can't get used to you speaking in my head. Pub's fine. I'm fine. Kennard's annoying, but
00:37:30
Speaker
kind of useful. Gold fuse quiet, but there's a stillness in the air. Something is happening. I don't know if it's what you're doing or it's what's happening here. Either way, be safe.
00:37:49
Speaker
Love, love, love. Amazing. Thank you. And then Dragga would just kind of filter that down the line to the nearest person, whoever's behind him and just go, oh, we've just, Claude's just spoken to Tali. She's all good and sends her love. And then pass that down. Chinese whispers. I wonder how that ends up. Yeah, who are you passing it to?
00:38:14
Speaker
Who's the closest to me? So, yeah, I don't know how the party formed. That's the only problem before starting this thing. So my mind went forward to just walking forwards to where Claude is, because I assume he'd be at the vanguard of the party, which would be Lucian, Helena, yourself, probably. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I just assume that Claude always sticks with Helena. Helena's going to be at the front because her brother's at the front. And so in my mind, when Drago is walking, he'd walk forwards to get to Claude. So maybe you heard it.
00:38:44
Speaker
By the time this message gets to the back, it's going to be, Charlie says hello, and at the end it's going to be dov, dov, dov. Nice, I like that. Yeah, I like that too. It's just a cool image though of like, oh, and then just passing it down the line and just update entirely. Nice bit of a morale boost as well. And I like it, I like it.
00:39:06
Speaker
Lovely, and this whole walk through the Blightlands goes without problem. You do pass indeed through a long stretch of burnt out, dried out trees, these broken trees. They stand almost like they've been cut down, not by something smoothly, but by something brutally hitting and removing them. The stumps are broken and shattered, the wood is burnt.
00:39:32
Speaker
The forest around it seems to be affected by the blight. This wood seems to have been affected in a different way. You walk along this with Vance at the vanguard leading the way. You walk for a few hours and you see the sun barely move in the sky, though you know time is passing.
00:39:49
Speaker
You continue to work through these lands. The trees again become thicker as you pass through the broken trees, so to speak. And time continues to trudge on. You walk over the broken leaves. The blackened land becomes thicker. The air becomes thicker and warmer as you get closer. There's a stillness. You're not sure if this is a clawed spell or just the stillness of this forest.
00:40:14
Speaker
The trees are dead. The leaves are dead. All you hear is the crunch of the ground underneath your feet as you walk. Eventually, you start to hit ground that isn't as flat and starts to become quite slightly almost hilly in respect, not mountainous, but just hilly and still covered in these dead trees that cover the thickets of the land.
Confronting Kelsan
00:40:36
Speaker
eventually you see Vance come to a stop and he points forward and what he's pointing to is a gap within one of these smaller hills covered in trees again and there's a small entrance dug into the side it seems dug it seems to be almost from this angle looks like a burrow like a large badger or a bear or some kind of somewhere that you'd put if you were a bet
00:40:59
Speaker
What? If you were a bear, you'd keep your cubs there? I don't know, I'm sorry. It's just a small tunnel, okay? It's a small tunnel from that angle. And he points to and looks back at everyone. In there. It opens up on the inside. We get through there and apparently you keep walking through and then we hit the clearing and the cliff edge and we can see it all. Question. Yep, you don't have to put your hand up, thank you.
00:41:27
Speaker
Do we have to go into the creepy dark hole? Could we not go over the ground? You can do, yeah. I mean, I just don't know what's up there. We can, yeah. Probably not any undead, thanks to Claude. I mean, that's a good point. It's up to you guys. I'm just saying, yeah, dark holes. We have a history of going underground. It doesn't go well. Oh, right. Well, I'm happy to go either way. Like you said, Claude's spell has kept any undeads away.
00:41:56
Speaker
Yeah, the only thing I was going to say, Chaos End did say follow the trees and go through the tunnel. Didn't we say we failed if we did that? Well, they said we wouldn't succeed. I still trust him on his directions, though. We could split the difference, half go over, half go under, see who survives. Yeah, do you want to split the party, Drago? No, I don't. I would just be in an arse. It's not like you.
00:42:24
Speaker
No, our character, no. I mean, I was just saying, I mean, from my point of view, going underground, it doesn't seem very sensible when we don't have to. I mean, I'm open to options.
00:42:36
Speaker
I didn't like the name of that riddle and what it said, that you go and ground and you fail. Ideally, I would like to not fail while we're here, because failure while you're here looks quite bad. But surely, if we do what Kelsan doesn't expect... Kelsan! Kelsan, then doesn't that mean that the big bad guy doesn't know what we're doing? Because if we follow what Kelsan says, then the bad guy knows because the bad guy's in Kelsan's head. Exactly. Great thinking.
00:43:05
Speaker
If Kelsan told us not to do the tunnel and we go over, isn't that kind of falling in line with what Kelsan requested? Who knows? Kelsan said that the way there was to go through the gash into the hole and then find the clearing.
00:43:28
Speaker
And he said, if we do that, you're going to fail. But also, Folly said that this might have been the good part of Kelsan telling us this, so I don't know. I do believe it was the good part of Kelsan that remains. Fine, Folly, you decide. You're the one who spoke to Kelsan. Are we going over? Are we going in? It's on you. My eyes turned to a folly. Mine too.
00:43:55
Speaker
So do the eyes of both Lucian and Vance, and they both give him a really hard stare, joining in like, yeah, pressure, pressure, pressure. Cast something to look to Folly and give him thumbs up, like you can do this. Folly is basically going to turn and just go into the tunnel. He's not going to say anything. He's going to lead by doing. Well, we'll see you there. We're going over the top.
00:44:38
Speaker
I would like to get my I told you so in now just in case and cut and follows
00:44:48
Speaker
I like to think he actually says that whole thing out. I'd like to get my, I told you so in now. Yes, yes, that's exactly what he did. Nice. You enter into this tunnel folly and as you poke your head in and start to move inside, it does indeed open up. This does seem to have been something etched out of the soil itself. There's nothing to hold this up. This doesn't seem to be kind of a minecart entrance. This just seems to be a route through the hills. It's very,
00:45:18
Speaker
it's a single long passageway that stretches and you can see almost as a pin dot in the distance light. Most of you have some kind of vision you of course could like a torch if you want to but as you look down this tunnel there is
00:45:36
Speaker
Nothing, it's just almost a straight boring line. Boring is in B-O-R-I-N-G. No, wait, that's the wrong spelling. To bore your way through something. It's been etched out, drilled out almost, obviously, but there are no drills. Of the ground itself, and it seems to just stretch on and on, and the steps you take, the closer you get, the light doesn't seem to get closer.
00:45:58
Speaker
You continue to walk. Time passes 10 minutes, 20, 30 minutes. The light doesn't seem to get any closer until finally it does seem to get closer after an hour, two hours of walking. As you get closer and closer to this entrance, this light, as it starts to approach your eyes, now used to the darkness and starting to become affected by the light, you do see the outline of a figure
00:46:23
Speaker
standing in the doorway, sorry, the doorway standing in the kind of the light way, almost, if you want, of the entrance of this tunnel, on the far side of the tunnel. And behind him, you can see an image that you can't quite believe is real yet. But this figure in a black color is stood there with its back to you. Vance and Lucian stop and let you guys approach closer, taking the lead on this.
00:46:50
Speaker
Does this cloak look like a cloak of Elvin kind? Investigation. Can I back up on that one because I would be thinking the same thing as Robin? Yep, each roll individually.
00:47:04
Speaker
I want to show you what I've rolled and I know this is a big moment, but it needs to be seen to believe. Natural one. You could just say 20. No, it's a 19. It's a 19. The best thing is you tried to show us and you missed the dice completely. It was a 19, which with a plus 11 is a 30 overall. Oh guys, let me just show you this quickly. I need to show you this. I need to show you this.
00:47:31
Speaker
It's a 19. Brilliant. That is one of the great... Yeah, 30. 30. This is not a cloak of elven kind. This is a battered, muddied, broken cape that you see in front of you. This is not a cape that you've seen before. Except that you would have recognised it slightly from the previous combat with a connection to Folly and the figure that grabs Folly's cloak.
Emotional Aftermath
00:47:55
Speaker
Drago, what did you roll before we get to that? I rolled a four, so because of my lack of darkvision, I don't even see a black cloak. It's just black darkness. You just see a silhouette. Yeah, a silhouette there. You can't make out what it is, absolutely. Robin, back to you in your investigation. Robin would have immediately put his hand to his bow, but upon seeing that he now believes it to be Kelsan, he's going to calm his hand and he's going to very calmly just go, Kelsan.
00:48:27
Speaker
Look at this, Kelsan. The figure slowly turns around and is indeed that of Kelsan with his black hood up, his skin now, his dark skin now bleached pale slightly and blotches over his body. His eyes, his left eye now almost totally blackened with a slight hint of purple, his right eye still retaining some semblance of his Asamarian form.
00:48:55
Speaker
He turns and stares at you, or doesn't say anything. But he doesn't seem to look you directly in the eye, almost looking at kind of navel height, kind of stomach height, not making eye contact. We're here to help you, Kelsan. But you need to step towards us and away from whatever that is. He takes a step backwards. How far away is he, sorry? Probably about 30 feet.
00:49:20
Speaker
Can I cast detect thoughts on him, please? Of course, yeah. Ooh, interesting. Is the shadow of Grazette there? Am I missing that, or did you? No, there's nothing. The silhouette you can see is the silhouette of Kelsan. You just rolled so poorly on the investigation, that was all, yeah. No, no, no, that's fine. You mentioned the silhouette when we first walked down. That was, yeah, sorry. It was Grazette. This would have got a different one. Yeah, the silhouette you can see is the silhouette of Kelsan, nothing else.
00:49:48
Speaker
Appreciate it. Thank you. No problem. Go for it. I wish to know what the initial surface, what the surface thoughts, what is most on Kelsan's mind at this moment. Suicide. Okay.
00:50:04
Speaker
And Carson's just going to look to the others and quietly say, we should be careful. He's thinking about killing himself. He takes another step. Folly. Folly, you spoke to him last. Can you just, I don't know, maybe your best to talk to him here. Kelsan. We're here to help. Please turn around. Well, sorry, you are turn around. Ignore that one.
00:50:33
Speaker
turn around we just kick in harmony at the background every now and then he stares back ignoring your song there's no coming back from where i have to go and from where i've gone and from what has happened to me i don't have long i was forced this far
00:51:03
Speaker
There's no way out. What do you plan to do with your last moment, Kazan? I don't know who he does know. And Vance is going to step forward and draw his sword and put his hand on his brother's shoulder and rest his forehead against the forehead of his brother.
00:51:31
Speaker
and his rather is going to hold onto the back of his neck and there's a moment of stillness and a whisper said between these two. As you see Vance's arm move back, the elbow of his right hand move back and then thud forward and you see Kelsan start to lean into him for a second
00:51:55
Speaker
His face suddenly starts to relax as he starts to slump down onto the floor and you see slowly the blade of Vance's weapon pull back as he falls down to his knees and just starts to stare at his brother. As Kelsan falls to the floor, anyone near Karstan, Karstan will fall to the floor, holding his head.
00:52:30
Speaker
I was in his mind. I just felt him die. Why were you in his... That's your own fault. That's what you get for feeding people's minds. Fucking hell, Polly. Sorry, Lance. Why did you do that?
00:52:51
Speaker
His head sinks down even lower and you just see his shoulders start to kind of bob up and down slightly as he takes some big breaths in. His hand starts to cover his face. My brother was gone. He needed to be free. I could see it in his face despite what you could do. Despite what
00:53:20
Speaker
what he had seen he would never forget.
00:53:27
Speaker
and pull him into her and sort of grab him in a bit of a hug. And he'll just let out a couple of stifled sobs as he tries to keep it together, but it just falls out of him like a jug overfilling with water. The emotion just every now and then splashes out. And despite his utilitarian military front, it leaks. Helena turns to her brother Lucian
00:53:57
Speaker
sort of over his shoulder and just sort of whispers to him, can you just do something brother? I don't know what I can do. We need to give the man a moment at least. Let's just, I don't know, I'm going to step through out of this godforsaken place and I'm going to give Vance a moment.
00:54:29
Speaker
And then, yeah, Helen, I'll just sort of let him go, rub the side of his arms and walk away from him. Castan's going to turn to Robin, having got himself up. Robin, can you at least check whether the book's on, Castan? Because it'd be really annoying if we didn't get the information of the book from him before he died. Jesus Christ, the band is bloody hell. Yes, but it'd be really stupid if
00:55:00
Speaker
I'm not disputing that, but literally the person who killed him is still stood there crying. He's like, I'm just going to loot his body. It'd be fine. Just give me a second. Robin, without saying anything, is going to move forward. He's going to kneel down next to Calcen's body. He's going to just rest his hand on his shoulder and say, I'm sorry. And he's going to close his eyes and
00:55:29
Speaker
is then just going to stay there and glance back at Lucian and say perhaps when the time is right and in a moment it may be best to take Vance out into the opening and away from his brother's body. Lucian's going to look back from him taking himself away and yeah that sounds like a bloody better idea than mine actually.
00:56:00
Speaker
Yeah. Okay. And, uh, Lisa's going to reach down without really speaking to Vance. He's going to get his hands under his kind of armpits and just kind of, come on, come on. I can't just lift him up and he is kind of. Hold on.
00:56:16
Speaker
I can, I can help. I'll take Kelsan with us. Because assuming we're in a tunnel anyway, so if Lucian's help in advance, Drago would step forward and put his arms underneath Kelsan's body and just carry him and we'll be behind him. Drago.
00:56:35
Speaker
I think Robin was wanting Vance to be taken away so we could try and see if the books on Kelsan... Yeah, well the body's coming with us so we can check to see if the book's there but at least we can't leave him here in a dark cave. Let's keep him close by to his family. I don't think we were planning on but... Dragon's already done it man, he's walking forwards. You walk out with...
00:56:58
Speaker
a now grieving, mourning vant and a lifeless body of a gaunt and limp Kelsan from what he previously was.
00:57:09
Speaker
and Vance kind of, after Lucian kind of lifts up Vance to kind of free, he kind of pushes off the arms of Lucian and walks on ahead out of the mouth of the cave and out and kind of looks to try and get some air and to look out across what should be a view. You find yourselves on a cliff edge looking out over some, you can see almost miles and miles and miles down.
00:57:35
Speaker
You can see the edge of Claude's spell now quite clearly, not too far in the distance, 30, 40 feet ahead of you, just before we reach the site that you see in front of you.
Reaching the Rift
00:57:47
Speaker
Advance looks out and his arms fall to his side and he falls to his knees as he stares out.
00:57:58
Speaker
And as you step through the clearing, pushing aside the brittle blackened leaves of a nearby tree which once gristled on the covering of the tunnel, the sight even beckons you closer. The air is fast and warm, the sound silence. The view is of a open, barren, central portion of this once lush forest. It is a sight of felled trees
00:58:29
Speaker
of dead life and the emergence of another force of nature. The air is filled with sulphur and smoke almost out of industry. The cliff edge that you stand on overlooks a deep and violent basin of dug out soil some miles wide and some thousand feet deep with a series of slow moving rivers. At the very centre, at least two miles from your location, is your mission.
00:59:01
Speaker
You can see it. The tower. A tower juts out of the ground. It seems to be sleep guard architecture, but corrupted. From the top of the tower, you can see deep red, orange, yellow arcs of lightning reaching into the sky. And as your eyes follow its energy, you see something that makes you take a strong inhalation of breath.
00:59:26
Speaker
This place is the ancient tower of Brittlestar. It was once known as Sthenberg Citadel. And as you look up, you see this giant swirling ring of energy that's formed above pulsing, sparking, emanating such heat that you can almost feel it from this distance.
00:59:47
Speaker
almost without noticing, almost overlooked from this abysmal sight before you, is what you first thought was, as Carstan rightly did point out miles ago, an ocean, a sea of blackness. But it isn't. The Earth groans with creatures, undead, fiends, abyssal creatures of unknown entities.
01:00:14
Speaker
Abominations and creations that would be too extreme for the most lucid and indescribable nightmares. You take a rough estimate. Their numbers seem to be in the tens of thousands. Their roots surround the tower like ants scuttling. All as one. Like a school of fish that seem to run from a single mind, these creatures follow a pack mentality, it seems.
01:00:40
Speaker
And as you look up, you can see the still struggling form of Galgrath, this dragon on the far side of the tower now, circling.
01:00:54
Speaker
towards the edges and many thousands of feet from the tower as Vance had rightly said are very few forces they become loosened very piecemeal around the edge of the basin these might be some of the areas that Vance was talking about to set up his possible portals to bring through the armies and a route down could be traversed at some distance and some distance covered sorry before before detection you've reached
01:01:24
Speaker
The end. You've reached the rift.
Episode Conclusion
01:01:31
Speaker
And if I know what happens, you can have to join us on next week's episode of the fellowship for the tabletop. I'm glad we went through the tunnel. Holy shit. We would have missed a genuinely you would have missed. Um, um, um, what's his name? Kelsey. Yeah, you wouldn't find Kelsey down. Kelsey down. Whatever you want to call them. Yeah.
01:01:52
Speaker
Kelsan, I thought it was Kelsan. Kelsan, who cares? He's a cartographic wonder. He's dead now. He was a cartographic wonder. I was suddenly going, damn it, we'd be really awkward. We still got the body. We don't want to defile a body. We can ask his brother, hey, can we just check he's got this important book rather than you go over there, we're going to rifle in his body. Carter's like, if he's killed him and he hasn't got the book on him, we're fucked now. Don't know where it is. It's like, I didn't tell you where. Yeah, exactly.
01:02:22
Speaker
One final thing. Man, Karsten feeling his death though. That will be, that's a good, I didn't think about that. That whole thing, that beautiful monologue at the end there, Mark, was incredible. What a way to build that ending scene there. Shit, we're here after so long. Give yourself inspiration. Oh, thanks, man.
01:02:45
Speaker
Take a D6 for next time. So I got a D6 for any of the enemies that you face next week? I would literally give you a D6, I'd give Casey a D6, I'd give Danny a D6, I'd give Darren one, Callum one, Will one, myself one, and all the listeners at home, I'd give you a D6 as well. Thank you very much for tuning in and listening, making this a party every day. We love you for it. If you want to, to...
01:03:10
Speaker
Have some Mad Bants with us. Check out our Twitter page. It's at Fellowship Tabletop. And if you wanted to go one step further, maybe you've got individual Mad Bants you wanted to give us. You can do so individually on our individual accounts. And my individual account is at iWorldA1. Casey's individual account is at... Mad Bants Casey. No, it's not. It's Unicorn Crit. I bet there is a Mad Bants Casey out there. Feel free to just sling her some fun D&D things.
01:03:39
Speaker
Danny's at. Total Party Thrills. Robin's at. Darren's at. Sorry, you should change your name to Robin. Darren's at. Robin Page, A6. Robin? What? Well played. Well played. Callum's at. TheD20Gamer. Will is at. Natural20Will. And massive hands up for our DM, especially for that closing monologue. Come find him at. Hastily Roll DM.
01:04:06
Speaker
Until next time guys.