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Behind The Swords Ep 3 - The Goofs And Gaffes
132 Plays3 years ago
With the finale approaching, we sit down and hash out the meaning of life.. All from the perspective of our characters.
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Transcript
00:00:00
Speaker
Hey
Introduction and Season Recap
00:00:01
Speaker
everybody, it's me, Blaze, the number one paladin on this podcast specifically. Uh, yeah, I'm going to smite you. I wanted to, anyway, I wanted to take a second just before the show actually starts. I mean, if you want to call this a show, it's a behind the scenes episode, little bonus feature. I wanted to say thank you for keeping up with us on this season. It's been.
00:00:30
Speaker
Absolutely entertaining for us to put it out and interact and just been a ball. We are already getting stuff prepped up for season two, getting stuff rolling, and we are going to get releasing on that soon, very soon. In the meantime, hang in there. We're going to have the finale coming up, keep an eye out.
00:00:57
Speaker
And it's going to get wild. Let me tell you, it is. It's intense. It's going to be some interesting episode between now and then.
Teasers for Bonus Content and Merchandise
00:01:10
Speaker
So keep your eye out and a couple more things. We're going to have some more bonus content here and there. Keep an eye out for that between now and the finale. And I really don't want to spoil anything, but there might just be some merch in the works.
00:01:28
Speaker
Waiting to see if it is up to snuff the standards are good enough And then yeah, we're gonna have some stuff that we'll be able to to send out So yeah, keep an eye on that and without further ado Feel free to laugh at us for being you know Who we are kind of dumb anyways enjoy
00:02:20
Speaker
You're listening to Behind the Swords. It's like the hired swords, but with 100% less dice rolling.
00:02:46
Speaker
I don't think that's the song. I don't know what song that was. But hey, we're we're here. Hello, everyone. Hi. Hi. Introduce yourself. Are you talking to us or the people listening? Oh, we are listening all of it. Yeah. My name is Mikey. I played jokes here. Oh, we're just doing free cuff here, right? Yeah. Well, he said to introduce yourselves. You don't listen to your DM. Wow. No, I specifically just said.
00:03:12
Speaker
Man, turn this into a bonus episode and things just go right off the rails. I'm Derek and I play David. Name. And I play Blaze. Yeah, that tracks. Wait a second. Hi, I'm Ash and I play the good girl, Druid, Gwyndolin. Yeah. Yeah, good girl. That's right. Yeah. Druid, not a barbarian. We promise.
Story Arc Conclusions and New Beginnings
00:03:41
Speaker
I'm Michael and I'm your dungeon master and we have some uh just behind the swords conversations to have before we this is before we record what we believe to be the finale and epilogue episodes of what we're calling season one here the end of the
00:03:58
Speaker
the end of some story arcs, the beginning of some new ones. And we figured we'd get on here and talk a little bit about what's happened up to this point, what we still think may happen, and kind of go a little bit of a deep dive into episodes up to this point. I think this is the first one we've recorded where we can talk about all the episodes we have recorded.
00:04:17
Speaker
So all the ones previously were like, OK, we can't talk about any of these things. So this would be fun. And we're on video so I can see everybody's beautiful faces. And so I can also also definitely we definitely died the whole time. There's also definitely been some nipples before the recording started.
00:04:35
Speaker
Oh, at least four. Yeah, at least four. Joxer had to be typical Joxer and, well, you know. Hey, hey, there was there was another another one to be blamed for that. All I've had is I am. Great as well. So the two Mikeys, the two Mikeys were were right up there. Two Mike's for the most starved for attention. Yeah. Did what we do. So.
00:05:04
Speaker
I don't even remember why I did it, but whatever. Yeah, we are excited about this finale and stuff and excited about season two coming up. We're working on some plans, some hot plans. Blaze, are there any news things we can say to them yet or are those hot plans coming later?
Evolution of Wild Hill
00:05:20
Speaker
Hot plans are coming later. I don't know that the schedule is necessarily going to work with releasing this, but there are things in the works and things of brewing. So, you know, it's not necessarily coming out of jocks or brew hole either. Yeah.
00:05:35
Speaker
Yeah, there's actually some preparation. It's actually funny listening to a podcast. You think, wow, cool. They thought of a thing that they want to do. That's a cool idea. You don't think about the fact that they probably thought of it like three months before it happened. You know, here we are. So anyway, that's pretty awesome. But anyway, I'm excited about all that. So let's dig in a little bit. And I want to say if I were to sit down with your character,
00:06:03
Speaker
If I were to sit down with your character and ask them, hey, what are your thoughts on Wild Hill currently, the current events? If we were to do like a 2020 TV news interview with your character. You're Diane Sawyer. Yeah, yeah. What would they say about Wild Hill in its current state as we leave it, end of the current episode we just recorded, Daven first.
00:06:29
Speaker
Wait, wait a minute, hold on. Okay, who wants to go first? I didn't prepare my voice for this. I'm not supposed to be speaking as David. Or you can say what you think David would say, whatever you want. Do somebody else first. Do somebody else first. I'll come back to me. Anybody else have a thought? Anybody? I think Joxer is going to essentially say that Dernaldi needs to die.
00:06:55
Speaker
OK, all right. You heard it here, people. You heard it here first on Wild Hill 2020. I know that's a surprise for everyone. Yeah, yeah. Nobody saw that coming. I think Gwendolyn would strongly back that up as well. She is ready to be done with Wild Hill in this point, because I mean. We're leading up to it's just an explosion of a town that hasn't
00:07:20
Speaker
I don't know. They've just been this way for so long and not asked why. And Gwendolyn's like, well, we're going to try to fix it here and now. And I think new leadership should happen, but we shall see. I think Daven is torn because
00:07:36
Speaker
The Davin at this core, I think just wants to say, there's no reason I have no ties to this place. Really. There's no reason for me to be here. I should just move on. We should just move on and let them do whatever they want. It's their business anyways. But there's something inside of Davin that wants to correct it and make it better so that it's not a problem going forward. And if they do leave, they know they're leaving it better than when they came. Yeah, for Krigs, he
00:08:03
Speaker
He's invested in Wild Hill as much as he possibly can be, which isn't like a ton, but in the original like the original reason in the campaign why we came here initially.
00:08:16
Speaker
he and Joxer at least, was to try to get the Quatsica fruit from the farms and this is one of like two locations that's even possible and the season is so quick and it would just be not feasible to get it from anywhere else. He's not intended on leaving and kind of got wrapped up way too deep in the doings of Wild Hill before he knew it.
00:08:43
Speaker
Yeah, you guys have a lot more invested in this town than me and Gwen would have. You know, it's Gwen, I think this was just kind of like a stop point, like a checkpoint before she's moving on. And for Davin, it was just kind of like, okay, let's see what happens in this place. You know, it's not like he came here for any specific reason. Yeah, I really feel Davin kind of came inquisitively like,
00:09:00
Speaker
Well, life is a storm and see me on the wind and all this other kind of just nonsense. And for Gwyn, I think you both just got like attached more to us character wise than like Wild Hill in and of itself and kind of found a roaming family as it were.
00:09:22
Speaker
Yeah. Cause I mean, this was the first time Gwen had ever really made friends. And so she's like, I, if I keep talking to these people, they're going to talk to me too. And it's going to be great. And then we'll make memories and maybe they can help me on my journey. And then those are all the thoughts that goes through Gwen's head. That's awesome.
00:09:39
Speaker
Yeah i think i think jocks are got a little bit more invested in the group and then completely got. Pulled off to the side from the the whole you know having having himself not been conscious and.
00:09:54
Speaker
and kind of just having this spotlight on him from... I guess the equivalent of what his biggest fear is, or turning into this rich knob of an individual. And Durnaldi is kind of this beautiful, just...
00:10:19
Speaker
I don't know, headpiece that that is like everything that jocks or hates in in in in society, I guess. That actually makes a lot of sense. It's like the stuff that jocks is trying to move away from is exactly what Denaldi is to him. And that's why he hates him so much. Yeah, I'm sure that like that the DM somehow magically chose that on accident and
00:10:46
Speaker
And that's one of those things that's like, it just was just this perfect predicament for me to get distracted because I, as Krigs or Blaze had mentioned that my focus for coming here was some of the knowledge that I gained from the monasteries. And I really wanted to get to the roots of some of the things that I could actually create.
00:11:13
Speaker
All right, so pretty interesting. Everyone's takes on Wild Hill and how they impact your character. And I kind of feel like Wild Hills become a character in a story, you know, a place that has an identity in some ways. And I think it's changing a lot, just like the characters that have come into the town have. It's pretty interesting having created Wild Hill kind of just to be a
00:11:35
Speaker
a port of interest for you to go have adventures in the wilds. And everything kind of changed and shifted to where the Wild Hill itself became such a focus. So it's pretty fun. But it's funny how surprising that could be. And I think that if there was like a newspaper in Wild Hill that would have a headline right now, it would be showdown at the Tower of Testing. High noon. Yeah, exactly.
00:12:04
Speaker
The shot heard around the world, the arrow strikes
Character Revelations and Connections
00:12:09
Speaker
next to the chief or something like that. So pretty cool and pretty exciting. It'll be fun to see what happens. And we literally don't know as we record this what's going to happen. But yeah, literally last thing was that arrow just right on the side of the wall by the chief. And you'll find out. I was about to say or the DM.
00:12:30
Speaker
Really some spoilers this episode, but try not to happen. Try not to. It's pretty tight lipped. Yeah, I'm not. I'm not sure there's many spoilers whenever it comes to the future. Yeah, it's it's kind of hard to spoil things you don't know. I don't think I was going to say it's going to happen. I was going to say it's a lot easier to not give out spoilers when you don't even know what the heck's going to happen. So yeah, the dice have definitely determined most of our events.
00:12:58
Speaker
I could say, yeah, that's true. And I could say that I do have adventures planned that are for different characters in case things go real bad at this showdown. So, uh, or maybe backup character in case David dies or maybe I'm putting together a afterlife adventure just in case you don't know. So, so we can, maybe you could earn your way back if something happens. Uh, am I the only one that's created a backup character? I have, I have a, a paragraph.
00:13:26
Speaker
for a character because I'm pretty sure Joxer is going to die. He's prepared for it. I have another character, but they use Unearthed Arcana, so I don't know how we feel about that. We'd have to talk about that, wouldn't we? Oh, I'm probably OK with it, but I'll say that technically, Joxer's Warlock patron is UA. So there you go. We've already got some UA in our in our game.
00:13:55
Speaker
I pull so much stuff out of my own, but that if you want to pull something from another book, I can't really get mad about it. So as much home brewing as I do, for goodness sakes. Uh, cool. Well, what was something, I think Blaze has something in mind, but I'm going to see if, if, if you guys kind of go to the same direction, but what's something in the last few episodes that really kind of stood out to you, maybe threw you for a loop or surprise you a little bit, caught you off guard.
00:14:24
Speaker
Anything in particular you guys could think of?
00:14:27
Speaker
Well, we talked about it briefly at the end of the last session that we recorded, but having Hurley be the captain that was in charge of the fort that we had discovered early on in the season was surprising, at least to me. I think to all of us, none of us are really coming that that's who that was. You know, we remember seeing that somebody was put in charge and there was no name given. And it was just something I didn't think was necessarily going to come back up. And the fact that you brought it around was cool.
00:14:55
Speaker
Yeah, no, I think that whole Delmar and Hurley situation and just coming back to the chief as kind of a primary source of confliction, it kind of took me away from where my head was originally going.
00:15:19
Speaker
I also agree. Finding out who Hurley truly was was amazing because those were my favorite episodes, I feel like, that we recorded because I like the spooky background of everything going on. We walk up to this keep and there's just blood on the ground. You're like, I don't know what happened here. Guess we're going in.
00:15:39
Speaker
I agree with you. That was one of my favorite parts, too, is that whole segment. Yeah, I loved it. Cool place. I think they answered what I was going to answer, so I'm going to turn it on you. And was Hurley always that that chain link or was it just something that you had to piece together because it made the most narrative sense, the direction the campaign went? That was a question I had, too. OK, uh, confessions.
00:16:09
Speaker
That was kind of a late decision. I honestly create NPCs.
00:16:20
Speaker
with very little about them at first. They got a name, maybe an accent or not even an accent as much as just a voice type and a motivation of some kind. And then I let the story kind of play out and decide what makes sense narratively and what would be neat. Now, I will say I didn't add it like the week before I decided that weeks, you know, probably halfway between the actual adventure into the mountains and when you met Hurley. But
00:16:50
Speaker
I because I figured I started to figure you're probably going to meet him at some point. He's got to have secrets. That's a good secret, you know, and I thought that was cool. So, yeah, that's it was it wasn't like in the moment, of course, semi-improved, semi-planned, but it was he sounds so confident. Decided. Yeah, it was decided upon not like
00:17:17
Speaker
not from the beginning of designing this campaign. This campaign looks absolutely nothing like what I put together last September, October, a year ago, like a year ago when I was starting to plan this out because we were talking about doing this podcast. This is not at all what I thought it would be. It's better. So it is because you guys built it with me and it wasn't just me. So it's awesome.
00:17:38
Speaker
Yeah, I just loved that this became kind of a symphony between all of us because you can definitely tell where there's moments where we kind of surprise you to an extent. Sometimes for the worst. Oh, okay. That's what you're going to do. Oh, that's great. Yeah, cool. Okay. Well, let's go ahead and race them then. Yeah, just having to put together ideas, you know,
00:18:08
Speaker
Sometimes in the middle of recording going, we've only recorded for 20 minutes and I don't know what we're going to do the next 40 minutes. So we have to, this is all, you know, off the cuff. There's probably out of the, what are we going to probably be at this point 40 episodes by now? We're at 40 now and we'll be at 44 or 45 by the time this releases.
00:18:29
Speaker
There's probably nine or 10 episodes that's happened where I've been like, okay, the next, the rest of this episode is all farting in the wind. We'll just see what happens. But those turn out to be super fun. And some of those are the ones where I just kind of set a table and you guys handle it and I mute and listen to you guys go for it. So I just let you role play for a while until I can play in for the next session.
00:18:56
Speaker
Was, was there anything we missed that you were a little sad about? There are a couple of things that would have been fun. I won't tell you what they are. Cause I'm probably just going to upgrade them to a higher level and roll them into the adventure in the future. So yeah, right now you'd roll right through it. Cause I built a lot of that stuff for when you were lower levels, those literally you had, I think I mentioned this before, but there were probably seven or eight jobs over the course of the three or four times you took jobs.
00:19:26
Speaker
Um, that you could have done. I had a, I had jobs for depending on what you decided to do. I figured you'd take Francine's job because I kind of knew she would be very appealing to your guys.
00:19:40
Speaker
Are you calling us bleeding hearts? Yeah, a little bit. And I mean, Derek wouldn't have taken that one. But yeah, Davenport was fine with it. Right. And Gwendolyn was like a no brainer. You know, yeah, I had to your dad got to find her dad. So I knew that would happen. But I definitely also, you know, have have other adventures sitting in my one note notes with literal like dungeon crawls that we haven't done. So there's stuff to do. So who knows? Maybe for maybe a one shot, maybe a
00:20:09
Speaker
Actually, part of the adventure will make it happen. I was curious about Widow Tolliver because she asked, did she ask us to go find her husband? I can't remember because now we're 40 episodes out here. I don't think she directly asked us. No, it was only Krigs. Krigs was the only one who heard that. Krigs was the only one that knew.
00:20:29
Speaker
If you find this place, the dragon's something or another. The dragon pit. Dragon pit. Then look out for a dude there. They will tell you this place doesn't exist, but I know it's out there. I just didn't know if we forgot about it, or if Krigs forgot about it, or if it was a job.
00:20:52
Speaker
I think we just got too distracted to ever go and look for it. Yeah. And like it literally did never come up even in passing like lore. No one ever mentioned it. So Krigs didn't take it for the, uh, like words of a crazy person or anything. Like he was not overlooking it, but, um, I think the agenda at hand kind of always took precedent every time it ever became like an option.
00:21:21
Speaker
I agree with that. I was actually curious if viewers out there had like, they listened to it and they're like, what is this going to happen? Honestly, we don't know.
00:21:31
Speaker
Honestly, if they watched all of Game of Thrones, they're fine with just plot points just falling off. And that's true. That's very true. Not if they not if they read the book, though, they'll be very upset. If they read the book, they're just still upset at the fact that there's not going to be any more books. It's not an adaptation. It's a bad adaptation. Yeah, it's like a little coin of adaptations. Yeah, Joxer still has a pair of boots. He hasn't figured out what they are.
00:21:55
Speaker
Yeah, you guys have magic items that you haven't even like check to see what they are. We just haven't like sat down. I think that's all I have. I don't have anything. I haven't even checked out my fancy new hammer. I think there's one other thing and it's it just this this story got this this campaign got so narrative driven, you know, it just got so driven by
00:22:16
Speaker
individual stories for characters as well as just the town and Everything else just had to fall in line with that or it didn't happen. And so it's just very different You know a lot of Dungeons and Dragons campaigns including some I've DM for it's like From it's like a video game from task to task complete the task and get the reward. What's the next task? Yeah, I prepared for that than this So you were gonna literally get jobs go out to the wilds come back get get paid buy stuff
00:22:44
Speaker
Go back out. Tub, he's a merchant. You were going to be able to buy magic items from Tub the tinkerer.
Narrative Evolution Beyond RPG
00:22:52
Speaker
That was part of the plan. He was just one of the options to go out there and buy stuff. Then I got super slick oil. He clearly didn't have anything to offer now. Well, his role has shifted. His role has changed in the story. Now he's like,
00:23:08
Speaker
This tinkerer who works for the big bads, supposedly. He just said it, the big bad, he just said it. Spoiler, spoiler. There we go, spoiler. He said big bads, so turn all these in there. It's all fluid, man, it can change again.
00:23:26
Speaker
I did plan for it to be more that way, more classic Dungeons and Dragons, but it in fact has not been that. It has been very much a story driven show. And I think that's just the way we're going to do. I think if we were at a table playing just us, it would be pretty close to the same. I think it would just go that way. I mean, we've sat at a table and played games before.
00:23:50
Speaker
And you could see how far into that one we got into the story. It was kind of the same thing, yeah. That was like six hours to do a one-shot. In case we've never talked about before, we did a one-shot one time when we all got together that Blaze ran and he had this entire story, this huge mat plan, all of these things for us to do and we got through like maybe a quarter of it.
00:24:10
Speaker
in eight hours. Well, let me give you a two minute if that rundown. It was a modern day setting where I sent you on a float trip for those that don't know a float trip. It's literally sitting inside an inflatable raft of some kind and going down a very lazy river, except all of you being these just absolute wonderful people. You are refused to paddle.
00:24:37
Speaker
If you want to talk about a story taking forever. No, man. You paddle. No, you paddle. Okay, guys. Well, I mean, some people wouldn't hand over the paddle.
00:24:50
Speaker
I'm just saying. No matter how you want to look at it, it was probably, I got, that was my first time ever running a campaign and buddy, you gave me every bad, uh, every bad experience that you always talk about. We had so much fun though. It was awesome. We were outside. It was a little cold candlelight. It was super cool.
00:25:12
Speaker
Oh, such a good horror horror scenario. Oh, spooky boy. I love the horror and that setting was great. And the characters we came up with were so fun, too. Oh, my gosh, yes. This isn't about that, though. This is about the hired swords. Yeah, that's right. This is our version of fun. We're just hanging out and. I think the point is our this campaign, the hired swords is just the way we would play. I think that's my point is like.
00:25:38
Speaker
And that proved it like we did that. We were so much in our character, you know, my like, what was she was Karen was literally her name, wasn't it? She was a Karen. Yeah, and she was like a total like gun toting gun toting Republican, you know, conspiracy theorist who was like stockpiling weapons and
00:25:56
Speaker
She was not, you know, fun to be around. So I played her that way and that caused drama with the with the game. But that's kind of how we did. That's how we do it. So that's kind of what this has become. Stay true. So story driven because it's it's driven by these characters. Yeah. So do you guys have questions? I have two questions. One of them is an easy one. One of them is a not easy one.
00:26:23
Speaker
All right, you want to go first then, Blaze? You can ask one now and let everyone else go, then ask your last one, however you want to do it. OK. I think my first question is a general question from the perspective of probably your character.
Guest Player Impact
00:26:42
Speaker
I forgot what it was.
00:26:44
Speaker
Oh, my God. Fire. You got to write it down. Poop, poop, poop. Anticipating it. Farts. Farts. Farts. Farts. Farts. There it is. I love that the voice that like I do for like being iconically annoying is is the one that gets used for farts like. Yep. Amazing. I remember now.
00:27:15
Speaker
You're the worst. You were legitimately the worst. Have you been drinking? Are you are you OK to drive? We're good. So we had an opportunity to have a guest on the show, which we've been playing the hired swords campaign for almost a year now. Season one will have lasted basically the entirety of a year in recording and preparation.
00:27:43
Speaker
We had the opportunity to play with Starbuck from the Twitter community, the TTRPG community, Custom Dice Maker, and just became a listener slash friend quickly to the swords. We got to have two different episodes and not from the character, I know from the character and from your own like personal say, how interesting was it to mid campaign
00:28:10
Speaker
add an entirely new dynamic of someone else to the party for like a quick just quick adventure like that. It changes the dynamic between everyone, I feel like. I think it definitely does.
00:28:29
Speaker
It also gave us a change of pace of like, all right, here we do. Here's the crew. We're going to record the session and this is the story. And then when we add someone else in the mix, we're like, what are you going to do? We don't know you. Exactly. And it was very nice. I really enjoyed having her on. And I think especially Gwendolyn, because that was the first female in a while besides the chief's wives that she got to really interact with.
00:28:59
Speaker
and talk to and be one-on-one. Also, both of you were half-elves, right? Yep. So there was some kinship there as well that you hadn't really had with many in Wild Hill. She smelled good.
00:29:15
Speaker
I loved it. I loved having her come on because one of the reasons is because I feel like in that amount of time we've gotten used to the conversations our characters have with each other and not saying that it becomes monotonous or repetitive, but it's expected. And to bring in this other person who just brings a whole new dynamic, like you said, it changes just the way that we have conversations, not just with her, but, you know, via her to somebody else as well, you know, because we have these other interactions going on. I thought it was kind of cool.
00:29:42
Speaker
Yeah exactly and it brings these other connections like krigs and davin you know we're building a friendship and everything before that but it seemed like that brought a different connection between the two of us. That was unintended but not bad you know.
00:29:57
Speaker
Yeah, I think it definitely added a lot of interesting situations where, you know, clearly jocks are trying to hide behind a barrel to, you know, leave some space for Krigs in a moment or, you know, Daven sleeping in the underbelly of the Bogus shack. Like, it just added this very interesting, like,
00:30:26
Speaker
The bogus shack belly. Yeah, the bogus shack belly. That's the bogey belly. That's where the brew hole stays. No, I got into the bogey belly through the brew hole. But I think it was really it was really nice to have that that, you know, is a change of pace. And then and she we had gotten a little bit more comfortable.
00:30:50
Speaker
comfortable with her just over the community and she understood where we were. So it was kind of fun to have that interaction where it would be nice to see more of that.
00:31:06
Speaker
The other thing that I really liked is it helped make the world feel more real also. Like when you're talking to NPCs, even though Mike, you do a great job with all of the NPCs that you do, you know that they're there for advancing the story more than anything. You know, they're either going to be the bad guy or the information dump or, you know, just somebody you meet in a bar that doesn't really matter. When you have somebody else playing one of those characters, it makes it feel like, oh, any one of these people is a real person with a personality and a backstory and feelings and interactions with you.
00:31:35
Speaker
that maybe I at least ignore a little bit when it's an NPC. Yeah. And I mean, it also reveals more about our personal characters whenever they have different opinions. Yeah, that's good. I thought it was fun because I did a lot of collab with her beforehand to kind of help prep. And so it was cool to reveal some secrets before you guys knew some stuff and tell them kind of tell her kind of some background of the place that she would know that no one else would or that you guys wouldn't know.
00:32:05
Speaker
And, uh, yeah, it was cool and just kind of to create a character. Cause I had, cause that character existed already. And then. And how coincidental was it that Solrin Chris Farron and Safran and Krigs, the whole Krig scholar? This is not a lie. That was a fantasy name generator website name. Nice. Okay. That I gave, I just gave her amazing.
00:32:33
Speaker
And whenever I was talking to, we were on a call on Discord.
00:32:39
Speaker
Starbucks and I. And when we were chatting, she was like, oh, my gosh, star or a sovereign sounds kind of like Safran. What about this? And I was like, yep. Mm hmm. Absolutely. Story. Let's run with Safran. Safran S.O.P.H.R.I.N. was the name of a guitarist when I lived in Tennessee that I met and became friends with. We don't speak anymore, but I loved his name, apparently.
00:33:04
Speaker
Uh, and then Craig's Galder is a call or shout out to the band Heilung, the Germany, or I don't even know if they're necessarily, it's kind of like a Nordic, uh, Viking style band. Not, uh, so that was kind of my tribute there, but yeah, it's funny how that played out. I was like, wait a minute. Yeah. Speaking of that, if you don't mind, I'm curious, so everyone else's name origins are, if there's anything, did you just make it up or is there like, where did you come up with a name for your character?
00:33:34
Speaker
Well, I can I can say that Joxer is Joxer, the mighty from, you know, Hercules from the Kevin Sorbo back in the day show. Yeah. Good stuff, man. Zeno. Yeah. Yeah. The origins of Zeno warrior princess clearly. Perfect. What about Daven?
00:34:00
Speaker
Oh, Gwen, Gwen. No, no. Daven first. I'm actually curious. I just made Daven up. I was just like, what's a cool name? Daven Meinstrator. That's what I'm going to name him. And it's funny because in that first episode, even before we started recording, nobody could figure out how you're supposed to actually pronounce his name. Is it Davon? Davon? I wasn't even positive because I'd never actually said it out loud. I was like, uh, this was Daven and that just fits now. I like it. Gwen.
00:34:27
Speaker
Um, I, mine's kind of like Davins. It's, it was made up, but it's a name. Like if I had a child or another, by child, I mean dog, I would name her Gwendolyn. I just really liked the name and I felt like, I don't know. I, I'm one of those people that just comes up with names right on the spot. Like I named the boars right then and there. Like I just, I'd like to be creative. Which the names were. If we could even remember they've had some names. I can't even remember.
00:34:55
Speaker
It was Chad and Tom. Chad and Tom. Tom. Tom. What was it? We thought it was. It was Chad and Todd. Todd. That's PODD. Todd. Classic office buddies at a workplace. Yeah. Chad and Todd. My favorite thing in D&D is basically coming up with the character backstory and the name and doing all this thing like she doesn't have a last name because in her culture.
00:35:22
Speaker
what she becomes or does as a druid that will become her last name, like her father was the carrying, so she doesn't really have a last name. That part I did think of.
00:35:38
Speaker
Gwendolyn, the ferocious furry. That's it. Gwendolyn, the other reactor. Gwendolyn, the barbarian? Yeah, the silver reactor. Gwendolyn, the complainy. Gwendolyn, the excited. The emotional mess. Anybody else got a question for everybody? So I guess it's interesting now because it might kind of wrap around a little bit more in
00:36:04
Speaker
after the finale, what is everybody most interested about learning on Joxer's background?
00:36:15
Speaker
I mean, the first thing is who his patron is. Davens had a little bit of conversation with Joxer, so he knows about this person, but a name, where she came from, why she's there or giving him what he has. None of that makes sense to him. From Davens' background, he's never experienced anything like that before. He knows that the gods exist, but he doesn't pay attention to them. He doesn't care about any of that stuff. The idea of any sort of a patron or
00:36:43
Speaker
or being like that coming down is interesting to him. And there's a couple of more things of why that's interesting as well that maybe you guys will find out later on. But right now it's mostly just the fact that like, why? Who is this person and why? I want to know about this girl. Is it an old girlfriend? Is it your sister? Is it your mom? Who's this girl? Because I remember what O'Tolliver given you a reading and she didn't say a name, but she mentioned a woman and I was like, Oh,
00:37:13
Speaker
There's an interest of sorts and we haven't heard anything about it. I think in Craig's perspective, he's been traveling with Joxer for about a year. I think we established whenever building the backstory. Yeah.
00:37:33
Speaker
Being on the war front and seeing various magics, it's not surprising to him so much anymore to know that there are gods and entities beyond his own understanding because he's only dealt with Helm and that realm thereof. Helm's Realms. Beautiful. So he understands that there are other things out there and he's able to do things himself that are
00:38:00
Speaker
kind of out of, you know, some kind of magical component behind it. So I think he's curious about Joxer and kind of not wary. With the whole situation in the fortress up in Stone Mountains and the kind of anger and frustration that they kind of had for each other for a couple episodes, it definitely made Krigs realize
00:38:29
Speaker
He's a little too old for this and Joxer might also be a little bit too young to understand where he's coming from. And so he he kind of just like lets him be.
00:38:43
Speaker
who he is without forcing too many expectations. So if he is magical or if he has these other things, he wants to know out of a friendship and a caring and like from a place of love, but he's not going to impose. So I think I'm curious to see how I end up reacting as Krigs when whatever happens happens. I think that's my most interesting thing.
00:39:11
Speaker
Definitely feel like, uh, jocks or could, could turn, turn a leaf in, uh, aspects. So that would be interesting to see. Nice. Nice. Nice. Uh, Ash, what's your question?
00:39:25
Speaker
I kind of have a joke in one. Should we start paying Daven for longer therapy sessions? How much? It's your hourly rate. Well, that's an hour. That's our time, Gwen. Walk away. All right, Gwen, back to the story. I don't know if we can afford it. Really, we screwed ourselves early on when it comes to making money because we stopped taking jobs and started just doing our own thing and we haven't made any money since that first mission.
00:39:51
Speaker
I'll pay you the trail mix. Yeah, we gained a house. I mean, that's normally money. That's true. Yeah, we've got that investment built in, I guess. Maybe we can sell it. You have assets. You have assets. You just don't have liquid funds. Yeah, we need to liquidize the Boga Shack or some of that ale if you can finally make something worth drinking.
00:40:11
Speaker
Seriously, set up a lemonade stand. Hey, I mean, we could definitely do the Boga Brew Shack. There you go. I like it. Boga Brew, man. It keeps evolving. It's the Brugge Shack. There you go. Now, Derek, your question was kind of a spin off of someone else's. Did you have another one that you had or?
00:40:34
Speaker
Yeah, I would like to know quite literally where do you guys think the campaign is going to go from here? And where would you like to see it go? And I mean like actual physical physical locations. So go on. I think we can both attest that like.
00:40:50
Speaker
It's your, Michael, our DM has now pulled out a notepad and pen so he can figure out all the ways to prove us wrong in the future. The true lazy DM. Uh, that'd be a nice time capsule thing. So I think that, and I'm pretty sure you were going to say roughly the same thing, Mikey, that he's laid out the North, uh, the untouched lands and
00:41:17
Speaker
Yeah, laid out with Hurley in conversations that like, yo, stuff goes on up there, bro. And that sounds like it's right up our alley. Yeah, no, I mean, honestly, like clearly, I mean, the path is north. And I didn't really know if it was going to be a moment of where we went in Sariah's stead or if it was
00:41:43
Speaker
You know, just of our own volition for Hurley or regardless, we're going to have to head in direction. We're going to go back to the mountains. Yeah, yeah. But like a little bit different because we're not going to the same quite. I mean, sort of the same, but it's go home and you can meet my family.
00:42:03
Speaker
Ooh, that might, we definitely need to get down to that. There's some interesting there. Six or seven different voices on the fly.
00:42:17
Speaker
They're all just, they'll all just sound exactly like Krigs. Post, post-processing. Higher tones, lower tones. There you go. Hey, hey, hey, hi. Um, yeah, no, and that's a, so what's interesting, and I don't even know why, but like,
00:42:36
Speaker
The untouched lands just sound so barren and I feel like volcanoes and silliness in that scenario. I don't know why, but it just feels like it's going to be this really burned fire and brimstone kind of area.
00:42:56
Speaker
I get that feeling too, but just from the name, not because of any sort of assumptions because of what we've learned about the place. I assume it's just going to be untouched. Like nobody goes there or lives there and maybe it's going to be really dangerous. You know, an extra wild wilds. The wild is a new chief. I'm worried about the new chief. I feel like we were all talking when I made a pristine joke calling the town Wilder Hill so we can all laugh now.
00:43:26
Speaker
Oh, this is a joke. Well performed. Oh, thank you. Gwen, did you have an answer? Uh, no, cause Gwen's going to go with the group is because she's made deep connections with everyone. So like the going forward is unknown to her. Like obviously her end goal is to find Alomora. So.
00:43:54
Speaker
I think in that you don't really have any idea where it is. And we've shown interest in like helping, too. So I would argue, like, stay with us. It's probably the safest for you, even though we've already technically all died together once. True. Yeah, you're super safe. Yeah, we're actually not alive. This is all been a dream. We wake up and start a new campaign. The man, she actually did kill us.
00:44:21
Speaker
No, we're all the Muppet babies and we're just having a dream. Yeah, that's awesome. I love it, that's a good spin. Awesome, anybody, any other questions, Blaze, did you have another one? Yeah, and this one is super high school. You ready for it? Yeah. What does your character think about the other characters? I also had a question similar to that.
00:44:50
Speaker
What is your question? And then we can. Mine was, does anyone have secret feelings towards each other? That is a part we're going to combo question because that could very well be the same. This just feels like a drinking game all of a sudden.
Character Dynamics and Connections
00:45:08
Speaker
Nobody's going to answer. Not only once. OK, so I mean, so what is what is the question? What is your character?
00:45:15
Speaker
What does your character think about the other characters in the party? And do they make them hot for teacher? Okay, so I can say- They're not the hot for teacher. They're the hot for teacher of teacher. Joxer, at this point, Joxer was pretty fond of Krigs, but there seems to be a disconnect.
00:45:39
Speaker
um, in, in their interests. And it's not like there's a dislike, but at this point there's, there's a distance growing. And I don't know if it's going to continue to grow or if it's going to like, his, his purpose is still the same because he had a reason to be here for.
00:45:57
Speaker
Yeah, you and others. I think just like our actual friendship, it's very much spawned by chaotic competition. Yeah, there is there is like a weird spontaneity and in like the that that growth of the character is like kind of a brotherly hood of, you know, we've been too close to each other for too long and we're butting heads.
00:46:23
Speaker
Um, yeah, the last couple of episodes, he and Devin are almost getting this like kinship in a bit. And then I'll say that that jockser is like, he's, he's, he's interested in, in, in being closer to Gwen in, in an aspect, I can't say that it's like a, a
00:46:48
Speaker
romantic way, but definitely like he wants to be able to help. But I'll also add that Dale is a weird confusion to him.
00:47:01
Speaker
That's possible. I, I'll go next because I feel like it's similar in a lot of ways. Daven's feelings toward Gwen are, you know, when there's that quiet kid in school and you feel like you want to talk to that person just to make them feel a little bit better. And then you find out they're actually really kind of cool and you enjoy talking to them. So you just become friends with them. That's kind of how Daven feels about Gwen. But at the same time, he sort of legitimately thinks she might be insane and making everything up.
00:47:26
Speaker
Because he clearly realizes that that Dale is not alive. And wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, hold on, hold on. What are you trying to say, buddy?
00:47:42
Speaker
Anyway, um, he can clearly see that Dale does not react or move or respond any sort of way. And at first he thought it was just like her cute, like a coping mechanism for like being alone growing up, but now he's legitimately starting to think that maybe she's just crazy. Um, but he's, he's not really to say that out loud yet. Um,
00:48:03
Speaker
for that's what he feels. Um, jocks are, he's a little confused about too, because the fact that he feels like he has a lot in common with jocks are because they have very similar ways. Like they both have magic that they can do. Um, they both have kind of like left their home in their family sort of thing, although for different reasons. So it feels like he has a lot of things in common. Um, but at the same time he feels like they're very different people too. So it's like a weird juxtaposition between their characters.
00:48:30
Speaker
Um, for Krigs, it's, he's grown like a good friendship with him, but he almost kind of feels, especially earlier on, like almost like it's a father figure in a way, because, uh, he's very similar to his dad. In fact, that he was a military man. You know, he's an older guy. He seems to want to be like a leader in everything. Um, and so he kind of looks at him that way, but he also, it's more of like a friendship, you know? Did I know your dad was a military man? I mentioned it before. I must've forgotten. Hmm.
00:49:00
Speaker
just spoiled the past for me. Nice. What's Krigs think of everybody? Krigs? In chronological order of how we've met, Joxer and Krigs have always had a sort of competitive
00:49:18
Speaker
spirit between the two. I mean, they met in some random bar, uh, drinking away the day and decided to have the drinking competition, which turned into hunting after wolverjacks. Uh, and, you know, waking up in the forest the next day, wondering, uh, well, where do we go from here as friends, I guess. And
00:49:42
Speaker
That competitive spirit has been problematic at times, whenever decisions and choices have differed. Opinions on what they should do has differed. And Joxer is one to make that very well known, and Kriegs is one to just act and ask for forgiveness later. So there's been some butting heads. But I think
00:50:07
Speaker
Again, I go back to what I was talking kind of earlier. I think he's just going to be supportive because he doesn't really feel he can do much else than that with Joxer. Just being, you know, close and whatever he can do to help out and make him achieve his goals is going to be good. Then Gwen bumped into me in Wild Hill very abruptly. Gwen in Krigs, I don't think Krigs really
00:50:39
Speaker
had major feelings one way or the other. I think Craig's never having, you know, he's 130 roughly years old and hasn't had a family outside of his own family and hearing the story of her looking for the father and the relationship he has with his father and some regrets. He kind of feels compassionate and almost sort of fatherly towards Gwyn in a way.
00:51:08
Speaker
more like protective, kind of like a, not necessarily fatherly, but more protective and more just like, you know, use little creature, soft little fuzzy dire wolf creature. Nothing is going to hurt you anymore. Kind of feeling protective would be probably the best description there. And that has gotten even more so now that he's got his new subclass.
00:51:36
Speaker
which has been sort of revealed over the last little bit after turning his back on Helm. He doesn't get nature very much. He lived in the mountains and it wasn't very... it was kind of sparse naturally. And so she's kind of become a guide, so he kind of needs her and feels like he needs her a lot more than she needs him at this point. So...
00:52:02
Speaker
That's where he's lying. And then with Daven, there's been a really interesting kinship between him and Daven where they're able to see things slightly more on eye to eye than like, say, he and Joxer did. Daven.
00:52:18
Speaker
has a darkness about him. And I think Kriegs understands that, understands what it's like to have whatever burden Daven has. Though he doesn't understand the burden itself, he knows what it's like to have one. And that darkness they share, I think, makes it easy to just show true colors a bit more.
00:52:39
Speaker
this is the way it is this is how my life is and this is the decisions I have okay I understand that cool let's go forward and with that I think it is allowed a closeness that he doesn't necessarily have with the either of the two but
00:53:00
Speaker
Yeah, protection. The first fight we got in was basically Krigs protecting Davin, and the only reason he fought the Elks was he basically watched Davin die right in front of him. Just a guy he just met. Yeah, that's good. Awesome. Anybody else have another question? Or has everybody asked their questions? Hey, just because you have a shield doesn't mean you have to protect everybody, all right?
00:53:25
Speaker
I mean, I feel like that is a feeling that I have felt many times in my life that bled into Griggs.
00:53:34
Speaker
Yeah, no, I can agree and kind of adding a little bit more on, I guess, Joxer's attention towards Gwen there because of his intense curiosity and kind of that interest towards kind of a knowledge. There is that map that you pulled out and
00:53:59
Speaker
and and trying to help you kind of kind of feeds on that, like, obsession that there is with jocks or whenever it comes to trying to, whether it be help someone or just find something new. Ash, did you answer the question? No, Mike tried to to scoot me out of. I really hear what her opinion is of people. I thought I thought you did now.
00:54:29
Speaker
You thought wrong! Gwendolyn is a lot like myself, so my feelings towards you guys is kind of similar in a weird way. She does see
00:54:44
Speaker
Krigs is kind of like this funny old man that just, he has war stories and he has all this, especially when we're, he has all this craziness. So like when we were out in the woods and he's going different directions, that's the point Gwen was like, I don't know about this guy, but she has looked up to him. She hasn't, when he's talked, she's always wanted to follow. There was no,
00:55:09
Speaker
really rebuttal on her end to be like, No, I don't want to do that. And so I do feel that that is reciprocated. Her relationship with jocks are is still developing, like, and if this means offense, I'm sorry, but like, we're both awkward. And I think that really plays into our relationship. Like, since when have we been awkward? And I feel like
00:55:37
Speaker
since we're so similar in that way Gwen doesn't she just sees it as oh awkward is normal so he's a normal guy i'm a normal girl and this is how we're going to function and i think gwendolyn is starting to get more curious of that her and jocks are a lot similar in more than one way especially with our hatred for dernaldi and how he is a crazy man and very bad
00:56:02
Speaker
As for Davin, he is the group therapist, as we all know, and one of Gwendolyn's top therapists to go to almost every episode when she has emotional breakdowns. Even though he thinks she's crazy, she doesn't know what love is. She got love from her mom, and I guess she thinks that she had gotten some love when she was born from her father.
00:56:27
Speaker
She is starting to love Daven, not in a romantic way, but like, man, I really love this guy.
Speculations on Upcoming Showdown
00:56:33
Speaker
Like this is like a brother of some sort, like she's and she doesn't really have that with Krigs, but I don't know. There's some about Daven. I'm not shipping them.
00:56:43
Speaker
Davins with Krigs, obviously, so. Yeah, you're going to have to fight Krigs. Just makes all this more tragic when Davin turns on everyone. I mean, I mean, it calls me insane. If Krigs is worn as a backpack, is that cheating? I mean, they're starting for a fanny pack, too. Fanny pack for accurate. That's that's that's what holds Dale, right? Yeah, exactly. Nice.
00:57:13
Speaker
Awesome. Yeah. Well, I have one more question, but is there anything else before we wrap it up? Any other questions for each other? No. All right. Here's my last question. Who will be dead at the end of this big showdown? I'm voting jocks here.
00:57:33
Speaker
Can I vote? Oh, wait. I mean, well, I mean, I was going to say the chief. Oh, what's the body count? Oh, gosh. Sure. What's the body count and who's going to be there in the pile at the end?
00:57:44
Speaker
Oh, no. I have a feeling Tomba is going to be there. OK, so so I'm going to get going after my good boy Tom. So Tom, Tom, Tom is a survivor. So so it's it's the chief is going to survive with no legs. Jocks is going to die. Sariah is going to lie. Also going to die. And then the rest of the rest of her party is going to be fine. And then all well, at least half the other hunters are dead.
00:58:14
Speaker
Wow, that's that's a body count right there. That is that is a fight. What? Uh, what about this? Add a stipulation of the party? Who's the first? Who's the first to die? If anyone dies in that fight, who dies? Joxer dies in that fight. Why? What kills him? He always gets into the fray trying to get like behind everybody and then no one supports his advantage. So it's it's fine.
00:58:39
Speaker
It's not going to be your fault is what he's saying. Pretty much, yeah. He's going to die because of all of you. I just remember the last time that I died and someone had an option to save me or not. I think the statement was, I think Jarks will be okay, so I'm going to do this other thing. Yeah, interesting.
00:59:03
Speaker
I think that Daven has a chance of dying only because of the fact that he's the squishiest of the group. So it wouldn't be that hard to kill him compared to everyone else, but I've got ways of avoiding damage. Yeah, I just don't think anybody's going to be focusing you because I think all of the people around plus your fellow companions are trying to take focus. I am quite literally standing in the middle of everyone right now shouting about how evil the chief is.
00:59:29
Speaker
That might put a little bit of attention on me. Very true. I put the drums out. Come on. That's true. Everyone hates drummers. Hey, come on. Blazer muted. That was amazing. God dang it. I can't capture the sound that your face made.
00:59:55
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, that was so good. Many jokes. They're not laughing at me at all. I thought I was funny. I swear I'm funny. Joxie Snorton. So, not to metagame, Daven, but I did put my steed directly next to you on purpose.
01:00:21
Speaker
for a quick getaway. I'm not going to kill your steed. Oh, that's not what you're saying. If you must die or you could write off in steed. And that's going to end our behind the swords episode. Wow. That's a banger. Always on a dad joke.
Season 2 Excitement and Audience Appreciation
01:00:44
Speaker
Wow.
01:00:45
Speaker
but wow guys it's fun to chat about it and uh i'm really interested to see what's going to happen and i'm really excited to go into season two i keep wanting to say campaign two but it's really the same campaign it's just the you know 2.0 and uh i'm excited to go into that and uh
01:01:03
Speaker
Thank you everybody for listening. You can follow us on Twitter and Facebook at the hired swords, the hired swords.com website. And yeah, look for cool news and announcements as well as I guess later this same week, regular release date, the finale episode followed by an epilogue, I guess is the goal. It could be three, it could be two, depending on how this next little situation turns out, but we'll see. We'll see. Let the bodies hit the floor.
01:01:34
Speaker
Thanks everybody, and we'll see you all next time. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye.