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C3 Episode 38 Reviewed Three
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Transcript
Introduction and Arc Recap
00:00:00
Speaker
D20 Radio, at your
00:00:14
Speaker
radio
00:00:23
Speaker
Hello everyone and welcome to Eberron Renewed, an actual play podcast where we play in the Eberron campaign setting. um My name is Jeff. I'm Phillip. And I'm Eric.
00:00:34
Speaker
I don't know what the reviewed order is anymore. It's it's me first and then you guys fight it out. I think Jeff and I just swapped spots, I'm pretty sure. That's how we meet up. Okay. As you can tell, potentially, by the fact that I am introducing this, that is not an actual play episode. We are going to review the last arc.
00:00:52
Speaker
Eagle-eared listeners may have noticed that we skipped the last reviewed, and I am sorry for that. I take full responsibility for not being prepared. and And there we go. Scheduling was also a nightmare, so it's not all on you.
00:01:04
Speaker
It was awful. I blame you. Yeah, but it was mostly my schedule. Here we go. So yeah,
Barnaby Finch and Social Anxiety Horror
00:01:09
Speaker
we're going to get started. So this, we're going to just go over the arc that began with the entry of Barnaby Finch.
00:01:17
Speaker
One episode before that, when we had the, what was the festival called? The holiday, Eric? I wrote down some things about it, but not the actual holiday. Long Shadows. Long Shadows. Where we couldn't go outside at night. So we played games that Kaz was bad at.
00:01:31
Speaker
Uh, The little animal game, Eric, the... Each dice... Yeah. showed the was that that Was that just you playing around one day up with a little game? I've never... No, i I looked online for people that had actually, like, mechanized board games into TTRPGs.
00:01:49
Speaker
so Okay. and Well, thank you to those people. The random Reddit user that I did not think to credit, so... In the grand tradition of Reddit, done. oh Those were fun.
00:02:01
Speaker
Kaz was bad, and that's always... I feel... I need to put out a disclaimer that I have not put out yet. Kaz, Kazimir Panarius, is a dumb 16-year-old.
00:02:14
Speaker
I am not... i often call myself dumb, and it's not a lie, but I'm not like the dumbest guy in the world. Is it convenient for me to always be leaning on the fact that my character is dumb during this campaign? Yes, it is, and that's why I did it this way. Because Kaz ain't done being stupid, even in this arc. But no, that was a good time, and we have already...
00:02:35
Speaker
I guess we could talk about the Athelhampton Manor has gotten two new residents since the last time we had a reviewed in Arumi and what is our butler's name?
00:02:50
Speaker
ah Oh, our awful... You're catching me with all these questions that I should have pulled up and ready to go. Fisk? Fisk. for What's his first name? I'll i'll find it.
00:03:01
Speaker
Gary. i was i I knew it wasn't Finch because of Barney. That was in my head. so Anyway, so we have two new residents. Valk has some fun interactions with both of them, which I love. Mia is a blast to watch interact socially as her character. She's so...
00:03:18
Speaker
Awkward and not nice at the same time. And it's just very funny. I'll get Frisk. What's it? Algot. Algot. Algot Frisk. Wonderful. Um, but that first episode of the arc was just kind of some, i don't want to say place holding, but it was character building. There wasn't a lot of action. We had the games.
00:03:37
Speaker
I got to see the map room. We talked a bit more about the, the locations on the map, the, where the, What's the word? Bunker. That's the word looking for. Where the bunkers are.
00:03:48
Speaker
Yep. And then the the very end of the episode, going into the the next one, our friend from Kernville comes back and brings her cousin, Barnaby Finch.
00:04:03
Speaker
ah And he's got a real problem. Everyone's way too nice. Does he have a real problem, though? He is under great distress, which is a problem.
00:04:16
Speaker
I'm going to put it that way.
Character Dynamics and Growth
00:04:18
Speaker
I do not sense his issue as a problem, but he is under a bit of distress. Yeah, that Eric, where did this idea for this this being the issue come from? And did you know that we would so quickly treat it as, I i do not understand why you're upset about this.
00:04:34
Speaker
but No, I expected a fair bit of that because, yeah, it's an absurd concept of like somebody comes to you and says my it started with my wife's too nice. Like that was like the the turn of phrase in my brain of like, OK, and how can I spin this out?
00:04:49
Speaker
And then the the larger concept. concept without getting too deep into it, because obviously there's still a lot for you all to discover. There's a video by a YouTuber named Super Eyepatch Wolf, and he has a whole video on social anxiety horror as a genre of like, like films just about like that.
00:05:09
Speaker
terror over how you are perceived and treated by others. And it's a very rich genre, but that's kind of like watching that video made me start thinking about how could I incorporate this into an adventure of somebody feeling this great sense of unease that how they're perceived.
00:05:26
Speaker
And obviously the, I feel like the obvious one is like, everyone starts like treating you with malice. Like you wake up one day and everyone is acting like you're a pariah. Hmm. But what if you flip that and everyone is just wholly accepting of you?
00:05:40
Speaker
How could that be terrifying for a person? So yeah, that's kind of the, the, the start point for the adventure and where the idea came from. I think I could see if I had a day, like where I was out about in my home with my family,
00:05:55
Speaker
I like to think no, but if I had a day out and about where like I had no friction with anybody, I would be like that was kind of a weird day. mainly because i'm ah Mainly because I'm an angry driver. but also right um Could you give an example, Eric, of a movie that falls into that genre? maybe a pretty of what What's a more mainstream one that people might...
00:06:16
Speaker
I mean, the most the most obvious one, not counting the remake that was so terrible, but the Stepford Wives would be like the, I think the biggest cultural touch point of like just noticing that everyone is acting a bit too perfect all the time. Okay.
00:06:30
Speaker
Yeah. I think what was so difficult for like, like it what made it hilarious instead of alarming to me was the concept that because it's just as weird that this town somehow functions on purely anti-social behavior.
00:06:49
Speaker
Right. And has no economy. Like the town is already impossible. Right. Yeah. So if he had just come to us and said the town is like this, we would have already assumed something magical is happening to make this town function in the first place. Right.
00:07:05
Speaker
An acrimonious city that apparently has a bar is all we know of it. And robes from each other, steals from each other freely and punches each other freely. Like there's no world in which this town exists with magical assistance.
00:07:19
Speaker
And so it was like we had, were expected to believe the town in the first place. And then this bizarro world of the town in which it's now completely frictionless everybody's happy.
00:07:33
Speaker
Or at least creepy. Because they're definitely mostly creepy. We can't talk about that yet. I think that is not a spoiler to anyone. yeah When we arrived at the town, we are going to be creeped out.
00:07:46
Speaker
not Not a spoiler. Fair enough. no Absolutely fair enough. We were creeped out from the descriptions. from the description Yeah, so we, after some talking and one punch, we do agree to help. That was so funny. he I think I'm helping him. I've hit him anymore.
00:08:09
Speaker
We agree to take on the job, and Kaz goes to Renee and finds out about Jim Jones on the Eldritch Mayor. Yeah. Eldritch mayor. I love it.
00:08:23
Speaker
And I know nothing about Jim Johnson yet. he He's probably not Eldritch. Jim Johnson is one of those things that like, if Philip, you you may be able to speak this or you might be better at this than me, that that is objectively true. But like, as it as a GM, you have a question that's asked of you that you look at your notes and go why? Why wouldn't I? Why wouldn't I have a mayor for this town? Like, why wouldn't I have this be a thing?
00:08:47
Speaker
And so, yeah, when when that topic came up, I was like, Jim Johnson, like just, so yeah, that, that was a moment of that for me. Wait, so you know what? No, I don't want to ask that.
00:09:01
Speaker
That will save that for the end of the arc. I don't want clarification on this at all yet.
00:09:06
Speaker
Huh? Now I'm very interested, but yeah, so we learned about Jim Johnson. We learned about the sudden philanthropy of a town. To the point that they're not, again, how do they have money?
00:09:18
Speaker
But the fact that they're giving so much of it to this orphanage or the plight of these orphans as it as we know it, right? Yeah, we haven't quite worked out how are how are the orphans getting the resources. like that i'm I'm very interested in...
00:09:34
Speaker
that question once we get get to it because that feels like yeah they're being given envelopes of cash there's stores over there go forth and make your way in the world you'll be fine i'm just walking around the streets of sharn and roat like with guys with the money and um If you have a big enough bag of money, no one asks questions, right? You'll get what you need and no one will ask.
00:10:02
Speaker
That is the Eberron I'm more familiar with at least.
00:10:06
Speaker
Um, and yeah, so we learned that we learned the philanthropy. We learned, i mean, this Jim Johnson guy who I liked to the way when I asked, does he look brellish? You were like, he looks the most brellish boring. Brellish got to fit in. Brellish is the way that I took that, which I adore.
00:10:27
Speaker
And we get on a train and we, and we go a bit, we, or wait, where was, where was Whiskers the cat? Was that in? That was in Star, Alaska. Yes. think it was the first town we stopped in.
00:10:38
Speaker
That's the next thing I have. I have the word bullet bullet bullet bath and ro yeah right where we boarded the train there was a cat it was weird eric are you able to expound on the cat at all i'm mr and Not at this time, because Vatheron is like a hub city. Like, I i firmly believe that you all will find yourselves back in Vatheron and you will find yourselves back at that tavern.
00:10:58
Speaker
I imagine. Well, that's where the... Oh, no, that was the border town. That wasn't where the the newspaper the newspaper is in and Calisart. My newspaper? Yeah, Calisart. My newspaper. say i shouldn but it's it's It's impossible that I should forget Calisart, and I feel like miserable about it every time I do because I do it all the time in this campaign because that's where Eris was from.
00:11:23
Speaker
really? That is heess is where Eris' dad served in the military. i like the the random I picked the random town off the Kyra map to write down the name of his military unit in case it ever came up.
00:11:36
Speaker
um So Aeris's dad is out Kalisart. You also named the Kalisart Cry. I did. Yes. A record. And I've been so tempted to do crazy things with my icon die.
00:11:50
Speaker
just to mess with the world every time we stop it. Every time we've stopped in a town on this, because I have no idea how to use my icon die with the chamber to help Nyx during this arc. And so every time we meet an NPC, as we've been making our way along, every bartender, everything like that, I'm always tempted to lean over to Eric and whisper, they work for the chamber and just hand him my, just just to do it. yeah Just to create chaos.
00:12:16
Speaker
Honestly, and that so that sounds like a much more fun way to use your icon relationships than mine where actually try to game it out and do something useful. yeah well you know Because that's that ain't working so far. yeah i will i will I will freely admit it took until this session that we were speaking of for me to really understand what the icon thing What that really meant.
00:12:35
Speaker
Yeah. This, yeah this session for the listener that were that probably right. The second is before the one where i actually meet the manifestation of my icon time, which didn't go great.
00:12:47
Speaker
The bronze flask was the name of the tavern with whiskers. Thank you very much. Whiskers, the cat at the bronze tavern. The next major, eat right that's what I said. The next major bronze tab would be an insane thing to build.
00:13:00
Speaker
but uh the next may summer the next major beat is we meet one ah another one of nix's well i guess you can't really say the other one was nix's old friend but an associate the other one was nix's old friend this one was was someone that nix has never liked that nix always wants a bath after engaging with good old glass eye yeah who gave answers and offered drugs and hit drugs. If you might see glimpses of the future that I,
00:13:37
Speaker
I appreciate she took her up on it. It's shameful. I will say I appreciated the sincerity with which you all like took Cass's question about like just the future. Like it was nice. Everyone got it and saw where he was going. And that's fun.
00:13:51
Speaker
I like that we all get each other's care. I feel like we get each other's characters. this campaign maybe more quickly than we have in the past, which is kind of neat. Except for Valk, who is supposed to be in an igloo.
00:14:02
Speaker
That's true. yeah but I have no idea what Valk's talking about half the time, and I love it. Like, because it's it's delightful to me. they They are dropping... It's so hard to... Same with you, Philip, to choose she or he. But they are dropping a lot of hints to follow up on, yeah which is great.
00:14:21
Speaker
About their former employer and foot with What did Mia say to Arumi? If I talk about her too much, she might show up. She might show Woof. but but What?
00:14:33
Speaker
What a thing. Yeah, the the problem, of course, is that I'm playing a much less nosy character this campaign because Eris would just go around saying the name to see whether it happened.
Time Loop on the Train
00:14:45
Speaker
That's a good point. and Speaking of Eris and names, neither Hob nor Milo ever called her the kid 6,000 times. i just want to put that out there real I know she was a little older than Kaz, but comparatively she was the kid. I mean, no, I mean, she her and Kaz, her and Kaz are certainly close on a maturity level at the very least. yeah Yes, that that is true. And Aeris would have been furiously angry had you done so.
00:15:10
Speaker
Yeah. Kaz is a much ah much more accommodating person. Aeris' existence has a more implied threat of violence, though, than Kaz's, I feel like. So that might might have something to do with it. It lot of fun. I'm trying to play...
00:15:27
Speaker
a teenager who wants to be moody about that, right but is way too busy with everything else. So he's just like, man, quit it. And then has to move on to like the real issue. Right.
00:15:38
Speaker
And I think, I think if he was not dealing with everything he's dealing with, he would, he would have become emo at this point. Sure. So he's just, he's just too busy.
00:15:50
Speaker
It's like his trauma is so weird and he doesn't know what it is yet exactly. Like, he knows there's trauma here, but I don't know what it is, so how do you decide how to process it or what I'm going to do about it or how I'm going to feel about it? Like, just, like, it must be so incredibly confusing.
00:16:08
Speaker
Whereas, obviously... Aeris had processed and crystallized hers into, I'm going to be angry at every everyone I meet until they convince me otherwise. Right.
00:16:21
Speaker
and And it's not permanent. They can slide back easily. Oh, yes. Yeah. The slightest slight will cause... so I don't want to i dont gloss over glass eye. Is there more either of you? I mean it was a fun encounter.
00:16:37
Speaker
The performance enhancing drugs are an interesting aspect. did you You took some, right? Like, procured some, but have not yet taken them, correct? I don't think... No, ah she had in the past, I think is what we established.
00:16:53
Speaker
She definitely did while, you know, I don't know, while working as a mercenary or something like that. there It was so definitely a time where she did Okay. I must've misheard would you have with would you period.
00:17:04
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Okay. And then we get on a train and what happens, nothing happens. What happens six times is we enter the time This, I thought I will, I will, I will admit in the, in it, I didn't realize until I re listened back for this six loops.
00:17:28
Speaker
yeah I did not realize we did six. They were the the last three were so varied. It didn't feel like a loop, but we did six loops. Um, The first one has to have an asterisk to it. You all just sat there and watched it occur. first one hardly that first one hardly counts because we were like, well, okay, what's going to happen here? And I guess that's true. We had six iterations. That's only five words. Yeah, I guess so.
00:17:53
Speaker
We really did, like, not knowing it was going to be time, we we really did just, like, watch some guys get assaulted and robbed made sure it didn't happen us and moved on. I'm not...
00:18:06
Speaker
and i Nyx has kind of become party leader in these in these situations because she's capable in battle.
00:18:16
Speaker
Capable and... She's comfortable with it. I don't think anybody else... I don't think anybody else in the party... Maybe except...
00:18:26
Speaker
At least who's present. I imagine V is extremely comfortable with violence, but fair yeah very I don't know anything about V yet. Maybe Selena. for Something... and I don't know if it's just... Madison plays Selena so... Just even.
00:18:45
Speaker
Just so even-keeled. And chill isn't quite the right word, but Madison... Selena's reactions to different things... are very contained.
00:18:57
Speaker
And I don't know if it's, I don't know which side of it. I don't know if it's, it's something just about her or if it's the aristocratic thing or or what, but she seems far and less bothered by violence than either Kaz or Valk.
00:19:14
Speaker
um Sure. Yeah. I mean, Kaz is terrified every time I fight Starks. Sure. Because he both doesn't know what's going to happen to him or what he's going to do. Big sharp pieces of metal are flinging around. It's a reasonable reaction. Yeah, yeah.
00:19:27
Speaker
yeah Yeah, you really get a sense that Selina has seen a lot based on her reactions to the world around her and the absurdity of a lot of things and her just going, yeah, okay, we'll deal with this now. Absolutely.
00:19:40
Speaker
And i think with Valk, a lot of it has to do with the mechanics of it lead the character to be more reactionary than... Sure. Like, Valk's got to see what's going on before they make their choices.
00:19:51
Speaker
I think the the reactions anytime something remarkable happens to the party, Kaz is scared, terrified, looking to be out of the way of whatever's coming at you all.
00:20:03
Speaker
Nyx is trying to figure out how to kill or stop the thing. Selina is like, okay, this again. And Valkyrie's just like, how do I not make this worse? Because I'm pretty sure I'm going to make this worse. That's fair. That's very fish. That's really funny. like that.
00:20:19
Speaker
what was interesting What was interesting to me, and this is later, will and the act iss the killer and stuff, was how quickly Nyx turned into concern for strangers.
00:20:31
Speaker
Like, when she saw wanton violence, she was like, nah, I can't let this stand. i don't i don't know. I like that. yeah Even even knowing thinking it was a time loop and re reset, she was like, I can't watch these people get slaughtered.
00:20:47
Speaker
Well, and I think like... Every time we got a little closer, I think there was definitely an element of... Okay, but if this is the last one, then the consequences go on. Like, the... You know, if if we get to the end and it turns out Nyx has just brutally killed a bunch of bandits, she can live with that. But we get to the end and Nyx just sort of stood there and watched a dining car full of people be eviscerated by...
00:21:17
Speaker
What looks to her like a nature demon, right there's there's consequences there. I think Nyx is trying...
00:21:32
Speaker
to be a better person than she is to some degree and in certain circumstances. bit Um, so let's go back first iteration, velvet. We don't know her names, but yet a, a, a changeling, an orc, a shifter, a dwarf, a human, and a knoll walk into a bar.
00:21:56
Speaker
Come parching into a train car and they want our things. And that is the first time I think I've gotten all five of the goon species correct the entire time. Nailed it. Velvet, great name for a bandit, by the way, Eric. Great name for a bandit. Especially one that has such an unplaceable physiognomy. Yeah. For lack of a better way of saying it.
00:22:19
Speaker
um And you said she was was it a gauzy mask. Is that right? like kind of Yeah. Very cool. Yeah. very cool big
00:22:27
Speaker
Like we said, they they steal from one group. They leave. We do hear a scream from the front, which makes us realize this is not just a single car and takeoff thing. So the next iteration, Nyx decides to make her presence known, and um which changes up just enough for us to realize...
00:22:46
Speaker
they don't know what's going on. Like what happened? The, the orc came up because you kind of verbally confronted. Yeah. And that's, so the gnoll did the attack. The gnoll did the attack. Yeah. The take biting a chunk out of guy. Much worse. Much worse attack. So much worse than a broken, like the nose will heal. The piece, the shoulder's gone.
00:23:08
Speaker
The chunk of you will not grow back. We don't grow those back. so um Yeah, so much worse. And that is when Kaz screamed. and oh And that is also when we see the hippogriff. Nix looks out and sees how they came down and how they got up. And it was a hippogriff and some sore sledge or just like planks of sore wood they were balancing. Planks of sore wood.
00:23:30
Speaker
Yeah. I guess i I was thinking about this. This would be similar to just a dog, ah or not maybe not a dog. It'd be similar to somebody pulling someone on a raft in the water. Like this hippogriff is not particularly strong because the sword would float some ish of its own right nature, right?
00:23:48
Speaker
the The visual for me is back to the future too. When you have like the mega hoverboard and all the other ones, like attaching their ropes to the back of the other hoverboard and like s flying behind. I don't know if that's enough of a cultural touch point for people to get anymore, but you all know what I'm talking about.
00:24:04
Speaker
I love that. I've named dropped Marty McFly in this very arc actually. Um, In fact, i said I said to the guy when I bought my suit for the wedding that I couldn't get the shade of gray he wanted me to because it looked too much like Marty McFly's prom suit.
00:24:19
Speaker
And I was wearing a pink tie, so I couldn't do it. Anyway, I also tried on a windowpane one, and he goes, that's a lot. That's more like a fourth or fifth suit. It's like, yeah, think you're right. Dude was cool.
00:24:32
Speaker
I said, fourth suit? Show me how much that cost? I'm a one-suit guy. Regardless. So... Before, no it was not before. that oh We also do like, we move around. We try to switch places and be in different spots see when the loop hits. This is also when Mia joins us and wakes up.
00:24:51
Speaker
but ah Your decision to have val have to wake, go from awake to waking up at the start of every loop is very funny. ah Yeah, it was.
00:25:02
Speaker
And Mia played it extremely well too. I can't remember if it was, I guess it had to have been at the beginning of the third episode. We send Grub off to see what Grub can see.
00:25:13
Speaker
Madison wants a raccoon in real life now because of Grub. Love that. you She's right here. She can defend herself. but I do want a real raccoon. I do not. i mean Grub Scouts, Nick Starks. They're available in your town.
00:25:27
Speaker
You can find them. yeah oh the i Oh, my gosh. that You could so easily befriend one. i We can't let that idea get out. ah Nick starts the fight.
00:25:45
Speaker
It's the first fight of the loop. It's just with the bandits. We don't know about anybody else yet. And... I it goes well for us. Like I bounce up and down from the floor to the ceiling a couple of times, but outside of that.
00:26:00
Speaker
Yeah. I mean, we won the fight. Um, Grubb comes back. and We dispatched all five, right? yeah like I think you took all five mooks out on your own, Nick. I know it was all five, but yeah, Nick's killed a whole bunch of things in like two towns. Three in one turn. Yeah, three of them went down in one turn, yeah.
00:26:17
Speaker
Because I did enjoy re-listening too. Oh, wait, hang on. I do more thing. No, no, wait, hang on. I do one more thing. Madison, wait. I... ah There's so many little like, and I can tack on this and this and this in yeah in the character sheet. It's so much.
00:26:33
Speaker
Now, Philip, remind me, and there's a question about this from a listener later, but is this your first time playing 13th age? Yes. Okay. The way you... The way you built your character makes it seem like you really know the ins and outs of this this system. And it's very i impressive. Whereas I'm like, I don't know. I have to roll 16 dice. I don't know what anyone else is doing. And I can't fathom how to play your character.
00:26:55
Speaker
make Me neither, brother. The thing of having to roll all the dice and not having control over it. I know that's like delightful to some people, but that's that just makes all of my skin crawl.
00:27:09
Speaker
i will you know what I will save this for when we get the question about 13 years, because I do have some things to say about that. um But Grubb comes back. We're all very confused for a minute when he's trying to do hand signals, but then all of a sudden, very dexterously, masterful shadow puppets.
00:27:26
Speaker
We're able to understand that there is, ah to the best of our knowledge, a tree demon at the front of it. he's a He is a shadow raccoon. true So like he can manipulate shadows.
00:27:37
Speaker
But these little guys can't do much. He needs right he needs a light source in order to sure cap shadows. I did love that you were trying to elucidate. I need you to make fire. It's like none of us can do that.
00:27:49
Speaker
Come on, raccoon. Get it together. There are no utility spells. hands Just for the wizards. I got nothing that's just useful except for harming people.
00:28:01
Speaker
Yeah. If you need a tentacle or some sort of weird sonic scream 43% of the time, I'm your guy. But if you need something done on purpose, magically. ah Bring this back up when we talk 13th inch because the developers have talked about that.
00:28:16
Speaker
Yes. Yeah, sure. Yeah, actually, let's rip through this because we probably have a lot to talk about. are lot of questions. Greb tells us about some tree demon and we say, well, that's obviously what we've got to do next. So next loop starts and Mia, clutch move.
00:28:32
Speaker
This is what happens when someone who's played D&D before it plays a changeling. ah Unlike me, just one dude the whole time. She becomes the bad guy. She's like, I can do this. It's, hey, I will not stand for this vernon erasure either. Thank you very much.
00:28:44
Speaker
i just I switched a couple of times. was a small boy once. I don't know what I was thinking seven eight years ago, whatever that was. Wow, that's accurate. Seven or eight years ago.
00:28:56
Speaker
She becomes velvet. And we run to the front of the train. We see this killerin is the name of the the monster, which really does look like like a vegetal shifter is the best way, based on the picture I saw.
00:29:09
Speaker
Best way I could describe the look. I think in fourth edition, there was a race you could play called Wilden. that yeah were like that. lot of the art is, yeah. Yeah. and They, they, they recycled a lot of the art assets. I fat came to find out when I was looking for killer in images, but yeah. That's funny.
00:29:28
Speaker
Mia does a great job convincing this thing that she is velvet. And mean, I don't know how much the plan actually changes at that point. It maybe have been the killer in job the whole time to go and slaughter the second car.
00:29:42
Speaker
But we get into the conductors, the engine room, I guess. And the conductor is dying, which is super cool and says, don't let him get the lockbox and then dies in a 16 year old boy's arms.
00:29:57
Speaker
And he will never be the same. Yeah, was gonna say that still happened. Like, yeah, having escaped the time loop, that still happened. And in the meantime, of course, ah Selena and Nyx are fighting the tree feast and summoning a demon and get losing control of it and fighting a tree beast and a demon.
00:30:19
Speaker
Okay, what how often what are the odds that when Nick summons a demon, the demon will go rogue? They're actually really low. Okay, okay. Like, the the mechanically, it's really low.
00:30:30
Speaker
So, my summoned creatures have a special mechanic called degradation, where basically every turn, at the end of every turn, i have to roll, and they lose a certain number of their hit points.
00:30:46
Speaker
um So they inevitably will, inevitably will lose control of them. But when they reach zero hit points, I have to make a save that is, i think, easy.
00:30:59
Speaker
Like it's really easy. Like it's, it's like one, one to five. It's like a, but that it's like a, what's that 20% chance. It's like a 20% chance. If I fail the save, then then they, they get half their hit points back. And now they're hostile.
00:31:15
Speaker
If I succeed, they just disappear back into the, into from whence they came. So it's not a high odds. I would almost argue if I were designing it, that it's too low.
00:31:27
Speaker
a chance for what I'm getting to do. But yeah, so it's a low chance, but yeah, it does, does happen, obviously. Yeah.
00:31:39
Speaker
and then and And Eric, I'm going to say kind to things. I have really enjoyed, and you've always been good at this, but I've really enjoyed this time how you've fed us the info that we need in the context of like the spells going haywire or even going off at all. Like you, the first time you show old Kaz was when Selena...
00:31:57
Speaker
No, no, sorry. It was when I had that weird glitch thing happen. And you were like, well, here's how this manifests. And then Selenicast color spray. And that's where we're at at the point. Selenicast color spray. And as an addendum to that, you say, in this weird prismatic thing, you see three different possible futures.
00:32:12
Speaker
And that was just such a cool way to give us the info that we needed. And I just really appreciated that. And thought I'd say it out loud. um Appreciate it. Yeah. but do We see three we see three the three possible endings, basically, and realize that the one was that... they were Was it like cracked screen or degraded? Yeah.
00:32:31
Speaker
Degraded, degraded, doesn't matter. um so And so that's kind of when we realize, okay, the only way this is going to end is with the lockbox in my hands.
00:32:43
Speaker
Yep.
00:32:45
Speaker
And then Philip explodes Buckbeak, is what I have in my notes. LAUGHTER
00:32:52
Speaker
That is what happened. Yeah. And we see the lockbox fall and there was a guy on Buckbeak. And so we know now this is the dude we have to stop. Don't let him get the lockbox from the... i will I will be honest. At first, I was afraid that I was him.
00:33:10
Speaker
I thought Kaz was him. And it I honestly wasn't sure until that vision. And even after that vision, I was like, it still might be Kaz. Yeah. Yeah. But, and then the fifth loop, we go to luggage car, we have a fight, we meet this guy and he is just, just one of those eccentric can do it all and is real goofy, but haughty at the same time. And you just want to scream about them kind of guys that Eric really has fun. with Really nail it, nail in my own brand. so
00:33:44
Speaker
Everything, everything that our adversaries can do is stuff from source books and stuff, right? Like the, What was the the grand flourish or whatever? Like that's something that one of us could potentially pick up if we want to do that. A talent or is that a monster only thing?
00:33:57
Speaker
No. So 13th age, very much in the same way that like every class has unique mechanics, like there outside of specific talents. There is no way for you all to dip into each other's.
00:34:10
Speaker
I lost the metaphor halfway through Inkwells. I don't know. the The, the, monster cards and the monster abilities are also wholly unique from player character abilities. So like okay building monsters in 13th age is a completely different workflow than making a character, which I like it personally. So yeah.
00:34:31
Speaker
So do you find yourself kind of, do you find yourself using monsters for even like human adversaries rather than building a character like 13th age? That's a better way to do it.
00:34:44
Speaker
Because building a character like is such a unique experience based on each class and, you know, between picking feats and talents and stuff, it would just,
00:34:56
Speaker
It's too much for what i need out of a monster, i guess. or I say monster loosely, out of a non-player character that is adversarial. so yeah and
00:35:09
Speaker
I just remembered I'm sitting in Madison's desk chair and it has a massager, so ill give me one but tell me you can hear this. ah all right um
00:35:19
Speaker
um i I will be honest, this is where I started to... This is where I had to stop listening because I had to to go to work today, so i didn't have the full day to listen like I thought I did. so But we have the fight. We see more flourishes. there's This guy bests us and mocks us. I don't think he thinks he's mocking us, but we certainly take it as mocking. He keeps calling me.
00:35:42
Speaker
He keeps calling Kaz Harold, which I was really internally conflicted if I wanted Kaz to know he was talking about a position and not this that just had the wrong the wrong name. like I don't know who Harold is, but it's not me.
00:35:55
Speaker
um I will help you find Harold if you will leave us alone. My name is Kazabier. But I decided he spent too much time adjacent to the court to not know what a Harold is. Yeah, can see that. Unfortunately. Yeah, because that would have been very funny.
00:36:09
Speaker
Yeah, and he can't be the dumbest guy. Like, that's not fair either. But he certainly can be. I am still at the helm. um And then the sixth loop.
Listener Questions and Character Insights
00:36:23
Speaker
We get it right. we get it right. We win. i end up with... ah good the The end of the fifth loop, I i legit, it was an internal conflict moment because you all had figured it out.
00:36:35
Speaker
You knew what you needed to do. But he had ongoing damage. Also, we did everything right. I think that's the other thing. yeah We did everything correct. yeah Except you did a little bit too much normal damage and threw ongoing damage onto him. So at the start of his turn, he got to zero hit points. I like, he he has to die and we have to start over.
00:36:56
Speaker
so sorry. i We didn't say The... the There were two of the scenarios where I had the lockbox, but one, he was dead and when he was getting away and he needed to get away. right yeah that the The story required that the that he gets away.
00:37:10
Speaker
So, he does in the sixth loop and I end up with a lockbox and again, I am sorry that I didn't get to listen to this one. Does it just go on? Like, we're done and the train continues? Yes. that's that That's how it ended, right? Like, we made it to Star Lasker.
00:37:27
Speaker
Yeah. I need to look up because we all say it differently. And I know that's... It's Star Alasker. There's not an extra S in there. it is It is a bit of a thing that we all like to pronounce stuff differently. But true adding letters is where I have to draw the line.
00:37:42
Speaker
But it was a very small font on a very oh yeah low JPEG map. That map needed more JPEGs in it, and it didn't have enough. And so I understand. I know that we have done one we have released one more episode past this point, but because i did not because this is kind of a narrative stop at the end of the train, at the time loop,
00:38:01
Speaker
And because I did not get a chance to listen back to honestly a pretty Kaz heavy episode, I would rather saved that one for the next review. So we're going to, we're going to call the recap there. Also, we've been going for 40 minutes and there's a decent number of questions. So I guess we've been recording for 40 minutes, but that first three was unusable.
00:38:19
Speaker
It was me trying to intro the show like six times, if you want to know, so you don't ask for the count takes. Uh, And also they they aren't family friendly because I don't like it when I mess up. ah Let me pull up the discord and we will start asking some questions.
00:38:36
Speaker
We will begin. If this is where I do the thing. If you would like to ask questions about the arc, you can do so on our discord. As we have been mentioning in the last few episodes, you do not find us on social media.
00:38:47
Speaker
We collectively don't play that game. I'm still trying hard to quit Twitter. It's difficult, but it's getting easier every day. I'll tell you what it is. Don't stir fire. I have started to like actually feel bad when I open and look at Twitter for more than couple of minutes. So it's really helping.
00:39:01
Speaker
But YouTube, where there's no problems, is where you can find us. And that is YouTube. ah Is it URL? No, it's just search for the Geek Pantheon on YouTube.com slash the Geek Pantheon. it does Okay, we do have a yeah URL for that one. Okay, great.
00:39:15
Speaker
YouTube.com slash the Geek Pantheon. You can find links to the Discord there and also to the Patreon there, which are both wonderful things to take a look at if you would like to.
00:39:25
Speaker
So we are going to go all the way back, I believe, to February... Oh my. Yeah. The last, the last review we did was in February.
00:39:36
Speaker
So. no So this is about the last arc. Irene asks, with the high number of theater people in the cast, how many instances of Into the Woods references had to be edited out?
00:39:48
Speaker
And like actually don't think any. um Shockingly, no. Yeah. But you're right. we are a i i can't speak for Mia. I don't know about Mia's past, but the other all of the rest of us have done theater or still do theater or are about to do some theater together, in fact.
00:40:07
Speaker
Yep. Eric and are going to be behind the scenes this time. ah Oh, and Laura asks a question that many of us have. Why did the lion burrow?
00:40:22
Speaker
We are going to go back to that arc to answer that question. Dadgummit. but Just the lion burrowed. i mean, here's the deal. i will be I'll be honest you' transparent. Philip already knows the answer because we chatted when he was in town.
00:40:36
Speaker
The lion burrowed because i came across the section of making other monsters elemental entities in the 13th Age bestiary. And thought that was really neat.
00:40:48
Speaker
And then I did two animals that were elemental in nature, the burrowing lion. And then you all didn't find the other one because it was the boar that stole Orumi's amulet. And so you would you could have fought a lightning boar also, but now you never will.
00:41:03
Speaker
So it was a ah technically an earth lion, so it could burrow through the earth and a lightning boar. So... I think the fact that it didn't look at all different from an African lion.
00:41:16
Speaker
ah It wasn't like, you know, made of rocks or something. Right. Yeah. Or instead of claws, it had little like spade hands. that Sure. yeah Yeah. Mole hands.
00:41:27
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it was it was sufficiently off-putting, which I think was a very good vibe for the show for the episode and a lot of fun and really neat and weird. And that's why I play this game. So it worked.
00:41:40
Speaker
Okay, going back um in the other channel. Eric, how long do you spend on menus for each episode? Laura would like to know. I mean, for each episode, like, here's the deal. When plotting out adventure, if I think there's an opportunity to go to a tavern, I will do a rough sketch of a menu.
00:41:59
Speaker
And then in preparation for the session, I will flesh it out once I have a better idea of where and what and how. But also at this point, I can pretty well pull one out of my tookus if needed, like, because I made enough menus to where, you know, I can make a menu now, but Philip, did you hear Eric say where the food comes from? I did. Yeah. i like And Eric is a bit of a foodie, so he's got that, like that's, that's locked and loaded and ready to go.
00:42:24
Speaker
Um, I did go to tapas place this past weekend. So a bootie boy. Oh yeah, well I had pizza delivered for lunch, so we're basically the same guy.
00:42:35
Speaker
Ophelia asks, where do you see, this is up for our a question for us about our characters. Where do you see yourself in five years' time? How is that different from where you'd like to be? That is a wonderful question that I am not at all prepared to answer. I should have looked at it beforehand.
00:42:55
Speaker
and I assume that Kaz will still be working for the consortium in five years' time. i I think he will have come to terms with his... time jumped, even if he doesn't really know what's happened, I think he might have started to actually in five years, I think he will have the maturity and wherewithal to actually reach out to some people.
00:43:14
Speaker
It won't take five years, but yeah at that point he will have. And so I think he might actually have rebuilt some relationships, which could be very weird considering he's so much younger than everybody else now, but.
00:43:28
Speaker
And where he'd like to be is in his mid forties, but he won't be. I think that would be the answer.
00:43:37
Speaker
Early forty s Sorry. That's really good. um I don't know nix's Nix is kind of jaded. She'd probably say probably dead from in a job that went wrong.
00:43:52
Speaker
but Where would Nix like to be in five years is a lot harder.
00:44:04
Speaker
i don't I don't know. i think that's part of Nyx's problem as a character is i don't think i don't think she has, not not not simply does she not have a plan, I don't think she has an ambition. I think she just kind of...
00:44:26
Speaker
reacts to whatever her current situation is and adapts to that situation for as long as it lasts and then readapts when that situation
00:44:44
Speaker
pretty inevitably falls apart because, you know, at some points you lose control of a fiend in your presence and and, there's usually pitchforks and torches and things or some paladins or something.
00:45:00
Speaker
Um, and then it's time to move on and come up with a new alias or something. So I, I think, Yeah, i don't I don't know that Nick's... To be in the same place five years from now would suggest ah that things have gone really well.
00:45:21
Speaker
Okay. Um... I want to acknowledge Rustifer had a great question just about the logo, but it was answered in the Discord by the artist, so we can, we're going to, ah and has some other great questions, so we're going to slide past that one.
00:45:37
Speaker
Flame asks, what's everyone's favorite time loop scenario in media? There is a correct answer to this, in my opinion. but Oh, my. first Oh. i Okay, since you have the correct answer, also I used to say, and i i I might still, I used to say Groundhog Day was my favorite movie, period.
00:45:55
Speaker
I have not watched it in long enough that I don't offer that information because I can't imagine it holds up like I wish it would. I may be wrong. I need to watch it again. But I love Edge of Tomorrow. I really enjoy that movie. And honestly, it I lose interest when the time looping stops.
00:46:10
Speaker
I still finish it because it's a movie. But like i've that was one of those movies that if I couldn't sleep, I put it on. Yeah. And I will say one more in a different medium.
00:46:22
Speaker
I have now read the seven and a half deaths of evil and hard castle. I've read it and I've listened to it on audio book just for a different experience of it. And it's
00:46:33
Speaker
the, it is very clever. for for the great majority of it. I don't necessarily recommend it because it's not the kindest book in the world, but it is a very clever time loop scenario. So if you want to ask what I mean by, if you are interested but want warnings, I will happily say what I mean by it's not the kindest book in the world to you personally if you want to reach out to me on the Discord. but i So i think i think I think Edge of Tomorrow or Live, Die, Repeat or All You Need is Kill ah that has all three names.
00:46:59
Speaker
is probably my favorite. right, go ahead. I've never seen Edge of Tomorrow because i hate time loops. um like I utterly hate time loops.
00:47:11
Speaker
I hate the trope. I hate the concept. I hate time loops. I hate the futility of it. And I especially hate, and this is not true of all time loop scenarios, um but it is of the, obviously the the stereotype is Star Trek, the next generation getting stuck in a time loop.
00:47:34
Speaker
The thing I really hate about time loops is usually... You get to the end and exactly one character knows that it happened and no one else does. And so no character growth has happened. No change to the narrative has happened.
00:47:49
Speaker
This episode of Star Trek might as well not have happened because it will never make a difference forever and a day. And so i hate that about time loop scenarios. I enjoyed Eric's time loop scenario five times. I was real mad, but real mad about the sixth time.
00:48:06
Speaker
Not my fault. No, no. Yeah, I haven't seen Edge of Tomorrow, so I can't judge whether that is in fact the the solution to my hatred of time loop scenarios. but I would say one of the things I like about Edge of Tomorrow, even though I say I lose interest from the time it does have one of the most elegant getting out of that it's it one of those elegant getting out of the time loop things from any of these sort of stories right eric what is the objectively correct answer i mean it's groundhog day like okay to me is is the best time loop scenario because there is growth it is impactful it is a meaningful narrative and yeah have you ever watched a video essay that suggests the the piano teacher is in on it and is probably a sorcerer or vengeful god of some kind
00:48:53
Speaker
It is a Paul F. Tompkins PowerPoint presentation. That is yeah the one that I've seen. Yeah. but yeah In Smarty Pants. Yeah. It's on Dropout. It's very good.
00:49:04
Speaker
That makes Groundhog's Day more interesting to me. I have never actually thought Groundhog's Day was very interesting. i was I will say when I said it was hate time loops. the The long time that I said it was my favorite movie, it doesn't have a lot to do with the time loop. It's because I think it's very funny. And Bill Murray cracks me up.
00:49:21
Speaker
And Bill Murray cracks me up. But okay. Nikki. Hello, Nikki. First question for everyone. 13th age, favorite parts, least favorite parts. What would you change if you could not homebrew, but like actual design standpoint.
Game Mechanics and RPG Systems
00:49:35
Speaker
So good. I will preface this by saying and I'm real tired of the D20 space. Like I've done it for like 15 years now and I'm kind of tired of it.
00:49:49
Speaker
ah So I'm, maybe overly critical. I think this is a fun game and I'm having a great time. The number of things I have to add to my role, like the number of places where modifiers are coming to my role that are not always consistent.
00:50:05
Speaker
So I can't just write down one number on my character sheet. And that's always what I add to my role. And then have remember to add the escalation die. And then there are also all these other little things with my character class, at least that I can tack on to an attack or re or use as a reaction to an attack or something like that.
00:50:22
Speaker
There's just so many little modifiers and fiddly bits that it feels like announcing the result of my role takes forever. Yeah. So I dislike that. I like the escalation die as a concept.
00:50:37
Speaker
And there are a handful of of systems that use something like that. And I like all of that. And I don't know, the fact that I'm getting to get, I got to roll more dice the second I leveled up to two, that kind of just sort of jump in power is fun.
00:50:52
Speaker
i I don't know if there will be a diminishing returns point where I have to have that many D10s, but I... it was fun It was fun to go from rolling one die for attack damage to two dice.
00:51:07
Speaker
Yeah. To speak to that a little bit, if I didn't, always said build. I did not build. I still didn't. If I did not find a spreadsheet-based character sheet to do some of that conditional math for me, like, I mean, just one of the things is you put in your modifier and one cell, your level's another cell, it does the math, and you don't have to think about that ever again.
00:51:27
Speaker
I can click a button that says raise escalation die to be the end of each round, which is great. I could not have done it without it. One thing I really like about 13th age is in the character creation aspect in D in d I, and it again, I've only ever played five.
00:51:45
Speaker
I never liked having to choose to take a feat or an other thing. i like the talents being baked into every character. I can kind of look through them and pick some things that are tantamount to feats that are fun. know, like one of the talents I chose that, you know, it's not a flashy one, but like, I never have to worry. I'm ah most of my spellcasting is ranged. I don't have to worry about being in melee. I just took a talent that's like, you're fine.
00:52:06
Speaker
And that's great. You know, most of the things, the fiddly stuff I dislike is stuff that I did to myself by picking the character. Right. I mean, I, I am growing more comfortable in some ways and more upset in some ways about having so little agency on each turn.
00:52:27
Speaker
Yeah. It really, it really stinks when it's like, I need to hit this guy and I roll and I pull a defensive die. Yeah. Especially when i will say this, this is a fundamental thing that I actually do want to pick someone's bone.
00:52:40
Speaker
It didn't come out like I needed it to. Yeah. But we're leaving it in because we're honest people. um I do not like that the Chaos Mage only has two defensive spells and they're both pretty chintzy. and my have If I have a one-third chance of drawing one at the beginning of every battle, it needs to be able to do something more than a free recovery for some for a random ally.
00:53:00
Speaker
Yeah, is is one of them. And the other one is a free recovery for random alley. And also I grow a tail or some stuff. There are some homebrew defensive spells in the SRD, the third party ones. And honestly, they're too OP. Like I show I was looking at them i was like I can't bring any of these to Eric without modifying them.
00:53:15
Speaker
So I, I will say that is that one actual 13th age base thing that does bother me is I have something like 12 attack spells and 17 icon spells and two defense spells. And they're both just a free recovery for something.
00:53:30
Speaker
So I'd love that's part of the reason I changed one of my, ah adventurer feats to be where I just get cure wounds now and I can actually help someone, which is nice. If I pull it, a bit I will add one last thing. I do really like the background system and yes the icon dice, which I think are probably the core concepts here.
00:53:49
Speaker
Um, so that sure. Yeah. I am excited to you to take advantage of what I now understand about the icon dice in the future. Yes. um And yeah, the background thing's great. It's a lot of fun.
00:54:00
Speaker
I like asking and kind of trying to finagle like, don't know, I think this might be Faye Touched is a lot of fun. Yeah. You have to have the right DM to play that way. And we do, thankfully. all right, Scrimp, what you got?
00:54:11
Speaker
i I love the... the uniqueness of all the different classes i think it's it it makes it a really fun system and also it you know it's both a good and a bad thing because i am less capable of helping someone clarify something about their character just off the cuff because there are very little shared mechanics across classes um even the spell casters are entirely different with how their casting works yeah
00:54:43
Speaker
Well, to Philip's point, like I'm kind of in the same place in terms of my TTRPG career where the D20 systems are starting to lose their luster at a pretty rapid clip.
00:54:54
Speaker
As a player in my home game, Jeff can attest to the fact that I just, I told my table, we're doing a powered by the apocalypse system for our next campaign. If you don't want to play, that's fine, but I'm not doing D20 anymore.
00:55:06
Speaker
And 90% of the players were okay with that. 90% of the players don't know what that means. Hey, I ran a game for almost everyone. You absolutely did. Yeah, at City of Mist specifically is the system that that we're going to.
00:55:23
Speaker
And I think there was just, I mean, Jeff and Philip can attest to the fact that I i spent quite a lot of time thinking about and figuring out what system we were going to use for campaign three, especially once WOTC proved themselves to be a company not worthy of support.
00:55:41
Speaker
Uh, so, cause the original plan was to return to D and D fit the different over and over and over. and beley Um, and you know, 13th age was a system I came across pretty early on, but it, the fact that it only goes up to 10th level,
00:55:58
Speaker
caused me to punt it away pretty quickly because I was like, oh, well, from a progression standpoint, that's that's not going to work. And then we just kind of stopped doing experience in Genesis for like the last quarter of the campaign.
00:56:12
Speaker
And that's on me. But it kind of made me realize that narrative progression is is fine to have. And so I think. moving forward into campaign four whenever that might be i think there will be a less clinging to a d20 system that i kind of felt like we needed to do just to have it be mechanically interesting um because yeah i agree that all the fiddly bits of the system are its biggest downfall but I love the icon dice. I love the backgrounds system.
00:56:44
Speaker
those Those are the two big things that I really like in addition to the uniqueness of all the different classes. Um, so, and, and also I think that this system has some of the strongest third party development, like some of the third party stuff that I've read is really, really good.
00:57:00
Speaker
Some of it is overpowered to just point, but a lot of it is really solid. So yeah. yeah I will say, in addendum to the my my two friends here growing tired of the D20 systems, I started the hobby after they had started their decline in interest in the D20 systems. And as a result, I have not played two campaigns in the same system.
00:57:21
Speaker
I've played five campaigns in five different systems. um That's also important because I only have one DM. Yeah, and it's air, and that's what you do. you Yeah, it's I mean, it it is great. Like, I've gotten to...
00:57:33
Speaker
ay I think Genesis will always have a pretty strong hold on my heart. I just really enjoy the fail but succeed idea is a lot of fun. But i I agree that it was a good idea to try a different system for Campaign 3, and this has been a fun one.
00:57:51
Speaker
Okay, Nikki continues, for Eric, have there been any major homebrew things you brought in and why? Also, can you talk about your base building rules for Athelhampton Manor? They go on to ask to mention some some other systems they thought you might have pulled from.
00:58:05
Speaker
and Strongholds followers. so Yeah. So there's not a whole lot homebrewing that I brought in to the campaign thus far outside of the headquarters system.
00:58:16
Speaker
You know, playing 13th Age in any other setting requires a certain level of homebrew because it is a system built for its settings. So they have icons and all that kind of stuff builds into the system that I...
00:58:28
Speaker
I had to spend some time pre campaign going through and figuring out which icons made sense because Keith Baker, as he's wanted to do, gave the very helpful advice when somebody asked him about icons in Eberron by going, just make a list based on your campaign. was like, thanks, Keith.
00:58:43
Speaker
ah
00:58:46
Speaker
He's not wrong, but. Oh, you need to you need to do that? Well, I i do it.
00:58:52
Speaker
Um, but it's kind of this chicken and the egg situation of your players need the list of icons before they make their characters, but you kind of need a sense of their characters before you know what the icon should be.
00:59:05
Speaker
Um, and so that was probably the hardest thing in terms of converting it to Eberron. Also, most of the monsters that I make are most of the monsters I use. I make like I I've used, if I'm in a pinch, I'll pull from the monster books.
00:59:21
Speaker
But for the most part, I enjoy kind of designing monsters in the system. It's pretty easy ah because the player characters are so powerful that it it's hard to make an enemy that's too overpowered because by the time you hit the third round of combat, all of the player characters are adding plus three to their attack rolls.
00:59:40
Speaker
So even if you've built something that maybe the AC is a bit too high, it's like, okay, wait two rounds. Yeah, as was going to it won't be in a minute. Yeah. or much Or much quicker, depending on how what CAS rolls.
00:59:51
Speaker
Yeah. Right. I'm so sorry. Don't be like awesome. I'm just waiting for when that bites back and like you're at four and then you roll a one and we just take it back to the start.
01:00:03
Speaker
Um, in terms of the base building rules, the basin system is what I pulled from. Will spell that please? V A E S A S E S E N. Okay.
01:00:17
Speaker
Which is from free league. Is that right? just occurs to me. Is it Waysen? It is from Free League. Yes, I Googled it. Free League is Swedish, but is the words? is I've heard it pronounced Basin every time, but it but has also always been Americans discussing the thing.
01:00:36
Speaker
And funnily enough, I pulled the headquarter building rules before I ever played Basin or was aware of the other rules of the system. I finally got to play it at Gamer Nation Con, which was super fun, and I enjoyed it.
01:00:48
Speaker
But yeah, I i really like the the headquarters rules because as opposed to something like Strongholds and Followers, I've not read the new D&D Bastion rules.
01:00:59
Speaker
They're pretty good. But i really like... the vase and rules because the concept is you are establishing headquarters in an old manner which fit perfectly for the vibe and the aesthetic of this campaign you're not building something from the ground up you find a creepy old house and you turn it into your headquarters and it comes with a
Character Inspirations and Themes
01:01:20
Speaker
butler so what more could you want so yeah i would i would very much recommend if you enjoy if you enjoy the vibe of campaign three Vason would be a really cool system that I think you would enjoy just as a recommendation.
01:01:33
Speaker
so yeah.
01:01:37
Speaker
Okay. Nikki continues. Philip, I've been following the show for a while and your characters have always felt strangely consistent to me and their archetypes, at least. ah What sort of books did you read or movies did you watch but that you think inspired you for the characters you make? They go on to mention that Jinx and Eris are very similar.
01:01:55
Speaker
So there's your question. I too was taken aback when I finally watched Arcane and discovered that it featured... The same character I was current, I had been playing for a couple of years by that point. yeah i I had absolutely no knowledge of League of Legends and I was well behind the curve on watching Arcanes. So the the the connection between Jinx and Aeris is delightfully coincidental.
01:02:22
Speaker
And yeah. Gosh, what? but but I read a ton of books. Um...
01:02:32
Speaker
Sorry, my dog just turned on the dryer. How'd you train him to do that? ah I assure you, I did not. Definitely. Beric was all very broadly...
01:02:47
Speaker
defined by the Guy Gavriel Kaye novel Under Heaven, ah the character Taye in that, who's this character that's at least at the outset kind of defined by ah the legacy of of a military family and the legacy of a of a sort of war hero parent um and is wrestling with that.
01:03:13
Speaker
And obviously the scope of campaign one became so large that but it changes a lot. Uh, Eris was, I knew I wanted to play an artificer. mean, Eris was created on the fly. Like I wouldn't knew I wanted to play an artificer and then, and I was thinking like a kind of big stoic hobgoblin artificer.
01:03:36
Speaker
And then Jeff said, I'm going to be a big quiet guy. And I was like, well, okay. Um, I was half right. So I went opposite. Well, you play, it's an audio format, brother.
01:03:50
Speaker
I know I was trying to get a break.
01:03:55
Speaker
Uh, and so I just thought, okay, how do I play not a hobgoblin, but still that ah without being, i didn't want to play a goblin cause Booyah was kind of ah a goblin tinkery kind of character. And so I wanted someone who had some goblin vibes and that was how I got Aeris.
01:04:17
Speaker
Uh, And then Nyx, honestly, a lot of Nyx from my love of X-Men and the character Magic in X-Men is definitely a, was definitely a starting point for Nyx.
01:04:31
Speaker
Who she really is, is obviously very different and she's not young, like Magic, but ah So they've they' all kind of got different inspirations. I honestly had to be fascinated to know what the consist what the consistency you see in them is.
01:04:47
Speaker
for For me, I think the consistent thing is that i I find in almost all the storytelling that I do is people looking for hope.
01:05:00
Speaker
in very different contexts in each of the campaigns. ah But that I think is what I would say is the consistent line through them. because i spent a bunch of time today after I read this question thinking, what is consistent about Beric and Aeris and Nyx?
01:05:12
Speaker
But I'd be really fascinated to know but what you have found as ah as an out someone not playing the characters, someone getting to observe the characters from the outside. I'd be fascinated to know what you have found as the consistency between them.
01:05:25
Speaker
that Nicky continues, for me, your character's consistently been the most endearing. That's extremely kind. Dex started as cold, but learned that was... be fascinated to know where you get that, too, because...
01:05:39
Speaker
Dex started as cold, but found out who' was a loyal friend. Hob's a tough guy, clearly he loved his friends. And Kaz being an awkward teenager and sad that he lost his opportunity to grow up with his friends. Their question is, what do you think inspires you to make such friend-loving characters?
01:05:53
Speaker
I did not see that through line when I did this. It's very insightful. yeah Yeah, I mean, yes. Both Dex and Hob are people who defined themselves and judged themselves by their usefulness.
01:06:06
Speaker
And if you are in, especially Hob, Dex a little less so as he grew up, but especially when he was like an orphan trying to figure, like his usefulness was his ability his survival.
01:06:17
Speaker
And with Hob, it's just like, that's just, he, he, that's just what he did and who he was. And when you are, in a group dynamic and you define yourself by your usefulness, you are going to be a good friend.
01:06:28
Speaker
ah the The friendships were also genuine, especially i mean, just honestly, especially Phillips characters and my characters seem to just be buds. Not um so much this time, which is interesting and different. Yeah, this is very interesting, different dynamic.
01:06:40
Speaker
I'm also noticing a lot of angst from Kaz about his lack of usefulness due to the inconsistency of his powers. Maybe you should talk to someone, Jeff. like oh Oh, no. i Can I tell you? He is, i know idea yeah Eric.
01:06:53
Speaker
I do mention this a lot. There is, or talk about this series a lot. There is a Dimension 20 campaign called Misfits in Magic where one of the characters says something along the lines of this other character doesn't think he can be loved if he's not being useful. And I was like, what's wrong with that?
01:07:08
Speaker
because so So maybe there is problem. Um, um, I had something else I was going to say, but um it's not, it wasn't. Sorry, I interrupted. No, no, no, no, no. That's, that's, that's a great point.
01:07:23
Speaker
but but I should, we should all talk to someone in fact. Again. Yes, fair enough. This, this is free.
01:07:33
Speaker
While I work through my existential dread and battle with despair in a broken world, like this, this, this cost me nothing. And then as far as Kaz, I think he is desperate to belong right now anywhere.
01:07:46
Speaker
Um, I also, I am a high school teacher. I don't know. I don't, we don't talk about it a ton. yeah I don't know if you knew that. I am a high school teacher and I see every day how important in groups are to teenagers and their friends are to them. Even, uh, just.
01:08:01
Speaker
From the friends they forced themselves to make in my classroom. So they have someone to talk to, to the friends they want to be within the halls, do their greater, whatever extracurriculars and stuff, you know? And so I, that's just a large part of the CAS that I built. Cause that's, I see teenagers a lot and that's. I would really like an alternate universe where a Kaz and Aris meet, because I think that would be very fascinating to see. Cause they're both, they're both desperate for that same thing, but their, their approach is so incredibly different.
01:08:28
Speaker
Kaz would think she was so cool and blow it so fast. um I don't know I feel like Kaz is a very plea people pleasing person in a lot of ways. And so his desperate efforts to not, yeah, the lack of control would be an issue, but no kidding.
01:08:47
Speaker
Uh, and then finally from Nikki, what other systems have you talked about? Have you considered we throw some out? I mean, city of mist we do it in our home game next and I'm desperate to introduce these guys to outgunned. I've recently discovered it and I'm yeah deeply in love with it right now.
01:09:03
Speaker
So I I'm very excited to sometime probably without having to record it, uh, run, run you guys through a, through an outgunned one shot or something. I love to try an outgunned one shot.
01:09:15
Speaker
I picked up, I'm gonna, I forgot the name now. Renegade press publishes it. Oh man. I know what you're talking about because that name. And I read the source book of it and I really enjoyed it. I'm gonna have to look it up real quickly. So I can give it credit deserves.
01:09:28
Speaker
thank You know just going to bookshelf real quick. That'll be quicker. While he's doing that, Outgunned is by a company called Two Little Mice. It's published through Free League, which is unsurprising because I have yet to meet a Free League RPG that I don't think is great.
01:09:43
Speaker
Overlight. Overlight. It's called Overlight and it seems super cool. I still, I still think kids on bikes is really high. Kids on bike was really fun. um I really enjoyed kids on bikes. The new kind of monkey wrench they threw in it where if you explode, you get to keep the, you get to raise your die up by one level.
01:10:04
Speaker
It's super fun. So I think that might be a part of the kids in space. thing there's three There's kids on bikes, kids on brooms, and now kids in space. Or teens in space, even, maybe. I don't know. their Kids in space would be fun.
01:10:17
Speaker
i've really like I really would like to play slash run in one of the World of Darkness. I think that would be a lot of fun. I think the system is kind of cool. and i you know i'm I'm also starting to err with City of Mess being example. I'm starting to err towards an interest in playing slash running in like urban fantasy settings as opposed to just vaguely medieval-esque fantasy.
01:10:39
Speaker
So that's one I would really like to play in. um Vason is another one that i I have gotten to play one shot in, but I think There's so much character building and character progression around your traumas as a character that I think it is a really like campaign built, a system built for a campaign.
01:11:00
Speaker
And City of Mist is very much the same way where your your progression is linear rather than Upward, like your character changes, they don't grow more powerful.
01:11:12
Speaker
And I really, I'm, I'm intrigued by systems like that in general, where it's not about a power fantasy. It's about a narrative through line of your character and how they change and evolve over time, as opposed to number go up.
01:11:25
Speaker
You know, there are some pretty big, actually, systems that I've never... I've never played Vampire the Masquerade. i I've only played Fate the one time with Philip at the con. Powered by the Apocalypse, I've never tried. Like, a lot of the kind of the... What's the one that came out? It's it's newer, but it's Morkborg.
01:11:38
Speaker
Like, there's a lot of pretty big ones, even, that I've never... Blades in the Dark is a huge one that I... We got to play Scum and Villain that one time. Yeah, we played little bit with Darren. But, yeah. Yeah. So, and okay that's one of those situations where I, I actually finally got around to reading the core rule book for that system. I'm like, oh yeah, we should have done campaign two in this.
01:11:57
Speaker
Um, um, okay. Rustafer asks for Nix at the top of this arc, you mentioned you didn't think you had the tools to identify why a town is too nice on the train. It seems like you're very effective. Is this a half hammer looks like nail situation or do you just benefit?
01:12:13
Speaker
It's just a benefit of your vigilance that you're ready for Thelania robbery. So it is a little bit of have hammer looks like nail and that that's how Nix sees a problem to be solved.
Cultural Perceptions and Character Views
01:12:24
Speaker
And in fairness, there's probably a little bit of Nix that recognizes that that might be a problem, especially given the kind of hammer that she has. ah But Nix has absolutely robbed a train.
01:12:37
Speaker
So Nix hears thump up the roof. It's like, oh, we're about to be robbed. Obviously. What else could possibly cause that to happen? What? Some kind of in-route repairs?
01:12:51
Speaker
Don't be ridiculous. Yeah. Refueling? yeah nix' Nix is absolutely robbed a train. And so it just... She knows what to expect. Then it was Thelanian that I think caught her off guard.
01:13:05
Speaker
But again... how do I so as e Eric pointed out how do i how do I stop this immediately began to be I'm gonna solve this so that we don't get stuck here
01:13:19
Speaker
awesome okay there are a lot more questions flame asks Philip is it uncomfortable to roleplay a character with in-world prejudices or negative assumptions such as Nick's feelings about lycanthropy that the rest of the party doesn't share all right, I'm gonna say something because I have enough credit with the players to not sound like a total heel.
01:13:37
Speaker
I don't know why anyone's okay with lycanthropes. oh In living memory for nonhumans, there was a zombie apocalypse of lycanthropes.
01:13:51
Speaker
A whole country was nearly destroyed lycanthropes. They were everywhere. They were actively killing people. Like, it's not like 17th century France where wolf attacks and we brilliant and we blame the people who aren't Catholic.
01:14:10
Speaker
And so we have trials. it's It literally happened. It's not irrational to think lycanthropes bad. I mean, we did kill the only one we've come across. So maybe we all feel that We live with one. Oh, right. Oh, God. Yes, of course. Ah! Ah!
01:14:28
Speaker
In fairness, Nyx's apparent comfort with him was I genuinely thought he was a shifter and forgot that he was actually a lycanthrope. um And so I'm trying not to completely change how Nyx acts towards him because that feels weird. So it's a it's an inconsistency I feel stuck with narratively about this. Nyx shouldn't be comfortable with this.
01:14:48
Speaker
And I don't think anyone should and if you actually live in Eberron. So i I think that people who are comfortable with lycanthropes should be the vast minority. And in fairness, doesn't mean they're wrong because yeah I, as a GM, have read and I know what caused the lycanthropic plague, but regular people don't.
01:15:11
Speaker
And it's not irrational for them to see lycanthrope and think, oh my gosh, it's going to kill everyone and turn us into lycanthropes and we're all going to die, as will everyone in the country if we don't do something about it right now.
01:15:23
Speaker
That sucks, But it is, I think, I don't know why. Well, I do know why. It's because we've decided that lycanthropes aren't scary, they're sexy. And so, as a culture, the same way we have with vampires. But lycanthropes and vampires ought to elicit terror.
01:15:42
Speaker
there ah And so that's that's my explanation for Nyx has these feelings about lycanthropes. Because they're dangerous and might kill us. ah Because at the wrong moment...
01:15:55
Speaker
Hendrik might lose, lose himself to the curse and start chomping. Yeah, that's why. ah So is it uncomfortable? i mean, a little bit in the the there that I know, i know my character is wrong to a degree.
01:16:11
Speaker
I don't know what kind of lycanthrope Hendrik is, so maybe I'm not, but, uh, there's a possibility that this is just wrong. And so I guess to a degree there's that, but I don't, I don't feel really any real discomfort because not, if I was, i was more uncomfortable and more careful um with Eris's background as an enslaved person than,
01:16:39
Speaker
And, you know, if I wasn't American, maybe I wouldn't be because it's a different conversation in different places. But because of that, I was a lot more careful and and uncomfortable about that and felt that needed a lot more care.
01:16:52
Speaker
and And I think we handled it pretty well, mostly by just not leaning into it, which was wise. ah Then I do about this because this isn't this isn't racism. Nick doesn't.
01:17:04
Speaker
dislike people this is like a this mix doesn't dislike people because of their ethnicity or or just who they are lycanthrope is not It's not an identity. It's not a, oh, this is just who I am It's something that happened to you.
01:17:20
Speaker
And maybe it's unfair to be concerned about that. But, you know, prior to germ theory, people were scared of lepers and that wasn't, they were wrong, but that didn't make it irrational, you know? Yeah.
01:17:32
Speaker
And I don't think she has negative assumptions about Warforged. I think she is probably, again, I think Nix is actually in this case, probably ahead of everyone else's On Warforged because everyone else sees Warforged as these are dangerous weapons that belong to someone. They're objects.
01:17:49
Speaker
And Nyx says, oh, no, this is an intelligent weapon. I totally get intelligent weapons. That's a thing. And so I think Nyx has no trouble seeing Arumi as a intelligence. She just also sees Arumi as a weapon and doesn't see that as a problem.
01:18:05
Speaker
And yeah in a very simple, pragmatic sense, that is technically precisely accurate. Right. i mean That Urumi doesn't want to be a weapon might be odd to this, but that's not... Kaz didn't know Warforged existed until he met one that was a real sweetie, so he's got no problem with Warforged. He's going walk up like a ding-dong to the next one and get himself rocked.
01:18:30
Speaker
Do you know Irumi? Dead. Yeah. so i think I think Nix's problem there will probably be more... She's not going to really get why Irumi doesn't want to be what Irumi plainly is.
01:18:43
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah, I think it would be a different conversation if Nix had a problem with shifters, because that's also yeah like a... Yeah, a thing with some Silver Flame Paladins and stuff. And that would be much more of the prejudicial problem.
01:18:55
Speaker
Yeah, and there I think she doesn't, and I think it's because... While Nyx might be a little bit blind to the the fact that she is the same danger as a lycanthrope.
01:19:08
Speaker
In that yeah she might just lose control and hurt somebody, as we kind of saw in the last arc. ah With shifters, I think she doesn't have a problem because that that she sees the easy comparison. they should It's very easy for her to feel empathy towards that of a...
01:19:24
Speaker
You have inherited some traits from someone who maybe was a lycanthrope, or you just kind of look like a lycanthrope. Maybe you're not, because no one really knows. Nyx kind of looks like a fiend.
01:19:36
Speaker
She's not one, though. So that's that's easy for Nyx. That doesn't actually require a lot of work to have and have the empathy there. Sure.
Future Content and Guest Possibilities
01:19:44
Speaker
ah Flame continues, Eric, how would you handle dragon marks for PCs in 13th age?
01:19:48
Speaker
Seems like it'd be more important than a background, but class depend so much stuff's class dependent. um So they there are general feats in 13th age. So i would I would throw them in that bucket that, you know, when you get a feat, you can pick from that.
01:20:03
Speaker
The least dragon marks would be adventure level, lesser would be champion level, and then greater would be epic level feats with the... prerequisites of them going up, up the ladder.
01:20:16
Speaker
Um, and then if somebody wanted to do a Sybaris mark, i don't know. It might have to be your race. Yeah. Yeah. Take over your pretty big. Your species, but that can, can is their turn. Yeah. Yeah.
01:20:31
Speaker
Might have to take over your kin. don't know. Yeah, but that that would be how I would handle it if any of the players had said, hey, I would like my character have a dragon mark, make it a general feat, and call it good there would be kind of my plan.
01:20:46
Speaker
Yeah. Okay, we have more questions. I think we have to get a little more pithy. We're running up on an hour and a half, and we are not close to being done. Okay, Nikki has another. Would you guys consider having guests join in on any number of episodes?
01:20:58
Speaker
Can you use some examples of great guests that she's heard on it ah they've heard on other podcasts? ah Yeah, I mean, I wouldn't be against it. It's just we we have such a hard time scheduling the core cast as that impossible time scheduling the core cast is evident by the fact that Trevor has not been on the show in quite some time.
01:21:15
Speaker
So adding an additional person in there might be too much of a re recall, but certainly open to it. Sure. i mean Devious Pop-Tart. Hi. Well, good to hear from you.
01:21:27
Speaker
Asks for everyone except Eric. What do you think would be your character's theme song? I'm really glad I read this earlier and had time, sorry, and had time to work this out.
01:21:37
Speaker
It's Arsonist Lullaby by Hozier.
01:21:42
Speaker
Okay. It's great. It's bluesy. And i feel like that works. um Don't ask me to justify why that works, but I feel like it does. It's about a sense of...
01:21:57
Speaker
my destructiveness being inevitable. And it doesn't hurt that the chorus is, all you have is your fire and the place you need to reach. Don't ever tame your demons, but always keep them on a leash.
01:22:12
Speaker
Nice. Love that. I didn't read this before right now and like I have no idea. I will come up with something and I'll put it in the discord because it's a great question, but I want to give it its due.
01:22:24
Speaker
And I just, I mean, i would just say something I heard earlier today or something. So I need to I need to think about it for a bit. Um, and then continue Eric, do you have any thoughts on theme songs for any of the NPCs or the manner itself?
01:22:40
Speaker
I mean, I, yeah, I, I pulled this question up right before we started recording and I will get you one for Javier, Aurora and Hendrick. But yeah, once again, I, I want to give this more thought than I currently have the brain space to right now.
01:22:53
Speaker
I think what we're hearing is there needs to be a campaign three playlist. Yeah, right. Hey, sounds good. And finally, from Devious Pop-Tart, for all of us, if you could add an icon relationship to your character, what would you choose?
01:23:06
Speaker
Or Eric, is there an icon you'd like to see involved more? Or perhaps swap out one of your 12 for a different one? was really trying to figure that this one out because I... I kind of designed her backstory having kind of worked out what I wanted to be.
01:23:22
Speaker
The chamber would be an interesting one just because it's the oppositional force to the Lords of Dust. And so that could be kind of an interesting wrinkle or probably more likely as I would give her some connection to one of the royal families but just through some off the books job she did.
01:23:43
Speaker
that Hazor connected to some low-end member of one of the royal one of Borinel's 18 children or whatever.
01:23:52
Speaker
i mean, I was thinking the exact same thing. The Irwin Arn House or something would be a fantastic one. i'm I'm really happy with the ones that I got to choose for Kaz. I think that they fit really well for a privileged teenager, so I can't really...
01:24:09
Speaker
Except for, yeah, just actually having like... Or even like the Dark Lanterns as an icon would be kind of dope. That would be the only thing. And maybe just because I'm so sharn-pilled.
01:24:24
Speaker
it doesn But...
01:24:29
Speaker
Eric, are there any of that you would have liked to have added? I don't know. Well, I think from the list, just in terms of ones that have been utilized, like O'Alan, I really like as an icon, I think would be interesting, especially given the nature of the campaign. Because the Druids spent a lot of time themselves kind of investigating and trying to manage extra player threats. So I think there's something, hot especially if somebody had a conflicted or negative situation.
01:24:55
Speaker
relationship. I think that could be really interesting. And that's like negative icon relationships with inherently good icons, I think are interesting, especially for good characters. Like I like the, the disagreement over a shared purpose kind of trope. And so that I think would be really sense from an icon standpoint.
01:25:14
Speaker
So awesome. Emily asks, and Phil, if you already answered this, are there any time loop stories you actually like? I generally dislike all of them. I have occasionally enjoyed things from like Futurama or the end of Loki season two, where we were essentially making fun of the time loop trope by just playing it for its absurdity.
01:25:34
Speaker
I enjoy that. Okay. And everyone, what if any is your favorite time travel story, time loop or otherwise? do you have a time travel story that you like? I do. I like Michael Crichton's timeline. The movie wasn't great, but the book is fun.
01:25:48
Speaker
And there's a series of what eventually become fantasy novels by S.M. Sterling called The Change, where at a certain point in 1997,
01:25:59
Speaker
Basically, every technology that relies on air compression or electricity ceases to function. It's not technically a time travel story, but it essentially is a time travel story. It's what do you do when the world is plunged back into the 15th century?
01:26:15
Speaker
Wait, so so electrics and pneumatics? Yes. That's... So nothing from the steam, power basically nothing from the steam engine forward works anymore. Gunpowder doesn't work like none of it.
01:26:26
Speaker
A hydraulic society. Yeah. Everything falls up apart. ah None of it. Yeah. Everything ceases. Yeah.
01:26:33
Speaker
I mean, I am a longtime fan of Doctor Who, which just time, I mean, sure for for a show with time baked into its premise, it just does not care about anything involving like making sense with time or linear reality or anything. It's just a mess, and I do enjoy that ah quite a lot.
01:26:53
Speaker
Who? ah Oh, sorry, Eric. I, I, do you have a time travel one outside here? How dare, I mean, the back pretty easily, honestly. Sure. First you back to the futures are perfect in my opinion. And then i really, i I like Looper just for the scene where Joseph Gordon-Levitt asks Bruce Willis to explain time travel.
01:27:12
Speaker
Um, and he says, I'll need yarn and straw and, or yeah, just don't worry about it. It works. So yeah.
01:27:21
Speaker
sure another one, but i can't think. Laura wants to know, who are your favorite NPCs so far? I really like Barnaby. I like watching her play Barnaby. That has been lot of fun. That is a lot of it, for sure.
01:27:34
Speaker
And I like Javier quite a lot. I enjoyed that conversation I got to have with Javier. There are couple of conversations got with Javier. Probably because we're not sitting still the way we were in Sharn. I don't know that I have enough development and in the NPCs yet to to have. here I want to know more about Aurora.
01:27:51
Speaker
Uh, just because I think that I'm, I'm delighted by the concept. So I would like to know more about her um so that she can be my favorite.
01:28:01
Speaker
Yeah. And that's like the, the long shadows scene and the, the time loop on the train. Like i kind of realized after the first couple of ventures, like I, as the game master needed to slow the campaign down a bit because it felt like, um,
01:28:16
Speaker
it's very easy in these kind of job-based campaigns to just go from the next job, like to, and so I wanted to have like an episode or two where we stay in the manor and like interact with each other and with the NPCs and then a travel arc. And so I think there will be more opportunities moving forward for those things to develop because at the start, it was just like, let's get out to the jobs. So yeah.
01:28:38
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Kevin's got some questions. Phillip, what are some of Nyx's expected developments? Sorry. What are some of Nyx's expected developments from the group over revealing her prior contact in the black market and from her old contacts, knowing who she's working with now?
01:28:55
Speaker
So my experience as a player in this podcast of revealing things about my backstory is diddly squat. Absolutely. No one will care. No one will react whatsoever. Okay.
01:29:07
Speaker
ah So that's Phillip's expectation is absolutely no one will be interested in the fact that Nyx has an entirely different accent in certain circumstances. Oh, no, I definitely noticed that. know you noticed.
01:29:20
Speaker
I know you noticed. Or that she apparently is on first name basis with a drug dealer. I assume that no one will have any reaction to that at all based on several years of experience.
01:29:34
Speaker
Nyx is... Nyx is pretty comfortable if it makes anyone uncomfortable. Nyx is not really bothered about it. she brought She brought Selena along because she felt less likely to get arrested by having a clearly well-dressed aristocrat.
01:29:51
Speaker
Nyx walking down the street by herself might be going to mug somebody. Nyx walking down the street next to Selena and Kaz is somebody's hired bodyguard. Yeah. And so Nyx used them as cover.
01:30:02
Speaker
So Nix is probably not too worried about it and figures that i'm ah I'm a criminal in some circumstances is probably not something anyone hasn't guessed yet. ah She would probably expect follow-up questions. Philip does not.
01:30:20
Speaker
You know what sucks is I have written down in my notes, like, you need to circle back to this whole Nix. You're 16 years old and Nix is a career criminal. you Now when I do it, it's going to seem as though I am capitulating to my friend's cry for health.
01:30:39
Speaker
My friends call out and share one. Yeah. But I will show you my notes. I believe you, Joe. Now, was I going to do it? Who knows? But I did write down that I should. Well, what I believe is that the notes exist.
01:30:51
Speaker
Yeah, that's what I'm saying. ah
01:30:55
Speaker
I think that i've I'm going to defend myself a bit. I think Hob and Eris had plenty of conversations about Eris' past. That's true. That's true. there were There were occasions where it did come up. Yeah.
01:31:06
Speaker
We never followed up on killing her mentor. That is, now that is certainly true.
01:31:14
Speaker
so And all the Barrick's past stuff was one-on-one conversations with him and his mom that we weren't privy to, That's fair. That's fair.
01:31:24
Speaker
So if I may, um ah Kevin asks, Jeff, is it live organic discovery or do you know a lot of Kaz's time gap? And do you have any degree of input for what Eric creates about that time?
01:31:36
Speaker
I gave Eric some very broad guidelines. I said, here's how long I think he was there. Here's, I will say this. He, because of the time differences in the planes, he was there for longer than 20 years, obviously, if he's an old man and some of these things.
01:31:53
Speaker
And I said, I think that he had several stages of being while he was there, like involved in the court, scared of the court beyond. yeah So that's all I, um,
01:32:04
Speaker
That's all I gave Eric. And so anything I learn, I'm learning in real time with my party members and the listener. So what Jeff has not learned are the dangers of giving Eric carte blanche after watching two campaigns.
01:32:15
Speaker
Yeah. I mean, it is remarkable me how each campaign has had exactly one player give me just a big, a big thing to just, f I, I trust you, which I, I very much appreciate that trust and promise not to abuse it after I saw what I did to fill up in campaign one lesson learned.
01:32:31
Speaker
But yeah, i will I will say a little bit different than... People loved Campaign 1, Eric. I think little bit different... You did not love Campaign 1. loved a lot of Campaign 1.
01:32:42
Speaker
There was a point at which I no longer loved Campaign 1. But let's not say I was not having a bad time. i um i have i have and i don't know maybe you've cut this i have i have decided i'm going to occasionally ask eric hey can i have a bit of a heads up so i can act like i know something that's going on or a vague memory like i don't want to be completely in the dark but like hey when i mentioned this guy you know him i'm like oh okay great i will act as though i do yes and i typically there have been a couple times where i've texted jeff when i'm planning the next session you're like hey does this make sense or are you cool with this aspect of it so yeah yeah absolutely
01:33:17
Speaker
Eric, is combat encounter design harder to anticipate in 13th age due to the nature of the escalation die? As I alluded to before, it actually, the escalation die is a bit of a safety net. Like it, it, it makes it less punishing when you've overcompensated.
01:33:31
Speaker
And then if, if you've underdone it, I, I tend to design combat counters a lot more difficult because the player characters are so powerful and things are so swingy in this system, especially once you get into rolling multiple damage die.
01:33:46
Speaker
You know, you might deal three damage or you might deal 22. So, yeah. But no, I don't find it to be harder than D&D 5th edition encounter design.
01:33:58
Speaker
So, yeah. Boy, be real punishing if it was harder than that. And then I believe our last question, Kevin also asked about everyone's favorite part of playing in 13th age. I believe we we have answered that. So Kevin asks, what theory for this next question?
01:34:14
Speaker
I know. What theories are floating around between the players about how your characters will eventually create the lighthouse consortium that we saw in campaign two? I have no idea.
01:34:26
Speaker
I'm excited to figure it out. I'm fairly confident that at some point we will unleash Belashira on the world. And that's... Yeah, he's going to show up....how it happens.
01:34:37
Speaker
Just because my dice set that I bought for this campaign all had eyeballs in them. How dare you? I haven't noticed that yet. Yeah, I mean, the direct question being what theories are floating but between players, the answer is none. That's true. Because Philip and I haven't talked about it, and I'm pretty sure that Mia and Madison have not listened to that bit of campaign to to know about the Lighthouse Consortium.
01:34:59
Speaker
And Trevor forgot it, I think. so I'm confident that Belashir will show up. I'm confident that I will hate it because i almost said Belashir is my cue, and that's not fair because my level of hate for cue is white hot, and I love Eric as Belashir.
01:35:17
Speaker
So funny. Yeah, I think...
01:35:23
Speaker
I feel like there is a lot... Again, because everything's a little timey-wimey, I feel like there is a lot of distance between what we're doing and the consortium we saw in Campaign 2. To the point that I don't think these characters will have a lot of bearing on that line, except for as founders, if that makes sense.
01:35:41
Speaker
i think My real concern is that something we're going to do is going to make that consortium necessary. Yeah, there's going to be... it It feels to me that there were several catastroic catastrophic events between Campaign 3 and the Lighthouse Consortium of Campaign 2 that we may or may not be privy to around 4.
01:36:02
Speaker
ah But I do like the...
01:36:08
Speaker
the background knowledge, I guess, yeah yeah that that we are going to be building this.
Closing and Social Media Presence
01:36:14
Speaker
Like, yeah that by the end of this campaign, a ball will be in motion to get to that point. And that's a lot of fun.
01:36:20
Speaker
I have kind of abandoned, and and Eric will certainly, ah this will have no bearing on his planning, I'm sure. I've almost abandoned the idea that we might see some past campaign characters as Lighthouse Consortium people. Like,
01:36:34
Speaker
coming back to warn us or whatever. i had that idea when we were initially planning just because we played with it in campaign two. But i much much the same way with campaign two, like we had a lot of campaign two under our belts before I even thought about playing with that. So I definitely want to give this campaign the same level of room to breathe on its own and stand on its own two feet before I start being cute with it.
01:37:00
Speaker
So very cool. Yeah. That is our last question. We've been going for over an hour and a half, so I feel like that feels fake. um Thank you all for listening. we will be back next week. We're continuing our adventures toward Pella's watch.
01:37:15
Speaker
um And that's all I have to say. Please check us out on the internet. We are on YouTube and Spotify and other places. And on the radio.
01:37:27
Speaker
I'm just so used to doing the socials thing and I got to stop doing that. I mean, there all of the accounts are still there. Just expect nothing from them. If you want to go look, then feel free. The links are still there. If you want to go x.com slash the Geek Pantheon, it's there.
01:37:41
Speaker
um I post on Blue Sky sometimes. There you go. go we would love to not yet a track ah We would love to see you in the Discord. it is a You do not have to be a patron to join the Discord. Anyone is welcome. We'd love to see you there.
01:37:56
Speaker
And we will be back next Friday. Until then, I am Jeff. I'm Phillip. And I'm Eric. Go Thunder. Have a great day.