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C1 Ep. 94 Eberron Reviewed 15
311 Plays6 years ago
Jeff, Eric, Philip, and Randy get together again for another exciting Eberron Reviewed, where they look back on The Road Below!
This episode is brought to you by the generous donations of our amazing Show Sponsors: Laura Pickrahn, Jessica Smith, Irene Viorritto, Ryan Royce, Darrell DeLaney, Jon Cary, Charles Compton, The Kamm Family, and David Scrams.
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Transcript
Introduction and Hosts Introduction
00:00:01
Speaker
This show is brought to you by the generous donations of our show sponsors, Matt Lewis, Laura Pickron, Irene Villarito, Darryl Delaney, Nico Batson, Darren Katska, Ryan Royce, John Kerry, Jessica Smith, The Cam Family, Charles Compton, and David Scrams, as well as all of our generous patrons.
00:00:33
Speaker
D20 radio, your gamers roll.
00:00:50
Speaker
Hello everybody and welcome to Eberron Renewed, an actual play fifth edition D&D podcast. I am Jeff. I'm Eric. And I'm Philip.
Revisiting 'The Road Below'
00:00:59
Speaker
And today we are not playing D&D. We are going to go over the last arc, which as tradition dictates, I did not take the time to remember the name of. The Road Below. The Road Below. I want to know what inspired that name.
00:01:17
Speaker
Well, then we'll get into it when we get into the questions. No, it was just the fact that we were going down to the flame was what initially inspired it. Because when I came up with the name for that arc, I did not know that we were going to be doing a mini arc in ROAT. So it kind of got muddled once the arc wrapped up.
Keeper of the Flame and Symbolism
00:01:36
Speaker
Okay, so I'm going to be perfectly honest school started back this week and I did not do my due diligence and listen back to all seven episodes so But we will begin at the beginning the first episode of the arc where we are en route to flame and keep We've decided to go with Graham to because she was on her way there To see if we could get an audience with the keeper of the flame
00:02:07
Speaker
Correct. Yep. And we do get that audience crushed it and tell, uh, the listeners, not me, cause I know all of them already, but, uh, tell the listeners, obviously it's, it's way too big to tell us all about the keeper and what that means and what that is, but give us, uh, either of you really, uh, give us a reader's digest version of who the keeper is, what her role is in the, in the religion, uh,
00:02:34
Speaker
So, um, I mean, Cliff notes version and Philip can correct or pick up anything I leave out. Um, many, many moons ago, um, there was a, uh, night of the silver flame called Tiramiran paladin or Dora.
00:02:50
Speaker
Palanid Dohler. Dohler. Not Dohler. She basically sacrificed herself in the flame to imprison a lord of dust or demon lord. Yeah, demon lord. Bel Shalor. And after she sacrificed herself in the flame to do that she her voice emanated from the flame and there was always one person
00:03:20
Speaker
at various points of history that came up for debate, but there's one person that can hear the voice of Tierra Myron from the flame. And that is the keeper of the flame. Yes, indeed. And they are kind of the
00:03:37
Speaker
symbolic leader of the church.
Meeting the Keeper and Lady Overrun
00:03:40
Speaker
It's possible in earlier days, they were a much more official leader, but you kind of run into an issue like now where you have a nine year old heading up your organization. So
00:03:52
Speaker
Yeah, so it's a, pardon me, it's a mouthpiece thing. Not necessarily a, not a, this keeper is exceptionally wise or exceptionally good or exceptionally, for all anybody can tell it's fairly random as to who begins hearing the voice. Is that right, Philip? Okay. Yeah, it seems to just be a matter of someone starts hearing the voice. And then the
00:04:21
Speaker
the Cardinals kind of interview that person to try and see if it's legitimate. And if they accept that it is legitimate, then that person becomes the next keeper of the flame. And there have been a couple of occasions where someone has claimed to start hearing the voice of the flame while there was still a keeper. And that's where you run into, you know, problems. Yeah.
00:04:51
Speaker
Well, I mean, it's, it's obviously not a lifetime position because Graham is a former keeper and very much still alive. So, yeah. All right. So we meet the keeper and her terrifying dog. And, you know, we get the opportunity to introduce ourselves and the rest of the people that came down with us. It was. Berwick, Booyah, Dex, Bornell, Graham. Correct. Just the five. Those are the five that went to. Yeah. Yeah. And so.
00:05:22
Speaker
We make the big ask of what can you do about our friend lady overrun. And apparently nothing.
00:05:34
Speaker
That was the basics of what was said. Yeah. I mean, here's the thing. I didn't get a chance to listen to it. If you guys remember it, I mean, jump in, take over, I'll handle the mini arc in the last episode. It was just, it was kind of an unknown, like it wasn't a, there's nothing to be done. It's nothing
The Raven Queen's Influence
00:05:48
Speaker
like this has happened before. So, but it is, but we were told it has been happening. Like it wasn't just this time that that's something has been occasionally preventing resurrection from succeeding.
00:06:00
Speaker
That is right. I had forgotten about that. This was a, all of a sudden, yeah. Various people's magics from various sources are no longer resurrecting. Yeah. Yeah. Right. Right. Right. Um, is the, I mean, the next major beat is the Raven Queen showing up, right? I would say so. Yeah.
00:06:27
Speaker
There's a bit of a mini secret conversation between Borenel and the Keeper of the Flame. But then yeah, you all go down to try and gain guidance on the mission ahead of you. But before that can happen, Erebus shows up, but it's a different voice. It's the rhythm.
00:06:53
Speaker
So the Raven said some things to Barrick. How did you feel about all that, Philip? We'll get to the thing that was cut at the end of the conversation here in a minute. No, I thought it was a good scene. We got asked a lot after
00:07:20
Speaker
after the initial failure of the resurrection attempt, why our characters didn't immediately assume, well, the Raven Queen's doing it. And I thought this conversation worked well in dealing with that because, of course, she's not the Raven Queen yet in our world.
Side Arc Setup: New Mission
00:07:43
Speaker
And nothing about meeting her has said, this is someone who controls whether you can resurrect someone.
00:07:50
Speaker
Yeah. And so I thought the conversation just from a narrative perspective was really cool in that it presented the evolution of her powers towards the more familiar entity that you've been kind of playing with.
00:08:04
Speaker
Yeah, it's been an interesting kind of thing when I'm planning sessions, figuring out, like, writing the origins of a god is an interesting thing to try and do and pace. And it's been, I've enjoyed it. Hopefully you all have enjoyed being on the other side of it, but.
00:08:23
Speaker
I mean, I'm just trying to keep up with the Raven stuff.
Mission Escalation and Krast's Dislike
00:08:26
Speaker
I'm gonna be perfectly honest. I feel like I'm treading water with whatever is going on with Barrick and as long as I can... As long as I understand enough of it to pretend that Dex understands it as much as he should, I am enjoying it. But it's... something else. Um...
00:08:48
Speaker
And that's the last of our heroes for a bit. Uh, the Raven. Oh, well, let's, let's talk about Philip. Philip threw his hat at me at the one at the end of that episode that I cut because it was unclear. Um, whether or not I basically said Erebus disappeared because the conversation began by Erebus forcibly appearing and Philip thought.
00:09:11
Speaker
that I meant I was taking away the pack. And I wasn't actually mad about that. It was like watching a TV show that drops some enormous bomb on you and the episode ends. And you throw your hat at the television. And in this case, you're the television, so I threw my hat at you. So it wasn't, how dare you do this to my character. It was how dare you drop that and then stop.
00:09:40
Speaker
We must play more now. Yeah. And then I took that as a signal of fight and started. So I just started punching Randy and he did not appreciate it. It was a thing. We broke all the stuff. Yeah. Yeah, we were just going to slowly replace all of our equipment. Thanks to our wonderful patrons.
00:10:02
Speaker
So yeah, but then we jumped to the side arc. Right. So we had, uh, there was, there was a time where we said, okay, let's send these other people to find Bala and we'll just do a reduced, or there was even talk of role playing it out as like a one shot live thing or something or all kinds of options. But, uh, then the morning we were to record.
00:10:28
Speaker
Uh, uh, Eric was like, why don't we just do the side mission? Just like a mini arc. And we were all kind of like, I mean, I was down for it to make a new character and play something fun and different. Uh, Phillip of course, wanted to continue with the character paths of the three in storm keep, which makes sense. A valid argument. Yeah. Um, but then it was like, nah, let's just.
00:10:52
Speaker
So Phillip already had a character and Randy volunteered to play Crass because I did not want to. So I got to I got to create somebody new. But yeah, so the whole thing. Hey, Randy. The whole thing starts with Crass and Drakir arriving and going to meet up with Thorin Stone Knuckle, a dwarf fighter.
00:11:17
Speaker
I did not know or I did not recall that Thorin was like the dwarf from the Hobbit or I would have done something different. But here we are. So old Thorin Stone Knuckle, who did not have a consistent voice for much of his existence, but certainly not the first 20 minutes. So they meet Thorin and. I tried to play Thorin as as though
00:11:49
Speaker
Like, just a dude, like the closest thing you could be in Everon to just being like a normal dude that lives a normal life. Like, yeah, he has a little bit of magical ability, but that's not an uncommon thing.
Plan Execution Against Fake King
00:12:02
Speaker
You know, it would make sense that a member of the Dark Lantern, Black Lantern or Dark Lanterns.
00:12:08
Speaker
Dark Lantern. A member of the Dark Lanterns would take advantage of the opportunity to learn a little bit of defensive or offensive magic. Or the ability to just speak covertly. But other than that, the things Drakir can say and do are just like, what? This isn't real to this guy. So that's Thorin.
00:12:36
Speaker
How quickly did it go from we need to break Commander Bala out to we need to kill the fake King Borin. Pretty quickly. It was real quick. It was fast. Can I say something? I think it came up in the second episode. Was it the second episode? Yeah. Yeah, because I guess the second. The first episode was setting up that distraction. Yeah. Talking with Ava and getting the water breathing potion and the other drug dealing thug, just trying to trying to convince the swords of liberty.
00:13:06
Speaker
to, boy, and if there's one thing that Randy really glommed onto about the character that Eric had built of Krast, it's that he does not like the swords of liberty. Yeah, you know what? I just want to say something about playing Krast. First of all, first of all, I wasn't feeling very well that night. My back was really killing me, and I felt it was kind of a daunting task to try to figure out
00:13:33
Speaker
exactly how to play him. So that's why I latched on to the, he hates the dark lanterns or the swords of liberty. He does not hate the dark lanterns. He hates the swords of liberty. So I really latched onto that. And I don't feel like I really did crass justice.
00:13:51
Speaker
I think he did a great job. I didn't say a whole lot the whole time. I know I hate those guys, so let's go for that. I was just so relieved in that group text when you said you would do it. I was like, thank God, because I didn't want to either. Yeah, I didn't really want to, but I thought, well, why not?
00:14:10
Speaker
But yeah, I mean to the point that we were having to roll against Randy to try to convince him to go along with something we wanted to do. That tracks, I know you texted something. I really thought you guys were getting upset with me.
00:14:26
Speaker
for a little bit. Jeff kept giving me these dagger eyes like, what do you want us to do then? No, not at all. No, it's the only one that gets really emotional at real people at the table. Well, and throw in hats because Randy was playing crass and I wanted to give Randy the ability to play crass correctly and well.
00:14:49
Speaker
Randy now has information about Crass backstory that has not come out at the table. So, that Randy will take with him to his grave. Yeah, you did text him something, right? Yes. So, and it said this. Um. Sword of Liberty stole your horse. Yep. Hot Jeff. You guessed it. So good. We all know how much Crass loves his horses though. That's canon. Um.
00:15:16
Speaker
But yeah, the mission quickly went from Breakout Bala to kill the king. Yeah, and you know, if there's one thing that I would have changed, I would have made Thorin a little more skeptical about the second, the new plan. Like he believes, he believed Krast enough to go along with Breaking Out Bala. He believes, I guess it is possible that it is a fake king on the throne right now.
00:15:43
Speaker
But when it went to like, so we should kill him. Like, Oh, well, okay. Should we? Thorin should have, but man, you know, you hear somebody threatened to kill you and everyone you love enough times and you start to go along to get along. I want to know if Eric was like surprised in the least that we decided to that actually Drake here came up with the idea to take out
Post-Assassination Chaos and Escape
00:16:08
Speaker
the false King. I'm not.
00:16:11
Speaker
Once Drakir began presenting that option, I wasn't surprised by it, though the solid nature of your plan and the success with which it was executed has really just
00:16:27
Speaker
I mean, the remainder of this act that we were doing in the story is just out the window. Like. Yeah, that's what I was wondering is. There was a lot more that was going to happen with the the false king on the throne, and it's just vapor now. So curveball. So this is why this is why I asked a lot of questions about the presence of the king before presenting the plan. Yes. I wanted a bunch of things established before I said, so let's kill him.
00:16:57
Speaker
He's not here. He's not home right now. When you were asking all those questions, I was sitting here going. Okay. I was actually hoping I could get a lot farther before, uh, Krast and Thorin figured out what Drake here intended to do, because it was not his intention to tell you. He just was going to do it. Yeah.
00:17:19
Speaker
I was looking for a wine merchant. Man, that wine cellar bit that man. That Marx Brothers bullcrap. But it was 100% genuine. Like, we need to find a wine cellar. Oh, golly.
00:17:34
Speaker
Oh yeah, none of that was, this'll be funny. Really funny. That was 100 percent. Randy and I thought he was talking about a place where wine is stored. Like what emails? We just see a bottle. Anyway. And then Thorin figured it out. So...
00:17:59
Speaker
I think we stopped recording and laughed about that for a solid minute. Yeah. So we do. We go and we find a wine merchant and Eric threw us a real bone with making... Oh yes, I am the wine merchant. In fact, the king will be drinking my wine this afternoon right out there. You kind of handed us that one.
00:18:23
Speaker
Well, it was, it was also the qualifiers of looking like the type of wine merchant you were looking. If you would have just said, let's go to the market and find somebody that sells wine. Like it wouldn't have played out like that, but yeah, I guess I did specifically say high class. You all were doing enough due diligence to where I felt like that deserved to be rewarded without a dice roll. If that makes sense. Like, um, you all were real committed to the bit. And so I was going to praise you for it. Yeah. It was Castor later. Castle lantern castle lantern.
00:18:53
Speaker
uh and uh he was just a real trustworthy fella real upstanding upstanding dude yeah i feel like we need to make sure that he's not you know he's been arrested i kind of feel like we need to go say that oh you yeah i thought that was a question at first if he's been arrested like you betcha he's been arrested oh yeah but you know he's like a hero he helped us get rid of the false king
00:19:16
Speaker
I mean, it ain't like we don't have an opportunity to talk to the actual king about this guy and his role. And I believe I don't know a lot about, uh, brilliant, but I know with most monarchies, the king has some power over who remains in jail. So, uh, I think, I think we're going to make sure castle Leonard and his, and his lovely wife are okay. Um,
00:19:45
Speaker
we uh so so drake here and uh and and thorin go to the wine cellar and things go well and not so much for one guy in a minute but uh oh wait has the shark thing already happened at this point no that was that was after okay so we put the poison in the wine we seal the wine we make sure that we can tell if it's been tampered with um
00:20:13
Speaker
And then Krast and Thorin go looking for ways out and places to be sneaky and hide and stuff. While Drakir kills a dude and talks to a shark. And I don't think there's any other character in the history of the world where that would be a shocking or not shocking sentence, but Drakir just makes sense. He killed a dude in cold blood and talked to a shark. I didn't actually talk to the shark.
00:20:44
Speaker
You befriended it. You gave it directives. Yeah, but not like I didn't I didn't I don't have speak with animals. I know. I know. You didn't have a conversation with a shark, but you still spoke to it. I speak to my dog. That's fair. And didn't kill him in cold blood. It was very practical. If Dex would have killed him, it would have been in cold blood.
00:21:09
Speaker
I mean, it wasn't even there for the... Drakir doesn't know who this guy is. It's just due that he murdered for practical reasons. Well, maybe. He was an inconvenience. He was a means to an end. His end. I could have tried to talk him out of going and inspecting and it's already been inspected. I could have done a whole bunch of deceiving, but it was just easier to just get him to walk around a corner and kill him. I don't see Drakir trying to smooth talk him out of doing something. I see what Drakir did.
00:21:41
Speaker
Okay, that's what I thought. In cold blood just means to kill without emotion. Oh, okay.
00:21:48
Speaker
Other than that case, there's a lot of that. Right. Dex, Dex would have, it would have been a very passionate killing of this guy. For some reason, Dex has allowed his hate to really bubble up about this dude that he doesn't deserve it. The Dex don't care. Um, I think it's cause Dex is so confused by everything else in his life that this is the one thing he can like get. Yeah, that's pretty much it. I want to kill this person for very tangible, real reasons. So, uh, so
00:22:19
Speaker
I mean, it just, it works and the king comes through and he drinks the wine. Well, we did, we did skip over, um, the Swords of Liberty stuff with the contact.
00:22:31
Speaker
Yeah, I guess. Yeah, I mean, it was because that comes into play, right? I mean, essentially, it was just we I was Thor had had a contact, a CI, who is a low level. And I believe was her parents called her Eva, but she likes Eva better.
00:22:53
Speaker
And basically said, hey listen, I need you to trust me that this thing is bad and we need you to get word to leadership to cause a distraction.
Dex's Reaction and Beric's Emotional Turmoil
00:23:03
Speaker
And we don't see her again when we go looking for her, which makes me think that she is doing her best to run it up the chain.
00:23:12
Speaker
And then we find out that it does work because before the king, it might even be before the king actually makes it to the castle. He may still be on the road. There's a hubbub off in the distance that we believe is the
00:23:24
Speaker
begin building a barricade to block the execution per session. And Krasst goes and talks to them. Yeah, Krasst of all people has to go talk to them. Hey man, we all had jobs. That's very true. So yep, he goes and persuades them not to advance just to stay there and keep the blockade. And essentially, I guess it played out that we really didn't need them.
00:23:47
Speaker
the way things turned out. So he stopped them from causing any further damage, I guess, to thwart what our plan was. Man, Whisper's a great spell though, right? Yeah. I mean, that's got a lot accomplished really quickly. Yeah, that Whisper's cool. I'm glad Thorin learned it.
00:24:16
Speaker
and then get the king, drinks the wine, dies, city goes horribly. Melts, actually. Is that what it is? Yeah. He melted, there is no corpse. Oh, well. But you know what? I mean, ultimately,
00:24:36
Speaker
our plan worked. And then chaos ensues. Drakir gets Bala to the shark. Thorin acts like he's really shocked and surprised. I mean, he would probably be shocked. But yeah, the king melted. I think shocked shocked and a crass runs away. Mini arc over.
00:25:02
Speaker
And I got to quote more movies as Drake here than I think I've ever gotten to as Barrick. I got Princess Lion Lines. I got to put Terminator in an entirely organic way. It's great. Oh, awesome. That's what the people want. And then Crass reaches out to Dex.
00:25:22
Speaker
Yeah, and in addition to all of the other things that our A-Team has been experiencing in the last, what, 90 minutes?
00:25:36
Speaker
Uh, yeah, sometimes I have to take a step back and realize like the, the amount of time that's passed in fiction for this campaign, as opposed to like recording once a month, but then realizing it's been like maybe seven months, well under a year for the characters. I think Laura has it masked out and I think it's more like three months. Yeah. It's like a really bad summer. Uh,
00:26:05
Speaker
But yeah, Dex hears that the, uh, Bala is saved. I think he tells me, he tells it in reverse. He saves the most important for last. We saved Bala. Great. We killed the guy. Okay. We killed the King. Oh, so yeah. So then we got Stu or as far as Dex is concerned, we got to get back right now. Uh, yeah. And so,
00:26:34
Speaker
You know, the thing about it is these things that require immediate action seem to happen right after Barrick has been devastated. And Dex has to be the one to be like, shove it down, bro. Got things to do. Lock it in a closet. We can deal with it later. This literal world shattering importance things are happening. It's not nice. It's not nice and it's not fun to do either. So.
00:27:04
Speaker
Barak does a lot of dealing with it later. Yes. Barak says out loud, I'll deal with this later at least three times in this episode.
Ancient Weapons and Delcor's Resurrection
00:27:15
Speaker
So yeah, you all go back upstairs for Jayala to commune with the flame to figure out the information about the dream thieves, what you all need to do. Yeah. There's like that really quick little
00:27:30
Speaker
What's more important thing, like, and where it's, you know, we need to know this stuff, but we got to get him back. Barrick is insisting we leave immediately for a teleport station. Booyah has already run up the stairs and told, told Borneo what happened. And then, uh, and then, uh,
00:27:51
Speaker
Eventually, Beric is able to clear his mind long enough to say, okay, a couple of minutes to hear what the flame has to say is okay. And what we hear is there are four giant weapons of giants.
00:28:11
Speaker
that were used the last time that the plane was defeated. What's the quarry plane called? Delcor. Delcor, thank you. I was in my head, it was delir, but that's not it. The last time Delcor was severed from the rest of the planes. And the Umbridge Inn have won. The other three have not been seen for thousands of years. But the sticking point of the whole thing is the word resurrect. Mm hmm.
00:28:40
Speaker
Jayala said, the flame said, we use the four weapons to resurrect the plane of Delcor. And I don't know if that's a, if that's a, I mean, my assumption is the flame doesn't make semantic mistakes. The flame speaks in a tooth or perhaps archaic language even, but it's not like, oh shoot, I'm at Thursday.
00:29:12
Speaker
Am I incorrect? You guys know more about this than that. That would be my assumption as well. Is the infallibility of the wisdom of the flame is assumed. Yeah. I will like you are correct in that the the flame does not make phrasing mistakes where it's just like oh darn it.
00:29:36
Speaker
So, but still the flame knew the end game was to separate again, to banish them and separate again. So if some form of resurrection is required along that process, I mean, then we'll. So exactly what was conveyed is the weapons were used on the plane of Eberron to sever that plane from Eberron. If those weapons are taken to the plane itself and used, then it will cause the resurrection.
00:30:09
Speaker
Yep. So I just thought of something, but I want to play it out in character, so we'll save it. So tune in next week for that. Yeah. The way you just said that made me think of something, but it'd be so dumb to parse out new information on this instead of doing it in your character with Dex Barrick and Booyah.
00:30:34
Speaker
So yeah, we, we get that information. We say, thank you. Uh, we run to the nearest teleport station letting it's going to run. Cause we have Graham, we walk briskly. Uh, um,
00:30:52
Speaker
and we try to start doing some planning ahead with the sending stones and it it mucks up good. Uh we try to tell Garrett uh Gerald Gerald Gerald we try to tell boat captain man tattoo guy uh while we're planning and he's like oh okay and then he gets put on call waiting so we can talk to grass but basically it's
00:31:21
Speaker
that that bit of play. Oh, and Eric gets real petty with his cousin. He gets petty with Rookin to be fair. No, he made he made four wait a second too. Yeah, that's fair. Yeah, I mean.
00:31:38
Speaker
a little victories mostly at root mostly directing that at root sure and you know Eric doesn't have any problems with war and you know it's fine Barrick needed something at that moment for a little bit of levity I get it
00:31:52
Speaker
But so the plan, we're able to say, hey, we've got the real king. We're coming right now. Get people you trust to the Orion House teleport terminal.
Lady Overrun's Return and Emotional Reactions
00:32:04
Speaker
And then we flex real hard, walking the king straight up to the teleport pad. Nope. Oh, no. No. You're right. I'm just going to walk right past that, huh? Well, no.
00:32:20
Speaker
Because in my head, that actually happened before some of the stuff I just said on the sending stones too. No, because remember, I even make a point to say that the people on the teleport, as we're standing on the teleport pad, making these plans, the people in line are getting angrier. Oh, that was my fault. I can, I shoved the two together. Yeah. When what really happened was we told Gerald, Hey, come on. We told, and then as we were getting there, the skiff comes down without
00:32:49
Speaker
Well, essentially, Barak realized I'm not doing it. This was Barak trying to be better about certain things. Barak was deciding I cannot just go to Rowet without talking to Orianna and dealing with what we just learned. I'm not going to ask someone else
00:33:15
Speaker
to go tell Orianna what we just found out that we failed. And so this was Barak, we need to go back. We need to do it not the way it should be done, but we need to take five minutes and say goodbye. So that was why Barak asked. That's why Barak asked Gerald to come in. Yeah, you have a weird way of showing it.
00:33:42
Speaker
So, Beric says, you know, bring down Orianna. And when Beric or Wink Air, Gerald comes down, there is no Orianna. And he's like, you gotta come to the boat. And we're like, we need more information. And he's like, come to the boat. And we're like, come on, please. I wanna say something about that. Listening to it, Gerald says, I was told not to. I want to know who on the ship out ranks us, that Gerald takes their orders over ours.
00:34:11
Speaker
I mean, firstly, Gerald doesn't take orders from nobody. There's no ranking system on this ship. I disagree. I told Gerald to get in a boat and come down and he did it.
00:34:22
Speaker
I didn't ask. I told Gerald, take Graham home and he was doing it. Yeah. And Oriana with a really freaked out face said, please get them up here, but don't tell them why because they need to see this. And Gerald was like, I don't feel like don't tell us was a good decision. Well, I feel like Gerald should not take orders from teenagers. He's not taking orders from anybody. He's just an amicable guy that likes helping out.
00:34:48
Speaker
Eric wanted his reveal. And so we need to give it to him. No, so we go up and standing on the deck is the people we expect. And the one that we don't is lady overrun. Yay. Seemingly well, maybe seemingly very alive. And
00:35:13
Speaker
Did Booyah hug her or just? I think, yeah, I think Booyah hugged her. There was a lot of stunned looks and everything and I think Booyah was the first one to kind of break the, well, she ran up and hugged Beric first. Right. Yeah. And said, I met your mom. Yup. And I screamed and I think Phillip threw something. Yes. Yeah. That is accurate.
00:35:41
Speaker
Twice in one arc. Eric has made me throw something. This time, though, it was personal because it wasn't at the end of an episode. Well, I wasn't in the room, so I couldn't throw it at you. So I just threw a pin across the room. So, OK. What? Yeah, you, Eric. Oh, are you talking to me? What? What? What? No, she's back.
00:36:06
Speaker
No, I talked to you, but how is she back? Well, that's not how this works at all. I mean, she she told like she goes on to explain how she was brought back, that apparently as Barrick grows stronger and collects packs, it releases the members of that family that he took the pact from.
00:36:30
Speaker
And in turn grows the lineage of his pack stronger along with the Raven is what's going on in Dolar right now. And that Yurick Rowan isn't super stoked with the person that the Raven is becoming. And so there's perhaps some dissension in the ranks. And we also knew earlier from Jayala that the Raven is losing her army. As she grows stronger, her army diminishes.
00:37:02
Speaker
So really, this whole thing is going to end up leading up to an NPC battle between Jรถrg Rรถwen and the Raven that we all just sit and watch happen. That's fine with me. That sounds rad. But yeah, so once again, Barak has to say, this is great, but we've got to go. You've grown quiet, Philip.
00:37:27
Speaker
I have, this is, that is how Philip and Barak feel about everything right now. So, so then all the stuff with the sending stone.
00:37:43
Speaker
Yes. I mean, Eric and Paula have their first real human-seeming conversation on mics where they both say things like humans would say to each other where they just say, this is what I think and what I feel. Both of them doing it back and forth, real communication, like two people. It was great.
00:38:07
Speaker
Philip and I have really grown in our relationship. It's really nice. Except, of course, Beric isn't actually saying what he feels in that moment. No, no, certainly not, Beric. So it's a human seeming conversation, but actually, because Beric is never allowed to rest in an emotional state, but has to leap instead from one emotional crisis to the next with the speed of the flash, he does not actually say what he feels. What was he feeling?
00:38:40
Speaker
Well, this relates to a question that was asked. We'll wait until we get to the question. Well, I mean, that's the last thing in the episode is him. That is kind of the episode. Yeah. It tells Dex, he doesn't tells Dex, this is a trap. And then we move, then we, we teleport. So let's go. It was a very nice button, I thought. Yeah. Well, so let's go ahead and answer that question first, as we're talking about it. Uh, it was Laura, Laura wanted to know what does Barrick think is a trap.
00:39:11
Speaker
Okay. Let's say it takes us 15 minutes to walk from the Citadel of the Flame to the ship. So 15 minutes ago, I more or less told the Raven Queen to go shove it. But I wasn't interested in doing her bidding anymore with regards to everything she's asked me to do.
00:39:39
Speaker
Then we walk across and all of a sudden, Beric, I met your mother and she says, you need to gather the packs because it makes your family stronger and frees them.
Patron Questions and Character Reflections
00:39:51
Speaker
So I tell the Raven Queen, I'm not gathering the packs. 15 minutes later, someone shows up that the Raven Queen wouldn't let out of death a minute ago with a special message for me about how my mom wants me to gather the packs.
00:40:06
Speaker
Yeah. You know what? That's all very valid thinking. That's every kind of suspicious. Yeah. Sure. I'm just flattered that you think I'm that clever. Like that's really nice. Well, that was going to be, that was actually going to be my counterpoint. I'm saying that's barracks. Honestly, Philip doesn't think it's a trap. Philip thinks you did it. Berwick doesn't trust this situation. Even a tiny, tiny, tiny bit.
00:40:34
Speaker
And Dex is going to go along with Barrick because Dex is super cagey right now about everything. Dex, literally, if they didn't show up two days ago on our boat, I don't trust them. Like if they weren't on our boat two days ago, I don't trust them. I think in a more emotional level, I think that what that moment was when he saw her was
00:41:03
Speaker
you're going to use even this against me. Beric knows that he just really, about Beric knows that now twice in a very short amount of time, he's really, really ticked off the Raven Queen in some, in the Raven in some capacity. And I think he just did not expect this to be something she would use against him. Refusing Paolo
00:41:28
Speaker
Refusing to let Pala out of death, that was one thing. It's fine. She's got this god complex where she manages fate now. That's one thing. And Beric's mad about it. But to then turn around and use her against him as he perceives this. It was just... Okay, there we are. I'm just...
00:41:51
Speaker
I think that just shut Berwick down and that's why that conversation went the way it was because Berwick just feels dead inside. And so I'm going to say the things I need to to get out of this conversation and go do something that will keep me moving. Because if I stand still, some other emotional crisis will come upon me and I will go mad.
00:42:13
Speaker
Philip, how are you doing? I'm fine. I thought that was Philip talking. Let's just get with Philip. I'm doing real good. Having a good semester.
00:42:23
Speaker
Okay, so let's jump into the questions. Again, if you are a patron, one of the tiers is getting a chance to ask questions to be submitted to Eberron Reviewed or the Knowledge Check. And we'll ask them and answer them on air. And if you are interested in doing that, you can always find us at our Patreon page, patreon.com slash the geek, is it the geek pantheon? Yeah, patreon.com slash the geek pantheon.
00:42:54
Speaker
So now that I have seamlessly integrated that plug, that was really smooth. That was really smooth and entirely accurate. All right. So the first question is from Irene. Irene wants to know where y'all as surprised as we were that your plan worked.
00:43:11
Speaker
Yes. I mean, yeah. Yes. Definitely. Like, I'll say this. It seemed to go too smooth. I kept waiting for it to hit the fan somewhere. We had put together a very good plan with contingencies and everything. I think it's the best plan you all have put together. Probably so. And... Good. I've never seen a D&D plan go off like that. Yeah. Eventually, I assumed we were going to fight our way out. See, I... Or that...
00:43:39
Speaker
or that Drakir was going to leave you two to die fighting your way up. I was of two minds about it. Like I mentioned earlier, the fact that Eric gave us that, yes, I am actually the wine merchant to the king and he's going to be right here in about three hours drinking this bottle of wine. Like he kept handing us things. We didn't have to roll that whole encounter, like for persuasion or deception or anything. We definitely rolled a couple of times. Did we? Okay. Because we had to convince him that we were wine merchants or something.
00:44:08
Speaker
Okay, because I remember the wine inspectors. Okay, you know, we've looked nothing like wine inspectors. Because I remember. I remember rolling for the potion guy, but I didn't remember rolling for Castellaner. But anyway, okay, so but and it went really smoothly. And then the messages kept working perfectly. And then, you know, the wine came out and it was still and we still hadn't at that point rolled for stuff. And I was like, Eric is either going to
00:44:39
Speaker
reward our good plan, or he's going to screw us real hard in about 30 seconds. I didn't know which one it was going to be. And based on my history, I could understand why you would think it would go the way that it ended up not going. Well, also, we haven't had a fight in like eight hours of podcasting or more. And so I thought, well, maybe he just wants to give the people some blood. But no, I don't want to say I was surprised
00:45:08
Speaker
because we had put together a good plan and Eric was going along with it, I would say I was relieved. Because I knew it was, it was at the point where he actually drank the wine, it was like, oh good, okay. I was surprised initially though with, oh yes, in fact, I am the wine, the king's wine guy. I think you can hear that in our voices. It's like, oh, oh wow, that's, that's just great.
00:45:38
Speaker
Uh, well, and I was trying to give this, this arc a very kind of. Popey like feel like less dour than the rest of the stuff that we all do together.
00:45:49
Speaker
And that's just, that's kind of a trope for me is like, in a lot of those stories, like stumbling to success or something where you're just like, oh, wow, okay, this is convenient. Well, let's roll with this. It was definitely a bright cheery interlude in the midst of real crap. I think is magnificent is that Castle and it tells us that both of our characters react with surprise.
00:46:18
Speaker
And then we still convince him that we're one. Well, you know, I mean, Whatever. D&D. His wife is the brains of the operation. He's just up at the front desk like, Oh, well, that makes sense. Okay. Here you go.
00:46:40
Speaker
So Irene continues, what was your backup plan if the fake king didn't drink the wine? And I think it was just let the procession continue until it got to the swords barricade and then we... Oh no, Dracure was gonna grab Bala, get in the river and leave you two to deal with the fallout.
00:46:57
Speaker
Yeah, I kind of saw that maybe happening. I mean, that makes sense, but it's not what the plan was. To be fair, it was impossible to leave a crass to deal with the fallout because Thorin could have just been like, oh, well, that sucks. Oh, the king. But then Thorin would have also had to find some way to spirit that wine away because it's still very much a bottle of vicious poison. Yeah. Surely it dropped on the ground and spilled and broke.
00:47:28
Speaker
Or something? I don't know. Yeah. Anyway. And then lastly, is it canonically clear to everyone that the king was a changeling imposter? We elucidated that people did see the changeling four before he melted. That is correct.
00:47:46
Speaker
Obviously not everyone and they're certainly going to be people because people by and large are stupid and reactionary who are going to say the changeling story they've heard is a cover up and the real king is dead. Well, because you got to remember there was maybe like 50, 60 people that actually witnessed this. Right. So you're talking about thousands of people hearing this second hand. But people that matter, Rook and three others that are big deals in the court.
00:48:17
Speaker
saw it. So, while they may not 1000% believe our Boro when he gets there, they know for sure that this dead person was not the real Boro. So, and that is canon. It happened. It was spoken out loud. Laura asks, Thorin was assigned to Roet to beef up security. So, was he shirking his duties this whole arc? It was an afternoon.
00:48:44
Speaker
and he had the day off. He even says that at the beginning. Yeah, I was about to say he had the day off. You took a personal day? Yeah, I got PTO. Dark Lanterns have a great union, and we've got PTO, we've got sick leave. We even get paternity leave, which is more than you can say for some places. Did you say he had PTO, so he got paid to do this? Yeah.
00:49:08
Speaker
No, I mean, yes, I'm gonna stick with the great union thing as being canon, but the actual story is...
00:49:15
Speaker
I thought it did say at the beginning that he didn't, he wasn't work. I may have just been a conversation between Eric and Jeff, but I think it got recorded. And it was like, yeah, he's not working today. So he's here. And it was a handful of hours that whole arc. Yeah, yeah. Like, because when, when, when, when, when Crass and Drakir get there, Thorin says, you were wrong about the timeline, the thing happens today. Yeah.
00:49:48
Speaker
Did you enjoy Graham's life story? I forgot that happened at the very beginning. Did you enjoy Graham's life story? Very confusing for you here. Yeah, I think I don't know because we didn't actually have that conversation. I don't know what
Family Dynamics and Wine Inspector Incident
00:50:08
Speaker
I think Dracure being from a highly tribal society, I think Dracure probably has a lot of respect for the elderly. I think he probably sat there listening very politely, but I don't know what's happened in Graham's life story. Maybe it's a rip-roaring adventure. Yeah, that's fair. That's the next campaign. It's going to be a prequel with Graham as the main editor.
00:50:34
Speaker
Oh, can we find someone else to voice? All right, Laura continues. I thought the silver flame was against resurrection. Why are they trying to bring people back? And why did jail and not ask the flame what was going on before the party got there? So one at a time, why are they trying to bring people back? Who's they I think is the I'm not sure. Yeah, I feel like Barrick was that us. Well, so she had referenced other
00:51:04
Speaker
attempts at resurrection not working. And while spiritually they believe they joined with the flame and so resurrecting somebody could potentially weaken the flame. There are also occurrences where you know your battle compatriot falls and it would be really great to still have them up and having your back and stuff like that or I mean there's just
00:51:27
Speaker
ideologically, they aren't huge on resurrection. But I think from a practical standpoint, there are moments where they would attempt it. And I think that's a fair thing to say. Yeah, I don't think it's outside the realm of understanding to say that some people act contradictory to their religious beliefs. Yeah, Berwick is, in principle, opposed to resurrection. But when it's, you know, when it's Paula, right? Eric's not thinking about the contradiction there.
00:51:57
Speaker
I don't think Booyah knows enough at this point about the silver flame to know one way or another. He's learning. And if she's talking about why did Graham go along with it, why did Jayala go along with it? Because they're empathetic people who saw a man just at the end of his wits with grief and thought, why not? And now he's five steps past the end of his wits. And in terms of Jayala not asking the flame what was going on before the party got there, Jayala said she was expecting the party.
00:52:27
Speaker
Like she knew they were coming and she's not a precog. So there were, there was stuff going on before the party got there. Right. And if, and if potentially Laura means why is it jail and not ask what was going on in the world, like the thing with the, the inspired and the plain stuff, plainer stuff. I mean, it just seems like she wouldn't wake up every morning as a nine year old and go to the flame and be like,
00:52:54
Speaker
So, uh, what threats face the world today? It's like her own personal, like Alexa, like flame, give me the rundown today. What's the news? So, uh, it would be a really interesting twist on the role of the speaker of the keeper of the flame is treating the flame like three bro. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, so I think, I think that's why, and, and yeah, so that's why Jill didn't really ask what was going on. I guess the flame told her or.
00:53:22
Speaker
I took Laura's question me more in terms of the resurrection stuff, which she did. Just as was evidenced by the conversations that you all saw, sometimes the flame can be a little confusing. And so context is important.
00:53:40
Speaker
Okay, this is from Glenn. I'm just going to read it out. Half knowledge, check question, half Eberron reviewed. Eric, I have a similar, everything happening at once session, as was happening in episode 93. Plan for one of my groups, if I can ever get them to meet again. Sorry, Glenn. What goes into the execution of bringing so many threads back together in one session? I mean,
00:54:09
Speaker
It's just a matter of, I think kind of, for lack of a better term, bottle episodeing, like keeping the focus contained to where everything can kind of come together. I feel like if you have too much going on, if you have too much going on
00:54:26
Speaker
in terms of the action, but you're trying to bring all these story threads together that can really muddle things. But like you all said and acknowledged, we have been dealing with a lot of heavy story beats and not a whole lot of combat. And that's kind of intentional on my part of trying to compartmentalize, but
00:54:46
Speaker
All right, and then the second half of this question is for Philip, Randy and I. What's the experience of having so many mixed emotions all at once? And if any, what major sore points are there? None of us like Eric. Pretty sore with Eric, pretty regularly. Eric is sore from where Philip's hat hit him. And the pin. The pin was, he was in Texas. Emotionally in my heart.
00:55:16
Speaker
The emotional Sharpies struck Eric in his heart. Yep. Uh, no, there are no sore points among the humans of us. I think Phillip's even over the whole shard thing. He seemed to be, we did see each other in person and he was nice. Yes. As far as having to play so many mixed emotions all at once, uh,
00:55:44
Speaker
I try my best to not have Dex be too mixed emotion. Like Dex is kind of too much id for that. He feels the main thing he's feeling and lets that guide him if it's anger or if it's sadness or if it's whatever, which means it's more rollercoaster-y than mixed, which can be frustrating and fun.
00:56:07
Speaker
Um, or just purpose. Okay. A lot of times, especially at the end of this last episode where it was like, all right, fine, but we got to go. Like, so I can't really speak to that one as much as I'm sure barracks, uh, Phillip can for barrack as far as mixed emotions are concerned or whatever you might have. I think the challenge is not so much a bunch of emotions at once. Um, I think the challenge in playing barrack is that, um,
Speculation on Regicide Consequences
00:56:39
Speaker
about the time I work out how is Barak's emotional state going to be due to this most recent revelation or event, the next thing hits him.
00:56:58
Speaker
And so, you know, Beric comes back from the dead and processing that and we arrive back in Stormreach and about got it good. And then we find out that the government in Breland has fallen and the king is becoming tyrannical. And so work out that. And then we find out that we burned a house down on somebody's butler and worked through that. And then you kind of see how Beric dies again.
00:57:25
Speaker
on and on and on and on and on and on. Barrick comes, I come to terms with Barrick, how Barrick's going to deal with Paolo's death and then Paolo's alive again, maybe. Um, so, uh, I think that's more the challenge in playing Barrick than multiple emotions at once is that Barrick, Barrick is never allowed to finish having an emotion. You know,
00:57:51
Speaker
If my first encounter with D&D was hearing Phillip describe the things that he's, his character has gone through emotionally, I don't know that I would have agreed to play. I'd have been like, that sounds like a lot. I got my own things. All right. Did you have anything to speak to with that? Um, yeah, as far as Booyah, it's
00:58:16
Speaker
I try to remember where he's come from and what he's been through with the loss of his son. He's on this path to try to become a better him, a better person.
00:58:34
Speaker
trying to find that compassion so i think that you know he feels for the things that that barrack is going through and he's trying to find ways to to show it you know to because i think you'll see that every now and then buya will go up you know to barrack and say something or you know he's the one that hugged polo when she came back so he he's trying to just find more ways to express himself more ways to show compassion
Closing Reflections and Humor
00:59:03
Speaker
you know, more ways to develop empathy, maybe. And I mean, that's kind of where I'm at with him. Cool. All right. I don't get this discord's fascination. What is bearish relationship like with Vore? Do they have any areas of conflict? I mean, they probably have areas of conflict there. They grew up in the same household and they're both young men.
00:59:32
Speaker
but not in, not in a big sense, I think. You know, Barak, Barak was, we've talked about Barak's relationship with his stepfather and that sort of thing in past episodes. But no, I mean, I think Barak and Vor had a reasonably,
01:00:01
Speaker
amicable relationship. Beric has a slight, but not particularly justified, dislike of Rook and Ere Clarn. That's more a holdover of the fact that every time I've encountered that it's been Eric playing him in a really smarmy way.
01:00:26
Speaker
Uh, and so I think, um, I think that's more of a personality thing than a politics thing. Uh, so Barak doesn't really like his boss, but you know, you don't necessarily blame your brother for who their boss is. So I think Barak can, and for, have a probably amicable relationship, have a mostly amicable relationship, I don't think
01:00:55
Speaker
I don't think that as adults, they've talked a lot. All right. I hope that satisfies you guys, Discord. We're hopefully to get some more vore in this next arc.
01:01:08
Speaker
All right. Cali. Oh, sorry. That was Darren's question, by the way. Cali asks, I think we did touch on this. Even if it was clear that the now dead king was fake, are there going to be repercussions on the wine merchant for giving a poison wine? He is definitely arrested. He may not be dead yet. Hopefully we can forestall that, but he's definitely arrested. How can Drakir be sure no one will discover the real wine inspector's body in the dumpster when there are crowds and hordes of people all over that area?
01:01:34
Speaker
I want to ask, does Drakir give a crap if they find that bug? That is the more important question. And no, I mean, for multiple reasons. One, Drakir feels exactly no regret at killing the wine inspector. Not because he had any dislike of the man, but just did it. The guy was in his way, killed him. Drakir's thoughts don't continue with the wine inspector now that he's in the dumpster.
01:02:02
Speaker
Well, and Phillips 20 specifically said that nobody could care that he was dead. So, Drakir cannot care. Actually, that's not what I said. I said that no one would miss him in the sense that no one would notice his absence. Right. They're going to notice his body when they search the scene. But the beauty of language, I can take that to mean he has no family, no friends, like he led a very sad life.
01:02:27
Speaker
If you want to, that's fine. But yeah, no one's gonna notice that the Wine Inspector didn't come back. And then secondly, Dracure does not, as we left it, Dracure does not intend to be back in Rowit.
01:02:42
Speaker
Right. Well, no one is dropping Bala off and going home. Like that was Dracure's stated intention. No one saw Dracure do it. Yeah. And by the time anybody would think we need to inspect this area for something fishy going on, Dracure's already sharked out of there. So yeah, why would he? And if things didn't go according to plan, there would have been a whole lot more bodies and it wouldn't have been a big deal. Also, I think that as as Dracure has traveled in the surface on the surface,
01:03:12
Speaker
Um, uh, for missions for his people. I think one of the things he's learned is that the more bizarre, the way he does things is the less likely he is to end up caught because even if there hadn't been a witness, yeah, he just snuck the wine, took the wine inspector around the corner, stabbed him, shoved him in a dumpster and then rode away on a shark. Yeah. Yeah. Well, that that's what he did.
01:03:41
Speaker
And also, I mean, it's the wine inspector that is dead in a dumpster behind the prime suspect of the person that poisoned the fake king. If somebody's going down for that murder, it's we probably know who it's going to be once that body's found. That's true. And you're here is entirely comfortable with that. Yeah. Yeah.
01:04:00
Speaker
Although, in really, really what Drakir is hoping, because this whole episode was Drakir doing nice things for people, Drakir is really hoping that Krast will find a way to pin all of it on the Swords of Liberty. Because that would make Krast happy. And this episode was about was Drakir trying to make other people happy. There you go.
01:04:21
Speaker
Cali says, when can we expect the Graham and Drakir variety hour spin-off podcast? Can you imagine an hour of me doing Graham's voice? No. Once it's past the initial introduction, Graham's voice is usually tolerable. That's true. It's just that in the first two minutes of you talking like Graham every time, it's all up here. This is doubt fire.
01:04:44
Speaker
then my voice gets tired. Yeah. I uh I listen to a lot of podcasts and I hope you guys don't take it personally when I say I just don't have time to add that one to the rotation. If you make it, I will I hope the best for it but I don't know that I'll have time to listen.
01:05:05
Speaker
Anyway. All right. And then the last question, and I'm not sure, I think it may have not quite been a completed thought, but it's Irene, and she says, what happens post quote unquote regicide? And I think that's what we're about to find out. Tune in next week. Right. Like we're about to record what happens post regicide. Irene, we're going to give your question the most thought and care in the way that we answer it by dedicating at least one episode to it.
01:05:31
Speaker
I mean, technically the rest of the arc. The rest of the campaign is post-regicide. Irene, we're really going to lock in on your question and do our best to answer it for you. That's all the questions. We've certainly talked enough to know that we're about to have to do it for like three more hours. Thank you guys so much for listening.
01:05:55
Speaker
find us on all the social medias at the Geek Pantheon. We're on Facebook. You can email us, thegeekpantheon at gmail.com. The aforementioned Patreon is out there. And again, thank you so much for listening and we'll catch you next week. Oh yeah, I'm Jeff. I'm Eric. I'm Phil. I'm Randy. Just like earlier. We'll see you later.
01:06:34
Speaker
Hello, everybody, and welcome to Eberron Renewed, an actual play D&D 5th edition podcast. I am Jeff. I'm Eric. And I'm Philip. And we are here not to... Not to praise Caesar, but to bury him. Can we start over? Fine. I just hacked up along in the middle of a sentence and we're 10 seconds in. I'd like to just begin again, please.