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C2 Ep. 115 Stranded in the Maze Chapter Two
287 Plays2 years ago
A mysterious figure asks the party for help, but are they truly who they say they are? And if so, what does that mean for the future?
This episode is brought to you by the generous donations of our amazing Show Sponsors: Laura Pickrahn, Darrin Katzska, Irene Viorritto, Ryan Royce, Darrell DeLaney, Charles Compton, Deviouspoptart, Nastasia Raulerson, David Scrams, Elizabeth Clark, Andy Dossett, Rebekah Gowman, deviouspoptart, Eðvarð Arnór Sigurðsson, Michael Clark, Eric Witman, Jerry Theuns, Philip Newman, Mark Stanley, and Shelby Johnson.
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Transcript
Introduction and Merchandise
00:00:00
Speaker
What is up everybody? Welcome back. I am Eric with a brief intro here for everyone because you do not want to miss this message. Do not skip ahead to the episode. We have merch. It's finally happened. We have merchandise available for Eberron Renewed for both campaign one and campaign two as well as general Geek Pantheon merch if you just want to rep the brand itself or general Eberron Renewed merch.
00:00:25
Speaker
as well that you definitely don't want to miss out on. If you just go to thegeekpantheon.com, that is the shop website. We repurpose that domain to where you all can go there and see all the awesome stuff that we have available for you all. We have shirts, hoodies, sweaters, coffee mugs, bottles, journals, pet apparel, and so much more to come. We already have another round of designs completed. We have some other products in the works that I'm waiting on samples for, and then we'll have even more for you. So go check out thegeekpantheon.com.
00:00:55
Speaker
for merch. It's finally happened. It took like six years, but here we go. Hope you all enjoy the episode and thank you so much. The following episode is brought to you by Mark Stanley, Phillip Newman, Shelby Johnson, Jerry Thunes, Andy Dossett, Eric Whitman, Edvard Arnoff, Natasha Rallerson, Deavius Poptart, Rebecca Gowman, Elizabeth Clark, David Scrams, Charles Compton, Darryl Delaney,
00:01:22
Speaker
Ryan Royce, Darren Katska, Irene Villarito, and Laura Picro, as well as all of our generous patrons. D20 radio, your game is roll.
Episode Setup and Mysterious Figure
00:02:07
Speaker
Hello and welcome to Ever On Your News, an actual play podcast at the Ever On Campaign Setting. I'm your game master, Eric. I'm Phillip. I'm Trevor. I'm Randy. I'm Jeff. Welcome to another episode. Gentlemen, what happened last time? My breakfast was interrupted. Bob got bopped to the top. Yeah. And he's not wrong. He's not wrong. Yeah. I paid way too much to fall out of the sky.
00:02:36
Speaker
gang trying to move in on the turf around the for sales they're beating up our friend well they're beating up one of our friends and ace and we're I would argue they've beaten up another one of your friends Philip I said they are beating up one of our friends and ace we including hob even though hob is now down or unseen trying to stop it
00:03:07
Speaker
Yeah. And at the very end of the episode, a mysterious figure hopped down and is showing the fight coming after the main group that just took out Ace with a very silly weapon. Absolutely ridiculous. Well, I'm curious as to how they're dressed. To finish describing them. Thank you, Randy. They are in full armor, head to toe, including a helmet that fully conceals their face. And it's a very smooth
00:03:35
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, it's just a very smooth surface, very round helmet coming up under their chin. And Aeris, you're the one that has the closest view on them. It's a material that you like. It's not metal. It's not leather. It's unlike really anything you've encountered before. Spandex. No, it's not. It is rigid and hard, like plate armor.
00:04:02
Speaker
But this person leapt off a roof and is moving far too quickly for it to be as heavy as plate armor traditionally is. It seems to be extremely lightweight. Weird. Yeah, so their armor looks kind of like how plate
Battle with Ogre and Minions
00:04:20
Speaker
would be assembled, though. You have your chest piece. I mean, it's a full set of armor, but they're moving very fast.
00:04:29
Speaker
You've made this so that I can't do this without being distracted by trying to figure out what comic book character I should be picturing here as the analogy, as the analog. Round helmet was a giveaway you felt like for me. I think Deathstroke. That would be kind of the closest analogy.
00:04:50
Speaker
So, yeah, their armor is colored primarily kind of navy blue and gold. Though you do note that there is a rather striking band on their right forearm, kind of built into the armor. There's like a white stripe. But with them moving as quickly as they are in the heat of combat, that's as much as you can get without taking time to stop and fully examine what's going on.
00:05:19
Speaker
Okay. No capes. Okay. So now we're back around to the top of the round. The minion group that just had one of their fellows taken out is going to turn and rush this new interloper. So minion group got two advantage on them. So they will pass two boost to the next person.
00:05:47
Speaker
Ogre is going to turn to the direction where that blast came from and take a shot at the window. Does Eris have defense? Eris has
00:06:18
Speaker
Specifically ranged. Yeah, it's only melee. Although I would perhaps argue some cover. Sure. Shooting through a window. And I'm going to flip a story point to upgrade green to a yellow. Now you all have two story points. That's a triumph. With...
00:06:43
Speaker
two success and actually three success, one triumph and a threat. So Eris, you are going to take nine damage before soak. Mm hmm. Mm hmm.
00:07:01
Speaker
Um, and they are going to take a point. Are you good with taking strain or was there something else you'd like to do with the threat? Pass the setback. Oh, uh, strain is okay. That's fine. Okay. Uh, and we're going to crit. Of course we are. Yeah. What did he shoot me with?
00:07:31
Speaker
Hand crossbow. Eris is allergic to hand crossbows. Eris doesn't have any lingering crits, correct? Not as of this morning. We're not rid of all of them. 75 is going to be hamstrung. Target loses their free maneuver until this critical injury is healed.
00:07:57
Speaker
So he shot you in the hamstring. Don't think about it too hard moving on. I'm thinking about it. It's difficult. It's difficult to understand. What's the difficulty of that? What's the severity of that? Average. Too purple.
00:08:17
Speaker
We've had one minion group taken out. So the single minion group left. No, Hob is down. The gnoll that's up on Milo is going to try to punch, but it's the start of his turn, so he's going to take seven damage. He should stop dropping roll is what he should do.
00:08:41
Speaker
Well, if he's burning from the inside, what would that accomplish? He's going to stop and drop, but that's all he's going to do because he died from his internal organs being set. I mean, it starts to, you know, I could just stop. Yeah, there you go. I could just see flames erupting from the skin, you know?
00:08:58
Speaker
Jeez. So yeah, there's a very disgusting smell. PC slot. So hob is down. Eris, you've seen this figure attack.
Cassian's Arrival and Request
00:09:13
Speaker
Milo, Raynard, you've also seen it. Raynard, you do have healing magic if you wanted to give it a shot. I'll heal hob. You'll heal hob? OK. So do you know what the difficulty is? Well, what is it?
00:09:25
Speaker
What is it against? So it's going to be your reverse skill. So it's going to start off easy difficulty if you run up and touch hob, which you can. You do have your maneuver. You can get to hob. If you want, then it would just be one purple difficulty. One purple difficulty if you use your maneuver to run up to hob and physically touch it. Well, you don't want that, but. I think you'll be fine with it. OK. OK. That pressed him? No, it was Matt.
00:09:56
Speaker
Sorry. Focus. I don't have any of that left. So that is three three success, two advantage. So you heal three wounds and three strain. Strain is not a problem for Ob anymore, but the wounds are no. I didn't, I didn't possess anything this time. How have you opened your eyes to see Raynard just over you touching me saying you're welcome. Um,
00:10:27
Speaker
Okay. Um, in PC slot is going to be, um, the single minion that was on hob is going to attack Reynard because healer. So I'll flip another story point to change one of these greens to a yellow. Now you all have three story points.
00:10:51
Speaker
Oh my god. It's so bad. That's wild. One threat and four blank dice. The only pip shown is one threat. And the one threat was Reynard's like, I'm going to get you one threat. Unbelievable. And that threat converts to strain, which converts to wound. That I'm going to get you, that goblin takes off Reynard. Gets terrified of Reynard's crazy eyes. One time, find some friends.
00:11:21
Speaker
I'm gonna getcha. That's what happens when you interrupt brunch. PC slot. Hob, Milo, or Eris. Well, I mean, if someone's going to be able to do something, they should do that because Eris's weapon is jammed, so Eris is gonna have to use her action to fix that, and she doesn't have a maneuver anymore, so. Okay, I'm gonna run up at a free maneuver.
00:11:47
Speaker
I can get to Sana's aggressors with one maneuver? Yeah. Okay. Oh, now that you're up, you also see this mysterious figure that's fighting three of the minions. Well, two minions. But I can tell pretty quickly that they're fighting around our side. Because they're scary looking. I'm going to...
00:12:15
Speaker
Heroic move is incidental, right? Yeah. Yes. Yours is because you've upgraded it to be an incident. And they're a minion group that's on sauna. Take them out. So two story points. They're gone. So that minion group is out. And then I'm going to turn to the half ogre that's directing traffic. And I'm going to do some. This is going to get stupid. But here we go.
00:12:44
Speaker
I'm going to suffer a lot of strain to do this. All right. I'm going to attack him with my Sesteth. Is that too purple? The half. Yes. Melee is always too purple. But there's no defense or anything? Or adversary? Oh, we're all right. Thank you. You're attacking the half ogre. Those two purple become too red. No defense. No defense. OK.
00:13:10
Speaker
double checking everything. That is two success and three advantage. So the two success leads to 24 wounds. Okay. And breach one.
00:13:26
Speaker
Okay, how do you knock the ogre out? The ogre is decimated by that. With rage. I cannot express how angry Hob is right now. You know he does. What does he do? Because he doesn't necessarily care about the four cells glass windows right now.
00:13:47
Speaker
He just rips all three of those guys off on it, throws them through the window. They're out temporarily. He spins around and just spear tackles this half over to the ground and it just happens to knock his head right. Like this was kind of a lucky one. I'm going to give him that. Nice. Yeah. And he gets up and looks around a little bit. And with those six advantage,
00:14:10
Speaker
The double of nothing. Six advantage. What do we do with six advantage? What do we do with six advantage? Who's left? Two minion groups? There's the minion group on the mysterious figure. There's the gnoll that was shooting at Milo. And I think that's it. All right. Guys, essentially I have a triumph. What can I do with six advantage that you guys have in your brains?
00:14:36
Speaker
That said, I really don't know what to do with the triumph. I can't place a triumph here. The guy you just knocked out was the boss, right? Yeah. Could he impose like on one of the other minion groups? Could he impose a discipline check? To run? Sure. That makes a lot of sense.
00:14:58
Speaker
Jack Reacher says, once you take out the main guy, two or three true believers will stick around, but everybody else takes off. And then he punches the main guy, and a couple guys run off, and he says, OK, now we know who everyone is. I'm going to flip a story point to upgrade one of their greens to a yellow. You all now have two story points. One success. They stay.
00:15:29
Speaker
Okay, and that was the second piece. Yeah, because Reynard went, then Hob went. So we have the Knoll that was shooting at Milo is going to turn and try to shoot. Oh, you know, he's going to keep stay the course, try to kill the powerful scary halfling. One success, one threat.
00:15:57
Speaker
So Milo, that is going to be five damage and he'll suffer strain, which becomes wounds. Um,
00:16:15
Speaker
And then the minion group that's trying to attack your mystery ally already went. I think everyone else is dead, so nobody can take this in PC slot. Um, so Milo. Okay. Is there still, there's still a group of them.
Debating Cassian's Offer
00:16:40
Speaker
There's a group of two that are attacking the armored individual, and then there's the null that's shooting at you. I don't think they've hit you yet. Well, they just hit you. Never mind. They just shot you. What am I talking about? All right. I'm going to Milo.
00:17:05
Speaker
waves his wand in a nice little circular motion and then points it at the knoll that's shooting at him and this little black bead comes out of the wand and as it speeds up it turns into a huge fist. Okay. And it's gonna try to punch the knoll. Okay. That shows a difficulty of too purple. Alright. What's gonna happen?
00:17:36
Speaker
And roll. Two successes and four advantage. Dang. So he gets punched for, let me see, let me figure that. That's going to be four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, I guess. Okay. Three from the wand, four from my arcana and two successes.
00:18:03
Speaker
And also has, also has knocked down and disorient equal to four. Okay. So you can, you can activate both of those. So you can knock them down with two advantage and then trigger disorient four for two advantage. We need they'll add a setback to their check for the next four rounds. Okay.
00:18:28
Speaker
Yeah, let's go ahead and do that. This guy's shooting at me. I don't like it. So yeah, giant fist flying through the air. It says it's on its back having just been punched by a giant shadow fist. Eris.
00:18:51
Speaker
Use an action to clear the jam in my Fletcher. She said was a mechanics check. Yep. What was the difficulty of said mechanics check? Hard. You have two story points if you'd like to flip one. Okay.
00:19:23
Speaker
Um, crap. That is five advantage. Okay. What would you like to do with five advantage? Got an idea. Maybe like you've got it to such a point to where next time the check will be easier. Maybe that can be some of it.
00:19:52
Speaker
No, Eris isn't going to spend another round working on this. Does Eris have a secondary backup weapon stashed in her old room?
00:20:04
Speaker
Hmm. Oh Eris has weapons that just aren't as good as this one I Mean the situation is much better now the note the last living knoll is on its back and Seems to be seeing birds. There's only two minions left fighting your mystery ally But they seem to have it well in hand And that's the only bad guys left
00:20:31
Speaker
sauna is cleared and safe. Ace is there. What is my range is too far for anything other than the Fletcher. I don't know. I have nothing else that can hit from long range.
00:20:58
Speaker
I have no ideas, so sure, lower the difficulty. Okay. And that is it for that round. So Mystery Ally is going to try to attack the minion group that's on him. What? Stop and start.
00:21:23
Speaker
Just double checking things. OK, so that cancels that. So that's six success in one threat. What were they doing? Attacking the two minions on them. Showing us up. Yep. I don't like this guy. That is accurate.
00:21:51
Speaker
Okay. Um, takes out one of the minions that's on him. One more still standing. Uh, and that minion group is going to take a swing at him because that's the only, well, the Nola is still up, but we'll go and do these guys first. One success, two advantage.
00:22:17
Speaker
And the Knoll is going to stand up kind of confused, looking around, going to shoot once again at Milo, but now he is disoriented. So he has two black on his pool. Um, I took, I took two strain and healed two wounds again with the cloak. Okay. Do you have to flip a story point for that again? Yes. Is it not a once per encounter thing?
00:22:43
Speaker
uh just as an incidental out of turn after suffering any amount of damage okay spend enough spend one story point well i'm gonna flip the story point so you all still have two so i'll change one of his greens to yellow that's a triumph um
00:23:07
Speaker
One success, one threat, one triumph. So that is going to be five damage, Milo. Four. Dang, I'm trying to stay up. And we'll go ahead and crit. 91. Don't like the sound of that. Yeah. No.
00:23:38
Speaker
Compromised. Increase the difficulty of all skill checks by one until the critical injury is healed. Oi, oh boy. Average difficulty, only two purple. And now PC slots all around, so doesn't matter what order. Three of them? What? Three of them? Or all four? All four, yeah.
00:24:04
Speaker
You got one minion and one Knoll. Yeah. Aeris, do you want to try to clear first or don't worry about it? If I just dropped out the window, what's my range to targets? Uh, that minion would be short range. What about Le Knoll? Um, also short range.
00:24:36
Speaker
Cool. Yeah, Harris just slides out the window and drops to the ground. And she will level the dart launcher on her wrist at the null.
00:25:05
Speaker
and blast him. All right. Short range. That's one success. Three advantages. Three advantage. So that is 11 damage before soak.
00:25:37
Speaker
Describe your Oh
Exploring Cassian's Technology and Agreeing to Help
00:25:40
Speaker
Cool No, well, how close is he close enough to the minion to catch it in a blast? Um Sure Okay, then I'll spend the advantage to activate its blast and deal six damage to the minion Which is enough to take out the minion as well
00:26:03
Speaker
Perfect. So Eris just lands, brings up the Dart launcher on the back of her gauntlet, and a series of super-heated flechettes launch out of it with this high-pitched shriek and just right into both of this goblin and this null.
00:26:34
Speaker
You see as the explosions and the fire of the blast hit the minion, the mystery figure raises up their forearm, and you see kind of a shimmering barrier block the residual heat and blast from the engaged minion hitting them. And they say, nice shot, Eris. I'm trying to say what?
00:27:04
Speaker
where there's just nothing Eris likes less than this. Do we recognize the voice? We are out of combat. No, you do not. We're out of combat? Yeah, that's all the baddies. Well, unless you're going to attack this guy. Eris trains the launcher on what's their face. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. I'm going to heal some strain. Hop drops to his butt. It just kind of sits in the road. All right, who are you?
00:27:34
Speaker
He reaches on his belt and tosses you a stim pack as he says a friend. And he reaches up and kind of clips off the straps on his helmet and lifts it off.
00:27:50
Speaker
A human man in his, you probably say about mid-40s, blonde hair cut relatively short and a blonde beard with a fair amount of scarring on his face. Not like deep scarring, but enough that they've seen a fair amount of combat. Oh, no, my friends.
00:28:15
Speaker
Fair enough. I've got a long story for you. My name is Cassie and I need your help.
00:28:39
Speaker
I don't know anyone named Cassian. So this whole friend business is I know I Like I said, I got a long story for you Eris Right, I don't know Trevor you don't know And he puts the helmet under his arm I
00:29:08
Speaker
I know you don't know me, Eris, but I would like to ask you for your help. I need all of you. And he kind of looks at everyone. I have no idea how to react to this. Milo sitting on his doofus looking for a healing potion.
00:29:35
Speaker
He reaches off his belt and tosses Milo's stem pack. Here. Hi. Here's the thing. Thank you. Hob's going to stand up, and he's going to go into the four sails with the full intent of sitting down and eating something because this just happened and checking on the guys you threw in there, making sure they're still down. So he's going to stand up and start walking towards the four sails, and he's going to say, well,
00:30:06
Speaker
It's not in our nature to...
00:30:10
Speaker
turn down an audience. So come in, I guess. As though he has any authority to invite someone into a public establishment. More familiar than probably you would care for, Hob, is you walk past him, and he falls in stride with you walking in, gives you a pat on the shoulder, and he's like, that's what he does. I know. And just says, I appreciate that makeup.
00:30:38
Speaker
Hop's not going to hit him back. He's like, all right, OK. And he follows you into the four sales. And you would have noted that he didn't call you Hop.
00:30:54
Speaker
Hobb is doing the thing Hobb went in there to do. He's like, grab a seat. Let's have a talk. He's like going to get some drink and food. Um, often has a broom and is sweeping up shattered glass off the floor. Right about that. I'll, I'll take care of it. I give him, I give him five gold because that ought to cover the freaking window. Um, Arizona disarming the corpses. Yeah.
00:31:22
Speaker
sauna is carrying ace's body into the four sails. Reynard, Myla, what are y'all doing? You know, if our healer wanted to do anything about that.
00:31:36
Speaker
Sorry, excuse me. I mean, I know we don't particularly like him, but not, we don't necessarily want him to bleed out. Right. And like every second he's unconscious, he's losing valuable, like mental processing. I mean, does he really roll the dice?
00:32:03
Speaker
That is a failure with poor advantage. I got to invest in some magic. You have all of the XP that we've heard. I probably have about 300. Raynard gives a passing look at Ace and goes, he's gone. I just love sleeping off, buddy. Okay, where are these Fletcher's from?
00:32:30
Speaker
They seem to be very rudimentary, crude make. They don't seem to be as high tech as what you saw in Millhatch. It's not like Millhatch is funding Dask or anything. It seems that people have witnessed these things being utilized in the streets and in fights, and people are trying their best to replicate and copy, and they're doing a poor job of it, but they're trying.
00:32:59
Speaker
What are they powered by? They are powered by just arcane artifice implementation. It's not a full dragon shard, which is why it's a poor look-alike. So yeah.
00:33:23
Speaker
Eris Hall's one of these insides sits down in what she possessively thinks of as her booth and begins disassembling it. Okay. Cassian sits down wherever Hobb has sat because Hobb was the one that seemed the most amenable to listening. I think Hobb sits in earshot. Milo stumbles in. Okay.
00:33:50
Speaker
We do have to do something about Ace. Hey, buddy, you got one more of those. Well, I don't have any on me. I'll make it right. Oh, yeah, for sure. And he pulls one. And I go shove it in Ace's neck. Oh, I go Uma Thurman Ace real quick. Everything's broken. Yep, probably. Everything's broken. Why did they do that? No, we're going to find out. You just lay there, I guess. Do you want like a drink? Yes. All right, throw us a bar. OK, thanks.
00:34:28
Speaker
That's funny. I'm going to use that. That was great. That was outstanding. Raynard, you checked out Ace, but are you going to sit with this new? I checked him out and I said, well, I'm going to make it. Oh, look at that. It's a miracle. Are you going to sit with this new mystery figure in Hobb, or what are you doing? Yeah, I guess so. I guess I'm curious. Milo?
00:34:56
Speaker
Yeah, Milo gets ale at the bar and then goes and sits down. Okay.
Journey to Cassian's Safe House
00:35:02
Speaker
Put this coin on the counter. Um, so Hobb says, all right, um, I'll be frank with you. I don't like that you know more about us than we do about you. That's bad.
00:35:17
Speaker
I'm not going to hold that against you. You tell us what you need. You tell us what's in it for us. And we'll let you know if it's something we're interested in. That seems to be how we do it.
00:35:33
Speaker
So I'm in town and I need to get home essentially. My means of return has been... I got hit with a bad batch of Dispel Magic and it fried my means of returning home. So I have to recharge it.
00:35:51
Speaker
And I know where I need to go, but it's dangerous. So yeah, I'd like to Hire slash and list you all to to help me out I can explain how I know you all if you like or if you'd rather I mean, it's the first thing I brought up. Okay. Yeah It's it's the hardest thing to explain is why why yeah, so I Am
00:36:22
Speaker
I'm not from around here. I am in town to prevent, I'm with an organization known as the Lighthouse Consortium. Hang on, I've got to write things down. You've got, what'd you say, a lighthouse? The Lighthouse Consortium is the name of the organization. It's the formal name. Lighthouse Consortium.
00:36:52
Speaker
I'm going to pull. It could be anything. I'm just going to pull the bandages off and you all stop me when you have further follow ups. Does that sound like a good plan? Sure. OK. So the Lighthouse Consortium is an organization dedicated to ensuring that various timelines don't erupt and die, is what we do.
00:37:19
Speaker
What? OK. So I'm not from this version of your world. I know you, but I don't know you. I know a version of you. I work with a version of you, in fact. Well, I don't work with all of you. And he looks at pay wasn't good enough for January, so he turned down the offer. But the rest of you, I work with.
00:37:49
Speaker
So, yeah. What did he call me earlier? Vega. He didn't call me Vega, okay. I'll be honest, in the moment I thought you said big guy. And then I realized, oh no, he probably said Vega. But he called me Eris. Yeah. A famously not her name. Yeah.
00:38:14
Speaker
So so you work with good to know that happens in all timelines Just that other one and the one where you end up in shard, I guess this kind of makes sense Yeah, Milo, what's up?
00:38:31
Speaker
So you say you work with all of us or just some of us? I don't work with Drainier because the pay wasn't good enough for him so he turned down the offer. But the rest of you, yeah. Are we just moving past the versions thing? We're just going to walk right past the versions? I don't think I'm ever going to get past the versions thing. Assuming that I...
00:38:57
Speaker
believe it. I'll be honest with you all. I'm what's called a jumper. I'm a field agent. I'm not the person that figures out how these things work. I will give you the version that I'm aware of and how I know to end up in places like this.
00:39:18
Speaker
You all are familiar with the planes, one of the planes, plane of madness, Zoriat, real crazy place. But it has a function of it that they figured out was possible is that you can actually step out of your timeline and see all these different versions of Eberron floating about. And then somebody figured out that you could hop into other ones.
00:39:47
Speaker
And they all don't move at the same rate. They don't move at the same time, things like that. Some of them have been utterly destroyed. So that's as best as I can tell you how it works. We have much smarter people than me that have figured out how to do it safely and replicate it. Particularly, any gestures at Milo Kiley was a big architect of all this.
00:40:15
Speaker
Wait, Kylie. Yeah. So she's alive where you're from? I don't know what to say other than I'm sorry, Milo. Yeah, she's alive where I'm from.
00:40:39
Speaker
What are you doing here? Why are you in this timeline? Like I said, I was on a job. King Bornell was in town. Assassin was going to kill him. It was going to lead to an inevitability of this timeline, no longer existing. So we needed to stop it from happening. I was in town to stop it from happening. One of the Assassin's allies hit me with a bad batch of dispelled magic, fried my communicator, and my ability to jump.
00:41:06
Speaker
What is this? A batch of the what? Dispel magic. Of dispel magic. I heard the spell magic once and the skull magic the first time. Hey bud, all the spells are magic. It is here.
00:41:26
Speaker
Yes. So mission accomplished, or not? Yeah, it was a great success. I've dealt with this particular assassin before, so that's why I'm alone. We work in teams on bigger jobs. What's your partner's name? I actually have two people that I work with. One of them, and he kind of awkwardly gestures in Aeris's direction. And the other one is a friend of mine, you don't know her.
00:41:55
Speaker
Paris Claire's. It's not you, but it's, yeah, anyway. No, I know it's not me. Then I don't know why you seem offended. Well, mostly I think you're making this up. Right. This is difficult to believe. Oh, I get that. I've gotten that before. Yeah. Well, I'm sure being a time traveler and all a bunch of things happened to you before and after. I've gotten that later is the thing you can say, which is weird.
00:42:26
Speaker
Is it possible that this Kylie that's where you're from is the one that's talking to me in my head? Oh. Milo, the king of disclosure. Milo, give me a perception check with a one red, two purple difficulty. I guess anybody could do this if you want, if you're paying attention to Cassian's reaction. How about four failures, three advantages. Okay.
00:43:01
Speaker
Nothing. Nothing. Well, no, I have exactly nothing. What was this? No, I guess I do. One red, two purple. Can I roll that right? I don't have any points out. One red, two purple, and it was a one check. Do you want to pass those advantage? Can we get a boost die?
00:43:18
Speaker
He got advantage. Well, if he wants to use his advantage to give you boost die, he can. But or he could use his advantage for something else. Yeah, I will do that. Thank you, Randy. I can use
Conclusion and Community Engagement
00:43:28
Speaker
that. You know, I want somebody to perceive something. I mean, he has four advantage. So you must get two. Sure. Where? Three advantage. You take two. Yours is better than mine. Oh, did I succeed? No. Yeah. Yes, you succeeded with the thread. One success.
00:43:48
Speaker
No. Yeah, just one success. One success? I also failed with a bunch of advantage. How am I the one that notices this? Raynard, you don't have to verbalize this or anything, but you can tell that Cassian was initially taken aback and then seems conflicted by what Milo said. And then Milo Cassian says,
00:44:15
Speaker
I'm not sure. Milo, that seems, I don't know. Mike Heilley does a lot of different work with communication and stuff like that. So she might be talking to you. I don't know. Interesting. I mean, if all this is true and you can different, I mean, yes, I was just curious. Very odd. Is there
00:44:45
Speaker
I have to assume that you've told this story before and people have not believed you before and you've done something to convince them. Do you want to just skip to that part with us? I mean there's not really, I don't have a magic trick unfortunately that just is a, I mean if you ask me like
00:45:03
Speaker
Typically, they'll ask me information that only somebody that knows them well would know. And then I just have to hope that the versions line up well enough. So if you go back to something early in your childhood that you would have told a close friend at some point, something along those lines. Because typically, early childhood is a good indicator because it's usually the same. Not all the time, but usually.
00:45:32
Speaker
That's a job for one of the chatty Cathie's who likes to talk about the personal life. Hob does not do a lot of that.
00:45:47
Speaker
I mean I've worked with various allies before that just I know they've never believed me but you know help me out I'll pay you and then we'll probably never see each other again. What is it that you need and I want you to be
00:46:06
Speaker
Oh yeah, so there is a extremely powerful dragon shard underneath the city of Sharn that has enough juice to recharge because these things require a significant amount of power to do what they do.
00:46:23
Speaker
So I need to venture down there and basically connect to them to where they can charge me up. And then I have to get to, there's a few different spots near the city where Zoriata is coterminous this time of year. So I have to get to a coterminous spot, manifest zone, and then I can hop through.
00:46:43
Speaker
So basically what I need you all to do is just escort me down below the city. There's a lot of nasty stuff down there. So just watch my back. I can't really do anything while I'm charging. So you all would just have to keep the baddies off of me. Let's talk, players. Working for money is the thing that we do. Right? It's true.
00:47:13
Speaker
If he's offering money and it's not, this is probably the least objectionable job Eris has seen from someone in a while. Just walk him down. I mean, Eris is not actually super keen about the part where we go down under the city where all of the horrifying monsters are.
00:47:36
Speaker
She hasn't actually heard any money yet. Right. Well, yeah, I was jumping in. I have more pressing, more pressing things to do than to escort. I assume. Yeah. Are you aware? In your universe or whatever. We use the timeline. OK. Whatever gets you there. Right. Yeah. No, I'm there.
00:48:07
Speaker
What's under a shard where you're from? Because we'll tell you what's under a shard where we're from. And then maybe you can rethink if there's a better role. How about a bunch of little dragon shards? Could that do it? So I'm not from my original timeline, if that makes sense. And in fact, I'm- Top throws his hands up like, sure, that makes sense too.
00:48:25
Speaker
Basically, we have a home base that makes exactly as much sense as anything else you said So it's Is it still a? Documenter of the calendar is it still 998 in this campaign or we moved over into 999 And let me look at the order of the moments I
00:48:46
Speaker
No, it's been five months. So it's still 998? End of July. It's about to be August. Okay. Only a little bit behind the real life calendar. So I know it's 998 here where
00:49:03
Speaker
I'm originally from, it would be like 1030 something, 1040 something, but I currently reside in 1598 is where we're based out of.
00:49:23
Speaker
So Sharn is a lot different. It's a lot more expansive. Honestly, most of Breyland is Sharn at this point with the expansion. But underneath it is still very bad, very nasty things. It's one of the most dangerous places you can go, which is why I sought you all as help because it's
00:49:48
Speaker
It's not uncommon practice to try to seek out versions of agents because we have a good sense of character. That stuff doesn't really change timeline to timeline. Who is your version of you? Like prancing around in a garden in Storm Reach somewhere. I'm very young right now.
00:50:15
Speaker
Harris goes upstairs to retrieve her Fletcher comes back down to work on it. What's your timeline? What's the urgency here? We might need if if.
00:50:30
Speaker
We decide to help you. We might need time to prepare. We don't take trips down there. We handle surface level toughs. Yeah, I got you. So basically, I have a handful of days before the manifest zones lose the enough potency for me to make a jump. We jump seeking these windows a time where we can get back.
00:50:54
Speaker
Now, there are going to be other manifest zones that I could go to, but they're on the other side of Corvair, so less than ideal. But yeah, if we can make it happen the next few days, that would be preferable for me. Why are you looking at me like that during your year? Oh, I'm in. Great. You and me together.
00:51:22
Speaker
I haven't heard any money yet. Right. Yeah, I have a stash at my safe house that we can go retrieve, as well as some gear that I'm more than willing to part with for you all if you like. That's from my time, so it's pretty good stuff. But yeah, how does 20 gold a pop sound? 80 total? Seemed fair.
00:51:53
Speaker
I mean, that's a decent wage. That's four cab rides. Life's threatening danger and all that. Yeah, I mean, I could go up to 30, but that's tapping out my entire reservoir of money. But I'm more than willing to do that if it gets you all on board.
00:52:16
Speaker
How many of those gestures to his belt? How many of those you got to share if we go down there with you? I have another belt's worth of five stimpaks back at my safe house. I'm more than willing to let you all have those for the job.
00:52:35
Speaker
Milo drains his mug and says, I have still more pressing matters to attend to. I shall see you all later. And he gets up and starts to walk out for sales. Hey, um. That was weird, right? Right, but you know what he's talking about. I mean, hey, Hop's gonna hustle. I mean, yeah, we have a murder to do, but. Hop's gonna hustle up, and be like, Milo, we're gonna take care of it.
00:53:05
Speaker
If you don't want to be a part of this, I don't even know that we're going to do this. But we're going to take care of your problem. I think Hobbs not trying to convince you that. Satan said it needed to be done quickly.
00:53:28
Speaker
And this person, I don't know them. I don't know if what they're saying is true or not. I mean, they could be leading us to our death. I don't know. I mean, and then to offer us really good wages, it just all seems a bit strange to me. I reserve my blind trust for one man and one man only, and that's Satan Boromar. Hey, um.
00:53:57
Speaker
Real quick temperature check of the group. Scale of like one to 10, what's our difficulty, what are we thinking difficulty of taking out Jason's gonna be? I don't know, can you track him in a small space? I've made something that will just eat him alive in there. See, I'm thinking, yeah, we could probably take care of Jason without too much difficulty. Which one is Jason?
00:54:25
Speaker
You know who Jason is. Ignacio. Which one is Jason? You know, Ignacio. You're a little rare to be like, is that not Jason? The one that just tried to heal? That's Des Ace. Oh. Are you being legit? Jason is Gigo's buddy. Yeah, I know.
00:54:47
Speaker
Raynard's just being Raynard. Yeah. And Trevor has never stopped being Trevor. Hey. Not once he started. It's a good motto in life. Yeah. Anyway. Like, legit, do you think we could go ahead and take care of Jason real quick? And then go earn a lot of gold. I hope we ask him to help us before we help him.
00:55:11
Speaker
By the way, that's part of this. Is Jason's thing going to be difficult enough that we could use this guy here? What is that you got there?
00:55:25
Speaker
Yeah, I guess it's not common around this part. It's called a ribbon weave. It's a nice, mid-range, melee weapon. Good for pulling people around, getting them close, doing damage. It's a Sarloan weapon.
00:55:42
Speaker
Yeah, have you figured out anything to do with it besides just hit people? Because it doesn't seem like there's much more you can do with it besides just hit people. I mean, you can trip them, you can string them up. Yeah, it is a very simple but elegant weapon. Yeah. For a more civilized age. Sounds dumb.
00:56:06
Speaker
But if that's what it's going to take, I'm literally, unless you all help me, because all of the versions of agents aren't around here. So if you all aren't willing to help until I help you with this job, then I don't have another option. So I can't get home without you all. I could hire just random mercenaries, but I'd rather do it with people I trust.
00:56:35
Speaker
It sucks because it feels like Eris is probably the only person that could vet his story since they worked closely together in the other thing. He probably knows stuff about Eris' past. Hob is never going to say, hey, Eris, relive some of that real quick to make sure this is convenient for us. So I don't know what to do here other than. I mean, he's offering money.
00:57:05
Speaker
Why are we trusting him to go on a job with us? That sounds like a bad decision, since this is probably all made up and he's either crazy or conning us or something. But he's got money. It's fair. And I didn't see how he handled it. Milo at the door opening the door. Less agreeable. That's what my concern is. It's weird. What? Just sitting there agreeing with everything we say.
00:57:37
Speaker
Actually, I think that might be our character flaw, that we are constantly contradicting and berating each other. There's probably a middle ground. I didn't see him in the fight. I was down when he showed up. Is there prowess there? Is he going to hinder us or help us if we're escorting him into the, what do they call it around here? The Underdark? The Kyber? Yeah, Kyber.
00:58:06
Speaker
I mean you know for all the joking I do about not being proper I did take out like seven guys so
00:58:18
Speaker
You got a nork? All right. That shows some facility. I mean, I should have late in the game, to be fair. But yeah, the only time I won't be able to help is when I'm actually charging up my implementation, my communicator and my jumper. Once my communicator's on, then it would be very easy to verify, because then I can touch base with home base and have people that you all know talk to you. No.
00:58:48
Speaker
No, I don't know, man. Wait, are you saying I can speak to Kylie? You're gone. Milo said the door back. He was lingering at the door. The window is broken. You could have heard through the window. I mean, Milo, it wouldn't be your version of Kylie.
00:59:17
Speaker
Yes, I understand this, but I could speak to a Kylie. I could ask that Kylie if she's the one somehow communicating with me. Yeah.
00:59:29
Speaker
Because I don't understand what all this is that you're saying. But if what you're saying is possible, then it could be possible that she's the one speaking to me. Maybe. I don't know. It all seems far fetched. I do have a question for you all, specifically Milo, because there is kind of a discrepancy here that I'm noticing. Who's asking the question? Cassian. OK. You're using your voice for Cassian. I just want to make sure.
00:59:57
Speaker
I do have a question for Milo specifically. Maybe you all can fill in the blanks as well because this, you Milo are distinctly different from every other Milo that I've encountered. Um, not to cast aspersions or be offensive. It's the head thing. Well, no, it's just that this Milo seems, it's not the head thing. Hey.
01:00:19
Speaker
Well, the head thing, yes. This Milo seems much more powerful. The Milos that I've known have never been magical users and have not been this smart, this intelligent, this put together. They've not lost their Kylie, is what you're saying. Some of them had, yeah, but you're different, Milo.
01:00:49
Speaker
So I don't know yes, but I only became different after I lost her so I don't But anyway, yes, you're right. I probably am different than the others you met Okay, I just wasn't sure if you and I didn't realize it was tied to Losing her sorry How would we have that information?
01:01:19
Speaker
I mean, there's... I have met one Milo. Right, and he's exactly like this one right here. Exactly. I know, but I wasn't... Indistinguishable. There are things that people can do to attain certain power, so I wasn't sure of the duration of your relation with Milo, that he had done something to attain this level of power. Warlocks, wizards, etc. Oh, he's had several full-on breakdowns. If that can imbue you with power, then that might have been what it was, yeah.
01:01:49
Speaker
He lost his wife and his business. You're much more quiet than every other version of you also. Well, don't incur it at home. Well, I can talk. OK, great. Just feeling informative today.
01:02:17
Speaker
I mean, if you all like, we can do payment up front. If you all need help on this other murder that you need to commit.
01:02:28
Speaker
I mean, yes, it's murder, but it's more. It's justifiable homicide. Hey, I just got done killing somebody. Right. This one thinks he killed R. Kylie. That's part of the reason we're going off from two. OK. So that'll give you some sort of motivation. Hey, I like Kylie a lot. R. Kylie is probably better than your Kylie's, just because, you know. Well, we don't know that.
01:02:57
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, we can, like I said, I'm more than willing as a sign of good faith. Pay up front even before I help you all with this other job, if you like, uh, Passover promised, uh, gear from the safe house store, whatever you need.
01:03:17
Speaker
I don't want to involve this person in our affairs. They don't have anything to do with what I need to do. There's one thing down. What about involving ourselves in their affairs? Where do you stand on that one, Milo?
01:03:44
Speaker
Look, if you all think we still have plenty of time to take care of Jason, then I'm fine. I will be in. The pay is good. Jeff is sitting here thinking that we can probably get them both taken care of within a week of game time.
01:04:09
Speaker
I mean, it doesn't seem like the Jason job is going to require a lot of time. Yeah. Like the Jason thing is going to be, it's going to take as long as the combat takes, like, I mean, um, there,
01:04:30
Speaker
A lot of different things happen to a lot of different Jason's in every timeline. This particular Jason that you're referencing, you said Ignacio. I mean, he gets killed a lot. He also does a lot of killing. He's not a good person in any timeline that I've encountered. Not here either, apparently. The qualifier. Some people say it's bad to kill a baby.
01:05:03
Speaker
20 gold. 30? It was 30. 30 gold can do a lot. So, and I, um, I have to imagine I've put myself in more dangerous and scarier situations for less money. And for worse reasons, frankly, I don't think this is necessarily a good reason. I'm described on really dumb stuff for bad reasons. We used to work for silver. We used to work for silver. So,
01:05:35
Speaker
Order of operations notwithstanding, I am willing to be a party to both things we're discussing. OK. Raynard said he was too, so. Yes, I only got to kill two people today, so I am in. There's probably going to be a lot of scary stuff for you to kill down there. People is not going to be the thing down there. I've got all these arrows to figure out what they do.
01:06:05
Speaker
Hey, why don't you see if any of them say words like radiant or bright on them and make sure to take those down there. Give it a shot. I'm just glad you think I could read.
01:06:20
Speaker
I'm sorry. We need to put a pin in everything. You are a highly educated upper class person. No shame in it. I just didn't know. The papers we stole, I just saw the pictures.
01:06:37
Speaker
What are you talking about, Milo? The stars, the stars, the stars could come out tonight. Yes, they could very well. Yes. Are you still in the four sales? Are we going to do this job for this Cassian fellow or what? I'm willing. He's paying. I'm in.
01:07:00
Speaker
Gold and gear. Gold and gear, yeah. And up front, so I have a minute to go buy something if I need it. And my safe house is nearby, so. Great. Some lightweight gear that would keep all of us, especially my big friend, Hob, from, you know, taking too much injury would be nice. I'm already working on that.
01:07:25
Speaker
Right. And if any of this gold can make that go quicker. Yeah. No, it's going to be expensive. So do we want to walk and talk and we can go to the safe house and we can walk stuff.
01:07:38
Speaker
We could walk. Great. And walk. There will be some talking here. No one's going to have to talk. I mean, you don't have to. There are some usual questions that I get asked, but you all don't believe me, so that's fine. I don't not believe you. No. I do actually not believe you. But I don't believe you. That's fine.
01:08:02
Speaker
So he gets up and puts his helmet underneath his arm and gets to walk out of the four sails. So does anybody have any questions or anything for him on the walk, or is it relative silence? At some point, Hob did eat. Let's put that in there. Man, do I have any questions for Cassian? Selfishly, Jeff has lots of questions he would ask Cassian. Right, right. About his old run of.
01:08:31
Speaker
Can you tell, is this our Cassian? Can you tell me? You could ask him what is, oh, like, version wise. Yeah. I mean, yeah, it's your Cassian. Yeah. He's very good at speaking. I'm going to be sad for a while, too. Just put that out there. Trevor, do you have any questions for the time traveling man? Any question Philip Randy asks will seem self-indulgent. So it has to be you if it's about where he's from. Other than that, we can all talk to him about the job. Yeah. I can't think of anything.
01:09:02
Speaker
What? Why? Okay. I understand. Very powerful shard down there. Yeah. Is that the only option you got? It's the only one nearby that wouldn't involve leaving the city.
01:09:17
Speaker
No, I mean, is one giant shard the only option you got? In terms of a power source, yes. Like I said, this stuff, they figured out where I'm from, how to manufacture a lot of this energy, and how to make it more sustainable. But here in this time, dragon shards are really all we got. Gotcha. So we're always running in a different clip. He didn't time travel. He jumped planes, and ours moves slower. Yeah. They're not all side by side. Do you ask that question in character?
01:09:45
Speaker
Yeah, sure. It's kind of interesting. Hobbs on a dummy. I mean, yes. And so it is possible to go back within your own timeline, but it doesn't work. If I were to try that, if I were to go back 150 years, what exists cannot exist.
01:10:04
Speaker
So, like, I would jump back into, like, one of my ancestors' bodies, essentially. Like, something that has a link to me. And if I need to do something here in Sharn, but one of my ancestors, hypothetically, is from Arenal, I'm going to be way off course to where I need to go. So, it's not an ideal way to do it. You're kind of hoping the next leap will be your last. Is it? I want to know, can I become a, what do you call it, a jumper?
01:10:35
Speaker
Can we become jumpers if we wished? I mean, honestly, Milo, not right now, because we have a pretty strict policy on only one version on the team. It gets confusing otherwise. And also, it's just we already have Milo.
01:10:56
Speaker
Now, to be fair, like I said, you are. Raynard is the reason they made the policy. They had two Raynards at one point, and it was like, we cannot do this again. We are much more... You're much more capable than the Milo that is at the Lighthouse Consortium. So it would be a... Yeah, so can you challenge your Milo for his position? Well, then... I think our Kylo would be pretty upset if her Milo got taken out. How capable are the other versions of Harb and Eris and Raynard?
01:11:26
Speaker
Um, I mean, uh, different skillsets, but as capable hob isn't a jumper. He works in extraction. Um, we're not the only organization that's figured this out. And there are some people that will try to do nefarious things by hopping timelines. And so what's extraction?
01:11:46
Speaker
Kidnapping. We'll typically pull people out who are acting adversely. I just reached through the time stream. New look for a bad guy. And then try to figure out what they did. You work for the TVA. So you're good at coercion. You're good at getting information out of people. So you and your partner have a good cop, bad cop kind of thing going. And you're remarkably good at your job.
01:12:16
Speaker
Would you say that, when it comes to interrogation, I provide a certain enhancement? Yes. I don't like that. Specifically when your partner is trying to be kind, but you're looming over their shoulder. It's a perfect combo. Good cop, hot cop.
01:12:34
Speaker
Yes, and what does the Milo do in your world? A lot of clerical work. And the Aeris and the Raynard. Like I said, Aeris is a jumper. We don't have Raynard here. Yes, one in a million. Oh yes, you said he does not work with you. Yeah, the pay wasn't good enough. So we offered him a job. As you can see, the Raynard here is falling on hard times.
01:13:01
Speaker
All Raynards turned you down because of the pay. It's the universal reality of Raynard. Being real greedy. You're the least financially successful Raynard in all universes. But I got you all. Oh, gosh. I mean, and he kind of says under his breath towards Eris, who said that not every Raynard got the offer if you get what I'm saying. Oh, yes.
01:13:31
Speaker
Milo does paperwork. I do miss the days of doing just paperwork. Champagne out of a vase. I mean, you joining the Lighthouse was a contingency of Kylie joining. She wouldn't join unless you came with her. I am a little concerned that Milo's going to try to single white female this other Milo. And just slide right in. Hope nobody notices. You've figured me out.
01:14:05
Speaker
Reach a door and Cassian puts his gauntlet up, backside up against the center of the door. You see a shimmer of light go through the door and then it slides into the wall, slides open, and he steps in.
01:14:21
Speaker
Does any of this ring of future tech to us? A little bit like it's it's it's very I mean it's magic like you live in a world of magic So it just seems very controlled very methodical And I mean his armor especially seems far and beyond what this is like any mage Smith any armor Smith would be capable of me
01:14:38
Speaker
We live in a world of magic where Eris is constantly making advancements. Yeah, but like this armor looks, I mean visually it looks like carbon fiber. We're gonna call it end of episode there. Thank you all so much for listening. If you want part of the conversation surrounding this episode, you can head over to our Discord, the link to which you can find on all of our social medias, Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, Facebook. We also have a YouTube channel, the link to our Discord is in all the video descriptions.
01:15:04
Speaker
But on the YouTube channel, I have various GMing videos and D&D book reviews and things like that that you can check out. And we have another actual play over on the Laughing Tree YouTube channel, GMed by Philip, using the D&D fifth edition system. And we have a Patreon, patreon.com slash thegeekpantheon, where if you want to financially support the shows, you can be so there. Thank you all so much for listening. I've been your game master, Eric. I'm Philip. I'm Trevor.
01:15:30
Speaker
I'm Randy. See you next time.